The members of the College Football Playoff selection committee are not paid for their services. But they’ll earn their keep this weekend, as they will actually be forced to make some difficult decisions.
BYU lost to Texas Tech in the Big 12 championship game, which means that at least two of the following teams should make the 12-team CFP: Alabama, Notre Dame and/or Miami.
Now, only one of those three teams played this weekend, and that one team (Alabama) got blown out. The Crimson Tide essentially no-showed against No. 3 Georgia in Atlanta on Saturday afternoon, losing 28-7 and delivering Alabama its second loss in its past four games. The CFP selection committee has — in the past — penalized teams that slumped into Selection Sunday while propping up teams trending upward, so that is one factor to keep in mind.
It’s really not clear what the selection committee is going to do this year. Last year, teams that were already “in” the bracket as of the committee’s pre-championship weekend rankings did not fall out of the field after participating in (and losing) conference championship games. SMU entered the weekend ranked No. 8 and fell two spots to No. 10 but stayed in the field. Ultimately, the committee did not have to decide whether or not conference championship games are worth putting on.
Now, it might have to make such a statement. If 10-3 Alabama falls out of the field entirely after being ranked No. 9 on Tuesday night, there will be significant fallout from such a decision. SEC commissioner Greg Sankey would, undoubtedly, be furious if a team that reached (and lost) the SEC championship game (as the No. 1 seed in the league) got knocked out of the 12-team CFP when it was already penciled into the field a few days ago.
If that game can hurt you so badly, it would completely disincentivize every team from wanting to play in the SEC championship game moving forward — which could lead to the elimination of conference championship games in general. That is what’s at stake in Sunday’s decision by the committee. It’s not something committee members should take lightly.
At the top, I expect that the committee will (obviously) slide Indiana up to No. 1 after the Hoosiers’ win over then-No. 1 Ohio State in the Big Ten championship game. I only dropped the Buckeyes to No. 2 because it was a three-point loss to the other best team in the country. No offense to Georgia, but I can’t see the committee penalizing the Buckeyes too harshly after such an evenly matched game.
I’ve got both Tulane and James Madison making the field out of the American conference and the Sun Belt, respectively. CFP rules state that the five highest-ranked FBS conference champions automatically qualify for the 12-team field — and, in most years, we’d assume that four of those champions would be Power 4 teams. Not this year. Not this ACC. An 8-5 Duke team that wasn’t ranked in Tuesday’s Top 25 (which included JMU at No. 25) is unlikely to leapfrog the Dukes, now the Sun Belt champions.
But, let’s address the pressing question: What will the committee make of the Miami-Notre Dame debate? We’ve all spent the past month arguing about the result of a Week 1 game. Should Miami’s three-point win over Notre Dame knock the Fighting Irish out of the Playoff three months later? Or does it matter more that Miami’s two losses are worse than the two losses Notre Dame has?
The selection committee has talked a great deal about how impressed it is with Notre Dame’s consistency over its 10-game winning streak and how much its defense has improved since September. But, five days ago, it also said that Alabama’s win over 5-7 Auburn was so impressive it had to jump the Crimson Tide ahead of the Fighting Irish.
So, the committee remains confusing — and unreliable. It seemingly makes up reasons to justify a ranking after the fact … even if it’s inconsistent with its evaluation of another team in the same set of rankings. Or the way it viewed these teams a week ago.
Ultimately, I think the committee will choose the easiest of its difficult paths. I think the committee will drop Alabama two spots after its blowout loss to Georgia (while highlighting the Tide’s win over the Bulldogs and other top-25 victories to keep it ahead of BYU, Vanderbilt and others).
But that would drop Alabama behind both Notre Dame and Miami, which would allow two of the most nitpicked teams of the season to both get into the 12-team field — and it would essentially run cover for the ACC to make sure it has a CFP participant. At that point, the committee could even rank the Hurricanes one spot ahead of the Irish due to that Week 1 result. If it wants to. The committee finally put Texas ahead of Vanderbilt (a team it beat) this week when the two teams landed back-to-back in the rankings, after all.
So much of this comes down to which teams the committee likes right now — and what it decides to justify. We’ll find out more at noon ET on Sunday.
