After the weekend's carnage, only Florida State remains a Playoff favorite of last week's top four. But for the first time the Seminoles aren't the most likely to make it, and therefore not the expected "top seed."
That honor goes to Auburn, who made the weekend's biggest statement by thrashing LSU 41-7. That solidified their top rating in our Strength power rating, which we are transitioning to using for the Playoff Odds projections. Florida State is barely in the top 25 in Strength, but is still favored straight-up to win out so they hold the #2 spot with a season-low 7.5% chance to go 13-0.
The Big Twelve has a trio of teams in major contention. Baylor slides up to #3 and is just over 50% to make it to the "final four." TCU upset Oklahoma and is at the #5 spot while the Sooners slid to #6. Right now it looks like the Big Twelve could end up with three teams at 11-1, making a mess for the committee. The Bears are currently a big favorite over TCU at home and a slight underdog to Oklahoma on the road, so they are positioned best. Mississippi narrowly leads TCU at #4 after beating Alabama, so either the SEC or Big Twelve could have a 2nd team in the Playoff, shutting out the Big Ten and Pac-12 (note: we revised our calculations a bit which flipped Ole Miss and TCU, but the takeaway is the #4 spot is up for grabs and no candidate is close to the 50% threshold).
Oklahoma fell the least of the three teams that were booted because they still have great support in the polls and therefore might "win" a three-win tie in their conference. UCLA fell from #3 to #9 after losing to Utah 30-28; they're still favored to win the Pac-12 which kept them from falling as far as Alabama, who is now 4th in their own division, let alone conference. The Tide dropped to #15 and like the Bruins don't control their own destiny, but need a lot more teams to lose to get to their conference championship.
Notre Dame moved up to #7 and their odds of beating FSU are getting better each week. If that happens they could claim a spot and kick the Seminoles out, but right now they're still expected to go 10-2 and fall just short of the Playoff.
SportsRatings College Football Playoff Odds chart, post-week 6 (October 5, 2014)
Last week |
10/5 Rank |
Team |
Playoff |
% Change +/- |
10/5 Rec |
Projected Record | Odds to win out |
|
|||
| Straight up | Cumulative | ||||||||||
| W | L | W | L | ||||||||
| 9 | 1 | Auburn | 62.4 | +53.7 | 5-0 | 12 | 0 | 10.4 | 1.6 | 9.1% | 2 |
| 1 | 2 | Florida St | 60.9 | -12.0 | 5-0 | 12 | 0 | 10.2 | 1.8 | 7.5% | 1 |
| 5 | 3 | Baylor | 52.2 | +18.2 | 5-0 | 11 | 1 | 10.7 | 1.3 | 18.1% | 4 |
| 12 | 4 | Mississippi | 32.2 | +24.2 | 5-0 | 11 | 1 | 9.6 | 2.4 | 2.0% | 3.75 |
| 11 | 5 | TCU | 31.3 | +23.1 | 4-0 | 11 | 1 | 10.3 | 1.7 | 9.2% | 10.5 |
| 2 | 6 | Oklahoma | 25.9 | -34.6 | 4-1 | 11 | 1 | 10.1 | 1.9 | 35.2% | 10 |
| 10 | 7 | Notre Dame | 23.5 | +15.0 | 5-0 | 10 | 2 | 9.9 | 2.1 | 5.8% | 5.5 |
| 23 | 8 | Ohio State | 20.6 | +19.0 | 4-1 | 11 | 1 | 9.9 | 2.1 | 18.7% | 15 |
| 3 | 9 | UCLA | 17.0 | -33.5 | 4-1 | 11 | 1 | 9.6 | 2.4 | 11.8% | 17.5 |
| 24 | 10 | Mississippi St | 15.9 | +14.8 | 5-0 | 9 | 3 | 9.5 | 2.5 | 1.1% | 4.75 |
| 7 | 11 | Marshall | 14.6 | +0.8 | 5-0 | 12 | 0 | 11.4 | 0.6 | 41.2% | 26.5 |
| 13 | 12 | Michigan St | 8.7 | +0.9 | 4-1 | 10 | 2 | 9.4 | 2.6 | 7.2% | 8 |
| -- | 13 | Utah | 5.0 | +4.9 | 4-1 | 10 | 2 | 8.8 | 3.2 | 3.2% | 25.5 |
| 17 | 14 | Clemson | 5.0 | -0.6 | 3-2 | 10 | 2 | 9.1 | 2.9 | 26.7% | 25.5 |
| 4 | 15 | Alabama | 4.1 | -37.0 | 4-1 | 10 | 2 | 8.5 | 3.5 | 1.9% | 7 |
| 22 | 16 | Nebraska | 3.9 | +1.7 | 5-1 | 10 | 2 | 9.5 | 2.5 | 4.9% | 21 |
| -- | 17 | Arizona | 2.8 | +2.7 | 5-0 | 10 | 2 | 8.9 | 3.1 | 0.2% | 11.5 |
| 6 | 18 | Oregon | 2.2 | -24.0 | 4-1 | 9 | 3 | 8.9 | 3.1 | 1.9% | 11.5 |
| 21 | 19 | East Carolina | 1.8 | -0.8 | 4-1 | 11 | 1 | 9.5 | 2.5 | 16.2% | 19 |
| 14 | 20 | Georgia | 1.8 | -4.6 | 4-1 | 9 | 3 | 8.7 | 3.3 | 1.4% | 11.5 |
| 8 | 21 | Brigham Young | 1.8 | -11.4 | 4-1 | 11 | 1 | 9.5 | 2.5 | 14.6% | 31.5 |
| 20 | 22 | Northern Illinois | 1.4 | -1.2 | 4-1 | 11 | 1 | 8.9 | 3.1 | 4.2% | -- |
