Bold Projections for College Football's Final Four for 2016-17 Season
It's not called the Final Four, but college football's recent move to a playoff system has created a similar end-of-year dynamic to what college basketball is finishing up. While it doesn't start with 68 teams in a single-elimination tournament, college football's establishment of the final four is still a lengthy process that in some cases goes back to the start of the season.
The teams who will qualify for this year's playoffs must be strong throughout the year, though the earlier they lose the less it might affect their chances of earning a bid. Two of the three one-loss playoff teams from the 2015-16 season suffered their defeat in October or earlier, while Michigan State made up for its early-November loss by knocking off a pair of unbeaten teams en route to the Big Ten title.
That prevented Ohio State from defending its national title, something very few people could have envisioned at this point last year. Anyone who did was making a bold projection.
But that's what the offseason is for, isn't it?
We've put together some bold projections for this season's “final four,” and while it probably won't happen it's not entirely out of the realm of possibility. Follow along as we set the table for what would be a wild college football playoff this winter.
No. 4 Seed
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Ohio State (11-2)
Right off the bat, we're amping up the bold factor by including a two-loss team, the first to make the playoffs in its three-year history. Even more controversial will be who Ohio State gets in ahead of, a two-loss Oklahoma team that the Buckeyes will have lost to in mid-September.
OSU will also fall in Big Ten play, dropping one on the road at Wisconsin in mid-October, but it will run the table from there, and wins over Michigan State, Michigan and Iowa (the last in the conference title game) over its final three games will send the Buckeyes shooting up the playoff rankings. The Iowa game win will come the same Saturday as Oklahoma beats rival Oklahoma State to wrap up the Big 12, but the committee will ultimately put more weight on that 13th game for OSU.
This will again spark up the debate over whether the Big 12 should expand or at least take advantage of its ability to hold a conference title game.
No. 3 Seed
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Notre Dame (11-1)
Would Notre Dame have snuck into the field last year had it managed to win at Stanford in its regular-season finale? Maybe, but we'll never know. Instead, in 2016 we'll discover it's possible to lose your last game and still make the playoffs.
The Fighting Irish finish up each year in California over Thanksgiving weekend, and this time around that will be against USC. They'll head into that game as the only unbeaten team in the country, partly because their only real challenge away from South Bend, Indiana, will have come in the season opener at Texas. Notre Dame's only other true road game prior to USC will have been Oct. 8 at North Carolina State, along with neutral-site wins over Syracuse, Navy and Army.
While its overall schedule strength won't be what it was in 2015, Notre Dame benefits from having avoided any pitfalls until its finale. That gives it enough of a cushion to withstand the late loss, though it does drop it in the final standings after sitting No. 1 for most of the year.
No. 2 Seed
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Clemson (12-1)
The only repeat participant from last year's playoffs, Clemson will win a second straight ACC title but won't make it through the regular season completely unscathed. Old nemesis Florida State will knock off the Tigers in Tallahassee, Florida, on Oct. 29, but FSU will lose to Louisville (whom Clemson will beat) and ultimately win any tiebreakers that pop up for the Atlantic Division title.
The Tigers will go into the ACC championship game as the No. 1 seed, moving ahead of Notre Dame after its loss to USC. However, they can't maintain that spot despite winning the conference title since their victory comes against a 7-5 Miami team that doesn't provide much boost to the resume.
Buoyed by Heisman Trophy-winning quarterback Deshaun Watson, Clemson heads into the playoffs already knowing what to expect and driven to finish what it started in 2015-16.
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No. 1 Seed
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Georgia (12-1)
Parting ways with head coach Mark Richt after a long and successful run (but not successful enough) could have blown up in Georgia's face. Instead, Bulldogs athletic director Greg McGarity looks like a genius after stating that Kirby Smart "is the perfect fit for the University of Georgia," per RedAndBlack.com, back in December.
In his first year on the job, Smart will lead Georgia to its first SEC East crown since 2012, its first conference championship since 2005 and its first legitimate shot at a national title in decades. Along the way, he'll also knock off all the rivals in one fell swoop, starting with Florida and then moving on to Auburn and Georgia Tech, the only loss coming in September at Ole Miss.
