Week 10 CFP Eliminator: Weak Resumes Everywhere

Last week, I spoke about how a Notre Dame upset of Clemson could spell big trouble for the ACC. Well, Notre Dame delivered, and how.

Unfortunately for the ACC, that means both Clemson and North Carolina are well behind the eight-ball in terms of having a CFP-worthy resume. Is there some good news here? Actually, there is. The problem for the selection committee (and the good news for Clemson and North Carolina) is that there really aren’t four teams in a better position, even with the losses to Notre Dame.

Ohio State and Michigan are both two weeks away from making their November 26th meeting a de facto Playoff play-in game. Georgia doesn’t look to be challenged again before the SEC Championship Game. TCU is a lock if it can stay undefeated, but otherwise is in not much better position than an ACC champion. And even with TCU, that’s only three teams. Who’s our fourth? A one-loss ACC champion? A one-loss Pac 12 champion? An 11-1 Tennessee, Ole Miss, or even Big Ten East runner-up? We’re running out of options, which means we could get some interesting choices for that final spot if things come down to it.

How it works

In addition to in this weekly article, I will also be counting down the eliminated teams on this Twitter thread. Be sure to follow the eliminations there as well as here, where I’ll be able to explain these more fully.

I need to start with two notes about the process.

1. The premise: My goal here is to not predict individual games or scenarios. With every single team, I ask myself one question only: if this team wins the rest of its games, will it make the Playoff? If the answer is no, that team is now eliminated. I don’t care how impossible it will be to win out; that’s not my job here. I will eliminate a team when that eventual loss comes. There’s no need to assume a future loss.

Now, how do I determine whether a particular resume is Playoff-worthy or not? For that, I look at 2007. 2007 was the most chaotic year we’ve had in modern college football. So I compare a resume to what the top four would look like with 2007-levels of chaos. If the resume is good enough, the team is still alive. Otherwise, it’s eliminated. As the year goes on, once I see how much chaos this season is really having, I can then adjust my standards accordingly, and start to look at individual scenarios and how outlandish they are.

Lastly, I will refer to currently-ranked teams when giving notes on a team. Keep in mind that where a team is ranked now is irrelevant. All that matters are the rankings late in the season. Being ranked now just means that a team is more likely to be ranked then, not that facing that team will definitely be meaningful.

2. Group of 5 teams: My general policy is not to eliminate any Group of 5 teams until they lose a game. Part of it is in line with the Eliminator theory––crazy things can happen in college football, and you never know how far out an undefeated team is. In reality, without hype coming in and without some marquee nonconference wins, no G5 team ever has a realistic chance. With the way this year has begun, no G5 team had a real chance this year.

Week 10: Teams Remaining

As the season goes on, I’ll add more detailed notes by each team explaining why a questionable team has not yet been eliminated. For now, though, we’ll start with just the list. We began the year with 130 teams (James Madison is still transitioning to FBS and is not eligible for the postseason this year). We began Week 9 with 18 teams alive, and three more were eliminated this week. Therefore, 15 teams currently remain in College Football Playoff contention.

ACC:

Big 12:

Big Ten:

Pac 12:

SEC:

Teams Eliminated

This season I will only be listing Power 5 teams in this section.

Week 10:

Week 9:

Week 8:

Week 7:

Week 6:

Week 5:

Week 4:

Week 3:

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