The Pac-12 leftovers: What will be Washington State’s and Oregon State’s ultimate fate?
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Kyle Bonagura, ESPN Staff Writer
PULLMAN, Wash. — Nothing about Saturday’s game between Oregon State and Washington State should have felt unusual. There is a familiarity that comes with having played 106 times over the past 120 years.
It’s a rivalry game in that sense. A reliable way to mark the passage of time. But this version — the first time the matchup featured both teams in the AP top 25 — might have had the friendliest lead-up to a high-stakes college football game on record.
The pregame festivities were highlighted by the schools’ mascots — Benny Beaver and Butch T. Cougar — being driven onto the field in a cart, waving each other’s flag, before sharing a dance at midfield. The WSU Cougar Marching Band played Oregon State’s fight song. Two days earlier, the schools’ presidents and athletic directors conducted a joint online press conference with a custom background of alternating OSU and WSU logos, during which WSU president Kirk Schulz proclaimed, “Go Cougs and go Beavs.”
“Just to be clear, this partnership has been super strong, but it’s on pause come kickoff for just a little while and then we’ll get back to it,” OSU athletic director Scott Barnes clarified, lightheartedly.
Following UCLA‘s and USC‘s decision last year to join the Big Ten, eight of the ten remaining schools have followed suit, scattering to the Big 12 (Arizona, Arizona State, Colorado, Utah), Big Ten (Oregon, Washington) and ACC (Cal, Stanford) beginning in summer 2024.
The collapse left Oregon State and Washington State without a major conference suitor and in limbo to chart their futures together.
“Fans need to know that we are leaving no stone unturned together,” Schulz said. “WSU and OSU are aggressively pursuing all options. Staff from our two schools are meeting daily to explore alternatives and determine the best path forward. Let’s be clear, WSU and OSU are in this situation not because of the quality of our athletic programs, but because of the size of our media markets.”
For many students and alumni of both universities, it’s the college town atmospheres in Corvallis (population 60,956) and Pullman (population 32,508) that attracted them in the first place. Nowhere else on the West Coast offers a chance to escape major population centers to attend school at a place with major college athletics. In the past several weeks, that small-town dynamic — and major source of pride — has become a threat to the futures of both towns and universities.
“Clearly, us being in the news has generated a lot of angst though within the community, within our faculty staff and students,” Schulz said. “It’s just, ‘Hey, what’s next? What is it going to look like? Are we going to lose part of our identity because of where we’ll land next year?'”
For a few hours Saturday night, those thoughts were on hold as Wazzu roared to a comfortable lead before a sold-out crowd, eventually hanging on to beat the Beavers, 38-35. With the game behind them, though, their shared future is back in focus.
PULLMAN MAYOR GLENN Johnson will finish his fifth and final term later this year. He moved to town from Sacramento in 1979, when he took a job teaching broadcasting at WSU’s Edward R. Murrow School of Communication. Since 1980, he has been the voice of the Cougars, serving as the public address announcer at WSU football and basketball games.
When Johnson arrived, the Cougars did not play all their football games in town, opting to play some games — notably several Apple Cups against Washington — 90 miles up the road at Joe Albi Stadium in Spokane.
It was a practice he recalled then-coach Jim Walden did not like.
“I remember [Walden] said, ‘Hey, it’s like preparing for an away game. We should have all these games down here [in Pullman],'” Johnson said.
Walden got his way in 1983, when WSU played its final game in Spokane. Even if the sentiment was rooted in gaining a competitive advantage, the decision had a wider-ranging impact.
“Wow, you’re transforming your downtown,” Johnson said. “People saw all the restaurants get busy with all the visitors and all the fans. They loved coming back. We weren’t getting that when I first got here. And that’s one of the important things.”
The impact WSU athletics has on the local economy is difficult to quantify, but even anecdotally the importance is easy to notice. Take the locally owned American Travel Inn, a 1-star, bring-your-own-shampoo motel less than a mile from campus. WSU logos are painted all over the motel, which is adorned with signs welcoming Cougars fans. Rooms are usually less than $99 a night, but on the night before the OSU game, that number climbed closer to $500.
