2016 Death to the BCS Playoffs: Official Bracket

Ladies and gentlemen, it has all come down to this.

14 weeks and hundreds of games have narrowed down the 128 teams in college football. The ten conferences have crowned their champions. All that remains is to take them, and six deserving at large teams, and put them into a bracket to determine our national champion.

This is the system designed by Dan Wetzel, Josh Peter, and Jeff Passan in their classic depicted here: a more equitable college football playoff where everyone gets an opportunity to prove they belong. We also add to the excitement and enhance the regular season by giving home field advantage to the higher seeds for the first three rounds.

In their system, a selection committee still decided the field. I don't have those resources at my disposal, so I instead take a number of metrics and use these to help me in my decision making process: rankings of Non Conference Schedule Strength (NCSS), First Degree (PP1), Second Degree (PP2), and Adjusted Playoff Points (aPP), and computer rankings compiled by Jeff Sagarin (SAG), the late David Rothman (ROTH), and the website All My Sports Teams Suck (AMSTS). I organically try to combine all of these to build the fairest playoff bracket that I can.

And so, without further ado, here is your 2016 Death to the BCS Playoff field, seeded from 1-16.

1. Alabama (13-0, SEC Champion)- NCSS: 3, PP1: 76, PP2: 32.67, aPP: 76, SAG: 1, ROTH: 1, AMSTS: 1. (LW: 1)
2. Ohio State (11-1, At Large)- NCSS: 5, PP1: 75, PP2: 31.45, aPP: 73, SAG: 2, ROTH: 2, AMSTS: 2. (LW: 2)
3. Clemson (12-1, ACC Champion)- NCSS: 5, PP1: 71, PP2: 31.27, aPP: 67, SAG: 5, ROTH: 6, AMSTS: 5. (LW: 3)
4. Washington (12-1, Pac 12 Champion)- NCSS: 2, PP1: 56, PP2: 22.91, aPP: 53, SAG: 4, ROTH: 3, AMSTS: 4. (LW: 4)
5. Michigan (10-2, At Large)- NCSS: 4, PP1: 62, PP2: 26.40, aPP: 57, SAG: 3, ROTH: 4, AMSTS: 3. (LW: 5)
6. Oklahoma (10-2, Big XII Champion)- NCSS: 4, PP1: 58, PP2: 23.80, aPP: 54, SAG: 9, ROTH: 11, AMSTS: 9. (LW: 6)
7. Western Michigan (13-0, MAC Champion)- NCSS: 6, PP1: 54, PP2: 17.25, aPP: 54, SAG: 15, ROTH: 12, AMSTS: 7. (LW: 7)
8. Wisconsin (10-3, Big Ten "Champion")- NCSS: 4, PP1: 55, PP2: 22.40, aPP: 52, SAG: 7, ROTH: 7, AMSTS: 8. (LW: 8)
9. USC (9-3, At Large)- NCSS: 4, PP1: 57, PP2: 25.67, aPP: 48, SAG: 9, ROTH: 8, AMSTS: 11. (LW: 11)
10. Colorado (10-3, At Large)- NCSS: 3, PP1: 52, PP2: 23.90, aPP: 47, SAG: 10, ROTH: 9, AMSTS: 10. (LW: 9)
11. Florida State (9-3, At Large)- NCSS: 5, PP1: 53, PP2: 27.44, aPP: 45, SAG: 11, ROTH: 14, AMSTS: 13. (LW: NR)
12. Houston (9-3, At Large)- NCSS: 5, PP1: 47, PP2: 21.33, aPP: 34, SAG: 24, ROTH: 28, AMSTS: 20. (LW: NR)
13. Temple (10-3, American Athletic Champion)- NCSS: 4, PP1: 39, PP2: 15.11, aPP: 28, SAG: 21, ROTH: 31, AMSTS: 21. (LW: 13)
14. Western Kentucky (10-3, Conference USA Champion)- NCSS: 6, PP1: 41, PP2: 16.44, aPP: 31, SAG: 37, ROTH: 51, AMSTS: 24. (LW: NR)
15. San Diego State (10-3, Mountain West Champion)- NCSS: 5, PP1: 33, PP2: 12.33, aPP: 18, SAG: 51, ROTH: 64, AMSTS: 43. (LW: NR)
16. Arkansas State (7-5, Sun Belt Champion)- NCSS: 5, PP1: 28, PP2: 16.17, aPP: 2, SAG: 82, ROTH: 92, AMSTS: 76. (LW: NR)

Out of the playoffs: Oklahoma State (10), Boise State (12), Appalachian State (14), Wyoming (15), Louisiana Tech (16)

To see the official bracket, click here.

Photo by Jason Plotkin (AP)

One major note I want to make about the selection process: Wisconsin got the Big Ten's automatic bid by making the conference title game because Penn State is permanently banned from the Death to the BCS Playoffs for being a football cult that placed the sport over the well being of children. Were they eligible, they'd probably end up hosting at least one game, but I refuse to allow a cult into these festivities. If you don't like it, don't support a program that covered up child rape. Penn State football deserved the death penalty, and I will be happy to die on this hill. But enough about that.

