Handicapping the College Football Playoff

Some usual suspects, some new faces as well.

Savor the College Football Playoff while you can, while it admits only four teams instead of 12, while it gives us the best regular-season in sports, when the immediacy takes over and the credentials are unquestioned.

In the next month or so, all will be revealed. Here’s a contender-by-contender look:

GEORGIA (7-0)

Schedule: Florida in Jacksonville, Tennessee, at Mississippi State, at Kentucky, Georgia Tech.

Prognosis: Trickier than it looks for Kirby Smart (pictured) and the defending champs. Tennessee is the main threat, but those back-to-back road games won’t be cake. If the Bulldogs win out, they play the SEC Championship against the West winner, probably Alabama. If they lose once, they’ll be reprieved of a 13th game and will stick out prominently when the final roll is called. The 49-3 opening win over Oregon is hard to dismiss. 

TENNESSEE (7-0)

Schedule: Kentucky, at Georgia, Missouri, at South Carolina, at Vanderbilt.

Prognosis: UT has failed to hit the 40-point mark only once, although they had a 7-point struggle with Pittsburgh. Wins over Alabama and LSU are like vaccinations against an upset. Beating Georgia puts the Vols into the SEC game and probably the CFP. Losing a tight one to Georgia and going 11-1 wouldn’t be a disqualifier. The other possibility is that they’re good enough to go 13-0, and nothing so far indicates they aren’t. 

Note: The late great Allan Malamud took one of his final trips to Knoxville, when UCLA played there. He noted that Tennessee football is such a big deal, “the hotel TV even has ‘Vol’ on it.’’’ We miss you, Mud.

ALABAMA (7-1)

Schedule: at LSU, at Ole Miss, Austin Peay, Auburn.

Prognosis: A 3-point loss to Tennessee shouldn’t knock out ‘Bama by itself, but the Tide has no margin for error. Its best chance is to hope Tennessee beats Georgia and then to avenge that loss in Atlanta. But the Tide is no lock to win back-to-back trips to Baton Rouge and Oxford, either. The win at Texas helps.

MISSISSIPPI (7-1)

Schedule: at Texas A&M, Alabama, at Arkansas, Mississippi State.

Prognosis: The Rebels took a smackdown at LSU and their non-league victims are Troy, Central Arkansas, Georgia Tech and Tulsa. But they get the Crimson Tide and their in-state cousins at home. They would need to win out, including a major upset in the SEC Championship game. If their running game can hog the ball for 35-plus minutes, they have a chance.

OHIO  STATE (7-0)

Schedule: at Penn State, at Northwestern, Indiana, at Maryland, Michigan.

Prognosis: The Buckeyes have been a pack of wild dogs since the opening 21-10 win over Notre Dame. Strange things can happen at Penn State, however. The Michigan game looms as always. If it’s close either way, both teams can argue strongly for a Final Four spot.

MICHIGAN (7-0)

Schedule: Michigan State, at Rutgers, Nebraska, Illinois, at Oho State. 

Prognosis: No one has played better than Michigan this year, and its 41-17 dismissal of Penn State doused the weak-schedule argument. Again, all roads lead to Columbus, and then a Big 10 championship date. 

Note: Penn State theoretically can squeeze into the picture if it upsets Michigan, and Michigan  wins at Ohio State. A 3-way tiebreaker for the East Division title would go down to each team’s record against the West Division, which is too murky to discuss here.

CLEMSON (8–0)

Schedule: at Notre Dame, Louisville, Miami, South Carolina.

Prognosis; The Tigers have been bobbing and weaving through the ACC, beating quality teams like Wake Forest, N.C. State, Florida State and Syracuse by not very much. They aren’t guaranteed to survive the Golden Dome or suddenly-ranked South Carolina either. But if they do and they win the ACC title game, they’ll be undefeated and hard to reject.

WAKE FOREST (6-1)

Schedule: at Louisville, at N.C. State, North Carolina, Syracuse, Duke.

Prognosis: Yeah, really. The Deacons lost only to Clemson, 51-45 in overtime. A rematch in the ACC title game would be a coin flip. The problems are (1) a robust schedule down the stretch and (2) a threadbare non-league schedule. Still, this team has topped 40 points in all but two games. It would need some train wrecks to get in, but it’s worth the dream.

TCU (7—0)

Schedule:: at West Virginia, Texas Tech, at Texas, at Baylor, Iowa State.

Prognosis: The Horned Frogs have been hosed by the committee before. Their schedule isn’t favorable, either. But if they make it through to the Big 12 title game and win it, they will have gone unbeaten in the nation’s most balanced conference. Chances are, their defense isn’t up to that challenge. They were in trouble against Kansas State until quarterback Adrian Martinez went down.

Note: Oklahoma State and Kansas State have lost only to TCU and could wind up 12-1. Most likely they won’t, and they have no eye-catching wins over non-conference teams, although Kansas State’s loss to Tulane doesn’t look so bad.

USC (6–1)

Schedule: at Arizona, Cal, Colorado, at UCLA, Notre Dame.

Prognosis: USC has the clearest path out of the Pac-12 traffic jam. A win at UCLA probably wraps up a 11-1 season and a conference title game. Win that, and USC can say it lost only to Utah, by one point in Salt Lake City in the final minute. The Trojans do not play Oregon in the regular season, but they might have to beat UCLA twice.

UCLA (6-1)

Schedule: Stanford, at Arizona State, Arizona, USC, at Cal.

Prognosis: The Bruins’ miserable non-conference schedule will be frowned upon in the committee room, if they get that far. They also got spanked in the second half at Oregon, meaning their only chance is to win out, and hope.

OREGON (6-1)

Schedule: At Cal, at Colorado, Washington, Utah, at Oregon State.

Prognosis: The Ducks will have to subdue their two most bitter rivals, then handle Utah, which beat them twice last year, then win the conference championship. Even if they do, they can’t bleach away that 49-3 loss to Georgia. With a 12-1 record, they could have handled a 24-3 loss to Georgia. Maybe.

AND THE WINNERS ARE….

Georgia, Tennessee, Ohio State, Michigan.