In the adjoining parking lot sits the Old European, a beloved breakfast spot that has been in business since 1989 and still uses family recipes that date back more than a century. On a typical morning, it’s easy to walk in, grab a booth and drink the famous fresh-squeezed orange juice almost immediately. On the Sunday following a football game, it transforms into a bustling madhouse with a line out the door.
Earlier this year, Pullman discussed plans to rebuild parts of its downtown, but had to put things on hold.
“We found out, well, by the time they could finally get all the construction done, you’re going to impact at least five home games,” Johnson said. “We as a city, city council, mayor, all of us said that we can’t do that. I mean, here are restaurants — our businesses are fully recovered from COVID and you can’t do that to ’em like that. So, we delayed the entire process until next year so we can get the thing done in time for next season. Home football games are a big economic driver for the community, and that’s far more than it used to be over the years.”
Even though there is no thought to the possibility of football going away, there is concern in Pullman and within the WSU athletic department about the long-term repercussions of the Cougars not being in a conference considered to be at the top level of college football.
“To ultimately be on the outside looking in a grouping of schools that this university has been a part of for over a century, that’s a painful moment for Washington State,” WSU athletic director Pat Chun said. “Then there’s the reality for people inside the athletic department. There’s uncertainty because everyone recognizes we’re going to reorganize our budget some way, somehow. The $35 million we got from the Pac-12 is not going to be there anymore.”
On top of the looming financial impact is the hit to civic pride.
“I think you always mentioned, ‘You’re Washington State University, a Pac-12 institution,'” Johnson said. “They also mentioned the research too, but from a general acceptance standpoint, people understand the Pac-12, especially here on the West Coast.
“Being part of the Pac-12 always has meant a lot and, well, I’ll tell you, seeing the Pac-12 basically implode, this has been tough to see.”
EARLIER THIS MONTH, a judge in Washington granted a temporary restraining order sought by OSU and WSU to prevent the Pac-12 from holding a board meeting. There was concern from the two remaining schools that the exiting members could attempt to dissolve the conference to force an equal split of the conference’s remaining assets.
OSU and WSU successfully argued that when UCLA and USC were barred from the conference board after announcing their departures for the Big Ten in 2022, it set a precedent that they did not have board or voting rights. The same approach was applied when Colorado announced it was headed to the Big 12 earlier this summer.
When Pac-12 commissioner George Kliavkoff scheduled a board meeting for earlier this month that included all 12 schools — 10 of which will no longer be in the conference next year — OSU and WSU initiated legal action.
“The meaning of the bylaws hasn’t changed just because more members have decided to leave,” lawyer Eric MacMichael argued for OSU and WSU in court.
A preliminary injunction hearing is expected to be held in October to determine who will have voting rights on the Pac-12 board.
In the meantime, OSU and WSU have been trying to assess the value of the conference’s remaining assets and compare them with existing liabilities. It has been a slower than expected process that will ultimately determine how the schools proceed.
“We understand some of the assets that the Pac-12 has — certainly the media payments, the NCAA tournament credits, CFP — some things we understand pretty well,” Oregon State president Jayathi Murthy said. “Some things we don’t understand — even about the assets in terms of who the payments go to, who controls them, etcetera. And then there are liabilities. There are the public legal cases that are going on, so we’re trying to figure out how those are going to shape our view. There’s lots and lots of fine print and lots of other contractual obligations that the conference has. The balance of these will tell us what net assets actually exist in the conference and we’ve got to understand that before we can chart out the path forward.”
The schools expect to have some sort of clarity in the next month. In the end, the decision figures to be somewhat simple: If the assets outweigh the liabilities, the schools will likely attempt to maintain control and attempt some kind of rebuild. If the liabilities are determined to be too great, then they would likely be forced to walk away.
With either scenario, the most likely result is a future intertwined with schools from the Mountain West Conference. Whether that’s a reverse merger with the Mountain West schools moving to the Pac-12 as a block to benefit from the brand value or WSU and OSU going the opposite direction remains to be seen. For fans, any difference would be mostly semantics.
The current Mountain West media rights deal pays its member schools roughly $6 million annually; however, there figures to be an increase should OSU and WSU factor in.
It’s still theoretically possible, too, that OSU and WSU could operate the Pac-12 as a two-team conference the next two years — essentially acting as independents — but that option is viewed as a last resort, sources told ESPN. (The NCAA gives conferences a two-year grace period to reach designated minimums for member schools should they fall below the required thresholds.)
