Marshall
Not pretty, but ALIVE!
BECAUSE SOME WANT TO WIN IN THE PRESS and are snobs.D1-AA, or FCS, has a 24 team playoff. 16 teams face off in the 1st round, winners play 8 teams that had 1st round byes.
D2 and D3 both have a 28 team playoff. 24 teams in the 1st round with 4 teams getting 1st round byes. 4 of the winners of the 1st round would play those teams with byes in the 2nd round based on how they're seeded (I would assume), while the rest of the winners play each other.
All 3 divisions go 5 weeks to get through the tourney. A 16 team playoff for the big boys would just take 4 weeks.
You want your sport to have a champion at the end of the year? No, let's just give everyone participation ribbons. Or send 66% of the division to meaningless bowl games.
You can still have bowls , GoDaddy, Independence, Famous Idaho Potato, whatever crap bowl you want for the MAC2 to play the Sun Belt 3 or even for teams that didn't make the playoffs, say TCU, Florida State, Northwestern, Oregon, Ole Miss, whoever. You could even incorporate some bowls into the tourney. Hell, it's what they're doing now for the 4 team playoff.
The bowls don't have to go anywhere. I get that the school/conference gets money playing in a bowl game, but the game itself is absolutely meaningless. Georgia vs UCLA in the Sun Bowl means nothing. Ohio State vs Sam Houston St in the regular season would have more meaning than that game. Notre Dame vs Oklahoma State in the Sun Bowl 1st round playoff game, somebody might actually watch that game on TV. Michigan St vs Houston 1st round playoff in the Liberty Bowl and I'm actually watching a Liberty Bowl for the 1st time in forever.
Every other division of college football does it, why can't the big boys do it?
David vs Goliath is a no win scenario for Goliath. If you win it was expected, but losing is embarrassing.