Tight end Tyler Warren (44) continues to break records for Penn State which maintained its No. 4 ranking and projected No. 6 seed in Tuesday’s latest College Football Playoff committee rankings.
Michael Conroy | AP photo
Click here to subscribe today or Login.
CFP committee chairman Warde Manuel cited the play of Notre Dame quarterback Riley Leonard (13) as a reason for the Irish’s rise up the rankings to No. 6 on Tuesday.
Michael Caterina | AP photo
Tuesday was status quo for Penn State when the new College Football Playoff rankings were released.
At this point of the season, that’s good news for the Nittany Lions.
Penn State remained at No. 4 in the selection committee’s top 25 on Tuesday night, which would put the Lions in line for the No. 6 seed in the 12-team bracket.
That would also mean a home game in the first round of the expanded playoff. If the season ended today, Penn State would host 11th-seeded Georgia at Beaver Stadium on Dec. 20 or Dec. 21. The Bulldogs jumped back into the field with a win over Tennessee on Saturday. The winner of that game would face projected ACC champ Miami in the quarterfinals.
As things stand, the No. 6 seed is the most likely landing spot for the Lions when the final bracket is unveiled on Dec. 8. But that also depends on them winning this Saturday at Minnesota (6-4) and then at home against Maryland (4-6) on Nov. 30.
Lose either of those games and the Lions would be in danger of missing the playoff entirely, even with a 10-2 record. Penn State’s lack of a high-profile win could easily hurt them in a comparison with a host of two-loss SEC teams like Alabama, Ole Miss, Georgia and Tennessee. If Texas A&M beats Texas in two weeks, there could potentially be six SEC teams at 10-2.
Committee chairman Warde Manuel was asked Tuesday night specifically about comparing No. 4 Penn State and No. 9 Alabama, which has one more loss but wins over four top-25 opponents.
”There’s a lot of discussion about the variables, strength of schedule, who they’re playing, where teams are ranked, where they’re playing — are they home, are they away,” said Manuel, who is the athletic director at Michigan. “There’s all kind of things that we talk about and look at and debate and discuss as it relates to that. So it’s not cut and dry. If it was about just strength of schedule, the rankings probably would look much different.”
With all of that in mind, Lions coach James Franklin wasn’t interested in addressing anything playoff-related in his weekly press conference on Monday.
“If I start talking about things other than Minnesota, then so do our coaches and so do the players, and we lose focus and then we come out and don’t play well,” Franklin said. “Then my press conference next week is miserable because (the media is) all over me because we didn’t play the way we should have played.
“There will be a time and a place to talk about that in great detail, but right now our focus is on Minnesota completely.”
Penn State did get a bit of good news on the resume front this week. Illinois returned to the committee’s ranking at No. 25, giving the Lions a top-25 win. It would help their cause if the Illini were able to close out with road wins over Rutgers and Northwestern to finish 9-3.
The top four seeds and the first-round byes go to the four highest-ranked conference champions. Penn State is a long shot to reach the Big Ten title game with Oregon already clinching one spot. Indiana can claim the other with a win over Ohio State in Columbus on Saturday.
The Lions would need the Buckeyes to beat the Hoosiers and then lose their finale to archrival Michigan the following week. That would give Ohio State two losses in the conference with Penn State and Indiana both 8-1. The tiebreaker would go to Penn State, whose Big Ten opponents have a higher conference win percentage than Indiana’s.
Ohio State is a 12.5-point favorite to win this week, but a fourth straight win by the Wolverines over the Buckeyes is looking unlikely. Michigan is 5-5 and already a massive underdog in early betting odds, which have ballooned to Ohio State -23.5 for the game, which will be at The Horseshoe.
IRISH MOVE UP
While Penn State is holding steady, Notre Dame got an important boost up two spots to No. 6 in the new rankings. If the Fighting Irish can hold that spot, it would land them a No. 8 seed, which means an all-important home game in the first round.
