SWAC prefers classics over FCS

— Monte Coleman took a seat inside the J. Thomas May Field House two weeks ago, less than an hour after his team pulled out a 42-41 victory over Prairie View A&M at Golden Lion Stadium.

The fifth-year Arkansas-Pine Bluff coach took a breath, then expressed his appreciation for what his Golden Lions had finally completed.

“I’m glad this season is over,” he said. “I love this team. I love these seniors. But they will say also that they’re glad that part is over. Let’s go win a championship.”

UAPB (9-2) still has two more weeks before it plays Jackson State in the Southwestern Athletic Conference Championship Game, an appreciated break to rest and heal up after having won six consecutive games to capture its first SWAC Western Division title since 2006.

The break exists because of the SWAC’s television contract with ESPN that will show the Dec. 8 conference championship game from Birmingham, Ala., but also because of the conference’s postseason preference.

The 20-team NCAA Football Championship Subdivision playoffs begin today, but no SWAC team is involved.

The league’s champion doesn’t receive an automatic qualifying spot into the playoffs, and no SWAC team has participated in the playoffs since Jackson State lost to Western Illinois 31-24 in 1997.

The SWAC is one of two conferences that choose not to compete in the FCS playoffs; the other being the Ivy League. (Another conference, the Pioneer League, will begin participating in the playoffs next year.)

And the SWAC has no desire to change its postseason path, deciding its “classic games” and championship game with prime television slots and payouts that come with those are a bigger benefit than a playoff game that would likely end with a loss.

SWAC Commissioner Duer Sharp said the league’s presidents and chancellors don’t even discuss the matter when they meet for the league’s spring meetings.

“During my nine-year tenure, it’s never been brought up,” Sharp said. “The exposure from ESPN and their family of networks and the tradition [of the classic games], you know, that’s really what the SWAC is about. There are a lot of classics that [fans] are wrapped up in. It’s hard to move away from that.”

To compete in the FCS playoffs, the SWAC would have to give up, or try to move, three of its best TV slots of the season.

It would be hard to keep the Turkey Day Classic between Alabama State and NCAA Division II Tuskegee on Thanksgiving, a series that dates to 1924, considering the playoffs begin two days later.

The league’s Bayou Classic between Grambling State and Southern University of Baton Rouge held each year in New Orleans has been played on the last Saturday in November since 1974 and has been televised by NBC since 1991.

The SWAC also would have to move, or eliminate entirely, the SWAC Championship Game if it chose to participate in the playoffs.

Sharp said if those games were moved, the chance for prime TV slots would diminish.

“When you move games off of their traditional date, you’re probably going to, how can I say it, lose your right to that time slot,” Sharp said. “When you move off your date, you no longer have the priority.”

But do SWAC players and coaches wonder how they would stack up in a national field?

Coleman, who has been on the UAPB staff since 2003, said even though most head coaches are happy to comply with the SWAC’s preference, the curiosity is there.

“It would be nice to see us in the FCS playoffs with some of the other schools,” Coleman said. “I think it would give the conference a little more notoriety, to see how we fare. But, when you’re in Rome, do as the Romans do. We’re in the SWAC, so we do as the SWAC does.”

The only change in the SWAC’s postseason structure that Sharp said has been considered is a possible meeting of the champion of the SWAC and the champion of Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference. The MEAC is another league consisting of Historically Black Colleges and Universities.

It was an idea that would create a mythical black college national championship, and it was was gaining traction two years ago but died out when the MEAC decided to keep its automatic qualifier to the FCS playoffs.

The game, Sharp said, would have been played in Atlanta and would have been televised on one of ESPN’s networks. But until that happens, if it ever does, the SWAC’s postseason plans probably won’t change.

“I think the presidents and chancellors are very happy,” Sharp said. “They really want us to grow the championship game. I think right now, it’s status quo.”

Up next WHAT SWAC Championship Game WHEN Noon Dec. 8 WHERE Birmingham, Ala.

RECORDS UAPB: 9-2; Jackson State 7-4 RADIO KAUP-FM, 89.7, in Pine Bluff TV ESPNU

Sports, Pages 26 on 11/24/2012

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