For the College Football Playoff, it's one last dress rehearsal. It's also one last chance to see just how much the selection committee loves the Southeastern Conference.
The best gauge when the second-to-last rankings come out Tuesday night will be whether Miami, which suffered its second loss of the season over the weekend, is placed behind any or all three SEC teams with three losses — Alabama, Mississippi and South Carolina — all of which are coming off wins.
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After a 42-38 loss to Syracuse that cost Miami a spot in the ACC title game, coach Mario Cristobal emphasized the nature of his team's two losses — both by less than one touchdown — and said “that makes us one of the better teams in the country.”
He wasn't the only one lobbying to make the 12-team field, which is eight teams larger than it has been. Ole Miss coach Lane Kiffin went to social media and emptied out the stats book, pointing out a flurry of numbers that he says favor the Rebels over the other SEC teams (without mentioning Miami at all).
Not surprisingly, Shane Beamer of South Carolina and Kalen DeBoer of Alabama were pushing for their teams, too.
Part of any argument on the behalf of the SEC leans on its teams simply playing tougher schedules because of the opponents in their own conference.
That argument has one hole. Texas, which has only one loss and has been the highest ranked SEC team since Nov. 12, owns the 32nd toughest strength of schedule — the worst among all 16 SEC teams (but still 22 spots higher than Miami).
What is the committee looking for?
Warde Manuel, the chair of the selection committee, has been asked every question in every way over the past month, all of which boil down to this: What is the committee looking for in setting the CFP rankings and, coming up on Sunday, the bracket?
Though he has brought up strength of schedule more than most factors, he has also been noncommittal when reporters have tried to nail him down on specifics, offering observations like: "We value winning." And: “If it was just about strength of schedule, we wouldn’t be needed." And this: “What we’ve been asked to do is to judge and to look at how teams are playing against the competition that they have and to rank them accordingly to how we see it.”
All of which makes a great case for another measure the selection committee can use: the completely subjective “eye test,” which is essentially what poll voters used for decades before number crunching and analytics supposedly turned the task of picking national-title candidates into a more scientific process.
What about the Big 12?
While Miami and the ACC wait to see where they stand, the Big 12 is having a moment of its own.
Nobody there is happy with the prospect of a single bid that could very well not even include a bye, which go to the four top-ranked conference champions regardless of their overall CFP ranking. One of those free passes to the quarterfinals could belong to Boise State of the Mountain West instead of the winner of Saturday's Big 12 title game between Arizona State and Iowa State.
It was the coach of another Big 12 team, Texas Tech's Joey McGuire, who gave the most impassioned plea for his conference while also questioning the SEC, which has six teams arguing for spots in the 12-team field.
“We need to quit looking at what patch, what the logo says on your jersey, what conference you're from,” he said. “Look at the tape. I know some of the guys on (the committee). I'm shocked that some of the old football coaches who know what they're looking at are not having more influence.”
There are four former coaches on the 13-person selection committee.
Some worst-case scenarios for the CFP
Because this is a new format with billions at stake, and because the SEC and Big Ten wield more power under this new arrangement, a lot of people from a lot of conferences are anxious.
Yes, some deserving teams will get snubbed or overlooked and not everyone will walk away from Sunday's bracket reveal believing this is a perfect system. But there are a few scenarios this week that could trigger more than just your day-after bellyaching:
— Mountain West: A UNLV win over Boise State would bring a team in the deep teens into the tournament, and also rekindle a story about everything that's wrong with the NIL era: The September departure of Rebels QB Matthew Sluka.
— SEC: A loss to Texas by Georgia would be its third and would test just how much the committee values teams that play in conference title games. Remember, Alabama (9-3) beat Georgia in September.
— SEC II: A Texas loss to the Dawgs would give the Longhorns two L's to the same team — the only team they've played with a Football Power Index (ESPN's metric) in the top 15.
— ACC: Clemson beating SMU would put the Mustangs on alert for getting passed over, but at least they had their chance.
— Big Ten: A Penn State win over Oregon would leave us with no undefeated team in the bracket, no real favorite in the tournament and would put the front-running Ducks in position to need a first-round win to possibly earn a rematch with well-rested Boise State ( remember the 37-34 nailbiter in September? ). Huh?
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