re: Uitimately, not having a championship game screwed Big 12

It's bad luck really. It's obviously set up that way to give them the best chance of making playoff and it did the opposite.
If a few more teams would have another loss. They could say they have two Champs deserving to be in. Or if the team that loss the head to head has a better resume and is higher ranked it protects them from NOT being a conference champ.
This is why they set it up this way and I feel the committee knows this and was pissed about them trying to stack their odds. What will be hilarious is if the opposite happens next year after they change the head to head champ rule..
Example: Oklahoma and Baylor have one loss. Oklahoma wins conference but has another loss to a non conference team like FSU. Their highest ranked team is not a conf. Champ