THE CHARM OF COLLEGE FOOTBALL: A 12-TEAM PLAYOFF CREATES MANY DREAMS

Alabama is finished, with a coach who can’t speak to losing players, while Georgia is on the rebound and Texas fights a QB debate — a Manning! — amid possibilities that BYU receives a first-round bye

     We see the gimmicky beauty of college football. It doesn’t matter which programs qualify for the simpleness of a final four, as Kirk Herbstreit and his cancer-surviving dog would agree. What we love is how Georgia beat Texas and lost to Alabama, which since has fallen twice and might summon Nick Saban to return — am I wrong? — while Ohio State, Tennessee and LSU also have lost.

     Halloween isn’t even upon us and only Oregon, Miami and Penn State are undefeated among contenders. And rather than stifle the system for a quartet, the sport now has a 12-team tournament that could render seven or eight teams as national champions. No one cares who is playing great in October and September. Who is playing wonderfully as the playoff format begins Dec. 20? Will Oregon survive as the Big Ten champ? Georgia as the SEC champ? Is Miami certain as the ACC champ?

     And why should BYU qualify as the No. 4 seeded team — in our first controversy — by winning the Big 12 title and receiving a first-round bye?

     Should we rule out Ohio State because Ryan Day is the coach? Or not? Should we dismiss Texas when Steve Sarkisian yanks a future NFL quarterback, Quinn Ewers, for Arch Manning while the Longhorns look ghastly as their fans throw hundreds of water bottles to protest a bad officiating call? Or not? And Alabama, after losing in Knoxville? Rather than blow out the locker-room walls, as Saban would have, coach Kalen DeBoer seemed to distance himself from players who wouldn’t make the tournament today.

     “I told them in there these are the speeches I'm not good at,” he said. “You gotta look inward first and make sure that everything you are doing is right. Anyone that you sense has any type of questioning, you gotta to make sure you bring them with. The ones that need to continue to understand what this program stands for and what it is all about.”

     Does he mean, coaching them?

     Want more? How about Indiana, which is 7-0 and has a local sports columnist asking if he’s doing mushrooms before losing its starting quarterback to a thumb injury? How about Boise State, which still plays on a blue field and has a potential Heisman Trophy winner in running back Ashton Jeanty? How about 7-0 Army? And 6-0 Navy, which plays Notre Dame at MetLife Stadium for a possible shot at the dirty dozen?

     We’re kidding. Or maybe not.

     A week after Oregon outlasted the Buckeyes in Eugene, Georgia delivered a major performance in Austin that rings loudly. The officials were wrong in penalizing Texas safety Jahdae Barron for pass interference late in the third quarter. As fans fired loads of debris onto the field, while watching replays on the scoreboard, the officials reversed the call against Georgia. Kirby Smart was livid on the opposing sideline. “You can’t do that! You can’t do that! … That’s bulls—!” the coach screamed at referee Matt Loeffler.

     A bad call threatened players with injurious objects. “Now we've set a precedent that if you throw a bunch of stuff on the field and endanger athletes that you've got a chance to get your call reversed," Smart said later. “And that's unfortunate because, to me, that's dangerous. That's not what we want, and that's not criticizing officials. That's what happened.”

     Don’t let indiscretion interfere with reality. The Bulldogs went on to win 30-15, which ranked as an all-timer: the third-biggest road win against a No. 1-ranked team. “Nobody gave us a chance," Smart told ESPN. “Your own network doubted us. And then they tried to rob us with calls in this place. These guys are so resilient.” Georgia has overcome a poor first half against Alabama and looks like a prime tournament advancer. For Texas, Sarkisian’s first monumental SEC game turned into a flop. Ewers started poorly against the pass rush — throwing an interception and losing a fumble after three sacks. Down 20-0 late in the first half, in came Manning, who went 3-of-6 for 19 passing yards.

     This is a fact of football life: A coach does not want a quarterback debate involving the nephew of Peyton and Eli Manning.

     “Quinn's our starting quarterback,” Sarkisian said. “I appreciate the fact that we're fortunate enough to have a backup like Arch that can come into the game and provide a spark in some sense, but at the end of the day, Quinn's our starter. … I think we’ve got to do a better job around him. I think he would tell you he can play better.” He said Ewers’ “eyes weren’t where they needed to be.” Did he need to sit?

     “I mean, it seemed like I did,” Ewers said. “I came out after, second half, and put a couple of good drives together, but it's definitely a weird position to be in, for sure. ... I felt good. I thought I was making some of the right decisions. Obviously missed a couple here and there. But it's tough.”

     In one sense, Sarkisian was right. “Losing a game like this doesn’t kill you,” he said. “It was one game. I think we can sit around here and throw a pity party for ourselves, but I don’t know what good that’s going to do for us.”

     It would seem, with weeks of mania ahead, that the SEC will have four teams invited to the tournament — Georgia, Texas, LSU and Tennessee. The Big Ten could have four — Oregon, Ohio State, Penn State and Indiana. Miami and BYU are champions of other conferences. Clemson, from the ACC, gets in as an at-large. Boise State is the fifth champ from the Mountain West Conference.

     That could change. But what won’t change? Kalen DeBoer doesn’t know how to deliver speeches to losing players. He won’t be making the tournament.

     BYU might. Indiana might. Boise State might. Navy might.

     I adore this. So should you.

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     Jay Mariotti, called “without question the most impacting Chicago sportswriter of the past quarter-century,’’ writes general sports columns for Substack while appearing on some of the 1,678,498 podcasts and shows in production today. He is an accomplished columnist, TV panelist and talk/podcast host. Living in Los Angeles, he gravitated by osmosis to film projects.