Some of college football\u2019s traditional powerhouses will be holding their collective breaths when the next set of CFP rankings come out at 7 p.m. on Tuesday.<\/p>\n
Those rankings, as determined by the 13-member selection committee, likely will cast the die for teams not competing in their respective league championship games.<\/p>\n
Georgia, 11-1 and preparing to play Alabama (10-2) in the SEC championship game at 4 p.m. on Saturday in Mercedes-Benz Stadium, is safely in the field.<\/p>\n
The Bulldogs, with a win over the Tide, would get a bye and likely end up in the Sugar Bowl CFP quarterfinal on Jan. 1 against a first-round winner. The Sugar Bowl gets the highest-ranked league champ from the SEC or Big 12.<\/p>\n
A Georgia loss to Alabama could drop UGA into hosting a first-round game on Dec. 19 or Dec. 20 at Sanford Stadium.<\/p>\n
The No. 10-ranked Tide (10-2), which survived a 27-20 win over Auburn on Saturday, has an outside shot at landing a first-round bye with a win over the Bulldogs depending on how high it\u2019s ranked on Tuesday night.<\/p>\n
Alabama, even should it fall to UGA and suffer a third loss, is expected to make the field. The committee set a precedent last season of not dropping losing championship game teams in the rankings beneath teams that did not play that weekend.<\/p>\n
The final set of rankings will come out at noon on Sunday, Dec. 7, and provide the seedings for the 12-team College Football Playoff bracket.<\/p>\n
Per the CFP protocol, \u201cthe committee\u2019s task will be to select the best teams\u201d through a process that considers:<\/p>\n
\u2022 Strength of schedule<\/p>\n
\u2022 Head-to-head competition<\/p>\n
\u2022 Comparative outcomes of common opponents<\/p>\n
\u2022 Relevant factors, such as unavailability of key players and coaches,<\/p>\n
The top-four seeds will get byes, while teams seeded No. 5 through No. 12 will play first-round games at campus sites on Dec. 19 and Dec. 20.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think this will be the toughest year the committee has,\u201d ABC commentator and College GameDay analyst Kirk Herbstreit said on Saturday night, \u201cwhen you look at teams like Miami, Vanderbilt and Texas.\u201d<\/p>\n
Indeed, Carson Beck\u2019s No. 12-ranked Hurricanes beat current-No. 9 Notre Dame head-to-head in both teams\u2019 season-opening game, 27-24, and have the same 10-2 record.<\/p>\n
The Irish, however, have been ahead of Miami throughout the CFP rankings and many expect they will stay there after closing the regular season with a 49-20 win over Stanford Saturday night.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019re talking about a (Notre Dame) team that is playing as well as anyone right now, won 10 straight games, all of them by double-digit points,\u201d Irish coach Marcus Freeman said. \u201cWho are the best teams now? Not Week One, now.\u201d<\/p>\n
Of the top 10 teams, No. 8 Oklahoma was perhaps the least impressive with a 17-13 home win over a 7-5 LSU team playing with an interim head coach that\u2019s lost four of its past six games.<\/p>\n
The Sooners or No. 9-ranked Notre Dame figure to hold the final at-large bids after league championship games are played unless jumped in the rankings.<\/p>\n
Miami won\u2019t have the opportunity to play Virginia in the ACC championship game for a potential automatic bid, as Duke won the tiebreaker among the five league teams that finished with a 6-2.<\/p>\n
That leaves the Hurricanes completely dependent on landing an at-large berth to make the 12-team field.<\/p>\n
Miami coach Mario Cristobal believes his team should jump high enough in the rankings to receive a CFP bid after the Hurricanes scored a 38-7 road win at No. 22 Pitt on Saturday.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve got great players in all phases and we\u2019re playing great football in all phases,\u201d Cristobal said in his on-field TV interview. \u201cThe best part about football is you get to settle it on the field where head-to-head is always the No. 1 criteria for anything regarding athletics and football.\u201d<\/p>\n
Texas, after scoring a statement win over No. 3-ranked and previously unbeaten Texas A&M, is hoping the selection committee will consider its wins over ranked opponents this season, too.<\/p>\n
The Longhorns\u2019 27-17 win over the Aggies prevented Texas A&M from appearing in what would have been their first-ever SEC championship game since joining the league in 2012.<\/p>\n
Texas hopes to jump from No. 16 into consideration for an at-large bid after its third win over a team ranked in the top 10 when they played them.<\/p>\n
The Longhorns scored wins over current-No. 14 Vanderbilt (34-31), and perhaps most notably, current-No. 8 Oklahoma by a 23-8 score in the teams\u2019 neutral-site rivalry.<\/p>\n
Coach Steve Sarkisian pleaded his program\u2019s case after defeated the Aggies on Friday night.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat team was undefeated, the No. 3 team in the country, a lot of the pundits think they are the No. 1 team in the country, we just beat them by 10,\u201d Sarkisian said in his on-field interview. \u201cIf you look at the body of work …. and you look at the non-conference schedule we played and go to Ohio State in Week One and lose by seven, when we out-gained them by nearly 200 yards, we have a really good football team.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt would be a disservice to our sport if this team is not a playoff team when we went and scheduled that non-conference game, because if we\u2019re a 10-2 team, there\u2019s not a question.\u201d<\/p>\n