Happy Halloween! We’re in for a treat on Tuesday night with the first release of the College Football Playoff rankings, although some teams may feel cheated. To add to the celebratory atmosphere of today’s announcement, the rankings will be discussed by new CFP Selection Committee Chairman Boo Corrigan, North Carolina State’s athletic director.
This is, of course, a warm-up act for the warm-up act, which is all the CFP rankings releases before the last one. Keep in mind that this ranking doesn’t work like a traditional 25 poll, where if you keep winning you’re unlikely to be overtaken. Each set of CFP rankings is discarded after it is announced, with teams re-evaluated from scratch each week.
Before we get to the predicted rankings themselves, here’s a refresher on some key points that committee members consider when deciding on a team’s ranking beyond their on-field performance:
- Strength of schedule
- Conference Championships (once decided)
- head to head
- Results compared to common opponents
- Results against ranked opponents
Luckily, the committee’s definition of “ranked opponents” is different than what you’re used to. The rankings they use are the previous week’s CFP rankings. They don’t take into account where teams are ranked in the CFP, AP Top 25, etc. when the games are played. Using game time rankings is the most worthless method of determining “ranked opponents”; In fact, the committee specifically prohibits the use of polls that start in the preseason.
Note that “Game Control” is not listed among the criteria. It was never considered, although the term (or similar concepts) came from the mouths of previous committee chairs. (The CFP has no way of measuring “game control” — I’ve seen the data the committee uses — but let’s face it: That’s what they’re talking about.) And really, who cares how you get to win, as long as you get there?
With that in mind, I believe the CFP rankings will look like this tonight. Remember, this is not necessarily how I would vote if I were on the committee. I’m just predicting what they’ll do tonight.
Note: This forecast is based only on previous results. It does not reflect the final prediction for the playoffs. The complete bowl playoffs and bowl predictions through the end of the season can be found here.