“The fact that we are waiting for some additional information does not mean that we haven’t been focused every day on what that scheduling scenario might look like and engaged in the proper conversations to make sure that when we do have that information we’re pressing go,” Barnes said.
At WSU, one of the most confounding parts of the conference realignment game has been the criteria for evaluation. If everything is being driven by TV media value, why is WSU being penalized for the size of Pullman when the Cougars have consistently been one of the biggest TV draws in the Pac-12 for several years?
“Depending on the metric you look at, we’re either in the top fourth, top third or top half [of the Pac-12] consistently over five, 10 years,” Chun said.
In an era where nearly all games are either broadcast on national TV or streamed, individual market size does not translate to larger audiences in the way it did when football was broadcast regionally. Where is the logic in the idea a school is more valuable from a TV standpoint because it’s located in a larger media market if there are years of evidence showing that school doesn’t translate to TV viewers? Rutgers, for example, is in the largest media market in the country, yet the Scarlet Knights were among the least-watched Power 5 programs in the country last season.
These are questions WSU has been left unable to sufficiently answer.
SINCE ARRIVING IN Pullman as the defensive coordinator prior to the 2020 season, Jake Dickert has consistently had to navigate through murky waters.
In 2020, it was the COVID season. In 2021, he took over as interim coach after Nick Rolovich and several assistants were fired for refusing to take the COVID vaccine. Now in 2023, there’s the uncertainty about his program’s standing within major college football.
“My number one job is the focus of seeing through the fog and understanding what’s on the grass matters,” Dickert told ESPN.
Through it all, Dickert has methodically taken the team in the right direction. Following the win against Oregon State, WSU jumped to No. 16 in the AP poll. It’s the Cougars’ highest ranking since 2018, when they reached as high as No. 7, and just the fifth time they’ve been ranked this high in September over the past 40 years.
“I said this summer I felt confident that we put together a really good team and no one was talking about it and we can do it in our own way,” Dickert said. “Our team is greater than the sum of its parts. … We got zero five star [recruits], zero four stars. We got zero. But we’re greater than the sum of our parts because of our connection and how we play and the buy-in that they have to their job.”
That track record with recruiting gives Dickert confidence that regardless of how the conference situation plays out, they’ll still be able to maintain a standard that fans can be excited about. It almost goes without saying that the Cougars have historically benefitted from being in the Pac-12 from a recruiting standpoint, but there has never been a time when they were consistently recruiting peers with the more high-profile brands in the conference. From that standpoint, their place in the college football ecosystem would remain very similar, though it remains to be seen how susceptible they would be to raids for top players through the transfer portal or how appealing a destination WSU would be for players looking to prove themselves at a higher level.
Take Saturday’s win against Oregon State, for example. Quarterback Cam Ward, a transfer from FCS Incarnate Word, put on a show while connecting on a combined 15 passes for 333 yards and four touchdowns just to Kyle Williams and Josh Kelly, both of whom transferred from Mountain West schools in the offseason. Some players of that caliber will inevitably not consider WSU if its not in a major conference.
“I always look at the positive side,” Johnson said. “It’s only the way it can be as a mayor. There’s enough people saying, ‘Oh, woe is us,’ and that kind of thing. But you’ve got to sit back and say, ‘Okay, what can we make out of this?'”
The most obvious answer is this: As college football’s postseason system evolves, WSU’s access to an expanded playoff will likely be easier from outside one of the expanded power conferences than from within. Assuming there remains a designated slot for a non-power conference team, the Cougars would be much better positioned for that than a team like, say, UCLA, which doesn’t have a track record to indicate it will compete at the highest level in the Big Ten.
So while there are serious budget concerns on the horizon that will have a negative impact on the athletic department and community, WSU — and Oregon State — remains intent on doing whatever it takes to stay relevant in major football.
Dickert summed it up succinctly: “We belong.”
Miami is inching closer but still needs some help.
