With the announcements of the Ivy League cancelling all fall sports, along with the Big Ten only playing conference football games, I am starting to question whether or not football will be played — or better yet, should be played.
Don’t get me wrong, I love college football and I joke with my coworkers there’s only four major sports, OU football, OU football, OU football and OU football. So, you see where my bias is.
That said, if teams only play conference games, can you truly crown a National Champion?
With the Big Ten cancelling nonconference games, we lose games like Michigan at Washington, Iowa State at Iowa, Michigan State at Brigham Young, Ohio State at Oregon, Penn State at Virginia Tech, Brigham Young at Minnesota, Miami at Michigan State and Wisconsin v. Notre Dame at Lambeau Field in Green Bay, Wisconsin.
Now, I’m not a fan of many, if any, Big Ten teams, but not getting to see Ohio State battle Oregon in Autzen Stadium, or getting to see Wisconsin play a challenging opponent outside of conference?
Not having these games will be very disappointing.
That said, I wonder if it’s even going to be possible to play a schedule this year. Or, should games even be played.
Now, I’m a huge college football fan and there’s no other sport I watch even remotely more than college football. It’s my life-blood.
That said, it may be best to postpone the college football season until the spring. You won’t be able to crown a true champion if teams only are playing conference games.
While that at least is a season, if say Alabama plays only its conference schedule, Oklahoma plays only its conference schedule and Clemson and Ohio State too, then you’re comparing apples to oranges in my opinion.
This season has some great games scheduled. Outside of the Big Ten games I mentioned, Clemson is supposed to travel to Notre Dame, Southern California is supposed to play Alabama in Arlington, Texas, Notre Dame is supposed to travel to Southern California, etc.
If these non-conference games aren’t played, then it really takes away from a college football season. If we just play conference games, the sheer joy of watching each week is gone.
Now, speaking solely as an OU supporter and fan, I don’t care about seven of the nine non-conference games. OU should win those every year.
If OU ends up only playing conference game, which would be nine, the only ones I would truly care about watching intently, would be Bedlam, and that’s a stretch because OU should win that game every year too, and the Texas game.
Speaking of OU/Texas, the State Fair of Texas won’t happen this year. So imagine this for a second, OU and Texas playing at the Cotton Bowl in Dallas without the fair going on. That game brings 300,000 people to Dallas for one weekend.
So having the game played without the fair as the backdrop is pointless. With the circumstances as they are, if they don’t outright cancel the season, the OU/Texas game should be moved to a home-and-home the next two years.
There’s no fun in that game in a Cotton Bowl stadium without the fanfare of the fair. Or, imagine playing that game with no fans at all, which could happen.
The 2020 season shouldn’t happen if we’re playing OU/Texas or even Georgia/Florida, both at neutral sites with the stadiums split half and half, without having fans in the stands.
For the sake of the purity of the game, postpone the season until the spring.
You could start the season February 13 and go through May 15, that’s a 14-week regular season, with May 15 being the championship game weekend.
Army/Navy would be May 22.
Then bowls could start May 29, with the College Football Playoff semifinals being June 5. The National Championship Game could then be June 7.
The vast majority of the stadiums sit empty in the spring anyway, so moving those games wouldn’t be difficult. And weather-wise, games in late November would be comparable to games in late-February.
If this were to happen, at least we could get a true National Champion. And that’s what we all want, right?