The College football Playoff Selection Committee was consistently inconsistent when it came to its application of strength of schedule.

From week to week, it was hard to discern how much value was placed on SOS compared to record, quality wins, bad losses, head-to-head, road performance or the oh-so-popular eye test.

The eye test. Maybe that’s why Indiana was ranked in the top five when it had a SOS of 106.

Maybe that’s why SMU was ranked No. 8 in the next-to-last (I don’t like the word penultimate) ratings despite a SOS of around 60 at the time. That allowed the Mustangs to stay ahead of Alabama because the committee was not going to set a precedent of dropping a team that played for its conference championship below a team that didn’t make its conference title game – overall resume be damned.

To be sure, ranking the top 10-12 teams in the nation is extremely difficult, especially when they play different schedules and different styles and face different challenges on the road.

You can’t tell me playing a game at SMU is harder than playing a game at Tennessee or Alabama or Georgia or LSU or Florida or Texas. Stadiums that seat 32,000 aren’t as noisy or intimidating as those with over 100,000.

While I feel the CFP committee mostly got the field right, I am concerned going forward about two things that revolve around strength of schedule.

Former Alabama coach Nick Saban and current Alabama athletic director Greg Byrne believe playoff-caliber teams will re-evaluate (code word for soften) their non-conference schedules because the CFP committee clearly valued wins over SOS. In other words, it’s better to go 11-1 with a cupcake schedule than 9-3 with one of the toughest schedules in the nation.

Now, the makeup of the 13-member committee changes from time to time, so maybe another committee would put greater emphasis on SOS.

But if it doesn’t, will Alabama play Ohio State in the regular season, which it is schedule to do?

Will Texas go to Michigan, or LSU play USC and UCLA in the same year, or Clemson play Georgia and South Carolina in the same year or Georgia play Clemson and Georgia Tech in the same year?

I’m a huge fan of attractive non-conference games, especially in the first month of a season before conference play begins. But I’m concerned about the message the CFP committee sent.

Here’s my other concern: The SEC has been debating for years whether to go from an eight-game to a nine-game league schedule.

I much prefer nine.

But the SEC’s argument to stay at eight would be to avoid beating up on each other – because the committee values record over SOS.

And since not all conferences are created equal – the Big 12, for example, is inferior to the SEC – the SEC likely will avoid playing nine league games. The SEC will also point out the league won six of the last nine national championships under the four-team playoff system.

If it ain’t broke, why fix it.

While I’d like the SEC to play nine conference games, I disagree with the narrative the SEC should be punished by the selection committee because it plays one less league game than, say, the Big Ten.

Teams should be judged by the overall schedule, not if they play nine league games.

And, this might surprise you, the SEC had far and away the most difficult SOS of any conference while playing just eight league games.

Here are the numbers to back that up:

The SEC has the five toughest schedules (Georgia, Mississippi State, Kentucky, Oklahoma, Florida) in ESPN’s Football Power Index – the guide apparently used by the selection committee.

It wouldn’t be fair to penalize Georgia (which favors a nine-game SEC slate) since it beefed up its non-league schedule by playing Clemson and Georgia Tech and has the No. 1 SOS.

The SEC also has seven of the top 10 in SOS, nine of the top 13, 13 of the top 20 and 15 of the top 30.

The Big Ten has three of the top 10 in SOS, five of the top 20 and 10 of the top 30.

The weakest SEC schedule was ranked No. 33 (Ole Miss). All others were in the top 30.

The Big Ten had eight teams ranked outside the top 30 and four outside the top 40.

The SEC clearly had more teams with a better SOS, but the SEC got three teams into the 12-team field, and the Big Ten got four.

That likely means the SEC won’t schedule as many marquee non-conference matchups or go to a nine-game SEC schedule.

I would understand the SEC’s logic. But I don’t have to like it.