Texas and Tennessee: Playoff Possibilities?

Two things:

The first. A two-loss team has never made the College Football Playoff. We’re annually prepared for the possibility—eventually, one would think, there will not be four power conference teams with one loss or fewer—but so far, we haven’t seen it.

The second. A one-loss team that didn’t win a conference championship has made the College Football Playoff four times. Half of the College Football Playoffs we’ve seen so far have included a one-loss team that didn’t win a conference championship. It’s more than possible. It’s annually fairly likely.

Against this backdrop, let’s talk about the two blowouts on Saturday by the guys in orange.

Texas was expected to beat Oklahoma. The possibility existed that it wouldn’t be close. Nobody reasonable, though, predicted the 49-0 stomping we saw in Dallas. It’s good for advertisers that Texas collapsed so disastrously last year in this game, because otherwise, it could have been turned off at the half. It likely was, by many, turned off at the half. Texas blew Oklahoma to smithereens.

One important piece of this—it may turn out to be the more important piece—is that Oklahoma is evidently a rather mediocre team. We thought quite a bit of them after they obliterated Nebraska. We were concerned by the loss to Kansas State, but not shocked. That’s the kind of thing that happens. Two blowout losses later, we can all acknowledge that Oklahoma is in a world of trouble. Brent Venables needs to figure it out, and fast, because this team isn’t only falling short of expectations. It might fall short of making a bowl game.

The other important piece, though, is that Texas appears to be pretty good. Movelor, our college football model’s rating system, has them as the tenth-best team in the country. Bill Connelly’s SP+, over at ESPN, has them fifth. Beating Oklahoma on a neutral field might not be a big deal, but beating a capable team by seven touchdowns while shutting them out? That will turn heads.

Crucially, Texas has two losses already. Crucially, they shouldn’t be expected to win out from here. They still have to go to Stillwater and Manhattan, each a game where Movelor currently has them an underdog. They’ll still be visited by Iowa State, Baylor, and TCU, none of which are expected to be cupcakes for the Horns. They still have to play Kansas, and recent iterations of Texas have famously struggled with the Kansas Jayhawks. Even if they win each of those games, the Longhorns will have to then win the Big 12 Championship, where they’d most likely play Oklahoma State in a rematch. Texas going 11-2 is highly unlikely, and 10-3 Texas is highly unlikely to make the playoff, even with what we’re about to say. Still, though, our model has Texas as 1.8% likely to make the playoff field, and our model is not currently applying the Kelly Bryant Rule to Texas.

What’s the Kelly Bryant Rule? In 2017, Clemson lost to Syracuse. It was a bad loss. But, with starting quarterback Kelly Bryant injured midway through the game, the CFP committee forgave roughly half of the loss, according to our model’s math. That’s precedent. And with Texas’s two losses both coming with Quinn Ewers off the field (or mostly off the field, in the case of the loss to Alabama), it’s more than possible the committee will forgive the defeats, at least to some extent. More or less, Texas would be treated as a 12-1 Big 12 champion with a loss somewhere between a close home loss to Alabama and a close road loss to Texas Tech in terms of quality. That’s a conventional playoff team.

Our model doesn’t apply the Kelly Bryant Rule to Texas yet because Texas is still a little too far out of the playoff picture. Looking backwards, we’ve only seen this applied to a playoff contender. Texas isn’t quite there, with eleven undefeated power conference teams above them in playoff likelihood. If and when a few more of those lose, if Texas is still a two-loss outfit, they’ll perform a Kelly Bryant Rule leap. This is one or two weeks away. If it’s going to happen, it will happen in our model before the first CFP Rankings are unveiled, and when the first CFP Rankings are unveiled, we’ll get our answer on the extent to which the committee is echoing the Kelly Bryant precedent.

Tennessee is, in this case, less interesting than Texas, but they made a statement on Saturday themselves. LSU is not presently a powerhouse, but they’re a respectable team, Tennessee was playing them in Baton Rouge, and the Vols came out of there 27-point victors. The visitors scored in the first minute and a half, and they didn’t stop scoring rapidly until the fourth quarter, which they entered leading 37-7. Tennessee looked good, and with Bryce Young’s health a question mark, they’re catching Alabama next week at a good time.

There are three primary routes for Tennessee to finish with one loss. The first is easiest: Beat Alabama, lose to Georgia. This isn’t easier because Georgia is better than Alabama. Nobody is very sure if Georgia is or isn’t better than Alabama. This is easier because if Tennessee gets to 11-1 but doesn’t win the SEC East, they don’t have to play in the SEC Championship, and while this would hurt their seeding, an 11-1 Tennessee with a win over Alabama is going to be pretty hard to keep out of the field, especially with their primary competition for the last spot in that scenario looking like it would perhaps be an 11-2 Alabama and one-loss champions from the lesser power leagues, none of whom would have as prominent a feather or as substantial a body of work as the Volunteers.

