Predicting College Football Playoff Rankings After Week 12: How Will SEC Be Set?
There wasn’t too much drama in the top five College Football Playoff rankings during Week 12, thanks to No. 1 Oregon’s comeback at Wisconsin, but No. 6 BYU lost for the first time and No. 7 Tennessee stood out the way in Georgia to bring about some changes in the rest of the top 10.
I was a little confused by the ambiguous power of the selection committee’s planning data, so I decided to take a closer look. I believe the strength of the committee’s scheduling metric is based more on opponents’ win-loss record than winning margin. Why is that important? Well, the strength of the schedule stats that I posted and that you will see on ESPN during the CFP rankings show are based on winning margin.
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So when you saw Georgia out of expected range last week despite playing one of the toughest schedules in the country, it’s because the opponents’ records aren’t as good as you might think. For example, a win over 4-6 Kentucky – a team ranked in the top 40 by my ratings – might be seen as worse than a win over 7-3 Colorado State, despite Kentucky being probably more than a touchdown favorite if those two teams played on a neutral field. It’s not a perfect process, but I had to adjust the strength of the scheduling component of my Playoff algorithm to account for this.
With that adjustment, let’s take a stab at projecting the committee’s rankings for this week after a lackluster performance last week.
Projected CFP Top 25 after week 12
|
Rk |
Team |
File |
SOS |
AP poll |
|---|---|---|---|---|
|
1 |
11-0 |
50 |
1 |
|
|
2 |
9-1 |
46 |
2 |
|
|
3 |
9-1 |
69 |
3 |
|
|
4 |
9-1 |
31 |
4 |
|
|
5 |
10-0 |
79 |
5 |
|
|
6 |
9-1 |
54 |
6 |
|
|
7 |
8-2 |
14 |
7 |
|
|
8 |
8-2 |
47 |
9 |
|
|
9 |
8-2 |
1 |
8 |
|
|
10 |
9-1 |
63 |
11 |
|
|
11 |
9-1 |
73 |
13 |
|
|
12 |
8-2 |
42 |
10 |
|
|
13 |
9-1 |
84 |
12 |
|
|
14 |
9-1 |
51 |
14 |
|
|
15 |
8-2 |
40 |
15 |
|
|
16 |
8-2 |
44 |
16 |
|
|
17 |
8-2 |
52 |
17 |
|
|
18 |
7-3 |
6 |
19 |
|
|
19 |
8-2 |
55 |
22 |
|
|
20 |
8-2 |
38 |
21 |
|
|
21 |
9-0 |
131 |
18 |
|
|
22 |
9-2 |
100 |
20 |
|
|
23 |
7-3 |
41 |
24 |
|
|
24 |
8-2 |
97 |
23 |
|
|
25 |
7-3 |
48 |
NO |
Next five: Missouri, Washington State, Pitt, Syracuse, Louisville
Biggest question: What to do about the logjam in the SEC?
Last week, the committee ranked No. 10 Alabama ahead of No. 11 Ole Miss, which was one spot ahead of No. 12 Georgia after the Rebels’ 28-10 head-to-head victory. Now, after Georgia downed Tennessee in Athens on Saturday, Tennessee enters the conversation as it falls from No. 7.
Considering that Alabama and Ole Miss both have wins against Georgia, I think the Volunteers will probably fall toward the bottom of that group despite their win against Alabama. Add to that the fact that Tennessee was below Indiana and BYU last week, and I’d be shocked at anything else. Tennessee isn’t out of the Playoff race by any means, but it may have to cause some chaos elsewhere. According to my forecast model, the Vols have just a 34 percent chance of making the field, compared to 94 percent for Texas, 88 percent for Georgia, 76 percent for Alabama, 70 percent for Ole Miss and 14 percent for Texas A&M.
And if you think that’s all hard to solve, make a case for Texas A&M to beat Texas in two weeks to create a six-team logjam. Good luck, selection committee.
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What the 12-team bracket would look like
The bracket below is based on the selection committee’s expected rankings for November 19. Find my forecasts for the final bracket here.
Note that, based on these rankings, Boise State would get a bye as the fourth-highest ranked conference champion, while BYU, the top Big 12 team, is the No. 12 seed.
(Photo: Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images)