The top ten teams in this bracket, and thus four of my six at large teams were easy to pick. Ohio State has the second highest total in every Playoff Point category, and swept the #2 spot in the computers behind Alabama. Michigan beat the Big Ten automatic bid earner as well as a team in the Pac 12 Championship Game, and then lost by one to Iowa and in controversial fashion to the aforementioned Buckeyes. USC was a giant slayer; they struggled early but then proceeded to knock off a pair of playoff teams after their slow start, including a win at Pac 12 champion Washington. Colorado didn't beat any playoff teams, but their only losses were to teams that made the field and their metrics back them up.

Photo by Mark Wallheiser (AP)

The headache came in picking the last two at large teams, and I had seven teams in mind: Boise State and Oklahoma State, who were in the field last week, and teams on the outside looking in Louisville, Florida State, South Florida, Navy, and Houston. The latter five teams had a weird rock-paper-scissors thing going on where every team was 1-1 against each other, and their Playoff Points were all in the same ballpark as each other. Ultimately, Florida State had the best measurables across the board of the seven teams on the table, so the Seminoles got the fifth at large spot. The sixth spot was even harder. I was completely prepared to give it to Boise State based on their having the highest PP1 of all remaining teams on the table, but the Sagarin computer ranking dropped as I was preparing this, and he had Houston 10 spots ahead of the Broncos. That made for two of three computers preferring the Cougars, and PP2 favoring Houston combined with the Cougars' win over Oklahoma at the beginning of the year was enough for me to knock the Broncos out. Boise State was my first team out, followed by pretty much all of these other teams in some order. Louisville and Navy were probably the next two out of the picture. West Virginia was also in consideration, but their two losses to the Oklahomas combined with a failure to beat anybody else of significance was what did them in.

So as a quick breakdown, the Big Ten and Pac 12 each got three teams into the Death to the BCS Playoffs, with the ACC and American Athletic Conferences each getting two teams in. The other six conferences each just got their automatic bid earner. It's weird seeing a season where the SEC only gets one team in, but it really was Alabama and everyone else; no other team had fewer than four losses, and three losses was my cutoff point for consideration for an at large bid.

Photo by Butch Dill (AP)

With regards to the seeding itself, the top four matches what the College Football Playoff Selection Committee came up with, largely because what they did makes sense. Alabama was a consensus #1 in all metrics, so they get three home games and the easier path. Ohio State was a consensus #2 ahead of everyone else, so they slotted in at #2 despite not even making the Big Ten Championship Game. The #3 seed was tougher than you'd think, but Clemson had the higher Playoff Points, and had a better resume than Washington did. The Huskies nonetheless, as a one loss major conference champion, still get a second home game.

Photo from University of Oklahoma Athletics Department

Your top first round host that won't get a second home game if chalk plays out goes to Michigan, who the computers love and have the best Playoff Points of anyone left on the table. We then go to Oklahoma, whose win over Oklahoma State gives them one of the best resumes in the country and finally catches them up in Playoff Points. Western Michigan, as the only team besides Alabama to run the table in the regular season, holds firm at #7, since going undefeated should earn you something. I almost debated about bumping them down to #8 behind Wisconsin, but since Wisconsin was a placeholder I couldn't justify it. Had they won, or were they an at large team, I might reconsider, but I'm happy with how this slotted out.

Photo by Jayne Kamin-Oncea (Getty Images)

USC jumps two spots despite being idle this week; I even considered giving them a home game, but the computers like Wisconsin more and I couldn't bump Western Michigan down. They actually get in ahead of Colorado because of their head to head win. Those teams' resumes beat out Florida State's, who finished third in their division behind Louisville and Clemson. Their loss to Louisville especially hurts, but they slot in ahead of Houston with better metrics. This was the hardest area to seed, though USC and Colorado were easy at 9 and 10.

Photo by Rob Carr (Getty Images)

We end then with the four remaining conference champions. Temple has low Playoff Point numbers, but the computers like them more than any of the remaining conference champions, and the American Athletic Conference was the toughest league of the remaining leagues. Western Kentucky avenged an earlier loss to Louisiana Tech by beating them in the Conference USA title game, and their metrics are all significantly higher than San Diego State's. The Aztecs didn't really play anybody, and that's reflected in weak Playoff Point numbers. It is better than the mark Arkansas State put up, with the Red Wolves finishing the regular season at 7-5. They were an easy choice for the #16 seed and the sacrificial lamb we're sending to Tuscaloosa in a couple weeks.

It's not a perfect playoff bracket, because the at large bids make for some interesting arguments. You could easily have put in, say, Louisville over Florida State based on head to head, but Florida State had the better resume. It was hard to knock Boise State out after having them in pretty much the whole time, but I couldn't justify it. At the end of the day, I'm happy with how it turned out. We have some pretty compelling matchups in Round 1, and the bracket offers some very interesting potential games in the weeks to follow.

Saturday, December 17th is the scheduled start of the Death to the BCS Playoffs. You can sign up for a free account on the BracketMaker website if you're interested in filling out predictions for the field. Thank you once again for indulging my desire for a more equitable college football playoff system, and I hope you enjoy the 2016 Death to the BCS Playoffs!