Downside is the pearl-clutching possibility of OSU/UM in back-to-back weeks.
Personally I am not a fan of rematches but I mind them less the longer amount of time there is between the first and the second game. For example, Ohio State played Oregon early this year and if Oregon had won the P12CG they would have met again in the RoseBowl. That, to me, isn't a big problem since game one was a LONG time before the rematch so we would get to see how the teams had evolved over the interim.
Conversely, as a tOSU fan I'd love for my team to have another shot at Michigan in round one of an expanded playoff. It would be great for the Buckeyes to get a do-over but it would suck for the sport in general and it would REALLY suck for Michigan. The Wolverines either win again (no big deal), or they lose and the first game becomes an irrelevant historical footnote.
The point I was getting at was that if we went to this I think you would necessarily have to get rid of final weekend match-ups that were reasonably likely to result in a rematch a week later. Counting every team that at least tied for a spot in the theoretical non-divisional CG from 2014-2021 those are:
- tOSU all eight years
- Wisconsin three times
- Michigan twice
- Northwestern twice
- Penn State twice
- Michigan State twice
- Iowa once
- Indiana once
- Minnesota once
tOSU/M would end up getting repeated a week later too often based on this history.
Wisconsin could probably still finish with MN because it is exceedingly unlikely that MN could make the CG in a year when they lost to UW.
Iowa/UNL is fine at least for now.
IU/PU is fine at least for now.
NU/IL is fine at least for now.
M/MSU could probably finish with each other since it is fairly unlikely that MSU would make it in a year when they lost to M.
The four remaining teams are tOSU, PSU, UMD, RU. Buckeyes/Nittany Lions is hardly any better than tOSU/M and the Nittany Lions have some history with UMD so I'd go tOSU/RU, PSU/UMD. Thus my final weekend match-ups would be:
- UW/MN the Ax Game
- IU/PU the Old Oaken Bucket
- Iowa/UNL whatever they call this
- NU/IL they have a name for this too, Land of Lincoln trophy or somesuch?
- M/MSU they have a name for this one too
- PSU/UMD the old Eastern Team throwback challenge
- tOSU/RU I'd try to sell Macy's a sponsorship deal and stick this in Yankee Stadium every year as the Macy's Thanksgiving Weekend Challenge (adding in MBB and WBB and maybe hockey all in NYC).