Cougars sit 25th in initial CFP rankings

If either team wins out, which would include winning a head-to-head showdown on November 21, it will claim the SEC West crown. It hardly seems like too much to ask for a field that includes 128 teams.

This year’s squad was-is-bound to be particularly controversial. Notre Dame has a realistic chance at making it into the playoff if it wins out – and will pull away from an offensively challenged Pitt team.

Nick Saban and Alabama are fourth in the College Football Playoff rankings. If there are multiple undefeated teams (like we have right now), whatever the order is now, that order will generally stay until one of them loses and gets passed up by the rest.

Namely, there’s more to assessing team performance than wins and losses.

Let’s start with Alabama’s resume. Why discount what they’ve accomplished so far this season based on a question mark? Nobody else can claim that many good wins, even though Alabama has yet to beat a truly elite team.

“We discuss playing conditions, absolutely”, committee chair Jeff Long said in a teleconference with the media. Now, after starter Everett Golson transferred to Florida State, and backup Malik Zaire went down with an ankle injury in Week 2, Kizer is suddenly a true freshman starter, having started six games for the Fighting Irish. But had Michigan been able to simply get that punt off, it would have been the other way around.

Last week at Temple, after the Owls took a 10-7 lead in the second quarter, Brown had one of the top blocks of the season. Last week we saw many teams fall in the face of a truly tougher opponent.

And if the Panthers didn’t fall to North Carolina last week, this would be another top 25 matchup for the Irish. In fact, the F/+ statistical ratings are in near total agreement with the committee. At a few point, the committee has to reward team records, because that’s how college football works.

This is not “brand-name” bias by the committee.

Both teams have also played in close games this season.

As David Wunderlich of Team Speed Kills pointed out last week, that’s one of the problems with the committee’s purely ordinal rankings: The margin between teams can’t be anything other than units of ranking.

Louisiana State University is second in the CFP rankings, following by Ohio State University and the University of Alabama rounding out the top four. That is mind-bogglingly dumb. Offense shouldn’t be rewarded over defense. Memphis is the top team out of a non-Power 5 conference.

After that, things get murky. 8 pm from Tuscaloosa, you’re going to want to get your popcorn ready.

The Pac-12 is in trouble.

The Irish dropped a heartbreaking, double-overtime loss to No. 11 Clemson on September 19.

Through nine weeks (and one Tuesday night game) there are still ten undefeated teams in college football FBS. Look at them grouped by conferences. With 34 points, Houston topped the previous highs scored against the Commodores of 31 (Georgia) and 27 (Ole Miss). “That’s a prime example of a guy that’s not necessarily a big part of the play, being able to execute no matter what the situation is because you just never know what’s going to happen, whether it’s me pulling the ball and coming out, or C.J. Prosise bouncing each gap and winding up outside”.