The second is harder: Lose to Alabama, beat Georgia, win the SEC. This doesn’t leave as much up to fate—the SEC champion is getting into the playoff unless something truly wild goes down. But, it requires going 2-1 against the top three. Not just 1-1.

The third is in between: Beat Alabama, beat Georgia, lose the SEC Championship. This would almost definitely be enough, but it, like the second, is tough. The Georgia game’s in Athens.

There are ostensibly five other games on Tennessee’s schedule besides these two, and four of those come against SEC East opponents, with two of those happening on the road. Tennessee winning all five is far from likely, let alone guaranteed. We don’t want to give the wrong impression there. But Tennessee’s put themselves in a position where Alabama’s visit to Knoxville on Saturday’s the biggest game that city has seen since Arkansas came through in November 1998. The Vols have a chance, not just to beat Alabama, but to win the national championship. That is a big deal.

More on that game later this week. Let’s talk about everybody else now:

The Top

Here’s how the top of the College Football Playoff picture looked entering the weekend:

Team	Make Playoff
Alabama	83.3%
Georgia	77.3%
Ohio State	71.0%
Michigan	49.0%
Oklahoma State	27.9%
Clemson	27.2%
Utah	24.0%

Here’s how it looks now:

Team	Make Playoff
Ohio State	82.6%
Georgia	80.9%
Alabama	77.4%
Michigan	40.3%
Clemson	34.4%
Oklahoma State	23.5%
Tennessee	10.3%

Notably present? Tennessee. Notably absent? Utah. The Utes went to UCLA and made a main character out of the Bruins, who now sit at 6-0 and find themselves just off this list with an 8.9% playoff probability heading into their week off. UCLA might have a loss to give at this point. UCLA’s in great shape.

Unfortunately for the Pac-12, as we wrote about on Saturday, UCLA is not the ideal team to have in this position. The Bruins, per Movelor, are only the 24^th-best team in the country. Utah, contrarily, is the fifth-best, and with this only Utah’s first conference loss, they remain the Pac-12 favorites.

There’s hope in Los Angeles—SP+ has UCLA eighth, SP+ has UCLA the Pac-12 favorites, Movelor and SP+ agree that USC’s overhyped but disagree on UCLA. Unfortunately, though, SP+ also likes Oregon a lot more than Movelor does, and when UCLA comes back from their weekend away, they’ll get on a plane to Eugene for a Pac-12 woodland showdown (SP+ has Utah tenth, for what it’s worth). So, the big story? Utah’s nearly gone, and with that there’s a lot more breathing room for Clemson, who looked fine in beating up Boston College.

Elsewhere at the top, we shuffled our top three. With Ohio State continuing to cruise, trouncing Michigan State in East Lansing, the Buckeyes are now believed by Movelor to ever-so-narrowly be the country’s best team. They’re only a third of a point better than Georgia on a neutral field, in Movelor’s eyes, and they’re only half a point better than Alabama, but between those pieces of points and the Buckeyes’ slightly more manageable playoff path, Ohio State’s the new national championship favorite.

Contributing to this swap was Alabama’s near-disaster against Texas A&M, though to be clear about something important: Movelor does not consider individual player injuries (our model only considers these in rare Kelly Bryant Rule instances, and even that doesn’t affect Movelor, only applying to the playoff rankings piece of the model). Bryce Young was hurt. Bryce Young won the Heisman last year. Alabama is still really, really good.

Also really, really good is Georgia, who pulled away handily from Auburn. Overall, there are three really, really good teams, and it’s hard to split hairs between the three right now. It might clear itself up, and the dance will certainly continue, but each is north of 75% in playoff probability and each is at least a touchdown better than every other team in the country (and at least ten points better than every other team in the country not named Michigan).

Moving down to the Wolverines, Michigan had a terrifying Saturday afternoon. Early in the game, running backs coach Mike Hart collapsed on the sideline, reportedly suffering a seizure. He was taken immediately to the hospital, and Jim Harbaugh announced postgame that Hart’s in stable condition. This is all a lot bigger deal than College Football Playoff probabilities. But, we’re a College Football Playoff probability blog, and Michigan did rally in the second half, pulling away from Indiana to win by three scores. The Wolverines dropped from a 50/50 playoff likelihood to around two-in-five, but part of that is Movelor’s surprise about the win only coming by three scores. Michigan’s at a spot where every point of Movelor makes a big difference in the model, and I’m not sure the most recent reaction is the best gauge of this team’s true ability. They’re definitely not seen as being on Ohio State or Georgia or Alabama’s level right now, but they’re also rather clearly the next-best team, AP Poll silliness aside.