Smart's background in defense will come in handy as that will be the side that carries Georgia early on, at least until true freshman quarterback Jacob Eason gets rolling and running back Nick Chubb begins to show the form he had before suffering a major knee injury last October. A September loss at Ole Miss will serve as the spark needed to get the offense more involved.
But then the Bulldogs will avenge that setback in the SEC final, knocking off Ole Miss (which will make the conference championship thanks to a third consecutive win over Alabama) and ending the West Division's seven-year run of dominance. The last East Division team to win it: Florida, in 2008, en route to the national title.
Fiesta Bowl: No. 3 Notre Dame vs. No. 2 Clemson
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With the Pac-12 failing to earn a playoff spot for the second year in a row, the Fiesta Bowl semifinal ends up being quite geographically challenged. All four playoff qualifiers are from the Eastern half of the country, and the top two seeds are both nearly 2,000 miles from Glendale, Arizona, but someone has to get shipped out West.
Both Clemson and Notre Dame will be playing at University of Phoenix Stadium for the second time in less than a year. Clemson lost to Alabama in the national championship and Notre Dame fell to Ohio State in last season's Fiesta Bowl, played on Jan. 1. After this one, neither is going to look forward to suiting up on the rolled-in grass at the home of the Arizona Cardinals ever again.
There won't be hurricane-like conditions for this rematch of the 2015 game between the Tigers and Fighting Irish, won by Clemson at home thanks to a late two-point conversion stop. That was DeShone Kizer who was stuffed just short of the goal line, but this time around it will be Malik Zaire who has piloted the Irish to the playoffs.
It's the status quo for Clemson, with Deshaun Watson coming close to matching his ridiculous 2015 numbers and running roughshod over Notre Dame's defense much like he did against Oklahoma and Alabama in last year's playoffs.
Final Score: Clemson 37, Notre Dame 27
Peach Bowl: No. 4 Ohio State vs. No. 1 Georgia
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Georgia's players might be able to traverse the route from the Georgia Dome's locker room to the field with their eyes closed, as this will be the Bulldogs' third game there this season. They open 2016 against North Carolina and we've got them beating Ole Miss in the SEC title game, and as the No. 1 seed they'll get to play a virtual home game in the semifinals.
Ohio State, as the so-called “last team in” to the field much as it was in 2014-15, is used to such a crowd disadvantage in the playoffs. Two years ago it had to take on Alabama in the Sugar Bowl, in front of a pro-Crimson Tide crowd, yet managed to come out on top and parlayed that into a national championship. Can the Buckeyes repeat that feat?
Georgia has made it this far despite starting a true freshman at quarterback, though most of the time Jacob Eason looked nothing like a first-year player. That changes here, as an Ohio State defense that made constant improvement throughout the season puts forth its finest effort.
Final Score: Ohio State 26, Georgia 17
CFP Championship Game: No. 4 Ohio State vs. No. 2 Clemson
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History isn't on the side of Clemson, since the last two teams to return to the national title game a year after losing in the final have come up short once again. Ohio State lost to LSU in 2008 after falling to Florida the year before, while Oklahoma was beaten by USC in 2005 a year after losing to LSU.
Florida State is the only team to avenge a title game loss (since an official championship game was formed in the late 1990s) when after losing to Tennessee in the first-ever BCS championship game in 1999, it returned to beat Virginia Tech the season after.
But Clemson has been all about setting new standards under coach Dabo Swinney, nearly becoming the first 15-0 team in FBS history in 2014-15 and now becoming the first team to make consecutive playoff title games. To do so will mean having to notch a second win in four seasons over Urban Meyer, which isn't an easy task.
Very few players are still around from that 2014 Orange Bowl, a 40-35 Clemson victory, though Meyer and Swinney remain for this rematch in Tampa, Florida. They don't have the same history as Swinney does with Alabama coach Nick Saban, but that won't take away from an excellently coached title game that comes down to Clemson quarterback Deshaun Watson scoring on a run in the final two minutes.
Final Score: Clemson 30, Ohio State 28
Statistics courtesy of CFBStats.com or Sports-Reference.com, unless otherwise noted. Recruiting information courtesy of 247Sports, unless otherwise noted.
Follow Brian J. Pedersen on Twitter at @realBJP.
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