Next week I am going to produce exact outlines for each team not yet eliminated to win their conference race.  While the SEC and Big 10 will be straight forward, the ACC Atlantic and PAC 10 might be a bit more convoluted.

This is going to require delving into the conference tie-breakers to sort out the intricate details.  This would be useful information to have consolidated into one location.  I happen to have a location to put such information.

The tie breaker procedures for all conferences follows after the jump.  A link to this page will be added to my sidebar for easy reference as the season progresses.

To simplify the listing I have made a list of all tiebreakers used by any conference and given them all a four character code.  Each conference's procedure is then listed in terms of these codes.

In all cases, if a step causes seperation of teams into different groups the procedures are started again from the top for each group.

Tie Breaker Key:

AGP: Record in all games played

BCS: Highest ranked team in the BCS standings

BCSA: Highest ranked team in the BCS standings unless the second tied team is within 5 ranking spots of the top team, where head to head among the top two teams will be used.

BCSE: Eliminate the team with the lowest ranking in the BCS standings.

BOWL: First bowl selects among the tied teams.

CND: Record versus common non-division conference opponents

CNTD: Compare record versus each common non-division opponents from top to bottom

DIV: Record within the division

DRAW: Teams selected by a random witnessed process

DTD: Compare record against each division opponents from top to bottom

H2H: Head to head among tied teams

HHC: If members of one group have each defeated all group of another subgroup, separate these groups

NDT: Record versus non-divisional teams

NDTD: Compare record against each conference opponent from top down

NDR: Combined conference record of crossover conference opponents

NEW: Eliminate the most recent conference champion

NFC: No formal champion named, tied teams are all co-champions.  Tie breakers are for BCS selection only.

NFDC: No formal division champion is named.  Tie Breakers used to determine championship game participation only.

TD: Compare against all conference games from top down.

ACC:

2 teams: H2H, DIV, DTD, CND, NDT, CNTD-NDTD, BCS, DRAW

3+ teams: H2H, DIV, DTD, CND, NDT, CNTD-NDTD, BCSA, DRAW

Big East:

NFC

H2H, BCS

Big Ten:

NFC

HHC, AGP, BCS

Big Twelve:

H2H, DIV, DTD, CND, BCS, AGP, DRAW

Conference USA:

[no tiebreaker for the championship game participants is listed.  These are the tie breakers for determining home field advantage in the championship game, if both teams have the same conference record.]

H2H, BCS

MAC:

NFDC

H2H, DIV, DTD, NDR, NDTD

MWC:

NFC

BOWL

PAC 10:

NFC

H2H, TD, BCS, NEW

SEC:

H2H, DIV, DTD, NTD, NDR, NDTD, BCS

Sun Belt:

H2H, TD, DRAW

WAC:

NFC

H2H, BOWL

My Ideal:

Ok, now that I have gone through all the designs used (some of which might not break all ties, likely ending in an unspecified draw) what would I use if I were forging rules for a new conference?

I have to admit the NFC, Bowl option is appealing to me.

1) H2H - Might as well go with the flow and use the most popular and effective tiebreaker there is.

2) DIV - This works well since most divisions play a full round robin

If we get to here it is most likely that we have a 2009 Big Twelve South like three way tie.  (A five way two loss tie would be fun too)

3) NDR - Let the difference in strength of the cross over teams settle the dust

4) AGP - Provide an incentive for conference members to boost the conference stature by winning out of conference games

5) BCSE - Slightly better than a draw

If we get to step 5 it is a 1 in 100,000 chance two teams are tied in the BCS standings, for example two undefeated teams did not play each other this year (only possible in the MAC and Big 10).

6) Draw