With the Hurricanes creeping up to No. 12 on Tuesday night in the College Football Playoff selection committee’s fourth of six rankings, the ACC’s hope of having two teams qualify for the 12-team field is still alive. Time is running out, though, to convince the selection committee they’re better than Notre Dame — and right now a gap remains in spite of the head-to-head win. The ACC champion — even if it’s No. 18 Virginia — is almost certainly guaranteed a spot as one of the five-highest ranked conference champions. That’s evidenced by the fact that five ACC teams are still ranked above No. 24 Tulane, the only representative from a Group of 5 conference. The question is whether Miami can do enough to join the ACC champion as an at-large team with one game remaining, on Saturday at No. 22 Pitt.
Though the Canes have no margin for error and could still use some help above them, they might get it if Ole Miss doesn’t win the Egg Bowl against Mississippi State. No. 6 Oregon jumped one spot above No. 7 Ole Miss, indicating that the Rebels might not recover from a second stumble.
With Rivalry Week on the horizon, there are still plenty of scenarios that can unfold — and hope is still oozing from the bubble.
Bubble Watch accounts for what we have learned from the committee so far — and historical knowledge of what it means for teams clinging to hope. Teams with Would be in status below are in this week’s bracket based on the committee’s fourth ranking. For each Power 4 conference, we’ve also listed Last team in and First team out. These are the true bubble teams hovering around inclusion. Teams labeled Still in the mix haven’t been eliminated but have work to do or need help. A team that is Out will have to wait until next year.
The conferences below are listed in order of the number of bids they would receive, ranked from the most to least, based on the committee’s fourth ranking.
Jump to a conference:
ACC | Big 12 | Big Ten
SEC | Independent | Group of 5
Bracket
SEC
Would be in: Alabama, Georgia, Oklahoma, Ole Miss, Texas A&M
Last team in: Alabama. The Tide can either lock up a spot in the SEC championship game with a win against Auburn in the Iron Bowl — or can miss the playoff entirely with a loss to its rival. The debate will come if Alabama finishes as a three-loss SEC runner-up. The Tide have played the ninth-hardest schedule in the country, according to ESPN Analytics, and their résumé would only be enhanced by facing a top-five opponent in the SEC championship game. A third loss, though, even in a close game to a top-five team, could drop Alabama into a dangerous spot in the top 12 where it might face elimination to make room for a guaranteed conference champion — or a second Big 12 team.
First team out: Vanderbilt. The Commodores could stay status quo this week, which means at No. 14 they remain a long shot for an at-large bid. Punctuating their résumé with a win against a ranked Tennessee would be the first step, but they’d also need multiple upsets ahead of them to get serious consideration. It’s conceivable, as Miami can lose at Pitt, Oklahoma can suffer a third loss to LSU, and Alabama can lose the Iron Bowl. None of that would matter, though, without a win in Knoxville.
Still in the mix: None.
Out: Arkansas, Auburn, Florida, Kentucky, LSU, Mississippi State, Missouri, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas
Big Ten
Would be in: Indiana, Ohio State, Oregon
Last team in: Oregon. With the win against USC, Oregon eliminated the biggest threat to its playoff spot in the Big Ten and further solidified its place in the top 10. The win against USC boosted the Ducks’ résumé enough to jump Ole Miss, and the complete performance against another ranked contender answered some questions in the committee meeting room. Oregon now has a 16.5% chance to reach the Big Ten title game, according to ESPN Analytics, but it must beat Washington and it needs Michigan to defeat Ohio State.
First team out: Michigan. The No. 15 Wolverines are here because they can reach the Big Ten championship game with a win against Ohio State and a loss by Indiana or Oregon. Michigan no longer has to worry about the head-to-head defeat to USC because the Trojans have three losses and dropped behind the Wolverines to No. 17 in the latest ranking. The loss to No. 8 Oklahoma, though, will probably keep them behind the Sooners for an at-large bid if they both finish with the same record. Nobody in the country, though, will have a better win than Michigan if it beats the Buckeyes for a fifth straight season.
Still in the mix: None.
Out: Illinois, Iowa, Maryland, Michigan State, Minnesota, Nebraska, Northwestern, Penn State, Purdue, Rutgers, UCLA, USC, Washington, Wisconsin
Big 12
Would be in: Texas Tech
Last team in: Texas Tech. The Red Raiders can clinch a spot in the Big 12 title game with a win at West Virginia. As long as Texas Tech does that, it should be a lock for the CFP — win or lose in the Big 12 championship. It would be both stunning and difficult for the committee to justify dropping Texas Tech if its second loss is to a top-11 BYU team that it beat handily during the regular season. The Red Raiders would be the only team that could claim a regular-season win over the eventual Big 12 champs in that scenario.
