Projected Final College Football Playoff bracket, Top 25 rankings: Alabama upends UGA, Florida State perseveres
Projected Final College Football Playoff rankings: No. 4-3
4. Alabama Crimson Tide
Remember when everyone had written off Alabama as dead in the water after the Crimson Tide lost to Texas, benched Jalen Milroe, and then played an exceedingly ugly game in a win over South Florida. That all feels like a lifetime ago now that Nick Saban’s team is an SEC Champion once again.
Alabama handed Georgia its first loss in its last 30 games, despite not even playing all that well. The Dawgs outgained them and Milroe didn’t have his finest performance by a long shot. But when it came to taking advantage of opportunities to score or get stops, the Crimson Tide got the job done.
The big question: Will the Selection Committee jump Alabama ahead of undefeated Florida State with FSU’s quarterback injuries? At the end of the day, I think they will, using the “four best teams” argument. It’s unfair to the Seminoles, without question, but it’s probably best for the Playoff (and morale in Tallahassee to not have to watch a Jordan Travis-less team in the CFP).
3. Texas Longhorns
It turns out, what we saw from the Texas Longhorns in the regular-season finale against Texas Tech was Steve Sarkisian pushing his team into death machine mode. The latest victim was the Oklahoma State Cowboys in the Big 12 Championship Game.
This was an absolute fireworks show from Quinn Ewers and the Texas offense. While the defense shut down Ollie Gordon II and forced several Alan Bowman mistakes, they didn’t honestly need to. Ewers nearly set a Big 12 title game record for passing in the first half, ending the day for 452 yards and four touchdowns. He was dominant, as were the weapons around him, and the Longhorns cruised to a 49-21 win.
With Georgia losing to Alabama, that now seems to lock Texas into a College Football Playoff berth. Putting the Crimson Tide ahead of the Longhorns when Sark’s group won that head-to-head on the road in Tuscaloosa would be criminal. Can we now finally say that Texas is back? If they aren’t, it’s the closest this program has been in a long, long time.