Joel Klatt considers how CFP committee ranked one-loss teams
Six one-loss teams enter Week 11 with their College Football Playoff hopes on the line. While there’s no debating their records, many have called into question how the CFP selection committee decides their final rankings
Ranked in the following order — Oregon (No. 6), Texas (7), Alabama (8), Ole Miss (9), Penn State (10) and Louisville (11) — Fox Sports analyst Joel Klatt isn’t convinced that the committee got this week’s rankings right.
“And at first blush, I’m like, ‘Okay, that looks fine. That looks, that looks great,'” Klatt said on Wednesday.” “And then I start to think to myself, ‘Well hold on for a second.’ Because if you’re just going to go by resume — which was clearly the case with Ohio State at the top over Georgia and Michigan — then why isn’t resume carrying the day for Texas?
“Texas has a better resume than Oregon, even though I think Oregon is really good. … I’m not knocking Oregon. I’m just outlining a few of the inconsistencies there because Texas has a better win. Winning at Alabama, in Tuscaloosa with the way that Alabama has looked — with the way that they just played against LSU — how does Texas not get a little bit of a bump there to become the best one-loss team in the country? Not sure how that happens.”
Oregon’s best win of the season came during Week 9’s 35-6 beatdown of then No. 13 Utah at home. Other than that, the other ranked win on their resume was against Colorado back in Week 4 — which is a less impressive win now than it was at the time. Even this weekend’s matchup against USC has little fanfare amid the Trojans’ collapse this season.
That win over Utah might not be so impressive after all, either, when you take into account they play undefeated Washington this weekend, which would be the Utes’ third loss of the season. On the flipside, a Utah win over the Huskies on Saturday would change everything when it comes to the CFP rankings.
Regardless, even if Oregon won out against theirnext three opponents — USC, Arizona State and No. 12 Oregon State — it still wouldn’t equal Texas’ win in Tuscaloosa.
“With the win over Alabama, they probably should have been the best one-loss team in the country,” Klatt continued. “… Of all these teams in the top 6, 7 and 8, I thought Texas was going to get a bump over Oregon. And I thought Washington (No. 5) might get a bump over Florida State (No. 4).
“But this committee just remained steadfast that is like, ‘Okay, we’re not going to do anything big. We’re just going to continue to rank teams in their respective record pods.'”
Of course, this could all be shaken up by Week 11’s events — and next Tuesday’s CFP rankings could be even more divisive.