| -- | 23 | Louisville | 1.0 | +0.9 | 5-1 | 8 | 4 | 8.3 | 3.7 | 0.8% | 29 |
| 19 | 24 | Texas A&M | 1.0 | -4.2 | 5-1 | 8 | 4 | 8.5 | 3.5 | 0.7% | 14 |
| 18 | 25 | Duke | 0.6 | -4.6 | 4-1 | 8 | 4 | 8.1 | 3.9 | 0.5% | 38 |
Dropped out: #15 Wisconsin, #16 Maryland, #25 USC
Others receiving "votes": Georgia Tech (5-0), Florida (3-1), Kansas State (4-1), Wisconsin (3-2), Virginia Tech (4-2), Minnesota (4-1), Colorado State (4-1)
Perhaps surprisingly, one of the biggest movers this week was Ohio State. The Buckeyes beat Maryland 52-24 on the road and are looking better each game—enough that their odds of winning at Michigan State and winning the Big Ten are pretty good. The Spartans handed Nebraska their first loss but almost blew it at the end, winning just 27-22. The Spartans move up to #12 while Ohio State leaps to #8. Nebraska even move up to #16; the loss to MSU was expected and their Strength rating is favorable. Furthermore Wisconsin's loss puts the Cornhuskers in good position to win the West division. Regardless, the outlook for the Big Ten placing a team in the Playoff is low.
Mississippi State jumped after upsetting Texas A&M. Like they did against LSU the Bulldogs took a huge 4th quarter lead and squandered some of it, but they're 5-0 against a tough schedule. Their outlook in terms of expected wins isn't much different than Mississippi's, but straight up they'll be underdog in three games so while they leap to #10 they're far short of Ole Miss's #5 ranking (the Rebels are one of the teams narrowly favored to beat them).
You would think that Marshall might be a major beneficiary of the weekend's mess, but really it just increased the odds that there will be lots of 1-loss Power Five teams, a bad scenario for the Herd who drop to #11 despite upping their odds to almost 15%. They're sitting just outside both polls and that lack of support will increasingly hurt them. They did catch a break with BYU's loss; if both teams had gone undefeated the Cougars would have been the team discussed as a possible Playoff-buster; now Marshall is the only non-Power Five team with a shot at going undefeated.
The Pac-12 is in chaos after this weekend. Utah re-enters the chart at #13, but their prior loss to Washington State weighs them down a bit. Arizona debuts at #17, just ahead of the Oregon team they upset, but the Wildcats aren't well-regarded by our power rating despite the big win. We see both the Utes and Wildcats having two losses, and Oregon perhaps three. After USC and Stanford both lost, that leaves UCLA the conference's main hope and they just took a big hit. There's still a lot of time but the Pac-12 is starting to look like the Big Ten in terms of Playoff futility.
The ACC isn't in much better shape. If Florida State loses it's probably all over for that conference, too, and we could see a Playoff with two SEC and two Big Twelve teams, or maybe Notre Dame in the mix. Clemson is the 2nd-ranked ACC team and they'd need FSU to lose twice to get to the conference championship. The Tigers still have a 5% chance to make the Playoff because they are looking more and more (26.7% now) like they'll win out and if the carnage continues, 2-loss teams will be in the mix. Mainly, though, they're at #14 because that's where they're expected to finish the season. Louisville re-enters at #23 after beating Syracuse 28-6 and Duke drops to #25 after an idle week, mostly from mixing in the influence of the unbiased Strength power rating. Georgia Tech is undefeated but still doesn't quite rate a mention here as their late schedule is a killer.
East Carolina, BYU, and Northern Illinois are the 2nd tier of non-Power Five teams. Each already has a loss and needs about 3 more weekends like the one we just had to improve their odds.
Georgia and Texas A&M both drop in the SEC pecking order. The Aggies lost while Georgia won, but the Bulldogs look like losers to 2 or 3 West teams in the SEC title game, even with full home field advantage given for playing in Atlanta. Wisconsin and Maryland dropped out of the chart along with USC.
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