Bowl Projections 2014: College Football Playoff Predictions Heading into Week 12
Another flurry of landscape-altering results shook up the College Football Playoff picture in Week 11. But heading into Week 12, it doesn't feel like the field has narrowed at all.
That's because while hopefuls such as Notre Dame, Auburn and Kansas State fell out of the picture, teams such as TCU, Arizona State and Ohio State made their cases a lot stronger with wins. So as Week 12's intriguing slate gets going, the eyes of the college football world will shift to which teams fall out of the running this week.
Despite all of the action left to take place, here's a complete projected field for the tournament based upon remaining schedule, current playing level and poll placement:
.jpg?w=256 "Ohio State Team Doctor")
| Championship Bowl | Jan. 12 | Arlington, Texas | Semifinal winners | Florida State vs. Oregon |
| Sugar Bowl | Jan. 1 | New Orleans, Louisiana | Semifinal | No. 2 Alabama vs. No. 3 Oregon |
| Rose Bowl | Jan. 1 | Pasadena, California | Semifinal | No. 1 Florida State vs. No. 4 Baylor |
The Projected Field
All four contenders in this projected field have one thing in common: If they win out, they will be conference champions.
Florida State remains the most obvious choice to earn a berth in the playoff. It has already navigated the most difficult roadblocks on the schedule. With wins over Louisville on the road and Clemson already in hand, it's hard to argue there's a more sure bet to be included in the field of four.
Alabama sits one game behind the No. 1-ranked Mississippi State Bulldogs heading into this weekend. But that will all change if the Tide come through on their favored status. According to Odds Shark, Nick Saban's team is a seven-point favorite to spoil the Bulldogs' undefeated record.
A win over the No. 1 ranked team in the country might not completely make up for Bama's loss to Ole Miss, but a win in the SEC Championship Game over the East representative certainly would.
As College GameDay pointed out on Twitter, the Oregon Ducks bear a strong resemblance to the Tide when it comes to their resumes:
Behind Marcus Mariota's leadership, the Ducks have more than atoned for their strange loss to Arizona. Mark Helfrich's offense has helped them win five straight games by 12 points or more.
Rounding out the field will be an interesting choice for the committee if everything plays out as one would expect. TCU and Baylor teams with 11-1 records would provide an interesting dilemma.
On one hand, TCU's out-of-conference strength of schedule was better than Baylor's. The Frogs' 30-7 win over Minnesota was big for them in that regard. However, as Stewart Mandel of Fox Sports pointed out, that advantage might mean less and less as the committee focuses on head-to-head matchups toward the end of the season:
Outside Looking In
Unfortunately, the College Football Playoff is being rolled out in a year that features a lot of parity. That means some good football teams with resumes similar to the those of their playoff-bound counterparts will be left out in the cold.
In that scenario, the headliners would be Mississippi State and TCU.
The Bulldogs would be especially disappointed to be shut out of the tournament now. Their 9-0 record is an incredible turnaround after being 4-5 at this point last season. However, they may be victims of unfortunate timing.
Losing this late in the season to Alabama would be detrimental to the team's hopes of staying atop the polls. With no shot at a conference championship game in that scenario, Dak Prescott and the Dogs would have little opportunity to prove they belong outside of convincingly beating Ole Miss in the Egg Bowl.
Coming out on the losing end of the Big 12 debate in that scenario would be TCU. As Gary Patterson told Carlos Mendez of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, the Frogs took a big step forward in their quest toward the tournament:
However the head-to-head loss could still be their undoing. With a tricky game at Texas representing their only opportunity to wow voters until the field is announced, the Frogs may also be victims of timing.
Of course, all is not lost for the Frogs quite yet. While both Baylor and TCU were impressive this week, the Bears still have to beat the Wildcats themselves. They close out the season by hosting Kansas State on Dec. 6. A loss for Baylor would all but guarantee a spot for an 11-1 TCU team in the playoff.
But that assumes TCU will finish the season without slipping up. With several weeks left on the schedule and a round of conference championship games on the horizon, the only safe assumption is that no team has punched its ticket quite yet.
There's still plenty of time for things to get weird.
.jpg?w=480 "Ohio State Team Doctor")
