Monday night's BCS Championship Game between the Alabama Crimson Tide and LSU Tigers could be the beginning of a radical change in how college football determines its national champion, reports Matt Hayes of The Sporting News.
Hayes writes:
"Over the next six months, the leaders of the sport will meet at least four times to iron out a plan that protects the importance of the regular season—the one aspect BCS leaders believe separates the game from every other—while embracing a new frontier for the poll-driven sport."
According to Hayes, conference commissioners will begin discussing plans towards moving towards a national playoff system in a meeting in New Orleans on Tuesday. Other meetings are scheduled to take place in Dallas and Miami over the next few months and "at least 60" different plans are on the table, varying from a four-team playoff to one game after the bowl games.
Mountain West Conference Commissioner Craig Thompson thinks it's time for a new system.
"There needs to be some kind of different culmination of the season," said Thompson. "We need a process after which we can truly say, ‘This is the national champion.'
BCS Executive Director Bill Hancock discussed the issue on Monday.
"Anyone who loves college football would love to be a fly on the wall during these discussions," Hancock said. "Everything you can imagine will be brought up, from who plays who to where they play to the business aspect of it. It’s all going to be on the table. We’ve got a lot of work to do."