College Football Playoff Rankings Running Thread

You can't throw out some results you don't like. They played the game on the field. Baylor won that day, overcoming a 21-point deficit to do so. For TCU to be ranked ahead of them, it needs to be shown that TCU's body of work is clearly superior. Right now, I don't see that argument. If Baylor loses to someone down the road, fine.

Frankly, I think Ohio State is better than either of them.

 

If that scenario plays out, Ole Miss probably sneaks back into the playoff.
Auburn already has three conference losses. If Auburn beats Bama, and Ole Miss beats Mississippi State, and assuming there's no upsets this weekend, you end up with a three-way tie between Ole Miss, MSU and Alabama. Ole Miss wins that one since they'd have beaten the other two, and they go to Atlanta.

Ole Miss is also still lurking at No. 8 in the CFP rankings. So if they backdoor their way to an SEC title while Alabama and Mississippi State get knocked out -- picking up two quality wins over Mississippi State and Missouri/Georgia along the way, without a truly horrendous loss on their record -- it seems likely they'd also sneak back into the top four.
Missouri or Georgia would have a case as SEC champions, but they both have a couple of really bad losses on the resume and the common knowledge that the SEC East is garbage. As much as I hate the Big Ten, I can excuse Ohio State's early-season bedshitting against Virginia Tech easier than I can Missouri losing to Indiana and a depleted Georgia team, or Georgia losing to Florida and South Carolina.

 

Ohio State was breaking in a new quarterback who hadn't had much work with the starters until Braxton Miller got hurt.

I agree that a loss is a loss is a loss. But I think that OSU is the third-best one-loss team, behind Alabama and Oregon, and ahead of TCU and Baylor.

 

Do you really think such a thing matters? With teams that recruit from all over the place? Alabama has players from Utah, Ohio, Minnesota, Colorado, Michigan, New Jersey, Maryland, Virginia and Iowa on its roster. How many "snow games" has a typical Ohio State player seen? Three or four, maybe.

Sure, a finesse passing team might have more trouble in inclement conditions. But Alabama typically isn't built like that. When they beat you, it's because they are bigger, stronger, faster and better coached than you. And that's true when it's 90 in the shade or 20 in the snow.

 

Florida St will drop out of top 4 next week due to library shooter

 

Ohio State beat a ho-hum 6-4 Penn State team 31-24 in double overtime on Oct. 25, in Barrett's seventh start. Beat Minnesota by seven in Minneapolis; TCU beat Minnesota by 23 in Fort Worth.

Of course, the Gophers just might lose three straight to lose the season, finish 7-5 and render those games moot -- and it would likely mean the Buckeyes carry only one win against a current top-25 opponent (Sparty) going into the Big Ten championship game. That would (should) be enough to force the committee second guess about whether OSU was that good, or whether those routs were a byproduct of the opponents.

Given that Baylor could have two against top-15 opponents (TCU, K-State), or that TCU would have at least one (K-State) with another of its wins matching OSU's likely third-best win (Minnesota), I'm thinking the Buckeyes still have quite a lot to prove. There's no real separation among those one-loss teams.

Heck, even Alabama and Mississippi State -- for as much as people love that SEC eye test -- have only one win apiece against current top-25 playoff ranking opponents. If we're talking full bodies of work, it's clear that they have some work to do, too.

 

Yes, yes I do. Alabama and Arkansas are probably best built to (offensive style wise) to handle it, but you simply can't convince me that it wouldn't impact a team from the deep south to play in those conditions. Not just snow...the cold. Your limbs simply don't work the same. It burns to inhale deeply. Your fingers lose feeling. The ball is like kicking a rock. The ball and the field are both damned slick. It's conditions that a warmer weather team simply wouldn't be able to replicate in practice. Yep...I'll take the team that used to those conditions, as part of their daily life, every freakin' time.

Plus, come on.....it'd be FUN to watch

 

Snow would be the difference, because contrary to popular belief it does get pretty cold in most of the deep South by mid-to-late November. (Last Saturday was an example).

I covered a game at LSU years ago where the wind was blowing so cold off the river into the press box that my fingers were stiffening up and I couldn't type.

 

Playing in the snow, if it's not like a blizzard, is fun and easier than playing in heavy rain. Windy and cold without snow is worse, and as Steak notes, that's not unheard of in the south.

 

Seriously? It was 70 in Ganesville last Saturday (75 average). 82 in Miami. 58 in Baton Rouge (72 average). 48 in Athens (66 average), 53 (68 average) in Tuscaloosa.

It 22 in Minneapolis (with snow & single digit wind chills), 36 in Columbus, 29 in South Bend, 27 in Madison, 32 in Ann Arbor, 35 in State College.

These are NOT the same. No one in the SEC played in anything resembling what Ohio-State and Minnesota played in last week.

No offense folks, but if you think a southern based team coming north on the first weekend of December, wouldn't be impacted by the weather....you're delusional.

 

It is USUALLY warmer in the south than the north, but not always. Likewise, it is not always as cold and snowy in the north in football season as it has been the past week to 10 days. Even in January, I have covered Patriots home playoff games where temperature at kickoff was minus-four, and games where it was in the 60s. Teams that can't cope with weather as a variable don't usually make playoffs at any level.

 

Last Saturday wasn't the first week in December, was it?

And you may not be aware, but in really bad conditions a major school will practice inside. They have things to work on, and anything that gets in the way of a good practice typically will be avoided.

Welcome to Nebraska. Brrrrrrrrr!