Georgia nabbed the fourth and final projected first-round bye in the College Football Playoff rankings released Tuesday, while undefeated Ohio State, Indiana and Texas A&M held onto the top three positions.
The Bulldogs rose one spot thanks to Alabama’s loss to Oklahoma over the weekend — a result that dropped the Crimson Tide six spots to No. 10 and lifted Oklahoma three notches to eighth.
The top four teams in the rankings released Dec. 7 will receive byes in this season’s playoff, which starts Dec. 19 with the 5-8 seeds hosting first-round games on campus and concludes with the title game a month later.
The selection committee endured a shakeup of its own last week, when chair Mack Rhoades, the athletic director at Baylor, abruptly stepped down and was replaced by Arkansas AD Hunter Yurachek
This ranking, along with those coming out the next two Tuesdays, are all about positioning. Two teams outside the committee’s top 12 would be in a bracket that assures spots for the five best-ranked conference champions.
Miami the best ACC team … but not so fast
But it’s not that simple for No. 13 Miami. Even though the Hurricanes have the Atlantic Coast Conference’s best ranking, their two losses in the ACC make them a long shot to play in the conference title game.
It leaves room for No. 16 Georgia Tech and No. 19 Virginia to become the ACC’s titlist, and could place added weight on Miami’s opening-week win over No. 9 Notre Dame in the ‘Canes’ push for an at-large spot.
“They haven’t been in similar comparative pools to date,” Yurachek said of Miami and Notre Dame. “But Miami is creeping up in that range where they will be compared to Notre Dame if something happens above them.”
Best of the rest and the bubble
No. 24 Tulane is now the third Group of 5 conference leader in three weeks to own the projected fifth automatic spot.
The Green Wave’s spot in the bracket would also be contingent on winning the American Conference (and staying ahead of any other G5 champions), where they, along with Navy, East Carolina and North Texas all have only one loss.
At No. 5 was Texas Tech, followed by Mississippi and Oregon.
The bubble teams both come from the Big 12 — No. 11 BYU and No. 12 Utah.
