It could all be so simple. Or it could be the greatest mess the sport has seen.
College football is hurtling towards a dramatic final weekend, with eight genuine contenders for the four spots in the yearly playoff – but, because it’s college football, of course things can’t be easy.
For those unaware, unlike other sports which decide their post-season participants on the field, the sheer size of college football means a panel of experts (who are heavily influenced by computer polls and data) determines the four teams who’ll play off for the national championship.
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Don’t worry, it used to be much stupider – they only picked two teams for a while there, and before that, there wasn’t even an official championship game unless the complicated bowl system happened to place the top two teams in one match-up.
Starting next year, the playoff will expand to 12 teams, ensuring greater access and meaning the furious debates over snubs will involve sides who almost certainly weren’t going to win the title anyway. But in the very first year of the four-team playoff, fourth seed Ohio State won it all, showing how important the slight expansion was.
Generally the playoff committee has done a fine job of picking the four playoff teams, because they haven’t been left with any truly tough decisions – 2014, when the aforementioned Ohio State snuck in over Big 12 co-champions TCU and Baylor, being the main exception.
And it’s possible 2023 will be simple enough. After all, the top four teams in the latest rankings are all unbeaten, and can all win their conference championships this weekend to ensure a perfect quartet of 13-0 teams qualify. So if you don’t like controversy, you want Georgia, Michigan, Washington and Florida State to win.
But if even one loses, there could be utter chaos.
COLLEGE FOOTBALL PLAYOFF RANKINGS (Pre-Conference Championships)
1. Georgia (12-0)
2. Michigan (12-0)
3. Washington (12-0)
4. Florida State (12-0)
5. Oregon (11-1)
6. Ohio State (11-1)
7. Texas (11-1)
8. Alabama (11-1)
1 plays 4, 2 plays 3 in semi-finals
CONFERENCE CHAMPIONSHIPS SCHEDULE (Relevant games only, all times AEDT)
5 Oregon vs 3 Washington (Saturday 12pm)
18 Oklahoma State vs 7 Texas (Sunday 4am)
1 Georgia vs 8 Alabama (Sunday 8am)
2 Michigan vs 16 Iowa (Sunday 12pm)
14 Louisville vs 4 Florida State (Sunday 12pm)
Let’s break down the scenarios, and see where it could get complicated.
Michigan seems almost certain to beat Iowa, posted as 23-point favourites at most betting outlets, so we’re not really going to entertain the Wolverines losing. After all the Hawkyes just can’t score, so unless they’re winning 2-0, the No.2 team in the nation will be back in the playoff.
The winner of the final Pac-12 title game, Washington or Oregon, will almost certainly make the four. The Huskies would be undefeated if they knock off the Ducks again, while the Ducks would’ve gained revenge for their one tight loss all year – and added a win over a 12-0 side to their resume – after a series of dominant victories across the rest of their schedule. Oregon is the reasonably strong betting favourite.
So that’s two spots taken. But then things get a bit iffy.
Let’s start with Florida State. It’s hard to imagine an unbeaten power conference team possibly getting left out of the playoff, so if they defeat Louisville on Sunday, we’d be shocked to see them drop out. The committee always claims to be picking the “best” teams not the “most deserving”, yet they always end up picking based on the latter, because unimpressive unbeaten teams like Iowa a few years back were in position to make the playoff until they finally lost.
The problem with the Seminoles is the loss of their starting quarterback Jordan Travis for the season, which takes them from ‘maybe the worst top four team but could keep it close’ to ‘yeah they’re probably gonna get smashed by Georgia or Michigan aren’t they’.
For the purposes of picking the best, the committee would probably love to see the Noles lose, since that means they don’t have to begrudgingly slot them into fourth. But again, a 13-0 ACC champion getting left out would just be insane.
It only becomes a possibility if there’s an upset in the SEC Championship game between Georgia and Alabama. The Bulldogs are on a 29-game winning streak off the back of consecutive national titles, and are solid favourites against the Crimson Tide, who have had shaky moments all year including needing rivals Auburn to completely stuff up on a 4th and 31 to win the Iron Bowl.
If Alabama wins, though, the committee has to make a brutal decision.
Do they leave out the back-to-back national champions Georgia, who again have won 29 straight games, especially if it’s a close loss? Or do they give them so much respect compared to Florida State and say ‘screw it, they’d win if they played the game, so we’re making the call anyway’? The latter would be one of the most controversial calls in the sport’s history but on paper you can see the argument.
And then there’s Texas, who are pretty big favourites to win the Big 12… and actually beat Alabama earlier in the season.
So let’s assume Alabama and Texas both win. Each would be 12-1 with a conference championship, the Longhorns having lost to rivals Oklahoma earlier in the season. But the SEC champion is going to get a lot more respect because of the degree of difficulty in that conference. Yet surely the on-field result means something!
The Athletic’s Stewart Mandel believes in this scenario, if Florida State, Alabama and Texas all win, then Florida State and Alabama would make the final four, and neither Georgia and Texas would.
Again, this is crazy. Texas beat Alabama and has the same record! And won its conference too! But the head-to-head result would be ignored because the SEC is (correctly) perceived to be better than the Big 12. (Which, along with money, is why Texas is leaving for the SEC shortly.)
But the alternative might be even crazier – leaving out both the 12-1 SEC champion and the 12-1 back-to-back national champion who lost in the SEC title game.
This is the world the playoff committee absolutely does not want – Alabama, Florida State and Texas all winning. (Throw a Michigan upset in there and it gets even stupider.) There’s no way to make everyone happy, and the probably correct call of leaving out Texas and Georgia sounds mind-boggling.
The one scenario where Ohio State makes it, after their loss to Michigan last week, involves three upsets – Washington beating Oregon, Louisville beating Florida State, and Oklahoma State beating Texas.
In that world the Buckeyes, who are inactive this week and rank sixth, would definitely move above the Seminoles and would cleanly pass the two-loss Ducks. (If Oregon beats Washington, it’d be close between the 12-1 Huskies and 11-1 Buckeyes, and you could definitely argue the former has a stronger resume despite looking less impressive over the back half of the season.)
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