Flat Start for 12-Team Playoff

Ever since college football introduced a four-team playoff a decade ago, analysts and armchair quarterbacks had salivated over the prospect of adding more teams to the mix.

- LAINE HIGGINS

When the sport announced an expanded postseason bracket for this season-with first-round games held on snowy campuses in December-fans were positively drooling.

With each passing week of the 2024 season, as the field came into view, the hype cranked up. And then, the first games of the inaugural 12-team playoff finally arrived this weekend-and landed with all the fanfare of a pigskin with a puncture.

It wasn't just that the four first-round games produced exactly zero upsets. It's that every one of them also degenerated into a onesided blowout. Not one of the visiting teams managed to get within 10 points of their higher-ranked opponents. The average margin of victory was a whopping 19 points.

Forget about a 12-team playoff. This parade of snoozers was enough to leave fans pining for the days of the BCS Championship. The carnage started on Friday night in South Bend, Ind., where Notre Dame cruised to a 27-17 victory over Indiana that was far more dominant than the score indicates-the Hoosiers scored two fourth quarter touchdowns.