Bowl Predictions 2014: Updated Playoff Projections After Week 12 Games

Surprise, surprise. There was another batch of highly ranked teams to fall on a college football Saturday.

Week 12 looked like a dangerous slate of games with playoff contenders Florida State, Arizona State, Ohio State and TCU all hitting the road, but the Seminoles, Horned Frogs and Buckeyes all managed to notch victories.

Of course, the Horned Frogs and Seminoles made things a lot more interesting than their fans would have preferred, and the Buckeyes only won by seven, even though they controlled the entire game.

However, the Sun Devils lost at Oregon State, Auburn dropped one at Georgia and Mississippi State fell from the ranks of the unbeaten.

Perhaps the most important result from Week 12, though, was that loss for the No. 1 team in the land. It was a strange situation with the top-ranked squad, Mississippi State, seen as an underdog, but Alabama was very impressive in the victory. The Crimson Tide control their destiny for the SEC title and seem to be hitting their stride at just the right time.

Not to be outdone, Wisconsin’s Melvin Gordon set the all-time NCAA single-game rushing record with 408 yards against Nebraska. What made it even more impressive was that it happened in three quarters. 

So what does it all mean for the playoff picture? Here is a look at the updated postseason bowl projections.

Bowl Projections

Sugar Bowl: No. 1 Alabama vs. No. 4 Baylor

Rose Bowl: No. 2 Florida State vs. No. 3 Oregon 

Championship Bowl (in Arlington, Texas): TBD (semifinal winners)

Week 12 Twitter Reaction

Ohio State kicked off Week 12 with a noon ET start and beat No. 25 Minnesota, 31-24. While the Buckeyes’ seven-point win doesn’t look particularly impressive if you didn’t actually watch the game, they did control the entire contest and would have won by more without costly turnovers. 

One player who did shine was quarterback J.T. Barrett. Todd Porter of The Repository and ESPN Stats & Info noted that he broke some records in the process:

"

BTW that's Barrett's 37th TD responsible for, an #ohiostate single-season record.

— toddporter (@toddporter) November 15, 2014"

Austin Ward of ESPN and Michael Felder of Bleacher Report seemed ready to throw Barrett’s name in the Heisman race:

One team that had more trouble than Ohio State did on Saturday was TCU. The Horned Frogs barely escaped a trip to lowly Kansas with a 34-30 win, and Pat Forde of Yahoo! Sports pointed out what all TCU fans probably feared in the aftermath of that game:

Nobody put up more style points than running back Gordon in Wisconsin’s dominant 59-24 win over Nebraska. While the Badgers are not in playoff contention, they appear primed to reach the Big Ten title game from the West Division after a win like that, although they will still have to take care of the Minnesota Golden Gophers. 

Gordon was the story with 408 rushing yards. ESPN Stats & Info and Andrew Siciliano of NFL Network put the ridiculous numbers in perspective, while SportsCenter noted that it was business as usual for the Wisconsin rushing attack:

The Big Ten Network passed along the highlights of the record-breaking performance, while previous record-holder LaDainian Tomlinson offered some congratulations:

Gordon commented on his day, according to The Associated Press, via ESPN.com: "Yeah, I didn't even know I was close to the record. I was kind of just running away." 

Outside of Gordon’s impressive day, the Big Ten picked up an impressive nonconference victory when Northwestern walked into Notre Dame and won in overtime. Nicole Auerbach of USA Today pointed out that the Wildcats may be in the midst of a disappointing season, but they have a couple of notable wins:

The most important Week 12 result in terms of the playoffs was Alabama’s 25-20 win over Mississippi State. Bleacher Report’s Matt Miller took the Crimson Tide’s perspective from the marquee win, while Grantland’s Shane Ryan pointed out that the Bulldogs are far from dead in the playoff picture:

"

Miss. St. should still control its own destiny after that game. Pretty impressive considering how it started.

— Shane Ryan (@ShaneRyanHere) November 16, 2014"

Another team that is far from dead in the postseason picture is undefeated Florida State, although the defending champs took it down to the wire yet again in a 30-26 win over Miami.

ESPN Stats & Info noted that the Seminoles have made a habit out of late comebacks, while SI College Football and ESPN’s Arash Markazi realized we should have never expected anything different:

Eventually, the pattern of falling behind early and coming back in the second half may catch up to Florida State when it plays against formidable competition in the playoffs, but it can put it on cruise control until then. The ACC is a notch below the Seminoles, and the Florida Gators don’t have the talent to knock Florida State out of the playoff race.

What’s more, there is something to be said for finding a way to win close games, and Florida State will be plenty battle-tested when the playoff contests are close in the final minutes. 

Fans can criticize the Seminoles all they want for narrowly escaping lesser opponents, but winning is all that matters, even in a sport dominated by style points.

Just ask Arizona State, which learned a valuable lesson, as ESPN Stats & Info pointed out:

Buckle up, because we are sure to see even more chaos in Week 13.

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