G6 Playoff

[ah59396]

I increased my giving as promised when we moved up. Substantially. I won’t give to a new IAA football effort. Might designate to another sport or take more vacations.

We are 1-AA already. The only thing missing is the jersey patch and the playoff.

[AppWyo]

We need promotion and relegation. We can call it the Football Association. They can give out a cup instead of a trophy.

No one wants to be relegated.

[Saint3333]

I increased my giving as promised when we moved up. Substantially. I won’t give to a new IAA football effort. Might designate to another sport or take more vacations.

We are 1-AA already. The only thing missing is the jersey patch and the playoff.

The substance of NIL vs. the form has created two divisions in substance.

[AppStFan1]

Division I-AA sequel.

Yup. We moved up just to be in the second tier. I heard some of our experienced fans say that we would have to move up to be in the second tier way back in the 90s and early 2000s. It made sense.

This was something the stay FCS crowd never grasped, it was a frustrating discussion.

Hopefully they can see it now.

[AppDawg]

This does nothing to address the fact our roster will continue to be a revolving door and every season is more and more a game of chance.

There will be a continued decline in building anticipation during the offseason as no one will know what kinda team we have until toe meets leather in September.

The rich will get richer, what little money we get from the Mothership will shrink, as will distributions from CFP… yet we are still on hook for paying disproportionately for the House settlement.

[spacemonkey]

There is no reason the G6 couldn't make their own rules if the p4 can. (After the split) We can have contracts in pay to play and make them liable for breaking the contract. (Think PGA, LIV Golf). The G6 have to quit waiting on someone else to do the right thing. We need to think equity stake from some hedge fund. Someone who can run it like a league. We have to do it. No one is going to do it for us.

[spacemonkey]

I googled "Number of Alumni for all G6 schools" I thought it interesting we came up 4th on AI estimated alumni of top G6 schools. On the other hand...AI has Central Florida listed as a G6.

AI Overview
Based on the definition of the Group of Six (G6) as the FBS conferences outside the Power 4 (American, CUSA, MAC, Mountain West, Sun Belt, and the 2026 reconstituted Pac-12), the alumni counts for these schools vary significantly, ranging from roughly 50,000 to over 300,000.
While precise, up-to-the-minute alumni numbers for every single school are not officially published, here are estimated figures for notable G6 schools and representative totals for these conferences:

Reddit·r/CFB
+1
Estimated Alumni for Top G6 Schools
Florida Atlantic (AAC):
300,000+ total university alumni.
Memphis (AAC):
150,000+ total university alumni.
Boise State (MW/Pac-12):
100,000+ total university alumni.
Appalachian State (Sun Belt):
100,000+ total university alumni.
San Diego State (MW/Pac-12):
300,000+ total university alumni.
Central Florida (AAC):
300,000+ total university alumni.

Reddit·r/CFB
Typical G6 Conference Alumni Profiles
Large Public State Schools: Examples like UNLV, Nevada, Fresno State, and East Carolina typically boast high alumni counts, often in the 150,000–250,000 range due to large enrollment sizes.

[AppWyo]

Money does not equate wins. Take the amount of money that UNC-Ch is spending compared to Appalachian. We went 5 and 8 and they went 4 and 8. We had more wins that cost less to get than theirs. Granted, we are in different conferences, but I believe were we in the ACC we would do better than just four wins.

[EastHallApp]

I wish someone with some $en$e would see the money in an NIT football tournament and keep the g6 CFP spot and create an NIT for the conference champions who did not make the tournament with some invited teams to create a 16 team playoff. Make it part of the CFP contract that TEAMS FROM THE P4 MUST PARTICIPATE in the NIT tournament to be eligible for the CFP the next year.

That being said...what makes them stop at football. I am sure baseball and basketball will be next.

Not sure that makes as much sense as you think. The NIT basketball tournament is on life support as it is. Even if you required teams to participate, it wouldn't stop players skipping it en masse to enter the portal or the draft.

