Game Day goes North to HAH-Vahd YAHD this Saturday!
For some reason, this intrigues me. I would like to Tour the campus someday.
Not clear to me why MSU is ranked that high. Their reputation this season was based on beating three highly ranked unbeaten teams in a row — LSU, A&M, and Auburn. But now Auburn is the only one of the three still ranked, and it has three losses. So it turns out that MSU has yet to beat a top ten team, and they sure didn’t look like a top four team yesterday.
Assuming you’re serious… 
If your goal is to demonstrate the superiority of the SEC, you’ll need to beat an opponent from another conference. Merely extending the SEC regular season by 3 games in January wouldn’t prove much of anything.
That’s the beauty of having teams ranked #2 and #4. As I understand it, #1 will play #4, and #2 will play #3. The only way to have an all-SEC final is for Bama and Miss State to win the semifinal against non-SEC opponents.
Aha, I misread your original statement – I thought you were hoping for an all-SEC playoff (all 4 teams)…which would be a bit of a reach.
Perhaps some of the voters thought they were voting for Michigan State. More seriously, more SEC bias. Hoping that Mississippi beats Mississippi State, Auburn beats Alabama, and the SEC East champ wins the title game. That might hopefully limit Satan’s Evil Conference to one team.
Good on Game Day for coming to Harvard. About time ESPN stopped pimping for their subsidiary SEC Network.
Updated Best Win - Worst Loss Rankings!
Best Win (all 0, 1 or 2 loss teams, using current AP rankings)
- Ole Miss (#2 Alabama)
- Arizona (#3 Oregon)
- Alabama (#4 Miss State)
- Baylor (#5 TCU)
5t. Oregon (#10 Michigan State)
5t. Ohio State (#10 Michigan State) - Wisconsin (#11 Nebraska)
- TCU (#12 K State)
- UCLA (#13 Arizona State)
10t. Miss St (#16 Auburn)
10t. Georgia (#16 Auburn) - Duke (#17 Georgia Tech)
- Arizona State (#20 Utah)
- Michigan State (#21 Nebraska)
- Kansas State (#23 Oklahoma)
- FSU (UR Notre Dame)
- Missouri (UR A&M)
- Nebraska (None)
Worst loss:
- FSU (none)
- Miss St (#2 Alabama)
- TCU (#6 Baylor)
- Michigan State (#7 Ohio State)
- Alabama (#8 Ole Miss)
- Nebraska (#14 Wisconsin)
- Oregon (#15 Arizona)
- K-State (# 16 Auburn)
- UCLA (#20 Utah)
- Arizona (#24 USC)
11t Georgia (UR Florida)
11t. Ole Miss (UR LSU)
11t. Baylor (UR West Virginia)
14t. Missouri (UR Indiana)
14t. Duke (UR Miami)
14t. Wisconsin (UR Northwestern)
14t. Arizona State (UR Oregon State)
14t Ohio State (UR Virginia Tech)
Average ranking, eliminating the 2-loss teams
- Alabama (4)
- TCU (5.5)
3t. Oregon (6)
3t. Miss St (6) - Baylor (7.5)
- FSU (8.5)
- Ohio State (9.5)
This isn’t the first time I’ve read that prediction. It wouldn’t surprise me, but I’d think twice before heading to a school that may not have its head coach for very much longer.
Yeah, I didn’t see the game. In general, I think that unless you are closely watching many games from around the country each weekend (like the CFP committee hopefully is), it’s best not to take these things into account, because it introduces a bias in favor of the teams you follow closely. So, in rating Oregon, I don’t give them extra credit based on their one loss being due to a horrible call.
In retrospect, I can’t remember what the hell I was thinking saying that Auburn should have been in the playoff with two losses in the first place.
“WE WON THE FUCKING GAME!!!”-
Dr. Morton Shapiro, President, Northwestern University.
Well spoken, sir.
Where’s Ga Tech?
Yeah, THIS. It appears their best performance of the season might have been losing to Alabama by only 5 on the road. And remember that Ole Miss lost to both LSU and Auburn, so Alabama’s win over Ole Miss now looks less impressive than it once did. It is now plausibly possible that the SEC could end up with a three-loss champion and no teams with fewer than two losses…would it then be represented in the playoff at all??
Barring a series of total collapses by highly ranked teams, I don’t see any reason why any conference should get two teams in the playoff, since it seems likely that all five major conferences will produce respectable champions, either with one loss or two losses and a very tough schedule. I would say that in that case the Big Ten should be left out in the cold, since OSU lost to Virginia Tech, Nebraska’s win in the title game would be its first good one, Minnesota already has three losses, and Wisconsin lost to Northwestern. I would say that overall Michigan State has had the best season in the conference, but barring extreme weirdness they won’t win the title.
They’re reflected in the Best Win category, as Duke’s best win. But all 2-loss teams were eliminated from the final ranking.
Overall I think the current AP poll is reasonable. I would move TCU into the top four over Miss St, but that’s a close call. As already noted, Auburn and Ole Miss are highly overrated. Two other major curiosities:
#14 Wisconsin, #21 Nebraska. Wisconsin’s best win by far(admittedly a dominant one) is over Nebraska, and their worst loss is Northwestern. I don’t see how you can possibly say that record deserves the #14 ranking, unless you also say that Nebraska should be much higher than #21. I’d put them both in the lower teens.
#13 Arizona State, #15 Arizona. Both have identical records. ASU’s best win is over Utah, and its worst loss is to (gag) Oregon State. Arizona’s best win is over Oregon, and its worst loss to USC. How does that work?!
I think ASU’s rating is about right, Zona should be where UCLA is, UCLA should be where Ole Miss is, and Ole Miss should be where Arizona is. It will be interesting to see what the “official” rankings say tomorrow.
Ole Miss beat Bama.
Of course. I meant to say that Alabama’s loss to Ole Miss now looks worse than it did when Ole Miss was undefeated.
Let’s see… Alabama beat Mississippi State and Arkansas but wasn’t as good as Mississippi. Mississippi beat Alabama but wasn’t as good as Texas A&M. Texas A&M wasn’t as good as Missouri. Missouri wasn’t as good as Indiana. Everybody in the Big Ten East has beaten Indiana (assuming OSU does this week). The inescapable conclusion: The entire Big Ten East is better than the entire SEC West.
Ole Miss beat TAM.
Whew, that was close. Bob’s logic was otherwise irrefutable. 
Insert Auburn and you’ve got it:
Alabama lost to Mississippi.
Mississippi lost to Auburn.
Auburn lost to Texas A&M.
Texas A&M lost to Missouri.
Missouri lost to Indiana.
Indiana has lost to pretty much everybody else…