The 2015 College Football Playoff Top 4, but no more

There will be a full ranking 128-1, but that will come after the regular season is complete. That’s right, we still have one more game remaining – Army/Navy next Saturday. You’ll get the full list at that point, just in time for bowl season. However, since the college football playoff selection committee is announcing the playoff teams tomorrow, here’s a quick look at the OFR/Option Read top 4 as they would stand.

Conveniently for the committee, the 4 are much easier this year than last (when, by my method, they got it wrong – and then got lucky the undeserving team got hot and proved to be the best in the country only with the help of the final two games). There’s no way they’re getting it wrong tomorrow. Even ACC officials might get this grouping right. However, the order might be of some note.

1. Clemson (13-0)

Clemson has been by far the #1 team for weeks, and it didn’t change despite a couple of close calls to end the season against South Carolina and UNC. The end of the ACC Championship Game certainly reeked of ACC officials protecting their guaranteed playoff spot, but even if North Carolina is correctly awarded the ball, they still have to score a TD AND get the two-point conversion. All in all, tying things up was unlikely. And beyond that, Clemson is still the favorite in OT. So, while we were robbed of a great finish on a completely terrible call, the outcome still probably turned out the way it would have, with Clemson winning.

Why Clemson at #1? They have wins over 4 teams with 2 or fewer total losses – Appalachian State, North Carolina, Florida State, and Notre Dame. Only Michigan State (2) and Oklahoma (2) have as many. MSU’s two best wins are really as good as Clemson’s 4 best, but Clemson is undefeated. Clemson didn’t rattle off as many blowouts as you’d normally expect from a #1 team. The Tigers had only three wins of at least 21 points. One, a 49-10 win over Wofford, is a throwaway result. Another was a 41-10 over a good but athletically inferior App State. Only the 58-0 win over Miami stands as a truly dominant effort. Clemson is very good, but the year was marked mostly by those in-between kind of wins, games that seem comfortable but didn’t get that way until late. The Tigers are clearly very good, but you just don’t get a juggernaut kind of feeling whether you’re watching them or you’re looking at results. They’re not quite as lucky an undefeated team as 2014 Florida State, but this isn’t a team that inspires a ton of confidence against other top teams. They did, after all, nearly lose to South Carolina. They haven’t looked completely in control of a game since October. Still, Clemson is the lone undefeated team, and they went 13-0 against a good schedule. They earned this spot, even if there are doubts they can keep it.

2. Alabama (12-1)

There’s one sore spot on Bama’s resume, but it’s oddly enough not the loss. It’s the lack of a really great win. Alabama’s schedule is very deep, but it’s hard to properly appreciate because there’s not a heavyweight in the mix. No school has beaten more pretty good teams than Alabama, who played 8 and beat 7 of them in a marathon of a season, but all those pretty good teams seemed destructible, losing 3 or 4 games each. Georgia, LSU, Wisconsin, and Florida were all beaten by 2 teams other than Alabama. Tennessee, Texas A&M, and Mississippi State were all beaten by 3 other teams. It’s a report card riddled with B+’s, more than any other student in the conversation, but all the other students at least have one A- or A+, even if they have more C’s and D’s, if you’ll pardon the metaphor.

If the quality of their wins didn’t work overwhelmingly in their favor, the nature of the wins did. They had blowouts (37-10 over MTSU, 34-0 over ULM, 38-10 over UGA, 31-6 over MSU), comfortable wins (35-17 over Wisconsin, 27-14 over Arkansas, 41-23 over A&M, 30-16 over LSU, 29-13 over Auburn, and 29-15 over Florida), and generally avoided close games better than others. Only one of the 12 wins came by a single score, a 19-14 win over Tennessee. Also, the loss was more respectable than most, coming against 9-3 Ole Miss in a wildly misleading game where Alabama lost 5 of 5 fumbles (odds suggest no more than 2 or 3 should be lost without luck factoring in), Ole Miss scored a long TD on a bad throwing decision that turned into a tip drill miracle, and Bama still only lost by 6 points. They were clearly the better team, just having a particularly unlucky (and un-Tide-like) day.

Alabama enters the playoffs as the likely favorite, the best and most talented team in the country. I’m sure that’s more important than their runner-up resume.

3. Michigan State (12-1)

MSU’s big picture resume really isn’t all that impressive. Close calls against Rutgers, Purdue, Oregon, and, most memorably, Michigan. Against inferior talent like Central Michigan and Western Michigan, the Spartans looked pretty good but just not all that great. Until their 55-16 win over Penn State, you never really saw them control a game from beginning to end. So what makes Michigan State #3 instead of #4?

The small picture resume looks pretty amazing. MSU finished as the only team to beat Ohio State. They also finished as the only team to beat Iowa. Having one unique win on the resume is a big deal. Having two is colossal. If MSU’s other 10 games were even remotely on par with Alabama (or even Clemson), the Spartans might be an easy #2. These two games are the difference between the Spartans being #3 and the Spartans being 6th or 7th. It may be all they have to hang their hat on, but it’s a very big hat hook. They had the most near-losses of any top 4 team, but MSU’s two big quality wins help them overcome their close, bad loss. It also doesn’t hurt that the other contender for #3 had an equally bad loss.

4. Oklahoma (11-1)

By some measures, Oklahoma is the best team in the country. They’re the hottest right now, beating Baylor, TCU, and Oklahoma State to end the season. No team in the top 4 is better battle-tested of late. However, momentum has little enough effect week-to-week. Taking 2 1/2 weeks off is going to sap what little effect momentum might have. Still, Oklahoma had a great year and was the most dominant team of the top 4. In my rankings system, Oklahoma generated the most blowout points of the 4, with 21+ point wins over Akron, Kansas State, Texas Tech, Kansas, Iowa State, and Oklahoma State. Only the mercurial Michigan Wolverines were as impressive with their blowout victories. As embarrassing as the loss to 7-loss Texas was, it was close. Also, Oklahoma won a non-conference game against a pretty good Tennessee squad. The resume isn’t quite on par with the others here, but it’s still a significant edge over also-rans like Iowa and Ohio State. And while my rankings don’t factor in conference championships, Oklahoma has one. That’s big.

 

This is the top 4 I believe in, and it’s also the matchup pairing I’d like to see, with Clemson facing Oklahoma in the Orange Bowl and Alabama playing Michigan State in the Cotton Bowl.