College Football Playoff rankings 2022: Projected Week 13 Top 25 after Tennessee upset, USC proves itself, Ohio State gets scared

Projected College Football Playoff rankings after Week 12: No. 8-7

8. Alabama Crimson Tide

While many top teams struggled to be convincing on Saturday, the Alabama Crimson Tide barely broke a sweat against FCS Austin Peay. Granted, that didn’t take more than showing up to Bryant-Denney Stadium for Nick Saban’s team as Jase McClellan, Bryce Young and Jermaine Burton were all dominant early and then they just coasted to the finish line in the 34-0 win.

Alabama’s two losses almost surely have the Crimson Tide out of the College Football Playoff picture, particularly with LSU having the win over them to its credit. With that said, this team is very much in the now highly competitive group around the edges of the Top 10 that have all looked great at times but have just stumbled one or two times too often.

7. Clemson Tigers

If we were talking about things at the beginning of the season, a 40-10 win over Miami might’ve seemed like an ultra-impressive result for Clemson and one that could seriously boost their standing in the College Football Playoff rankings. Alas, the Hurricanes haven’t held up their end of the bargain, but it was still a wholly dominant effort for the Tigers and one that showed something important.

Even in their wins, there have been many times this season in which Clemson has either taken its foot off of the gas or has just lost the plot in the second half of games. When it looked like they might be in danger of doing that again on Saturday, though, they pulled themselves out of that funk and ended up running away with it. For a team now more alive than ever in the CFP race, that’s something that we needed to see.