Bowl Projections 2014: Updated College Playoff Predictions Before Week 15
Only one week separates college football from inevitable history in the making, as the first-ever College Football Playoff field will be set after Week 15.
Just like most expected, the first year of the CFP has already produced endless debates across college football. How valuable truly are head-to-head wins as opposed to more style points? Just how bad of a loss can a team take and still make the cut?
In the end, the only opinions that matter are those of the committee. And after a huge conference championship weekend, their decisions shouldn't be much easier than they are now.
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Playoff Projections
Sugar Bowl: No. 1 Alabama vs. No. 4 TCU
Rose Bowl: No. 2 Oregon vs. No. 3 Florida State
Championship Game (in Arlington, Texas): Sugar Bowl winner vs. Rose Bowl winner
Week 15 CFP Rankings and Championship Odds
| Alabama | 38-25 |
| Oregon | 11-5 |
| TCU | 17-4 |
| Baylor | 8-1 |
| Florida State | 9-1 |
| Ohio State | 12-1 |
| Arizona | 65-1 |
Note: Odds courtesy of Odds Shark, last updated Dec. 3 at 11 p.m. ET
The CFP committee sent a very clear message to the Florida State Seminoles in the last rankings of the season before the playoffs are determined. The defending champions were again dropped, this time to fourth (and behind TCU), after an ugly win against Florida to close out the regular season.
But in the ACC Championship Game lies a golden opportunity to at least gain that spot back.
Florida State will face No. 11 Georgia Tech in the title contest, unquestionably one of the best teams it will have played this season and quite possibly the best. Head coach Paul Johnson's dangerous triple-option is just the type of offense that can give the Seminoles fits.
Any win in which the Seminoles don't drag their feet all game long should catapult them back to No. 3, killing a dream matchup with Alabama in the Sugar Bowl, which Yahoo Sports' Dan Wetzel noted:
The 'Noles are far from the only squad on upset alert over the weekend. Out in the West, the Pac-12 Championship Game offers as big of stakes as a conference championship has seen in quite some time.
No. 2 Oregon and No. 7 Arizona will face off, as the Ducks look to avenge their only loss of the season. A victory would clinch their spot in the Top Four, but it could do the very same for two-loss Arizona, according to the USA Today's George Schroeder:
Things will be decided on the field in many of these Power Five championship contests—at least in the Pac-12, Big Ten, ACC and SEC. But out in the Big 12, we're left splitting hairs.
That's because both TCU and Baylor enter the final weekend with just one loss and nearly neck-and-neck in the rankings. The Bears' head-to-head win over the Horned Frogs hasn't seemed to matter much in the committee's eyes.
Baylor remains hopeful of jumping past TCU with a season-ending game against No. 9 Kansas State, which would give them a boost when compared to TCU's game against lowly Iowa State.
But if the committee hasn't moved Baylor ahead after TCU's ugly win over Kansas, they're not going to with another TCU win.
The Big 12 will indeed get their championship opportunity, but it will be Gary Patterson's Horned Frogs spoiling the CFP party.
.jpg?w=480 "Ohio State Team Doctor")
