could be fun to do a 2 year version in a world cup style.
first season is conference only to become tournament eligible. # eligible/conference is determined on strength of conference rankings using sp+. strength on conference is determined by averaging the individual teams in each conf sp+. the conferences above the average conf strength (all conf averaged together) get 1/3 of total # of conf members, confs under the average would get 1/4, with each getting a min of 1. Independents are considered a conference of their own.
this gives 34 teams, so the bottom 4 teams ranked in sp+ would play a play-in game.
this could be done after the first season, but for example, this is the current ranking:
for season 2, you could use sp+ to determine what pot those 32 are in. just use sp+ and go down the line in ranking, first 8 go in pot 1, next 8 in pot 2, etc.
end up with 8 groups of 4, they play round robin. top 2 from each group go onto knockout rounds, and then single elimination from there. or if we want more games, go to double elimination in knockout rounds. or expand to 64 and double group size and knockout rounds start at 32.
