The college football playoff debate is a spirited debate among college football fans, critics, school administrators and even coaches and players. The central debate is whether college football should institute a playoff system to replace the Bowl Championship Series (BCS). Some playoff proponents, however, have suggested modifying the Bowl Championship Series, rather than to destroy it or replace it with a different playoff system.

The BCS is the system established, prior to the 1998-99 football season, to select two participants to compete for college football's FBS division (formerly division I-A) national championship. There have been numerous controversies about the teams that should play for the college football national championship.

For a Playoff

The playoff supporters refer to their desire to see the college football national championship decided "on the field." They believe that the coaches' and media polls and the computer systems used to rank the various teams are either too biased or too static and scientific to extract the best match-up. Rather, proponents contend that the top college football teams should meet in various head-to-head match-ups in a bracket-style tournament to determine the ultimate two teams that play in the national championship game. Many proponents suggest that Bowl Championship Series supporters are only interested in the significant money created by college football's current bowl system.

Barack Obama has spoken out in favor of a playoff, before and after the 2008 U.S. presidential election. On November 18, 2008, in Obama's first interview as president-elect, Steve Kroft of 60 Minutes ended the interview with a question about the topic. Obama replied:

I think any sensible person would say that if you've got a bunch of teams who play throughout the season, and many of them have one loss or two losses, there's no clear decisive winner that we should be creating a playoff system. Eight teams. That would be three rounds, to determine a national champion. It would it would add three extra weeks to the season. You could trim back on the regular season. I don't know any serious fan of college football who has disagreed with me on this. So, I'm gonna throw my weight around a little bit. I think it's the right thing to do.

Against a Playoff

Playoff critics point to various obstacles and unintended consequences that a college football playoff would present. University presidents and administrators generally refer to the amount of time that a college football playoff could take away from student-athletes' studies, final exams, and other academic endeavors. Many critics present the argument that the Bowl Championship Series has established various complex contractual relationships among football teams, conferences, and bowl games that would be difficult, if not impossible, to overcome. Playoffs could also take away from the importance of the regular season and intensity of rivalries. Potentially, a single loss can end a team's chance at a National Championship or propel some other team into the title game under the current system. This makes regular-season college football games, particularly in the beginning of the season, more important than regular-season games in sports with a playoff.