No, the CFB Playoff is not more exciting than March Madness

Former Texas A&M football head coach Jackie Sherrill said the new College Football Playoff system is better than March Madness now.

Jackie Sherrill was the head coach for Texas A&M football and led them through one of the most successful stretches in school history. His run of three consecutive conference titles from 1985-1987 has only been done two other times by the program. He is honored and revered by Aggies everywhere, even though he only spent seven seasons with the team.

So why is Sherrill’s name coming up now? He recently made some interesting comments about the playoff systems for the NCAA’s two biggest sports.

"“The playoff system just moved it ahead of basketball,” Sherrill told The Caller of USA Today. “For years, March Madness was the biggest thing in college athletics, not now. You really don’t even hear about basketball until it gets to that time.”"

That’s a fair point by Sherrill, although I have to nitpick. To be honest, even before college football introduced the playoff system, the casual college basketball fans were never really interested in the games on a national level before March. Most fans pay attention to their team and then get excited when tournament time comes around.

The BCS Rankings and now the College Football Playoff committee’s rankings were always the talk of October-November-December.

However, he does make a good point that the playoff system has elevated the level of excitement for college football. It makes those two semifinal bowl games mean so much more when a national championship is at stake. It literally tripled (one BCS National Championship to three CFB playoff games) the amount of high-stakes post season games than we had before.

It sparks the conversation of how many teams should be included in the playoff, but that will never change. Whether it’s four, eight, 10, 16 or 68, there will always be teams that feel they don’t deserve to be there. Funny enough, in the two years where the conversation was loudest about teams not deserving to make the field in 2014 and 2017, Ohio State and Alabama both won the title.

Having said all of that, I’m not convinced the College Football Playoff has surpassed March Madness in terms of excitement. It just never will until there are more teams involved. You cannot match the level of insanity that comes from buzzer beaters from an underdog, such as Loyola Chicago in this year’s tournament.

College football’s regular season is miles ahead of any other sport in terms of excitement, and that includes the professional league from the same sport. College Football games are just more important than any other sport or league’s regular season. But the playoff system isn’t better than the NCAA Tournament.

Upsets are a regular occurrence in March Madness. Given the CFB Playoff is the nation’s top four seeds, even a lower seed winning is not that shocking. Though you know at least one or two upsets are going to happen in March Madness, you have no idea when they will happen.

Do you remember who lost to Ohio State in the first game in 2014 off the top of your head? Probably not, but you still remember VCU and George Mason’s Final Four runs, Butler’s two national championship runs, and you will never forget where you were when you heard Virginia was the first team to get knocked off by a 16 seed. Go UMBC Retrievers.

Next: 2018 game-by-game Aggie football predictions

The feats that no one thought possible other than the guys inside that locker room are what make March Madness so incredibly special. Without more of the “little guy” in the CFB Playoff, it will always come up short in terms of excitement.

Jeff Shull is the Site Expert for the Gig Em Gazette on FanSided. Follow him on Twitter, and be sure to follow the Gig Em Gazette on Facebook and Twitter.