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Nothing has been determined yet. But there is one major takeaway for Penn State from the latest College Football Playoff committee rankings.
No doors have been shut on the Nittany Lions’ hopes to return to a New Year’s Six bowl game.
Penn State remained at No. 10 in the rankings after finishing the schedule 10-2 with an uninspiring win over Rutgers.
The bad news for the Lions is that both Wisconsin (No. 8) and Florida (No. 9) jumped them. But the good news is that a potential Rose Bowl contender Minnesota plummeted down to No. 18 and that mighty Alabama has also finished behind them at No. 12.
Penn State was the committee’s top-ranked two-loss team a week ago. But Wisconsin’s decisive road win at Minnesota — a team that beat the Lions — moved the Badgers into that spot.
Florida also moved ahead for a number of factors, including an easy victory over Florida State on Saturday and that the Gators’ best win, Auburn, now looks a lot better after the Tigers beat Alabama.
“We did spend considerable time talking about (ranking the teams) 8, 9 and 10, for sure,” CFP chairman Rob Mullens said.
But the net result is that Penn State still has paths to the same three major bowl games they had a week ago — the Rose, the Orange and the Cotton, in that order.
ROSE BOWL
First thing’s first for the Lions. No. 1 Ohio State must beat Wisconsin in Saturday’s Big Ten championship. The Buckeyes may still head to the Playoff with a loss, but the Badgers would be a lock for the Rose with a win.
But if the Buckeyes win, then the Rose Bowl gets to pick a Big Ten replacement between 10-3 Wisconsin, 10-2 Penn State and 10-2 Minnesota.
Though that normally goes to the next highest-ranked team, the Rose Bowl says it can make a decision if teams are in a “cluster.” Fortunately for the Lions, it doesn’t look like Minnesota is in that situation, having dropped well below both Penn State and Wisconsin.
Right now, the committee looks favorably on the Badgers.
“Their impressive win over Minnesota gave them three wins over top-25 teams,” Mullens said. “Their loss to No. 1 Ohio State, then a close loss late at Illinois. We see them as a balanced team, top 10 nationally in relative offense and defense.”
In other words, Penn State not only wants to root for Ohio State, but root for a lopsided game.
The Bucks will be trying to do exactly that.
They crushed Wisconsin 59-0 in the 2014 championship to try and claim the No. 4 seed for the Playoff. They did, and they went on to win the national title.
This time, Ohio State wants a decisive win to hold onto the No. 1 spot and avoid a semifinal game against reigning champ Clemson.
Ohio State beat Wisconsin 38-7 in October. A similar outcome Saturday might be enough for Penn State to jump back ahead and earn a ticket to Pasadena, where the Lions would face either Utah or Oregon.
ORANGE BOWL
Florida moving ahead of Penn State this week looked like it would lock the Lions out of any shot at the Orange Bowl or Cotton Bowl. But Alabama’s major fall kept both options open.
If the Lions don’t land in the Rose Bowl, they could end up in the Orange if No. 4 Georgia beats No. 2 LSU in Saturday’s SEC title game. That could very well put both the Bulldogs and Tigers into the Playoff.
The domino effect would be that Florida gets bumped up to the guaranteed SEC spot in the Sugar Bowl. The Orange would then take the next highest-ranked team from the SEC, Big Ten or Notre Dame.
With no more games left for them, that would be Penn State over No. 11 Auburn and No. 12 Alabama.
The most likely opponent in Miami would be No. 23 Virginia, which is the only team other than No. 3 Clemson to be ranked by the committee this week. The Cavaliers face the Tigers on Saturday for the ACC title.
COTTON BOWL
If Wisconsin and Florida claim the bids to the Rose and Orange, respectively, Penn State still has a good shot at the Cotton Bowl’s at-large bid, which goes to the highest-ranked team from any league still available.
It’s not a guarantee, though. Potential wrinkles include No. 5 Utah losing to No. 13 Oregon in Friday’s Pac-12 championship or No. 6 Oklahoma falling to No. 7 Baylor in Saturday’s Big 12 title game.
An 11-2 Utah or 11-2 Oklahoma team could still be ahead of Penn State for the Cotton Bowl bid. Though if Oklahoma loses, the Sooners could end up in the Sugar Bowl if Baylor goes to the Playoff. Baylor is much more likely to fall behind Penn State with a loss, and Oregon is already behind.
A much less likely obstacle — if Virginia were to pull the upset over Clemson, it could knock the Tigers out of the Playoff. If that happens, Clemson couldn’t go to the Orange because Virginia would get that spot as league champ, locking the Tigers into the Cotton.
If Penn State lands in the Cotton, the Lions would face the top-ranked Group of 5 conference champion — most likely the winner of Saturday’s AAC title game between No. 17 Memphis and No. 20 Cincinnati. Also still alive is No. 19 Boise State, which could get the bid by beating Hawaii for the Mountain West title on Saturday and with a Memphis loss.