First team out: BYU. The Cougars can clinch a spot in the Big 12 title game with a home win against UCF on Saturday. They’d be a CFP lock with the Big 12 title, but a loss would likely knock them out of the bracket because they’re already in a precarious position and would have lost to the same team twice. They would need multiple upsets to happen above them to stay in consideration as the two-loss Big 12 runner-up.
Still in the mix: Arizona State, Utah. ASU can earn a spot in the Big 12 title game with a win against Arizona and a BYU loss or a win and losses by both Texas Tech and Utah. The Utes will reach the Big 12 title game if they beat Kansas and both BYU and Arizona State win and Texas Tech loses.
Out: Arizona, Baylor, Cincinnati, Colorado, Houston, Iowa State, Kansas, Kansas State, Oklahoma State, TCU, UCF, West Virginia
ACC
Would be in: Miami
Last team in: Miami. Miami’s chances of reaching the ACC title game are now 14.2% — third best in the league behind SMU and Virginia, which are both above 80%. That means their best chance to reach the CFP remains through an at-large bid. They must win at Pitt on Saturday, and it helped that the committee ranked the Panthers No. 22 on Tuesday night. Miami’s loss to SMU no longer looks as bad as it initially did after the Mustangs cracked the CFP top 25 at No. 21. Miami is getting some help, but it has also helped itself by winning three straight games by at least 17 points. Saturday at Virginia Tech brought Miami’s first road win outside of its home state, which is something the committee has been awaiting. Miami’s win against Notre Dame remains one of the best in the country, and the Canes are within range of the committee revisiting the head-to-head tiebreaker. They’re both in the same conversation as Alabama and BYU. If Miami can win at Pitt, the committee will certainly factor that into its discussion during the fifth ranking. It’s important to remember, though, that head-to-head isn’t the only factor in the room. The entire body of work is considered, and right now, the committee is more impressed by the Irish.
First team out: Virginia. Of all the convoluted scenarios still left in the ACC, this isn’t one of them: If Virginia beats rival Virginia Tech on Saturday, the Cavaliers will clinch a spot in the conference title game. And with No. 21 SMU now one of five ranked teams from the conference, the ACC title game is likely to feature two ranked opponents. The Mustangs have the best chance to reach the ACC championship game (86%) followed by Virginia (81%) after Week 13, but SMU lost to Baylor, TCU and Wake Forest — the latter two of which are above .500. If SMU wins at Cal on Saturday, the Mustangs will clinch a spot in the ACC title game. Virginia was the committee’s second-highest-ranked ACC team behind Miami in its fourth ranking, and the Cavaliers had a bye.
Still in the mix: Duke, Georgia Tech, Pitt, SMU. Here’s where you can find your convoluted scenarios. Pitt can get into the ACC championship game with a win and a loss by SMU or UVA. Duke can get in with a win plus losses by two of the following three teams: Pitt, SMU and Virginia. Georgia Tech needs so many things to happen it might want to find a church instead of playing Georgia.
Out: Boston College, Cal, Clemson, Florida State, Louisville, North Carolina, NC State, Stanford, Syracuse, Virginia Tech, Wake Forest
Independent
Would be in: Notre Dame. The Irish are doing everything right — they’re winning and looking good doing it. If they can seal the deal with what should be a relatively easy win against Stanford, Notre Dame will be in the familiar position of waiting and watching while the conference championship games unfold and possibly alter the picture. Notre Dame fans should be keeping a close eye on the SEC and Big 12 title games. If Miami beats Pitt, the committee will compare that common opponent with Notre Dame, which also beat Pitt. They would continue to talk about the head-to-head tiebreaker, but that’s not the final determinant. Both Miami and Notre Dame can earn at-large bids, but if there are two Big 12 teams in, someone currently in the top 10 will have to be excluded.
Group of 5
Would be in: Tulane. This is where the committee will probably continue to differ from the computers, which say James Madison (57%) and North Texas (54.4%) have the best chances to reach the playoff. JMU’s schedule is currently ranked No. 123, while North Texas is No. 127, and that has held both of them back in the committee meeting room. Tulane is No. 73 with wins against Duke and Northwestern. The No. 24-ranked Green Wave maintained their spot this week as the committee’s highest-ranked Group of 5 team following the 37-13 win at Temple, their largest margin of victory this season.
