Where Tennessee is ranked in College Football Playoff Top 25 after the loss at Georgia
Tennessee Football was ranked No. 11 in the new College Football Playoff rankings update from the selection committee on Tuesday night, but did not make the 12-team playoff bracket. The Vols were the first team out after BYU was ranked No. 13 but made the field as the projected Big 12 champion.
BYU was seeded 12th and Boise State was the No. 4 seed as the highest-ranked projected Group of Five conference champion. Conference champions from the ACC, Big Ten, Big 12 and SEC earn automatic bids, along with the highest-rank champion from the Group of Five.
Where Tennessee checks into the #CFBPlayoff Rankings this week.
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Tennessee (8-2), coming off the 31-17 loss to Georgia Saturday night, hosts UTEP (2-8) on Senior Day at Neyland Stadium Saturday (1 p.m. Eastern Time, SEC Network+).
Ole Miss was ranked No. 9 and Georgia came in at No. 10. The Vols dropped four spots after the loss at Georgia, after being ranked No. 7 last week. Ole Miss beat Georgia 28-10 two weeks ago in Oxford. Georgia lost at Alabama in September and Tennessee beat Alabama in October.
The two Ole Miss losses were home against Kentucky on September 28 and at LSU on October 12. Tennessee’s other loss was at Arkansas on October 5.
Oregon was ranked No. 1 ahead of Ohio State, Texas, Penn State, Indiana, Notre Dame, Alabama and Miami.
Tennessee’s playoff chances could be increase this weekend, depending on outcomes in the Ole Miss-Florida, Indiana-Ohio State and Notre Dame-Army games.
Wide receiver Bru McCoy said Tuesday afternoon the focus for the Vols is not just winning, but winning impressively the next two weeks.
“It’s kind of stating the obvious, we got to win out,” McCoy said. “We have to win convincingly. We have to show some things on tape that maybe we haven’t shown previously so that whoever knows that we can do certain things at a high level.
” … Really just win out and put all of our hard work on display. We have talked a lot about the potential we have and almost being there. Now we have two opportunities these next two weeks to put that on display.”
Next week’s ranking update will Tuesday from 7-8 p.m. ET on ESPN. The final two releases will be November 26 (8-9 p.m. ET) and December 3 (7-7:30 p.m. ET), before the 12-team College Football Playoff Bracket is announced on December 8.
Dates and destinations for the College Football Playoff
The first game in the 12-team College Football Playoff era will be played on Friday, December 20, in an 8 p.m. Eastern Time start on ESPN. A triple header will follow on Saturday, December 21: Noon ET on TNT, 4 p.m. ET on TNT and 8 p.m. ET on ESPN.
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Quarterfinal games will be played at the Fiesta Bowl, Peach Bowl, Rose Bowl and Sugar Bowl. The Fiesta Bowl will be played on New Year’s Eve in a 7:30 p.m. ET start on ESPN. The other three will be played on New Year’s Day, with the Peach Bowl starting at 1 p.m. ET (ESPN), the Rose Bowl at 5 p.m. ET (ESPN) and the Sugar Bowl at 8:45 p.m. ET (ESPN).
The semifinal round will be played at the Orange Bowl and Cotton Bowl. The Orange Bowl will be played on Thursday, January 9 (7:30 p.m. ET, ESPN) and the Cotton Bowl will be played on Friday, January 10 (7:30 p.m. ET, ESPN).
The national championship game will be played in Atlanta, set for Monday, January 20 at 7:30 p.m. ET on ESPN.
About the College Football Playoff
The 12 teams in the playoff are the five conference champions ranked highest by the CFP selection committee, plus the next seven highest-ranked teams by the committee.
The four highest-ranked champions will be seeded No. 1 through No. 4 and will receive a bye into the quarterfinal round. The fifth conference champion will be seeded where it was ranked by the committee or 12th if it is outside the top 12.
Non-conference champions will be seeded No. 5 through No. 12, even if they’re ranked in the top four, meaning bracket seeding can look different than the final CFP rankings. Teams seeded No. 5 through No. 8 will host first-round playoff games on campus.
Historic bowl relationships and CFP rankings will be taken into consideration when assigning bowl destinations for the top four seeds in the quarterfinal round.
No modifications will be made to the bracket to avoid rematches between teams that have already played this season. The bracket will remain throughout and will not be reseeded. The highest-seeded team will receive preferential bowl placement for the semifinal round.
