College Football Playoff: SMU right in the mix for CFP appearance
The SMU Mustangs landed at No. 13, the first team out ahead of Texas A&M, in the first College Football Playoff rankings revealed Tuesday night on ESPN.
For SMU head coach Rhett Lashlee, he’s seen his team been ready for each challenge in ACC play. That’s paid off with its ranking and a 5-0 record in league play.
“Our team and our staff has done a really good job of literally being present and just working on chasing the standard that this team has set for ourselves each week,” Lashlee said after the 48-25 win over Pitt. “They did it tonight at a high level. The last time this happened, we went on the road and beat Louisville. It was a big win for our program. We had two weeks to sit, be told how great we were before we had to go to Stanford. It’s gonna be no different. Now we’re gonna have two weeks, we’ll see where we’re ranked whenever we know at the end of the day, to your point, we control our own destiny. And in two weeks, a team that’s pretty good, that beat us last year is coming in here.”
Lashlee believes his team belongs in the national conversation. After the huge win over Pitt, the Mustangs showed that to the national media and committee.
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“I think it means that SMU, our program belongs at this level and our program is capable of competing at a high level at this level,” Lashlee said. “Which we all believe, but it’s no different than everything else I just said about Kevin, we had to go do it. We’re not done. We’ve not accomplished anything yet, but we put ourselves in position that in the middle of November, we’re competing for a conference championship in the ACC in our first year in the league. So I think our players and our staff deserve a ton of credit for that.”
Up next for SMU is a 2:30 p.m. CT matchup on ESPN against Boston College on Nov. 16. The next College Football Playoff rankings come out next week on Tuesday once again.
