Follow TSS on Twitter @TheStudentSect
With the College Football Playoff, there are four spots and six group entities that can make up those four spots. I’m including the non-Power 5 group as a whole, and throwing Notre Dame somewhere within the Power 5, maybe with the ACC since the Irish need the shove.
My math tells me that means someone’s getting left out, and possibly two someones in the event we get multiple someones from the same conference. Granted, that would be total crap (technical term), but college football is known from time to time to deal in the world of intellectual crap and dishonesty.
So let’s rank them, from conferences least likely to be squeezed out … to those most likely.
6. Pac-12
Most of us with functioning honesty in our veins have come to realize the Pac might be on late, but it’s elite football. Teams from the league show well in bowl games even though it’s completely silly to gauge conference power by that standard alone. Pac-12 teams have gained the respect that whoever wins their conference — unless that team has a wild amount of losses — will probably get in. The reason the Pac-12 is ahead of the SEC is because at least in the preseason, its programs seem to feature real championship contenders in both divisions. On the other hand, the SEC is such that if the East champion sneaks out a win in the conference championship game, it could be detrimental to the West winner’s playoff chances because of the SEC West’s relative strength. USC and Oregon are playoff contender favorites, and you really don’t need to beat the brain to foresee a scenario where an Arizona State or Arizona get that type of respect either.
5. SEC
Personally, I think you’d need to lose at least three in the Pac-12 or SEC to even be thought of as being a champ in this conference (people’s opinion or the actual conference champ) and miss the playoff, but envision a scenario where Florida wins the East with four losses and plays Arkansas which wins the West with two losses, and Florida wins the conference title game … so bereft of legit out of conference wins, this would be DOOM for the SEC. It won’t happen, but it exists. The champion is getting in, folks, and probably from the SEC West regardless of the title game outcome, so long as mass tinkling of the bed doesn’t happen out of conference as it did in the bowl games.
4. Big Ten
For one, you’ve got the national intrigue of the defending champion coming from the conference and again being a viable contender. People will want to see if Ohio State can be knocked off no matter how many losses the Buckeyes have (assuming two or fewer). The other aspect of it is that the Big Ten really isn’t bad, especially at the top. Even if Ohio State stumbles, that’s a hell of a pelt on the wall for whomever defeats them, and that team would get in unless it falters the rest of its season. I think Michigan State has earned enough respect that the Spartans would be just fine with a loss, maybe even two.
3. Big 12
I’ve given hard thought to this one, and I chalk the Big 12’s better odds than the ACC up to having at least one ready-made title-contending team with enough returning power to be back in the mix (TCU)… and the Law of Incessant Complaining. Said law states that if you raise enough hell about some sort of injustice, people will just not want to hear it again, so you’ll get a minor bump in “benefit of the doubt” if a similar scenario happens again. As much as college football conferences love the money grab of a conference championship game, the Big 12 isn’t going that route right now, and I think this will be an important year to determine if this playoff stuff is going to force the conference’s hand in that matter. That would be sort of unfair, but … capitalism, baby.
2. ACC
This isn’t trying to bang on the ACC, but anyone has to be able to see this is an overall rebuilding year for the upper crust of the conference. Yes, that’s probably making too much of Jameis Winston’s departure and not enough of Everett Golson’s transfer, but the conference really looks like it has two power teams (Clemson and FSU) that will feast on a spread of improving but overall mediocre teams. You toss Notre Dame into the mix and it gets a little less hairy, but there’s just not a lot of proof across the conference of what we will see. I’m sort of talking myself out of this ranking now, because as talented as FSU and Clemson are, they could run the table. I just think that sort of thing is taxing, difficult, and eventually catches up with you if you don’t have the experience in that environment.
1. Non-Power 5
This is low-hanging fruit, but I’d rather be mentioned low-hanging fruit than be totally disregarded. It would be nice to eventually see a day when a non-AQ team goes unbeaten … just to see how it is treated. Certainly, barring an abhorrent out of conference schedule, that team would belong. So yes, I’d like to see a Boise State go unbeaten this year (the Broncos are probably the best bet to do this sort of sabre rattling along with Cincinnati) just to watch the committee squirm and have to make the tough decisions which — if they go the wrong way — could get lawyers involved. And lawyers make everything more fun.
