Have a conference championship. Let's say for example, Texas goes undefeated in conference play and 2nd-place TCU has 2 regular season conference losses, including to Texas. But, in the conference championship game, TCU beats Texas and neither team now goes to the playoff. Could you imagine the outrage in Austin. It's unfair to make a true champion have to beat a team again to win the conference. It works in conferences without a round robin schedule because there is no true champion after the regular season.