College Football Playoff Bubble Watch: Field being reshaped in day shows beauty of 12 teams

Seven top-20 teams lost Saturday, the most of any week this season.

Just one top-five team, Indiana, lost Saturday.

This is the beauty of the 12-team College Football Playoff.

In the BCS era, Saturday’s results would have been a footnote, with most of the conversation centering on whether we might stumble into a national title game between two Big Ten teams, Oregon and Ohio State.

In the four-team Playoff era, Indiana would have been officially eliminated, and the chaos below would have been fun but wouldn’t have shaped much in the Playoff picture as Notre Dame crept into contention to make the field and the Big Ten sorted out its champion and second bid.

But Saturday’s upset-filled docket completely reshaped the Playoff field in 12 hours.

Tennessee started the day wondering whether it needed to mount a grassroots campaign to make sure Indiana didn’t get in the field ahead of the Vols. UT ended the day wondering whether it might host a Playoff game.

Alabama began the day as a 14-point favorite visiting a harmless Oklahoma team, controlling its own fate in the SEC race, Playoff race and threatening to compete for a national title. The Tide flew back to Tuscaloosa all but eliminated from the title picture in Kalen DeBoer’s first season.

The 12-team Playoff gives us more relevant games with more teams, and as a result, we got the wildest, most compelling day of football of the season yet. The closest thing was Week 6, when five top-20 teams lost, but that included fraudulent USC, Michigan and Missouri teams being exposed in conference play.

Indiana and Army played the two biggest games of the day. Neither delivered, losing in a pair of forgettable duds. It didn’t matter. Saturday was anything but forgettable, especially for how it shaped the first bubble.

Teams ranked Nos. 5, 7, 9, 14, 15, 16 and 19 lost. Deion Sanders and Colorado coughed up control of their destiny in the Big 12 title race, now needing a minor miracle to reach the Playoff.

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It’s all good for the sport. It’s compelling entertainment.

And if anyone believed expanding the Playoff to 12 teams would ruin the regular season, Saturday’s shakeup was the most compelling argument yet to the contrary.

Each week, Bubble Watch will examine who’s in, who’s out and who’s somewhere in the middle leading up to the first 12-team College Football Playoff. It’s a realistic snapshot of the field, not a projection. The five highest-ranked conference champions will get an automatic Playoff berth. Find Austin Mock’s model’s bracket projections here.

ACC

After the anarchy of Saturday, the ACC’s bubble hopes are revived after chances of getting two teams in the field looked dead in the water for weeks. But the SEC’s wild Saturday means either the ACC title game loser could get in, or Clemson — if it beats a ranked South Carolina team next week — could get in without playing in Charlotte, N.C. The Tigers would be 10-2 with a 1-1 record against Top 25 teams if they win next week.

The safe bet is still on the ACC landing one team, but landing two now looks like a shade below a coin flip.

Big Ten

Indiana lost by 23, and between its first and last drives of the game, managed just 19 yards of offense. The Playoff looked like it was going to be out of reach, despite Curt Cignetti’s postgame protestations.

But with all the help Indiana got after the loss, the one-loss Hoosiers can count on hanging on to a spot in the field, unlikely to fall below enough two-loss teams to be out, even with their suspect strength of schedule. The loss did feature a punt return touchdown and a gift score on a botched punt.

Ohio State and Oregon are locked in the field no matter how the Big Ten title game shakes out. And the questions about Penn State’s suspect resume disappeared after the SEC’s implosion Saturday.

Big 12

What a shakeup. Colorado and BYU stumbled on the way to Arlington, and now, if all four teams tied atop the Big 12 win next week, it’ll be the Sun Devils and Cyclones playing in the league title game and possibly for a first-round bye in the Playoff.

The Sun Devils were a non-factor in the title race for most of this season but just kept winning. Now, with the Territorial Cup ahead, they’re in the driver’s seat for a Playoff spot after beating Kansas State and BYU in successive weeks.

Iowa State has a tough rivalry game against Kansas State in Farmageddon this week, and if K-State springs the upset, it’ll be BYU going to Arlington. Colorado coach Sanders was frustrated after the Buffaloes’ four-game winning streak ended against Kansas and put their postseason in jeopardy.

“We controlled our own destiny, and we fumbled it,” Sanders said.

You and lots of others Saturday, Deion.

SEC

There are only four teams in the SEC that can feel good about their Playoff chances heading into the final week of the season.

Texas A&M controls its own destiny and will host Texas for the chance to play for an SEC title. The Aggies have no chance to earn an at-large bid but can make the Playoff by winning the conference.

Alabama and Ole Miss will fall out of the bracket for now, but rivalry week could still have enough surprises in store to bring them back into the conversation. The bad news for Alabama and Ole Miss is rivalry wins over Auburn and Mississippi State don’t offer any boost to their resumes. They’ll need a lot of help.

For now, the SEC looks like it’ll have three teams in the field barring upset losses for Georgia or Tennessee. If Texas A&M goes on a run, the SEC will put four teams into the field.

Group of 5

Army’s 35-point loss on a neutral field to Notre Dame ends almost any hope of the Black Knights getting into the Playoff, even with an AAC title. They’ll need a lot of help in the MWC race. UNLV debuted in the rankings, and unless the Rebels or Boise State lose next week, it’ll likely be the MWC champion who earns the Group of 5 bid. Tulane is lurking, but it seems unlikely to jump either team with a win over Army, which will almost certainly fall out of the Top 25 and fall farther with a loss to Tulane, undercutting the Green Wave’s resume.

Others

The Irish have been rolling since the debacle against Northern Illinois and are closing in on hosting a Playoff game with a win over USC next week, possibly grabbing the favorable No. 5 seed that means hosting a No. 12 seed and then playing the lowest-ranked conference champ to receive a bye.

Marcus Freeman’s team ended Navy’s and Army’s Playoff hopes and has won its past nine games by an average of more than 32 points. No one is talking about the Irish as a national title contender, but overlook them at your own peril.