Joel Klatt explains Florida State’s path to CFP without Jordan Travis

Florida State securing their 11th win of the season last weekend was overshadowed by a devastating injury to star quarterback Jordan Travis, whose career with the Seminoles is now over.

As a result, the Seminoles were bumped down in the latest College Football Playoff Rankings, now ranked No. 5 in the country and sitting outside of the top four for the first time this season. But college football analyst Joel Klatt still has hope in Florida State, believing that there’s still a path for the Seminoles to make the playoffs even without their leader under center.

“I’m still torn up for Jordan Travis. Gosh man, kid deserves better than that, it really sucks,” Klatt said. “Now having said that, Florida State still has a path, they still have a chance. Just like in 2014 Ohio State still had a chance and still had a path when JT Barrett went down late in that season.”

The Buckeyes famously lost quarterbacks Braxton Miller and Barrett in the 2014 season and still managed to hoist the national championship trophy when the season was all said and done. And if the Seminoles want to put themselves in the same scenario, Klatt believes it all starts with a dominant win over Florida this weekend to end the regular season.

“If you remember, the catalyst to Ohio State being included in that first playoff was their dominant win over Wisconsin. Now that was in a conference championship game in the Big Ten Championship game. I believe that this week is a huge week for Florida State, and it’s a huge week because as you’re going to see Florida is littered all over this College Football Playoff Rankings,” Klatt explained. “They have a hand in so many spots on this ranking that we see and to be quite candid with you, there’s not a ton of consistency but a Florida team that is not very good, other teams that are not ranked have handled them, namely Utah.”

Florida will have faced three teams currently ranked within the Top 10 of the College Football Playoff Rankings after they take on Florida State this weekend, providing a clear barometer for the Seminoles in how they perform on Saturday versus the Gators for the first time without their star quarterback.

“I just think Florida State’s got to handle Florida,” Klatt said. “If they do that then I think that there’s a chance that even the injury is going to be overlooked. And remember, the committee is supposed to look at injuries. You might not like that, but that’s part of what they look at, and so Florida State moves to five. Hard to argue with that.”

Dominant wins versus Florida and Louisville in the conference championship game could keep Florida State’s playoff hopes alive, but they’ll likely need some help from some of the nation’s other top teams as well during the final weeks of the season.

Florida and Florida State kick off at 7:00 p.m. ET on Saturday in a matchup airing on ESPN.