No other sport bases playoff berths on a subjective determination of what team is “best.” The NFL doesn’t. MLB doesn’t. No one does but college football. Everyone else bases playoff berths on what team is most deserving, generally based on who has the best record with reasonably comparable schedules. It’s why a comparatively mediocre team like Tampa Bay or Carolina will make the NFC playoffs and a subjectively “better” team like Detroit will be left out. Selecting playoff teams based on the subjective judgment of which team is “best” invariably leads to bias and preference and other improper considerations entering the picture. Take 1993. Notre Dame has no legitimate claim to the 1993 national championship. Neither did Florida State, which won it. It’s true that the Irish beat the Seminoles in South Bend on November 13. And then lost in South Bend to a Boston College team that won its eighth straight game on November 20. The same BC team that West Virginia beat in Boston on November 26. The upshot is that 11-0 Nebraska, champion of the Big 8, should have played 11-0 West Virginia, champion of the Big East, for the national championship in the Orange Bowl. Not Florida State. As WVU coach Don Nehlen put it, “we beat the team (BC), that beat the team (ND), that beat the team (FSU), you know what I mean?” But FSU was a bigger brand than WVU, and Bobby Bowden was the media’s darling who had yet to win a championship after being thwarted many times (usually by Miami). So WVU got screwed and Nebraska lost to FSU in a game played in Florida. Not having a real chance to win it all, and it being a time before made-up claims to national championships (ala UCF and others) was socially acceptable, WVU’s team had a good time on Bourbon Street and got destroyed by Florida in the Sugar Bowl. That 1993 WVU team was not as good as the 1988 team that lost the national championship to the Irish in the Fiesta Bowl (a game in which QB Major Harris separated his shoulder on the first offensive series). But it earned a chance to play for the title. And either the Mountaineers or the Cornhuskers should have finished 12-0 and deservingly won the title. It didn’t happen because Tom Osborne and Don Nehlen and their teams were not as popular as Bobby Bowden and his team. So the subjective criteria of “best” gets repeatedly manipulated by the media and the pollsters from year to year, and it looks inconsistent because different explanations are used to justify what amounts to a popularity contest. In real life it is exceedingly rare for there to be three teams, much less four, that deserve a chance to play for a national championship and have a genuine chance to win it. Virginia Tech played and lost narrowly to the one that probably precipitated the multi-team playoff, 2004 Auburn. This was before the ESPN promotion of the SEC had fully taken off and Auburn was the rare SEC team that could lose a popularity contest - in that instance, to blue bloods USC and Oklahoma. Notre Dame has no gripe. A two-loss team cannot be said to “deserve” a shot at the championship and the Irish clearly were not even deemed to be among the three or four “best” teams. This was a debate about who were the 8th, 9th, 10th and 11th best teams. That Notre Dame was left out is notable only because the Irish almost never get the shaft. Far more often, Notre Dame plays a role in giving another team the shaft - like Michael Vick and the 2000 Hokies, who should have gotten the Fiesta Bowl bid awarded to an outmatched but more popular Irish team. Until all programs - including Notre Dame - are in some kind of conference or super league or other similar confederation that lends itself to a selection process that takes subjective determinations of “best” out of the picture, there will be inconsistent results - and not coincidentally, something for the media to talk about. Notre Dame had a good team and a good year. Not great, but good enough that its fans should be pleased instead of engaging in the wretched whining too many have exhibited. The abysmal behavior of Notre Dame’s leadership has sent a poor message to its fans and supporters. Like the kids in the gym of Hickory High, Notre Dame fans should be proud of what their team is, and not concern themselves with what it is not. ** Edited by Tailgate Guru at 12/15/2025, 7:35:58 PM ** Edited by Tailgate Guru at 12/15/2025, 7:39:49 PM