SMU’s path to the CFP is clear … and clearly ironic

Karma comes at you in strange ways. Sometimes it hits like a sledgehammer, sometimes like a creeping fog. And sometimes, karma shows up riding a mustang.

SMU is one of the best teams in the ACC this season, a legitimate conference championship and playoff contender despite the fact that the Mustangs aren’t receiving any of the ACC’s TV riches. That’s funny enough, but when you factor in another element—Florida State’s woeful 2024 faceplant—well, that raises SMU’s season to the level of art.

The Mustangs are 5-0 in the ACC, 8-1 overall, leading the conference and in prime position to challenge for a first-round bye in the College Football Playoff. Florida State, meanwhile, is 1-7 in the conference and 1-9 overall, a failure so catastrophic it’ll leave scars on this program for years.

Yes, the irony is thick here; Florida State is in the midst of a lawsuit against the SEC over what the school claims is an unfair distribution of media rights revenue. The lawsuit is widely viewed as a pretext for FSU to leave the ACC, which is locked into a TV deal until 2036, for richer pastures.

Meanwhile, SMU isn’t accepting any TV revenue from the ACC for nine years, the price necessary to join the conference. It’s turning out to be some excellent exposure for SMU, and a hell of a deal for the ACC — at least the bully kicking everyone’s butt isn’t taking their lunch money. Yet.

So let’s do what the rest of the ACC has done and leave Florida State behind. How legitimate of a contender is SMU? Both the AP and the CFP rankings have the Mustangs ranked No. 14 and behind Miami, despite the fact that SMU lost to Big 12 leader BYU and Miami lost to unranked Georgia Tech.

The disparity in rankings is largely a result of the early-season disparity between the two, and soon enough, it won’t matter; if both Miami and…

Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/smus-path-to-the-cfp-is-clear–and-clearly-ironic-165336186.html

Author : Yahoo Sports

Publish date : 2024-11-13 16:53:36

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