The top five teams in the College Football Playoff rankings stayed the same, even as results on the field and key metrics indicated change may have been in order.
It seems inevitable there will be another debate over Big Ten vs. SEC when it comes to regarding the strength of the conferences.
CFP chairman Mack Rhodes acknowledged the committee held a lengthy discussion when evaluating No. 2-ranked Indiana and No. 3-ranked Texas A&M.
The IU eye test
The Hoosiers (10-0, 7-0 Big Ten) scored a last-minute 27-24 road win at Penn State, a team led by an interim head coach that has lost six consecutive games and sits next-to-last in the 18-member conference.
The Aggies (9-0, 6-0 SEC), playing a road game in the SEC for a third consecutive week, beat a No. 22-ranked Missouri team 38-17.
Texas A&M has the No. 15-ranked schedule strength, per ESPN metrics, while Indiana’s schedule strength is 33rd.
“There was a discussion about body of work, when we think about those teams, so we looked at Indiana’s win at Oregon and Indiana’s win at Iowa, and Texas A&M’s win in South Bend (vs. Notre Dame) and the most recent win against Missouri,” Rhoads said.
“Indiana, their win against Penn State, you know, the conversation about Missouri, Missouri is a really good team but probably not the team that they’ve been starting their third quarterback a true freshman, that’s a really tough spot for that young man.
“When you look at those two teams, they are really close defensively, give Indiana the edge, and they are really close offensively, and certainly gave the slight edge there. Indiana finding a way to win, Fernando Mendoza, the second-rated quarterback in passing efficiency, so those were all conversations.”
Transitive properties
Ohio State, the No. 1-ranked team, has the 41st-ranked schedule and boasts the Big Ten’s most impressive non-conference win – a 14-7 home victory over No. 10 Texas in both teams’ season-opening game.
The Longhorns actually outgained the Buckeyes, 336-203, rushing for 166 yards.
It’s worth noting that Florida, a team that is 3-6 overall and 2-4 in the SEC, won more decisively at home over Texas (29-21) than the Buckeyes did earlier in the season.
The Gators out-gained the Longhorns 457-341, holding Texas to just 52 yards rushing – far less than an Ohio State team the CFP committee champions for its defense.
“It looks like the same old circus to me,” SEC Network analyst Paul Finebaum said on Monday. “They get in there, they’re all collegial and they’re all friendly, and they all think like a committee, and that’s not the way you’re supposed to do it.
“You’re supposed to think like a football mind should think: who is the best team?”
The committee’s decision not to elevate Texas A&M over Indiana – and to bump Texas Tech over an Ole Miss team (9-1) that defeated The Citadel 49-0 – outgaining the FCS opponent 603 yards to 106 yards with 35 first downs to 5 – will not sit well with SEC coaches.
Riding Red Raiders
The Big 12 conference Red Raiders scored a 29-7 home win over fellow Big 12 member and previously No. 7-ranked BYU (8-1).
The Rebels, with a No. 32 schedule strength, suffered their only loss of the season at No. 5 Georgia, 43-35.
Texas Tech, with a No. 48 schedule strength, suffered their only loss against an unranked Arizona State team, 26-22, that lost earlier in the season at unranked SEC team Mississippi State (24-20).
“The longest discussion that we had in the room was Texas Tech and Ole Miss,” Rhoads said. “Texas Tech’s win this past weekend against BYU was really convincing on both sides of the ball.
“We really looked at Texas Tech’s two top 13 wins, BYU and Utah. Ole Miss had the really good win at Oklahoma and also a win against LSU, but Texas Tech is highly regarded by the committee.”
Same old circus
There were concerns after last season that schedule strength was not weighed as heavily as the CFP indicated that it would be, resulting in three 3-loss SEC teams not making the 12-team field.
Rhoads discussed the new schedule-related metric that was introduced, and the “tweak” to the previous schedule strength.
“We introduced the new metric, which is record strength, which measures how well a team performs against its schedule,” Rhoads said last week, “and that’s a cumulative sum of scores as we progress through the year.
“And then we took schedule strength and we tweaked it … we put more weight on the stronger teams, and so that was the adjustment for schedule strength.”
Missouri coach Eli Drinkwitz pointed out last week that Texas A&M’s superior schedule strength did not factor in, and indicated he took no comfort in having three former coaches – none of whom were head coaches in the SEC -- on the CFP committee.
“Every coach has a different taste in what they’re looking for on film,” Drinkwitz said. “Some guys are defensive coaches, they’re going to evaluate defensive strengths. Some guys are offensive coaches, they’re going to evaluate offensive strengths.
“Some people don’t like other people, some people rank their conference better than others. Some people think that because they played in this conference, it’s going to be different.”
The three former coaches on the committee are Mark Dantonio (Michigan State), Mike Riley (Nebraska, Oregon State) and Chris Ault (Nevada).
Golden Domers
Vanderbilt (8-2) represented another instance of an SEC team with a stronger schedule strength (21st) being ranked behind two other teams with similar records, Notre Dame (7-2, 30th) and Utah (7-2, 52nd).
“We have conversation about Vanderbilt playing an Auburn team that had a coaching change, having to take to overtime and win at home,” Rhoads said. “A lot of conversation about Diego Pavia, maybe the most important individual to their team as they go. The wins versus South Carolina, LSU and Missouri, really good wins
“But when we looked at Utah, the convincing win over Arizona State and then Cincinnati …. And Notre Dame is a team that has won seven straight. I think early in the year they lost two by a total of four points; defensively they struggled a little bit, it feels like the Arkansas game was a turning point for them offensively. The committee, we really like Notre Dame as a complete team, defensively, and their run game is as good as anybody if not the best in the country … then (Freshman CJ) Carr at the quarterback spot, he’s the third-ranked quarterback in terms of passing efficiency in the country.”
The third set of rankings will come out at 8:30 p.m. next Tuesday, but the only rankings that truly resonate will be the final set (noon, Dec. 7), which will set the 12-team College Football Playoff field.
The respective conference championship games, played on Dec. 5 and Dec. 6, will factor heavily into the final rankings.
Here’s how the 12-team playoff would be seeded if the season were to end today:
First-round bye
1 Ohio State (Big Ten champ)
2. Indiana
3. Texas A&M (SEC champ)
4. Alabama
First Round
(on higher-seeded team’s campus)
5. Georgia vs. No. 12 South Florida (Group of 5)
6. Texas Tech (Big 12 champ) vs. No. 11 Miami (ACC champ)
7. Ole Miss vs. No. 10 Texas
8. Oregon vs. No. 9 Notre Dame
Quarterfinals
Georgia-South Florida winner vs. No. 4 Alabama
Notre Dame-Oregon winner vs. No. 1 Ohio State
Texas Tech-Miami winner vs. No. 3 Texas A&M
Texas-Ole Miss winner vs. No. 2 Indiana
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