[EastHallApp]

So the proposal is for a G6 playoff... that doesn't even include the best G6 team. So no one could credibly call the winner the G6 national champion, if there were such a thing.

Real worst-of-both-worlds solution.

I agree that "G6 runner up" would be an odd tournament and title. But if you look back at our two recent teams that would have been one of the favorites to win that type of tournament (2018 and 2019), winning that odd title would still be better than playing 8-6 Middle Tennessee and 9-5 UAB in a bowl that is virtually meaningless.

I think a lot of fans agree with you. I actually have a different opinion. Maybe if you're only looking at what happens in the 60 minutes between the whistles, I might agree.

But I was also never one to care much that we were playing the teams you mentioned instead of a better G5 or some 6-6 P5. Although I have written before that I'd love to see G5 bowls move to a champion vs. champion or champion vs. P4 model, where a few select bowls are established as the G5 "major" bowl games.

Regardless - bowls are a different concept than a postseason tournament. To be frank, they're more like a party. A celebration to cap off a good season, or a great one in those cases.

Those New Orleans trips were insanely fun. Spending 2-3 days in the French Quarter a week before Christmas, and capping it off watching App play in the Superdome and win big... those are lifelong memories for me. (Montgomery was great, too, fwiw, albeit in a completely different way.) Having teams end the season competing to be in the national top 25, to me, is more significant than a tournament for the "we're the #2 mid-major" trophy. Ultimately, what mattered competitively was that we won a bowl trophy - six in a row in fact.

If you gave me the choice of a holiday trip to New Orleans/Miami/Vegas/Orlando etc. for another bowl game versus sitting in Boone in mid-December weather or going to some remote college town for a Round of 16 game (or, more likely, watching on TV) - I'm taking the bowl game every time. But again, that's just my preference from experience. I know many will disagree.

[Bootsy]

Changing the rules so more 5-7 teams can compete in bowl games with unclaimed bids:

https://www.espn.com/college-football/s ... bowl-games

Easy button: in lieu of changing the rules, maybe ditch some of the lower-tier bowl games…since no one wants to watch them in the first place?

[Seattleapp]

Money does not equate wins. Take the amount of money that UNC-Ch is spending compared to Appalachian. We went 5 and 8 and they went 4 and 8. We had more wins that cost less to get than theirs. Granted, we are in different conferences, but I believe were we in the ACC we would do better than just four wins.

Are you talking about last years team? You think that team woulda won more games in the ACC than they did in the Sun Belt? We wouldn’t have won a single game in the ACC last season

[JTApps1]

Changing the rules so more 5-7 teams can compete in bowl games with unclaimed bids:

https://www.espn.com/college-football/s ... bowl-games

Easy button: in lieu of changing the rules, maybe ditch some of the lower-tier bowl games…since no one wants to watch them in the first place?

How about less bowls since half the players don't even care now?

[AppWyo]

Money does not equate wins. Take the amount of money that UNC-Ch is spending compared to Appalachian. We went 5 and 8 and they went 4 and 8. We had more wins that cost less to get than theirs. Granted, we are in different conferences, but I believe were we in the ACC we would do better than just four wins.

Are you talking about last years team? You think that team woulda won more games in the ACC than they did in the Sun Belt? We wouldn’t have won a single game in the ACC last season

We will never know since we did not play them... We would not have beaten Michigan nor Texas A&M had we not played them. You really need to play a team to really know.

[AppWyo]

A playoff without automatic qualifiers is an invitation tournament.

[Bigdaddyg1]

I kind of compare my view of App football in the same way as Panthers football. My expectations for both are to win the NC and the Super Bowl. My realistic view is that either final game is generally unlikely. If that doesn’t happen I want both/either team to make a playoff. If that doesn’t occur then I want my teams to be competitive and entertaining. If one or both sucks and isn’t entertaining then it’s pointless for me.

