College Football Playoff 2014: Final Predictions for Week 13 CFB System Rankings

Mississippi State was the No. 1 team in the Week 12 College Football Playoff rankings, but that all-important ledger is set for a change at the top after yet another week of NCAA football filled with shocking upsets and surprise results.

Alabama's 25-20 win over the aforementioned Bulldogs gave it a nice boost in the polls, and it should be included in one of the four College Football Playoff spots when the Week 13 results are published. The Crimson Tide seem to be in control of their own destiny, just the way micromanaging extraordinaire Nick Saban likes it.

Arizona State's faint dreams of CFP glory were snuffed out by a game Oregon State squad in a 35-27 loss. The Beavers, a mere 2-5 in the Pac-12 after their surprise victory, have now seemingly cleared the way for in-state nemesis Oregon to win the conference and snatch a playoff spot.

Florida State is still undefeated after a come-from-behind 30-26 victory over Miami and, despite losing so many in-game skirmishes, is on a seemingly inexorable march toward the national championship.

Here are some predictions for the Week 13 CFP rankings, followed by a closer look at two teams that will likely be jockeying for a final playoff spot over the final few weeks of the regular season.

Rank	Predicted CFP Poll	Associated Press	Bleacher Report
1	Alabama	Florida State	Alabama
2	Oregon	Alabama	Florida State
3	Florida State	Oregon	Oregon
4	Mississippi State	Mississippi State	Mississippi State
5	TCU	TCU	Ohio State
6	Baylor	Baylor	TCU
7	Ohio State	Ohio State	Baylor
8	Georgia	Ole Miss	Ole Miss
9	Ole Miss	Georgia	Georgia
10	Michigan State	Michigan State	Michigan State
11	Kansas State	UCLA	Kansas State
12	UCLA	Kansas State	UCLA
13	Wisconsin	Arizona State	Wisconsin
14	Arizona State	Wisconsin	Arizona
15	Auburn	Arizona	Arizona State
16	Georgia Tech	Auburn	Georgia Tech
17	Arizona	Georgia Tech	Auburn
18	Nebraska	Marshall	Utah
19	Utah	Missouri	Marshall
20	Missouri	Utah	Nebraska
21	Oklahoma	Nebraska	Colorado State
22	USC	Colorado State	Missouri
23	Notre Dame	Oklahoma	Notre Dame
24	Clemson	USC	Oklahoma
25	Marshall	Duke	USC

Sorting Out the Final Playoff Spot

Assuming Alabama, Oregon and Florida State all win out and capture conference championships, they should be locks for the inaugural College Football Playoff. That could leave quite a scrum for the final playoff spot, as there are several worthy one-loss contenders.

TCU still pips Baylor in both the AP poll and the Amway coaches poll, even though Baylor beat them by three points earlier in the season.

The 61-58 Baylor win is far enough in the rearview mirror, yet late enough in the regular season, that no trace of recency or primacy bias will likely affect the playoff decision-makers, even though Baylor does hold a tiebreaker advantage for the Big 12 championship from the result.

The Horned Frogs eked out a 34-30 win over lowly Kansas in Week 12, and it will be interesting to see if that damages their reputation at all. Head coach Gary Patterson realizes the perception of his squad is out of his hands.

"I can't control any of that," said Patterson, via Dave Skretta of The Associated Press. "The best thing for us is to win out, be 11-1, be (Big 12) co-champion, and then we'll let the chips fall where they do. There's still a lot of football left to play."

Orlin Wagner/Associated Press

Baylor leads the nation in points scored with 50.1 per game, which is a wildly impressive feat, but it is not much better than the Horned Frogs' 45.9 points per contest.

TCU has more high-profile wins than the Bears by virtue of going 4-1 against teams ranked in the Top 25 at the time of the contests (Baylor is 2-0 in such contests). It's difficult to parse these two teams, although defense might be one possibility. 

Assuming TCU fends off Baylor in the playoff committee's estimation, it still must contend with the Bulldogs, who should win their final two games against Vanderbilt and Ole Miss.

Including two SEC teams in the CFP may be too much for some football fans to stomach, but it's tough to say the Bulldogs deserve to fall out of contention after just one loss to an SEC West rival with the No. 2-ranked scoring defense in the nation.

Brynn Anderson/Associated Press

Grantland's Charles P. Pierce is of the opinion that the Bulldogs could be hurt by their lack of brand recognition:

"

The topic under discussion was whether Mississippi State — which entered a game at Alabama undefeated and left the stadium with one (close) loss — had disqualified itself from the four-team super-duper All-U-Can-Hype television hootenanny that will debut at the end of this football season. The question is absurd, because it depends not on Alabama now having the upper hand on Mississippi State. It depends on Alabama being Alabama, which Mississippi State is not, and the playoff decision will be made not on the relative strength of the two teams but the relative strength of the two brands. Because, based on Saturday’s game at least, there’s not a dime’s worth of difference between these two teams.

"

Of course, the last part of that final sentence is just as applicable to TCU and Baylor. Mississippi State ranks in the top 20 in both scoring offense and defense, but it will be hurt by the late loss and will be hoping Auburn can somehow pull off more Iron Bowl shenanigans and trip up Alabama at the end of the season.

Ohio State is also in the running and should be in consideration if it wins out. ESPN's Kirk Herbstreit has the Buckeyes in his personal top four:

Led by freshman quarterback J.T. Barrett, Ohio State has won its last five games by an average of 21.2 points. The wins have come against mostly lower-tier opponents, but it's impossible to count out a hot team from a power-five conference at this point.

Deciding among these four teams is an unenviable task, to say the least, and it seems the only thing that can really clear things up is a big team dropping another game as the season comes to a close.