Earlier today we posed a question/thought for Jeff Tingey (ISU), who is the Big Sky rep on the FCS Selection Committee.

Rumors
Thunder Lake Lodge

It was a fairly simple question and we felt it encompassed what many around the country were thinking.  Jeff was nice enough to respond with a well written answer.

SFI:  If I said to you, “these new rankings are telling top FCS teams to only play teams they can beat and beat badly.  Any win at all, no matter the level, is more important than a loss, even if it’s to a very good FCS team”…..would you have a response to that, agreeing or disagreeing, based on your committee’s discussions?

JT:  “My response would be in disagreement to your question.  Quality wins are of utmost importance in the seeding of teams.  To that end, quality losses are also valuable.  For instance, earlier this year our own Big Sky member, Eastern Washington University, suffered an overtime loss at North Dakota State University.  While the result of the game goes into the “Loss” category, being able to go toe-to-toe with the defending national champions in their home venue was valuable.  Then, their strong performance in their win column has helped propel them to their current ranking (wins over Washington State, Montana and Northern Iowa).  

In general the Football Championship committee also relies heavily on a strength of schedule rating (SRS) sheet provided by the NCAA.  That formula establishes a rating for each team based on the resulting network of team, games, and game results.”  
We thank Jeff for answering our question, fully realizing he didn’t need to.
It appears as if the Simple Rating System (SRS) is alive and well again this year.  The problem with the SRS is that it is unbelievably flawed.  Last season the final SRS came out and had Dartmouth at #2.  Harvard was #4.  Those two teams don’t compete in the playoffs.  Seriously.  Princeton at 5-5 was head of UND in that final SRS ranking (interestingly enough New Hampshire was behind UND but got selected for one of the final spots anyway).
We really hope that there is more conversation going on as it gets to selection weekend (November 19) to try and realistically pick the field based on their resumes and not an embarrassingly flawed SRS.
(Plus he included “quality losses” in there.  Ugh).