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Someone from the SEC is going to get squeezed out of the College Football Playoff.
Probably. Maybe? While getting three teams into the 12-team field seems guaranteed and landing four looks pretty likely, there will be a fifth team from this power conference with a playoff case left outside the postseason picture.
Mathematically, there’s a plausible scenario where these five SEC front-runners post double-digit wins during the regular season:
Georgia goes 12-1, losing once in the regular season but winning the conference championship;
Texas goes 11-2, with the second loss coming to Georgia in early December in Atlanta;
Alabama finishes 10-2 with both defeats coming in two of four games – against Georgia and Missouri at home and Tennessee and LSU on the road;
And both Tennessee and Mississippi go 10-2, which might be underselling the potential of these two contenders.
If you accept that the top four from the SEC make the playoff, whether that fifth team grabs an at-large bid depends on how the selection committee views the second-place finishers from the Big 12 and ACC. Would the committee be willing to overlook a team that reached its conference title game in favor of one that finished fifth in its league?
For now, USA TODAY Sports’ updated playoff bracketology goes with four from the SEC, leaving the Rebels as the first team outside the field.
College Football Playoff field bracket projection
The biggest shift from last week’s bracket involves a shakeup atop the Big 12.
Kansas State was No. 4 a week ago but has been replaced by Utah. The Wildcats suffered an epic meltdown late Saturday night at Brigham Young, eventually losing 38-9, while the Utes held off Oklahoma State with quarterback Cam Rising again sidelined due to injury.
That road loss drops Kansas State out of the field entirely. Stepping in as the league’s second…
Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/sec-teams-gets-squeezed-latest-110245231.html
Author : USA TODAY Sports
Publish date : 2024-09-24 11:02:45
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