Continuing, the AP Poll has Clemson ahead of Michigan, and that’s worthy of skepticism. Not as worthy of skepticism as other habit-driven groupthink further down the ledger (someone please expose USC already), but certainly suspect. With the ACC housing only one team in Movelor’s top twenty, though, and none in the SP+ top ten, it’s possible the Clemson lesson won’t be taught until the Fiesta Bowl, and it’s possible that lesson won’t be retained, since we’re so used to seeing semifinal blowouts. We could go years without internalizing Clemson’s mediocrity. I may weep at points during this saga.

Anyway, Clemson’s not bad or anything. Movelor does have them seventh. But their path is so easy that they’re next in line behind Michigan for playoff prominence.

Oklahoma State’s path is not easy. The Pokes still have to play at least three teams in the Movelor top 20, and only one of those games is at home, and that doesn’t include still-undefeated TCU, whom they’ll meet in Fort Worth this weekend. But, Spencer Sanders & Co. kept Texas Tech in reach and then finished them off in the fourth quarter, and they’re 5-0, and they remain the Big 12’s best hope.

USC and Other Deceit

Going league-by-league now, USC beat Washington State and beat Washington State comfortably, keeping their own unbeaten run going with yet another victory over a team who might not win seven games. It was arguably the Trojans’ most impressive win so far, and it came by sixteen points at home against a team Movelor thinks would be a home underdog if James Madison came to town. This weekend, USC goes to Salt Lake City, and clearly there are things wrong with Utah, but every sportsbook and reputable rating system has the home team favored to win.

That said…

After the trip to Utah, USC gets to play Arizona, Cal, and Colorado in a row before finishing the year against UCLA, Notre Dame, and potentially a final Pac-12 opponent. So, if USC wins this week, 10-0 might be the expectation heading into those last two. And thus, they’re 7.3% playoff-likely.

We promised other deceit, and it came in the form of Washington. If you’ll recall, UCLA’s initial claim to strength came from beating Washington handily at home. Well, the Huskies went to Tempe on Saturday, and they lost by a touchdown to Arizona State. Arizona State’s probably better than they’ve gotten credit for being—they’ve played two teams in Movelor’s top ten, and also USC—but Washington was always suspicious, and the logic that UCLA was good because they beat Washington is both irrelevant (because now they’ve beaten Utah) and a house of cards that just lost its bottom row.

Notre Dame Lingers

Notre Dame isn’t going to make the playoff. They’re less than 1-in-100 likely to do that. They lost to Marshall, and this year’s is not one of Marshall’s better teams. But with BYU in the rearview, the Irish now set their sights on tearing up the top of the board. Remaining opponents include Clemson at home and USC in Los Angeles, and there’s also a thin chance Syracuse will be a factor when Marcus Freeman and the lads head up there at the end of the month. There’s a big Movelor/SP+ split over these guys—we have them ninth, Connelly has them 27^th—but even SP+ presently has the spread on both those games within four and a half points. Notre Dame might not be a top ten team, as Movelor sees them. But it might not take a top ten team to take down Clemson or Southern Cal.

The Matter of UNC

North Carolina won its fifth game of the year on Saturday, and with Georgia Tech beating Duke, the Tar Heels are now alone in first place in the ACC’s Coastal Division. Over the next two months, Movelor only has them an underdog in one regular season game, which is enough to make these guys two-in-three likely to win that division, one-in-five likely to win the ACC, and one-in-fifty likely to make the Playoff, a number three times as good as that of TCU. Meanwhile, Wake Forest rolled over Army, keeping their backdoor playoff shot alive (the Deacs would need Clemson to lose two ACC games, and the Deacs have no remaining margin for error, but the Deacs do still sit at about a one-in-thirty playoff likelihood); NC State escaped Florida State, keeping their own backdoor shot alive (same situation, but only a one-in-fifty playoff likelihood); and the fact UNC’s win came over Miami left the Hurricanes just 2-3 overall, with only a three percent chance of taking the conference title.

The ACC is a mess, which makes Clemson nearly the biggest conference title favorite in the country, only narrowly trailing Cincinnati. Behind them, though, it’s UNC, and UNC’s work to date does suggest that should they win out, they’ll make the playoff field. That’s only seven straight wins, now. A lot, but even if you call each game a coin toss hardly 1-in-100.

Is TCU Good?

TCU won again on Saturday, escaping from Kansas over a wild second half as Jason Bean filled in admirably for Jalon Daniels, who was hurt early in the day. The Jayhawks drop to 5-1, and they’re currently a touchdown underdog on the road at Oklahoma on Saturday, suggesting those of us who measure the gaps between teams in points are largely in agreement on where this is going. They should still make a bowl—they get six chances to get that sixth win—but they’re going to be an underdog in every single game.

