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College Football: Big South champ will be playoff bound

FCS postseason to expand from 16 to 20 teams beginning 2010

By Travis Sawchik - tsawchik@thesunnews.com

The Football Championship Subdivision playoffs are expanding - and the Big South has an automatic invite to the dance.

Coastal Carolina athletics director Warren "Moose" Koegel told The Sun News on Friday that the NCAA has approved the selection committee's proposal to expand the playoff field from 16 to 20 teams beginning in 2010.

Koegel is a member of the committee.

After the expansion, all conferences that meet the criteria of having six teams together for at least two seasons will receive automatic bids, according to Big South commissioner Kyle Kallander.

With the addition of Stony Brook this year, the Big South will meet the criteria and will receive an automatic bid as part of the expansion, barring changes in the conference.

"It's good news for FCS football," Kallander said. "More teams in the playoffs means more interest in the sport and in the regular season.

"FCS football has one of the smallest ratios of teams in the postseason."

The FCS has 114 member schools eligible for postseason play. The expansion brings the percentage of teams that qualify for the postseason to 17.5.

By comparison, 19 percent of Division I men's basketball teams qualify for the NCAA tournament and 53 percent of Football Bowl Subdivision teams play in bowl games.

It is the first expansion of the FCS playoffs since the playoffs grew to 16 teams in 1986.

In its history the Big South has sent just one team - Coastal Carolina in 2006 - to the playoffs. To qualify, Coastal - or any other Big South team - needed a near-perfect record to earn one of eight at-large berths in the previous format.

The new playoffs will feature four first-round games with 12 teams earning byes. Koegel said the first round will be moved up a week, slotted to begin before Thanksgiving.

Koegel said the number - 20 teams - is a compromise from the committee's original desire to expand to 24 teams.

Nesbitt serious, but improving

The mother of Coastal Carolina football player Alphonso Nesbitt said her son is "progressing" but is still in serious condition after being involved in a hit-and-run incident.

Nesbitt was hit by a car early Sunday morning on Bluff Road in Columbia. He remains in an intensive care unit at Palmetto Health Richland Memorial Hospital.

Gwen Nesbitt said her son has "bleeding in his brain ... and weakness in the right side of his body." That is besides a broken right leg and a broken nose.

"Obviously we are all saying prayers for him," Koegel said. "A lot of people are sending cards ... we are offering all the support we can."

Nesbitt was a walk-on player who was in the running to contribute as a backup defensive back this coming season.

Police are still searching for suspects. His mother said the car involved was believed to be a 1998-99 silver Toyota Avalon.

CCU athletics director on the condition of football player Alphonso Nesbitt, who was hurt in a hit-and-run accident

Contact TRAVIS SAWCHIK at 843-626-0286.