Why Arizona State, the Big 12 champion, deserves a bye in the College Football Playoffs
Behind an exceptional performance from Heisman hopeful Cameron Skattebo, Arizona State clinched a playoff bid with a 45-19 win over Iowa State in the Big 12 title game on Saturday at AT&T Stadium.
It was a culmination of one of the best stories in college football as the Sun Devils went from picked near the bottom of the Big 12 in the preseason to conference champions.
Leading 24-10 at halftime, Arizona State broke the game open in the second half, forcing two turnovers on Iowa State’s first two possessions in the third quarter. The Sun Devils showed everything you wanted to see late in the season from a playoff team.
A creative offense led by Skattebo’s 170 rushing yards and quarterback Sam Leavitt’s three touchdown passes picked apart one of the best defenses in the country. The defense gave up two scores on its first two drives, but then locked in and kept the Cyclones out of the endzone until the fourth quarter when the game was out of hand.
You want to see teams playing their best football in December and this was easily the most complete performance of the year for Arizona State.
“A whole bunch of people stepped up,” Kenny Dillingham said. “That was the best part about tonight on offense. The o-line stepped up, Sam continues to be an unbelievable football player and the future of Sun Devil football. I could go on with a list on offense and then for the defense gets three takeaways to start the second half. Are you kidding me? It’s like a scene from amovie.”
The Big 12 Coach of the Year was appreciative of the win and the work that went into turning Arizona State from 3-9 in 2023 to conference champions. But Dillingham also had to spend the postgame press conference as a politician, partially as the Sun Devils await their fate on Sunday when the College Football Playoff bracket is revealed.
There’s a real scenario where Arizona State, a power conference champion, enters the 12-team field as the lowest seed. That means, despite winning their conference, the Sun Devils could have to go on the road to Columbus to face Ohio State or to South Bend to face Notre Dame.
Dillingham thinks Arizona State did enough to get the bye or at the very least host a first round playoff game.
“Last year they left a team out because of their quarterback, we’re 11-1 with our starting quarterback,” Dillingham said. “Having beat four ranked teams, having won the Big 12 championship, so I do think because we made a standard that the quarterback is that valuable, I think there should be a real chance we get a first round bye, I definitely think we should host a game.”
Four of the 12 teams will receive first-round byes and two spots will certainly go to the SEC champion, Georgia or Texas, or the Big 10 champion, Oregon or Penn State.
That leaves two spots between Arizona State, Boise State and the winner of the ACC championship game between SMU-Clemson. With SMU’s No. 8 ranking, it’s likely the ACC champ will get one of the spots. Clemson is No. 17, but a top-10 win this late in the season could catapult them into the top-10.
So the debate likely will come down to Arizona State and Boise State. The fact that a power conference champion finds itself in this debate is a frustrating situation for the Big 12 as the conference continues to try to earn its respect nationally without Oklahoma and Texas in the league.
If you ask Big 12 commissioner Brett Yormark, there is no debate.
“Where I sit, there should be no comparison between us and a Group of 5 champion,” Yormark said before the Big 12 title game. “Strength of schedule matters. We play nine conference games.”
To be fair, the Broncos are a good team led by running back and Heisman candidate Ashton Jeanty, who is easily one of the best players in the sport. Boise State rolled through its conference schedule with relative ease and picked up two ranked wins over UNLV in the process. The Broncos also played No. 1 Oregon close in Eugene.
Boise State is worthy of a playoff spot, there’s no doubt about that, but a bye?
Over a team that has ranked wins over Iowa State and BYU plus a win on the road in Manhattan against Kansas State? Is the Mountain West a better conference than the Big 12? Absolutely not.
Just take a look at the league’s standings and you’ll see most of the conference outside of Boise State, UNLV and Colorado State is hovering around .500. Now look at the Big 12, where a team like Colorado is only fourth place at 9-3 followed by two 8-4 teams, BYU and TCU.
The Big 12 is a deeper and better league, so why is this a debate?
This is where the perception and branding problem in college football arises. The two teams in the Big 12 title game were ranked behind three SEC teams with three losses. Ole Miss lost to Florida and Kentucky, Alabama lost to Vanderbilt and Oklahoma.
But losing to Florida is a lot better than losing to Texas Tech apparently and much of that has to do with the logo on the helmet and not the play on the field.
If we’re talking just play on the field, there’s not a hotter team in the country than the Sun Devils. Arizona State has won games in every fashion during its six game winning streak. And as Dillingham alluded to, the Sun Devils were also without Leavitt in one of its losses on the road to Cincinnati.
The Sun Devils aren’t just a playoff team, they’re a team capable of winning multiple games in the postseason.
If beating a top-20 opponent in the conference championship game by 26 isn’t enough for a bye, maybe it will at least be enough to jump No. 11 Alabama.
This story was originally published December 7, 2024 at 2:29 PM.