These threads and never ending discussions about college playoff scenarios, FCS relegation (so to speak), bowl games, G5 playoffs, etc are fine for some but for me they have killed a lot of the joy for watching and enjoying the games. The obsession with playing for a national championship is insane. Most fans really don’t care about this unrealistic goal that some here can’t let go. They also could not care about NIL or even pay for play. Obviously our program evolved and most have no desire to return to FCS/SOCON days but dang those were really fun times. Nobody outside of our world cared or even knew about Natty games in Chattanooga but damnit we did. Beating NC and SC in the same year was awesome and winning all those bowl games was equally amazing. Once we started obsessing over the post Drink year it all started going down hill in terms of the joy and fun. COVID nearly derailed it and the flood disaster was brutal beyond football.

Some unrealistic fans here seem to think that if we ponied up millions of dollars for a bunch of guys who don’t give a damn about TIGMA that it will make it all better. App will always be my school but the love for football is not close to what it once was.

[fjblair]

I kind of compare my view of App football in the same way as Panthers football. My expectations for both are to win the NC and the Super Bowl. My realistic view is that either final game is generally unlikely. If that doesn’t happen I want both/either team to make a playoff. If that doesn’t occur then I want my teams to be competitive and entertaining. If one or both sucks and isn’t entertaining then it’s pointless for me.

These threads and never ending discussions about college playoff scenarios, FCS relegation (so to speak), bowl games, G5 playoffs, etc are fine for some but for me they have killed a lot of the joy for watching and enjoying the games. The obsession with playing for a national championship is insane. Most fans really don’t care about this unrealistic goal that some here can’t let go. They also could not care about NIL or even pay for play. Obviously our program evolved and most have no desire to return to FCS/SOCON days but dang those were really fun times. Nobody outside of our world cared or even knew about Natty games in Chattanooga but damnit we did. Beating NC and SC in the same year was awesome and winning all those bowl games was equally amazing. Once we started obsessing over the post Drink year it all started going down hill in terms of the joy and fun. COVID nearly derailed it and the flood disaster was brutal beyond football.

Some unrealistic fans here seem to think that if we ponied up millions of dollars for a bunch of guys who don’t give a damn about TIGMA that it will make it all better. App will always be my school but the love for football is not close to what it once was.

I'm with you. I still like college football, but I no longer love college football. Gone are the days when it consumed me each season, and lived and died with each ASU win or loss. It has nothing to do with a G6 playoff and everything to do with pay to play and the portal, I didn't sign up for any of this.

I'll still pull for App State of course, but the bloom is off the rose. It was a hell of a run.

[JTApps1]

I kind of compare my view of App football in the same way as Panthers football. My expectations for both are to win the NC and the Super Bowl. My realistic view is that either final game is generally unlikely. If that doesn’t happen I want both/either team to make a playoff. If that doesn’t occur then I want my teams to be competitive and entertaining. If one or both sucks and isn’t entertaining then it’s pointless for me.

These threads and never ending discussions about college playoff scenarios, FCS relegation (so to speak), bowl games, G5 playoffs, etc are fine for some but for me they have killed a lot of the joy for watching and enjoying the games. The obsession with playing for a national championship is insane. Most fans really don’t care about this unrealistic goal that some here can’t let go. They also could not care about NIL or even pay for play. Obviously our program evolved and most have no desire to return to FCS/SOCON days but dang those were really fun times. Nobody outside of our world cared or even knew about Natty games in Chattanooga but damnit we did. Beating NC and SC in the same year was awesome and winning all those bowl games was equally amazing. Once we started obsessing over the post Drink year it all started going down hill in terms of the joy and fun. COVID nearly derailed it and the flood disaster was brutal beyond football.

Some unrealistic fans here seem to think that if we ponied up millions of dollars for a bunch of guys who don’t give a damn about TIGMA that it will make it all better. App will always be my school but the love for football is not close to what it once was.

I agree that winning a NC was never a goal I had in mind when moving to FBS. Who we play and how much we win matter. I do still want the chance to play P4 teams, but they're doing all they can to make it more difficult to compete.