College Football Playoff Bubble Watch for Championship Weekend Trastitulares

There are only ten games remaining before the College Football Playoff selection committee makes its choices. Five conference champions will get bids, as will seven at-large teams. And for what will likely be a rarity under this iteration of the College Football Playoff, we have large bubbles for both the at-large bids and the conference championship bids. So this bubble watch will have two sections: First for the at-large bids, then a second section breaking down those teams who can still win their conference but are well below the at-large threshold.

At-large bubble watch: 7 teams fighting for three spots

Right off the bat, four bubble spots are taken off the board. The winner of Ohio State vs Indiana will get in as a conference champion, while the loser gets an at-large. Also, Georgia is a lock even if it loses the SEC Championship Game. So the Bulldogs losing that game would shrink our bubble to two spots. The same is likely (though not definitely) true about Texas Tech in the Big 12 Championship Game. If both Alabama and BYU win on Saturday, we suddenly go from three open spots on our bubble to just one. Ouch.

Above the bubble:

As mentioned above, Georgia is almost certainly in even with a loss. Maybe a massive blowout can change things, but unlikely. The same is true about Texas Tech, though the Red Raiders are less comfortable than Georgia is. Oklahoma is sitting on the right side of the bubble right now. But the Sooners have a signature win over Alabama, so maybe if Alabama gets embarrassed by Georgia on Saturday that hurts both of them. Alabama also currently sits at No.9 in the CFP rankings, putting the Tide in the field as long as they don’t drop. So if Alabama stays competitive in the SEC Championship Game, it’s probably in the field.

Needs help:

Based on the current rankings, Notre Dame is in line for the last Playoff spot. But that’s only true if Texas Tech beats BYU. A BYU victory likely bumps the Irish, unless Texas Tech falls way down in the rankings. Also, while Notre Dame does have a slightly better overall resume than Miami (FL), the Hurricanes did beat the Irish way back in Week 2, so head-to-head might come back to swap those two teams. BYU, of course, can help itself by winning the Big 12. But maybe if the Cougars keep a loss to Texas Tech very close, they can impress enough to jump Notre Dame. On the other hand, maybe they get blown out badly enough that Miami jumps them. And if Alabama loses badly in the SEC Championship Game, that could also push Miami into the field.

Off the bubble:

The committee could always change its mind in the final week (they would probably say they were “fixing an error” or something like that), but these three are sitting outside where they would need to be to have a chance at this point.

The Conference Champions Bubble Watch

Four conferences are positioned such that their champions will be among the top five conference champions. They are not, as we would usually expect, the Power 4 conferences. No. The AAC is not guaranteed that its champion will be in the top five, because 7-5 Duke is in the ACC Championship Game with a very weak resume. So if Virginia wins the ACC, then the five conference champion bids will go to the four above conferences and Virginia. But if Duke wins, things get interesting.

On the bubble:

James Madison, UNLV are in this category. UNLV plays Boise State this weekend, a marginally better opponent than Troy. Is that enough to jump the Rebels over the Dukes? Probably not. But if Troy wins, UNLV is definitely next in line, ahead of the Blue Devils.

Chaos bubble:

Boise State, Duke, Troy, Kennessaw State are in this category. If we get to this, the Duke resume is honestly not bad. Mean, it’s bad, but not so much compared to these three. Duke does have the most losses, but none of them are honestly too terrible. Boise State would probably have better losses than Duke, though the Blue Devils certainly have better wins. Troy’s resume is way worse than both of these, both in terms of losses and of wins, so the Trojans really shouldn’t be in this conversation. Kennesaw State is potentially the real wild card in this. At 10-3 the Owls would have two games over Duke in the loss column. The problem there is that there are no good wins, plus a blowout loss worse than any Playoff team has ever had (even though it’s to Indiana). Also, there’s a loss to Wake Forest, a team Duke just beat. I would think in this chaos scenario it’s between Boise State and Duke. And the nod might go to Duke, but not by much.

Fuente: https://sports.yahoo.com/articles/college-football-playoff-bubble-watch-123101197.html

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