Kyler Murray
I’ve seen a lot of debate about this topic, and the debate is borderline ridiculous to me. So I thought I would bring it to you readers for your thoughts.
Which four teams belong in the College Football Playoff?
My thoughts:
#1 Alabama: They’re 13-0 and won the SEC Championship. Their non-conference schedule was a joke (Louisiana-Lafayett, The Citadel, Arkansas State, Louisville), but they handled their business against SEC opponents and beat everyone on their schedule.
#2 Clemson: They’re 13-0 and won the ACC Championship. They had two solid non-conference games (a 56-35 win over South Carolina and a 28-26 win over Texas A&M). Their only other close game, aside from playing A&M, was barely beating a Syracuse team when the Tigers were down to their #3 quarterback (Kelly Bryant transferred, Trevor Lawrence got hurt).
#3 Notre Dame: They’re 12-0 with no conference championship game. They have some solid wins, but nothing great. However, they scheduled some tough teams (Michigan, USC, Virginia Tech, Stanford); it’s just that three of those four teams had down years (USC, Virginia Tech, Stanford).
#4 Oklahoma: No, they don’t play defense, but they’re 12-1 and avenged their one loss in the Big 12 Championship game. That was against a solid Texas team. Otherwise, they played some tight games, but that loss to Texas was better than the Purdue loss for . . .
#5 Ohio State: Yes, the Buckeyes won the Big Ten Championship, but their loss to 6-6 Purdue was not only a big letdown, but it was a blowout loss. The Buckeyes have the potential to beat those other teams in the top four, but the big-play guys for the top four would gash OSU more so than the all but Oklahoma. (For the record, I don’t have strong feelings about whether Oklahoma or OSU should be in the CFP – I think both would lose to Alabama in the first game.)
#6 UCF: UCF beat everyone on their schedule. They even won their conference championship without their starting quarterback.
#7 Georgia: This is the biggest, dumbest debate I’ve seen. Georgia played Alabama close, but they have already proven they can lose to TWO teams. How could you name a national champion who has two losses when three teams only have one? For example, should a 2-loss Georgia team be named national champions above a 1-loss Alabama team who split the season series between the two? The Patriots were 16-0 in the regular season before losing to the 10-6 Giants, and yet the Giants were the Super Bowl champs and go down in history as the best team that year. I don’t care if Georgia “looks” like a top-four team, because that’s subjective. What’s not subjective is that this season, they were worse than Alabama and worse than 9-3 LSU when it came time to playing those teams. They had a chance to settle the issue on the field, and they didn’t do it.