Still in the mix: East Carolina, James Madison, Navy, North Texas, South Florida. JMU has clinched the East Division and a spot in the Sun Belt Conference championship game. It will face the winner of Southern Miss vs. Troy. Five teams from the American are still eligible to play in the conference title game, and multiple tiebreaker scenarios are still looming. Tulane has one of the most direct paths. It would clinch with a win if it is the highest-ranked team from the American in the CFP ranking. North Texas would clinch a spot with a win — because Navy was not ahead of Tulane and North Texas in the CFP ranking Tuesday. Navy could clinch a spot with a win and a loss by Tulane or North Texas.
Bracket
Based on the committee’s fourth ranking, the seeding would be:
First-round byes
No. 1 Ohio State (Big Ten champ)
No. 2 Indiana
No. 3 Texas A&M (SEC champ)
No. 4 Georgia
First-round games
On campus, Dec. 19 and 20
No. 12 Tulane (American champ) at No. 5 Texas Tech (Big 12 champ)
No. 11 Miami (ACC champ) at No. 6 Oregon
No. 10 Alabama at No. 7 Ole Miss
No. 9 Notre Dame at No. 8 Oklahoma
Quarterfinal games
At the Goodyear Cotton Bowl, Capital One Orange Bowl, Rose Bowl Presented by Prudential and Allstate Sugar Bowl on Dec. 31 and Jan. 1.
No. 12 Tulane/No. 5 Texas Tech winner vs. No. 4 Georgia
No. 11 Miami/No. 6 Oregon winner vs. No. 3 Texas A&M
No. 10 Alabama/No. 7 Ole Miss winner vs. No. 2 Indiana
No. 9 Notre Dame/No. 8 Oklahoma winner vs. No. 1 Ohio State
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David Hale
We don’t talk nearly enough about luck in sports.
It’s only reasonable to want to believe the best team always wins, that the outcome of a game is the reward for a better process, that, in the end, we all get what we deserve.
But then you watch 10 minutes of Florida State football and it’s impossible to deny that there are football gods at work and they can be awfully vengeful.
And so it is that, at this late point in the season, the College Football Playoff rankings still hinge, in no small part, on a botched extra point at the end of Notre Dame-Texas A&M.
We can look back at Miami‘s game against SMU on Nov. 1 — a game that, with 2 minutes to go the Canes had a 90% chance of winning, according to ESPN’s metrics — and consider it a bad loss, then a week later, see Oregon — with less than a 40% chance of beating Iowa with 2 minutes remaining — pull off a comeback and have it constitute a critical point on the Ducks’ résumé.
Alabama nearly doubled Oklahoma‘s yardage but lost, Ole Miss gave up 526 yards to Arkansas and won, Georgia has trailed in the second half five times this year but has just one loss to show for it.
These things happen, and while there’s clearly valuable data involved — Georgia wins those games, because the Dawgs are really good — any time we’re discussing a one-game sample size, there’s room for ample debate over what matters and what doesn’t.
The committee’s job is to counterbalance the fickleness of luck with a calculated, rational, repeatable process of evaluation that, if applied again and again by dozens of different people, would largely yield the same results; something akin to scientific testing, a way to filter out the noise and get to what matters most. “The process,” as everyone from Nick Saban to Michael Lombardi have called it.
And yet, it’s hard to say exactly what the committee’s process really is. Even when it’s explained — Miami isn’t in the same bucket as Notre Dame, so they can’t be compared directly, for example — the logic often crumbles under the slightest bit of scrutiny.
Instead, the committee has mostly relied on its own luck, and each year, by the time the final rankings are revealed, the 13 games played on the field provide enough clarity that most reasonable people will proclaim the committee got things right, save for the occasional reminder to Florida State that, yes, the football gods are not Seminoles fans.
This year though, it’s increasingly likely the committee’s luck could run out.
We have one full weekend of games left. There are reasonably 16 teams who’ll make a case as to why they should earn one of the seven coveted at-large spots. Without a little luck in Week 14, the committee’s going to have some incredibly hard choices to make.
