I decided to check out what the teams that made the playoffs the last 4 years had in common (other than the obvious) and did a little sifting through rating/rankings to see what came closest. Time and time again, the AP poll was the best predictor of how the CFP rankings would end up. The only thing the AP poll seems to have more influence on is the Coaches poll which is pretty obvious it’s mostly just coaches asking an assistant to read the AP poll, fudge a couple of teams up or down a notch and turn it in.
So here are some of the things that came out of it.
Every team was ranked in the AP Preseason poll.
The lowest AP Preseason ranking to make the CFP was OU at 19 in 2015.
12 of the 16 teams were already ranked top 7 in the AP Preseason poll.
14 of the 16 teams were ranked in the top 8 in the AP week 10 poll.
The same 14 teams ranked top 8 in the week 10 AP poll were ranked top 7 in the first CFP poll.
The lowest ranked playoff team in the week 10 AP polls was 14th.
7 G5 schools were ranked top 25 in the week 10 AP poll.
The highest week 10 AP week 10 rankings for G5 teams were UCF and Memphis at 15.
Memphis was ranked two spots higher in the first CFP, the other six schools were ranked lower.
Make your own conclusions. Here are a few of mine.
Although the AP has an obvious influence on the first CFP rankings, the CFP does show a bias against the G5 teams in the rankings. Even with that true, had they not have a bias, chances are they could still not make top 4. OU being the lowest ranked beat a #6, #18 and #11 back to back to back to make it from the 14th spot. Ohio State being the next lowest ranked team to make it at 13th beat #8, #25 and #13 to worm they way into the top 4. UCF beating a #20 team just doesn’t compare to the other two.
UCF’s best chance (if they have a chance) is to work their way quickly up the AP poll to be near top 10 by week 10, two of their late regular season opponents to be ranked when they play them and beating another ranked team in the championship game. I don’t believe UH has the same opportunity. We would probably need 20 point victories over Arizona and Tech to surge us up to top 15 and then the next three games would see us get leapfrogged no matter what we did against TxSo, Tulsa and ECU.
we have two things going for us this year…ed oliver and ucf’s ncaa recognized natl championship last year.
assuming both uh and ucf are undefeated when they meet.
ed oliver is going to get a lot of press all year and this may help us climb the polls better than we would otherwise…of course we have to be as dominate as ucf was vs uconn last night.
it may be more difficult for them (the cfp committee) to leave the aac champ out and put a one loss big 10, pac, sec etc .in …if it’s an undefeated aac champ who beat another top 10 undefeated to get there
. This cfp is supposed to crown a true champion but if the aac champ keeps getting a separate natl champion they will be under some pressure to try and discredit this, what better way than to vote in an aac team and see them demolished in the first round of the playoffs…that would be the aac opportunity.
You either skipped over the list or you are expecting major exceptions because of Big Ed. I will point back to the only two teams that were ranked lower than top 8 by week 10, beat three top 25 teams after, not just one. No way UH makes it up to top 8 in the AP by week 10 and even if they make it to 14th by week 10 and get to beat an undefeated UCF on the road in the championship, they would still have to be lucky enough to have two other games against top 25 opponents in the later part of the schedule. Ed isn’t going to make the CFP committee treat us as nice as 2015 OU and 2014 Ohio State without the three top 25 wins last in the season.
With their schedule, I think UCF will have a difficult time cracking the Top 15 unless a lot of P5 teams start racking up multiple losses. They might drop in the polls even when they win as the voters leapfrog UCF with P5 schools that were not ranked to start the season.
Not much hope for UH to crack the Top 15 unless Tech and Arizona have better than expected seasons.
Just for arguments sake, let’s say #21 UCF is undefeated come Oct 30th, the first CFP ranking, and they have wiggled their way up to #10 in the AP. I would argue based upon the three years of CFP history that we have that their first ranking in the CFP would be no higher than #15 in the CFP poll.
We also have from history that whoever they play in their remaining schedule will be downgraded to avoid giving them quality wins and ensure they can’t move up that much. It will enshrine the “they haven’t played anyone” mantra. Conversely, the CFP will look at the remaining teams of the “brand name” schools’ schedule and irrationally rank their opponents to ensure quality wins which will justify the committee moving those brand teams into the top 4. Again, this has already happened multiple times.
This is my opinion why viewership and fan attendance is dropping precipitously. It is not just cord cutting. It is people who don’t see the point of watching their teams play games that don’t matter, because they don’t have even a shot at the national championship. Evidence is the PAC, they have been left out of the CFP 2/3 years, their fan attendance and ratings have been hurt the worst out of the P5 these last three years.
Exactly. The cartel is making a huge mistake.
The CTE issue is not going away. When you polarize your national attention to a very few Teams it only exemplify this huge issue. The national attention loves the Cinderella story or the underdog. Clemson vs Alabama or OSU are no longer or considered underdogs. When you see/eat/watch the same product over and over again people will lose interest. It is basic psychology.
If there was a time for regional realignment now has never been a better time.
After looking at the schedules, SDSU has a pretty good one if they can run the table. @ Stanford tonight - I normally root for the G5 over the P5 but not Boise, Fresno St and SDSU until the Coogs lose.
