B1G Division Tie Breakers
With all the recent prognasitications over what our overall record will be I decided to start looking at tie breakers in what should be a highly competitve B1G East Division.
If Michigan, Michigan State, and Ohio State all finish the year 11-1 with losses against each other the tie breaker goes to who is the highest ranked in the first College Football Playoff rankings released after the completion of the regular season.
Additionally, the Rose Bowl isn't tied to select a specific B1G team in the event the B1G champion is in the playoff.
So with that being said, would this season be a failure if we went 11-1 and wound up in the Citrus Bowl for the second straight year or the Outback Bowl as an alternative? (MSU / OSU in the Playoff the other in a big name bowl like the Orange and the B1G West Champion in the Rose essentially relegating us to the fourth choice in the B1G)
The Citrus bowl must have five different teams in six years starting with Minnesota two years ago and Michigan last year which makes it most likely under these circumstances that Michigan would play in the Outback Bowl which is the next highest ranking bowl.
http://www.bigten.org/sports/m-footbl/archive/081011aaa.html
August 15th, 2016 at 11:00 AM ^
So, unless I screwed this up, (which is very possible) a non-B1G champ NY6 invitee should look forward to playing either Florida State or Houston, or the equivalent ACC runner up/mid major cinderella--and hoping to be picked over SEC schools, ND, and whichever other schools finish in the top 12 or so. ND is almost always a shoe-in with 2 or less losses, but right now Michigan has so much hype, we'd get the nod. But then there's also bound to be 2 or 3 SEC teams who are overrated and have ESPN behind them, plus a bunch of other random division runner ups and conference champ losers.
Hopefully this is pointless speculation and we're in the playoffs or at least the Rose as runner up. But, if the B1G is somehow shut out of the playoffs, it becomes extremely slim pickings to make another NY6 Bowl... especially if ND finishes in the mix, too.