And that means we’ve got plenty of outrage left to send the committee’s way.
This past week seemed to be the apex of the biggest rankings debate: Notre Dame or Miami?
The argument here is easy to understand. The committee has consistently had the Irish well ahead of the Hurricanes, despite both teams having the same record and Miami holding a head-to-head win.
But you know what’s even easier to understand? BYU has a better record than both.
In fact, let’s look at some résumés.
Team A: Best win vs. SP+ No. 19, next best vs. No. 21. Loss to SP+ No. 2. Two wins vs. teams 7-4 or better. No. 5 strength of record.
Team B: Best win vs. SP+ No. 9, next best vs. No. 25. Loss to SP+ No. 3. Six wins vs. teams 7-4 or better. No. 6 strength of record.
Both look like pretty obvious playoff teams, right?
Well Team A just moved up a spot in the rankings, seems assured not just of making the playoff, but of hosting a home game, and no one seems to be arguing about its spot in the rankings. That’s Oregon at No. 6.
Team B would currently be our first team out, a team with a résumé that shows equally impressive wins, an equally understandable loss and a far more impressive breadth of quality opponents. And yet, no one seems to be arguing much about BYU’s spot in the rankings either.
Why is it that the Cougars — the forgotten one-loss team with a higher ranked win than Oregon or Notre Dame and a better loss than Alabama or Oklahoma — sit at No. 11 and no one seems to care?
We get the frustration over Miami’s placement. There’s plenty of anger to go around. But don’t let BYU get lost in the shuffle. The Cougars’ résumé holds up against all the two-loss teams and is on par with Oregon and Ole Miss. Somehow, the committee — and nearly everyone else outside of Provo — seems to be ignoring it.
Wait, are we really defending Notre Dame here? Hey, somebody’s got to do it.
Let’s take a closer look at the Irish, who’ve become the punching bag for every fan frustrated with the committee’s rankings.
Right now, Notre Dame is effectively the golfer who wrapped up his round early and is waiting in the clubhouse, hoping no one else makes too many birdies. The Irish are safely in the field, and only a road trip to lowly Stanford is left on the docket.
But as the committee’s rankings hold steady week after week, there has been more and more time to debate the merits of Notre Dame’s résumé, and when we reach the end of championship week, it’s hard to ignore that one team aiming for a playoff bid doesn’t actually play in a conference.
So, does Notre Dame really deserve the benefit of the doubt?
In short: Heck yeah.
The Irish have five wins against bowl-eligible opponents — more than Georgia, Ole Miss, Vanderbilt or Texas Tech.
Both of Notre Dame’s losses were one-possession affairs against top-12 opponents. The loss to Texas A&M came down to a fluke occurrence, as the Irish flubbed a point after try.
Notre Dame’s game control — about as good an estimation as we have for the eye test — puts the Irish ahead of everyone but Ohio State, Indiana, Texas Tech and Oregon.
In four games since Nov. 1, Notre Dame has beaten its opposition by a combined score of 181-42, lambasting Syracuse so badly in Week 13 that Fran Brown might not shower for a month.
Look at any of the underlying metrics — explosive play rates, defensive stop rates, Jeremiyah Love being awesome rates — and Notre Dame is as good as anyone in the country.
So yes, we get the more logical debates about Miami’s Week 1 win or Alabama’s superior schedule, but the bottom line is, outside of Ohio State, there’s probably no team in the country playing better, more balanced football than the Irish. That probably shouldn’t be the only consideration, but as we debate which teams ought to be docked a few points in the rankings, Notre Dame probably shouldn’t be at the front of the line either.
Yes, Miami has a good argument against the committee’s treatment of the Hurricanes. The committee, too, seems to acknowledge under-appreciating Miami early on, and is adjusting by slowly moving the Canes up one spot each week, hoping that’ll be enough to appease the masses.
But here’s a question: What if Miami’s real beef should be with the ACC, not with the committee?
For each of the past two years, there has been widespread consensus that the ACC’s best team is Miami. But, barring some truly high-level chaos in Week 14 — something the ACC is apt to provide — the Canes won’t be playing for a conference championship again.