The Horned Frogs, meanwhile, remain undefeated, and their clash with Oklahoma State takes place on Saturday and takes place in Fort Worth, making this weekend a massive one in the Big 12.

Movelor is low on the Frogs. It only reacts so much to in-season results, and with TCU having been so bad last year and having only played one team in the Movelor top 75, they haven’t made up ground yet. SP+, though, has them 23^rd, and the oddsmakers evidently believe in them. With Oklahoma State a Movelor darling (despite SP+’s skepticism, and evidently skepticism in the markets), this is a chance for TCU to prove something, and to establish itself as a straightforward playoff contender. The Big 12 has only one great option—it’s the Pokes—but TCU’s the next-best thing. After that, you get to Texas or Kansas State (who did squeak by in Ames, by a point), but the fact K-State’s loss came to Tulane doesn’t bode well for them even in the miraculous scenario where they win out.

Illinois Is Lurking

Well, they’re ranked in the AP Poll now, so maybe they’re doing this out in the open. Whichever’s the case, Bret Bielema’s squad grabbed an important home win over Iowa on Saturday night, Chase Brown’s 146 yards leading a 9-6 victory. With Minnesota still holding just one loss, they remain the division favorite, and Purdue took down Maryland on the road, making a case that they themselves will take the West. Behind those two, though, it’s the Illini, and with Minnesota visiting Champaign on Saturday, we’re looking at the biggest Illinois football game since that year they started 6-0 and finished 6-7.

Of course, Wisconsin is also just a game back in league play, crushing Northwestern in Evanston to kick off the Jim Leonhard era. One of the Badgers’ losses came to Ohio State, meaning they can still get the head-to-head nod over every team besides Illinois in the West. It is, oddly enough, kind of a great race, and for some Movelor context, the four teams leading it—Minnesota, Purdue, Illinois, and Wisconsin—would line up 2^nd, 3^rd, 5^th, and 2^nd, respectively, if dropped in the ACC.

It’s a Shame Mississippi State Lost to LSU

We don’t have much to say about the SEC at the moment. But we sure would if Mississippi State was 6-0 with Alabama, Georgia, and Mississippi all remaining on the schedule.

Two results of note: Mississippi pulled away from Vanderbilt in the second half after a clunky start, and a Will Levis-less Kentucky lost at home to South Carolina. It was a ten-point loss, so Levis might not have made the difference, but the Wildcats did close to nothing offensively, and South Carolina has a solid win ahead of this weekend’s visit from Texas A&M. It’s progress from the Gamecocks.

James Madison Is Doing This

Unlike Illinois and TCU, James Madison’s AP Poll ranking does not elicit eye rolls from our model, which has the Dukes 26^th. More than anything, this speaks to how badly JMU was beating up on 99% of the FCS and how closely they were hanging with North Dakota State before they made the leap. Their 22-point margin against Arkansas State was their second-closest game of the year. Eleven wins and zero losses is in their sights, and if the 12-team playoff does come next year, the Sun Belt could rapidly ascend to being a perennial contributor to its contestants. This is the future Pac-12 and ACC officials feared, and this is what they’ve had to accept with their own conference’s lives in jeopardy.

Coastal Carolina also stayed undefeated, winning at Louisiana-Monroe. They only did it by a touchdown, though, and Movelor has them as only the fourth-best team in the Sun Belt, and just 72^nd-best in the nation. They are the worst undefeated on a list that includes Syracuse.

**

Our categories, exiting the week, along with their playoff probabilities:

Favorites (>75% Playoff Probability)

• Ohio State (82.6%)
• Georgia (80.9%)
• Alabama (77.4%)

Contenders (>10% Playoff Probability)

• Michigan (40.3%)
• Clemson (34.4%)
• Oklahoma State (23.5%)
• Tennessee (10.3%)

Factors (>1% Playoff Probability)

• UCLA (8.9%)
• USC (7.3%)
• Penn State (6.6%)
• Oregon (4.7%)
• Mississippi (3.9%)
• Wake Forest (3.4%)
• Utah (3.2%)
• Minnesota (3.2%)
• North Carolina State (1.9%)
• Texas (1.8%)
• North Carolina (1.8%)

Undefeateds

• TCU (0.6%)
• Syracuse (0.4%)
• James Madison (ineligible, FCS-to-FBS transition)
• Coastal Carolina (0.1%)

Cotton Bowl Candidates (Movelor Top 25, <1% Playoff Probability)

• Notre Dame (0.8%)
• Baylor (0.4%)
• Texas A&M (0.0%)
• Cincinnati (0.0%)
• Kansas State (0.8%)
• Wisconsin (0.0%)
• Oklahoma (0.0%)
• Purdue (0.2%)
• Mississippi State (0.3%)