This week, that would be the difference between a potential matchup with Alabama being played in South Bend instead of Tuscaloosa.
As an independent without a conference title to chase, the highest seed Notre Dame can earn is No. 5. The Irish take on No. 19 Army (9-0) on Saturday at Yankee Stadium before closing the schedule on the road against another historic rival in USC (5-5).
“We’ve been impressed in how Notre Dame has recovered since that loss to NIU at home,” Manuel said. “And their performance moving forward we’ll continue to monitor and take a look at. But they’ve really come on strong since that loss.”
BIG DAY FOR BOISE
(AP) — Boise State received the fourth and final bye in Tuesday night’s rankings, leaving BYU out of that mix and placing the Big 12 alongside the SEC on the list of power conferences with a gripe.
Undefeated Oregon received top billing once again, delivered by the committee a few hours after Big Ten number crunchers ran through tiebreaker scenarios and realized the Ducks had clinched a spot in the conference title game no matter what happens between now and December.
Ohio State stayed at No. 2, one spot ahead of SEC co-leader Texas. Miami of the ACC was ranked eighth but gets the third seed and a bye that goes to the top four ranked conference leaders. And likewise, Boise State of the Mountain West was ranked 12th by the committee but was slotted into that fourth and final bye.
BYU was ranked 14th, but gets the last spot in the 12-team bracket as the fifth-best conference leader. That bumps out No. 11 Tennessee, which lost to Georgia last week and now takes the spot the SEC’s Bulldogs held last week: first team out.
There are three more weeks of rankings to go, culminating with the reveal on Dec. 8 that sets the bracket for college football’s first 12-team playoff.
Boise State’s rise into the bye wasn’t all that unexpected after BYU suffered its first loss of the season, which caused its eight-spot tumble down the rankings. It’s a bit of a comedown for Big 12 backers, who would point out that every team in their league has a stronger strength of schedule than the Broncos. But BYU’s season has been full of close calls — four wins by six points or less — and that factored into its ranking this week.
“Given some of the games they played and close games they had, it was an indicator that some of the teams below them should move ahead,” Manuel said.
Of course, nobody cries foul louder than the SEC, which was generally appalled at seeing Georgia left out last week after its lopsided loss to Mississippi. Now, the Bulldogs are back at No. 10. Alabama is No. 7 and Ole Miss is No. 9. All three teams, along with Tennessee, have two losses. But nobody can argue with that conference’s strength of schedule.
“One, they just had a loss to Georgia. It’s really splitting hairs,” Manuel said on the committee’s choice to leave Tennessee out and put the other three SEC teams in. “They have great offense, great defense, they play hard. The committee had a hard time. You’re talking about four really good teams.”
Other rankings: No. 4 Penn State, No. 5 Indiana and No. 6 Notre Dame.
And, in this week’s biggest quirk, SMU is undefeated and alone in first place in the ACC, but still got ranked 13th.
PROJECTED MATCHUPS
• No. 12 BYU at No. 5 Ohio State: Buckeyes would be a three-touchdown favorite.
• No. 11 Georgia at No. 6 Penn State: Who needs a playoff? They were ranked 1 and 2 in the 1983 Sugar Bowl; Penn State 27, Georgia 23.
• No. 10 Mississippi at No. 7 Indiana: So far, Hoosiers have been paired against Tennessee, Alabama and now, Ole Miss, in projected brackets.
• No. 9 Alabama at No. 8 Notre Dame: The second (Tide) vs fourth (Irish) winningest programs in history.
BIG GAMES THIS WEEK
• Indiana at Ohio State: Indiana’s weak schedule (106th per ESPN) hurts it. A win at Ohio State would break a 28-game losing streak in the series and put a rest to all that.
• Army at Notre Dame: Speaking of weak schedules, Army’s ranks 133 out of 134. A win here would get the 19th-ranked Black Knights in the conversation.
• BYU at Arizona State: A Sun Devils win (and a Colorado loss at Kansas) throws the Big 12 into chaos and could cost it that first-round bye for good.