When leagues were smaller and had two divisions, the idea of pitting one division champ against the other made intuitive sense. But with expansion and the end of division play, what we’ve gotten is wildly diverse scheduling and the potential for confounding tiebreakers to ultimately decide which two teams get to play for a conference title.
In the Big Ten and SEC, where winning the league isn’t a do-or-die proposition, that’s fine. In the ACC, where only the champion might get a playoff bid and there’s a real chance that six different teams will tie atop the conference with a 6-2 league record — well, that’s a big issue.
So, why not just tweak the rules of how a conference championship game is seeded? What if one spot goes to the team with the best conference record and the other spot goes to the next highest ranked team? Doing so would ensure both the most deserving team (best record) and best team (highest ranked) got a shot, and it would’ve ended any concerns about the ACC being passed by multiple Group of 5 leagues, because a mediocre team like Duke would’ve had no shot at winning the league.
The ACC has bent over backward to try to find unique solutions to potentially existential problems in recent years. This is a change that would be forward thinking, easy and beneficial to the league’s playoff prospects.
It just won’t come in time to save Miami in 2025.
Remember last week when Tulane was also No. 24, just ahead of Arizona State, and behind Illinois, Houston and Missouri, who all lost? It might seem reasonable, given that precondition, that Tulane would then move up, say, three spots or so, while remaining a tick ahead of Arizona State.
But no, a week later, the Green Wave still check in at No. 24, a spot the committee seems to have set aside as “Where we put a Group of 5 team,” like the junk drawer in your kitchen that holds packing tape and birthday candles and those weird scented oils your mother-in-law ordered for you off TV — a placeholder for all the stuff you don’t know what else to do with.
In the big picture, it probably doesn’t matter. As long as Tulane stays ahead of its compatriots in the Group of 5 — winning the American, out-ranking James Madison — the Green Wave will make the playoff. And perhaps that’s all that matters.
But of the teams that jumped Tulane in the rankings this week are Arizona State — still with a chance to win the Big 12 — and Pitt and SMU, who have decent odds of making the ACC title game. Georgia Tech, despite a miserable loss to Pitt, also held firm ahead of the Green Wave.
A year ago, the ACC’s championship game implosion earned Clemson a bid into the playoff, but also shifted the ACC behind Boise State, the best Group of 5 champion, allowing the Broncos to land a bye. The stakes have changed for 2025-26 — the top four conference champs are no longer guaranteed an off week — but that doesn’t mean Tulane should be fine settling for the 12-seed either.
Tulane’s strength of record is ahead of Georgia Tech, Virginia and Pitt. If one of those teams claims the ACC’s playoff berth, what’s the rationale for putting them ahead of the Green Wave? And the difference between the No. 11 seed and the No. 12 seed might be about traveling to the SEC or the Big 12 for a playoff game.
The Group of 5 has largely been set to the side by this committee all year, so none of this comes as a surprise. But Tulane — or JMU or Navy or North Texas or San Diego State — all deserve to be judged on the merits of their résumés, not by which conference they’re affiliated with.
The bottom of the top 25 seems to be prime real estate for the ACC, but the one ACC team who might most deserve one of those coveted spots between 20 and 25 is nowhere to be found.
Wake Forest has the same record as SMU, and it beat the Mustangs head-to-head.
Wake Forest has a better overall résumé than Georgia Tech, and it only lost to the Yellow Jackets (in overtime) as a result of an officiating call the ACC later apologized for.
Wake Forest is a game behind Virginia in the standings, and the Deacons have a head-to-head win over the No. 18 Cavaliers, too.
Look, Wake Forest doesn’t ask for much. The Deacons are like the friend who’s always willing to pick you up from the airport, only better because they’ll probably bring along a box of Krispy Kreme. So if some ACC team that no one respects is going to be ranked 23rd regardless, why not Wake? Because the next time a committee member’s connection gets delayed out of CLT, it won’t be Pitt offering to pick them up and give them an air mattress to crash on. That’s strictly a Wake Forest thing.
Also angry this week: James Madison Dukes (10-1, unranked), North Texas Mean Green (10-1, unranked and now losing their coach), Navy Midshipmen (8-2, unranked), Utah Utes (9-2, No. 13 after being this week’s team that somehow isn’t as good as Miami anymore), Alabama Crimson Tide (9-2, No. 10 and far too close to the edge of the playoff for comfort)
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