CFN Article - What if Bama and UGA both go 12-0?

selmaborntidefan · Oct 17, 2017

Skeeterpop said:
I completely understand where you are coming from here. However, are you telling me a Clemson team who lost to Syracuse, an Oklahoma team who lost to Iowa St, or any other one loss team would be more deserving than Alabama to get into the playoffs who would have just lost to the new #1 and undefeated team in the country? That would be the best loss of any other one loss team and it would have been to an undefeated team. Of course Alabama would deserve a spot over any other 1 loss team. Who cares when the game was played.

The problem is the committee counts WINS >>>>> LOSSES.......

Clemson would also have beaten Auburn, Louisville, Va Tech, Ga Tech, NC State, and FSU and possibly a good Miami team.

Oklahoma would have beaten Ohio St, Oklahoma St, TCU, and somebody good twice. If Ohio St wins the B1G then the Sooners win looks even better.

We would have beaten FSU, Auburn, and ATM.......and MAYBE a decent or not decent LSU (who really knows?)

It's not the slam dunk if we don't win out, folks. The SEC as a whole is NOT that good this year, and we had the misfortune
to draw weak Eastern teams like Vandy and the Vols this year.

Win your games or don't complain. Been my mantra since 1978.

UntouchableCrew · Oct 17, 2017

B1GTide said:
Is the GA/ND game totally meaningless if ND makes the playoffs at 11-1 and GA does not after losing to Alabama with a final record of 12-1?

Every game matters - not just 5 games/year.

Clearly the timing of the game matters though. When your Buckeyes made it in 2014 it was largely because the early season loss to Va Tech was seen as an early season aberration and the team that destroyed Wisconsin in the B1G Title game was much better. Conference title games are the peak of a great teams season, proving they're the best in the conference. I'd argue they absolutely hold more significance than the average regular season game both to the committee and the average fan.

UntouchableCrew · Oct 17, 2017

selmaborntidefan said:
The problem is the committee counts WINS >>>>> LOSSES.......

Clemson would also have beaten Auburn, Louisville, Va Tech, Ga Tech, NC State, and FSU and possibly a good Miami team.

Oklahoma would have beaten Ohio St, Oklahoma St, TCU, and somebody good twice. If Ohio St wins the B1G then the Sooners win looks even better.

We would have beaten FSU, Auburn, and ATM.......and MAYBE a decent or not decent LSU (who really knows?)

It's not the slam dunk if we don't win out, folks. The SEC as a whole is NOT that good this year, and we had the misfortune
to draw weak Eastern teams like Vandy and the Vols this year.

Win your games or don't complain. Been my mantra since 1978.

I agree with you in theory but I think that Alabama has earned the benefit of the doubt. There's a level of respect nationally for the program that I really can't imagine they'd miss the playoff with one loss.

TiderMan · Oct 17, 2017

If all Power 5 conference champions have 1 loss or less and Notre Dame also has 1 loss, no conference (SEC or otherwise), will get two team in the playoffs. In order for a conference to get multiple teams in the 4 team playoff, 2 conferences will have to implode and the conference champ will have to have 2-3 losses.

CajunCrimson · Oct 17, 2017

TiderMan said:
If all Power 5 conference champions have 1 loss or less and Notre Dame also has 1 loss, no conference (SEC or otherwise), will get two team in the playoffs. In order for a conference to get multiple teams in the 4 team playoff, 2 conferences will have to implode and the conference champ will have to have 2-3 losses.

I disagree....

Especially if the ACC 1 loss team is Va Tech or NC State......or the B12 with Ok State.....

B1GTide · Oct 17, 2017

UntouchableCrew said:
I'd argue they absolutely hold more significance than the average regular season game both to the committee and the average fan.

Only because of the timing. As proof, if there are a bunch of upsets in conference championship games and a bunch of 2 or 3 loss teams win those games, how many of those teams would make the playoff? Not many, if any? Why? Because the committee has shown that they look at the entire season, not just the last game of the season.

ETA - the committee has said many, many times over the years - the conference championship only matters if ALL other things are equal. In other words, they only add weight to that game if there are 2 teams that are virtually indistinguishable when examining their seasons as a whole. Well, how often is that going to happen, if ever?

selmaborntidefan · Oct 17, 2017

RammerJammer14 said:
It is completely meaningless if the team that loses still gets to play in the next round of games based on perception compared to some other team they have never played.

The comparison is not exact because of the four-team playoff but let's go back to 2011 for just a moment, okay? This argument came up - hell, I used it myself - but it's not "exactly" correct.

There was a HUGE stink as I'm sure you recall that Alabama somehow benefited from losing to LSU (as if we could have planned that). But what so many forget as time goes by is that the REAL thing that helped Alabama was the fact that Oregon had played AND LOST to LSU in the season opener. That game made it close to certain that Alabama WOULD, in fact, get the nod over Oregon because there were multiple rematch scenarios.

The claim is that the Alabama-LSU clash in November didn't count....but it most certainly DID (just not in the way most people think). Once we lost, we were in "hope somebody loses" mode.

How did we get back in the game?

1) Oregon took out Stanford, 53-30
2) TCU took out Boise on a missed kick, 36-35
3) Baylor took out OU, 45-38
4) Iowa State took out Okie St in OT,
5) NC State took out Clemson, 37-17
6) USC took out Oregon by 3
7) Clemson took out Va Tech in the ACCCG, 38-10

So if you REQUIRED a conference title then......

Pac 12 champion - Oregon (who LSU had already smoked)
ACC champion - Clemson (with 2 losses)
SEC champion - LSU (unbeaten)
Big 10 champion - Wisconsin (2 losses)
Big 12 champion - Okie St (loss to Iowa St)

Literally there was only ONE game that could have required conference champions, LSU-Okie State. And let's be honest....if we had been up against OKLAHOMA rather than Okie State????? The voters pick OU.

But it's NOT right to say that the LSU-Alabama first game didn't matter. In fact, the entire sequence mattered. Without even ONE of those games, Alabama doesn't wind up back in the title matchup. In that sense, they ALL mattered.

And btw - if Arkansas had upset LSU......we were probably done for, too, because it would have created a three-team vacuum that LSU would have won out.

selmaborntidefan · Oct 17, 2017

UntouchableCrew said:
I agree with you in theory but I think that Alabama has earned the benefit of the doubt. There's a level of respect nationally for the program that I really can't imagine they'd miss the playoff with one loss.

Not if we're up against Clemson and OU we won't.

Both teams beat us the last time each played us. OU gets some sort of benefit of the doubt I absolutely cannot fathom. And in Clemson's case, it's the defending champs.

Ordinarily I would agree with you. This time? Not so sure.

I doubt it will matter. Every single time this happens, Georgia manages to lose to some team they should beat.

B1GTide · Oct 17, 2017

UntouchableCrew said:
I agree with you in theory but I think that Alabama has earned the benefit of the doubt. There's a level of respect nationally for the program that I really can't imagine they'd miss the playoff with one loss.

That is what got OSU in last year. There is something to this. But we had an extraordinary road win last year. Alabama's schedule this year has been its easiest in over 10 years. It is a shame that Francios got hurt or the FSU win would look totally different.

Saban4Ever · Oct 17, 2017

If BAMA and UGA are both undefeated when the selection committee has it's first show on Oct 31, it will be interesting to see where UGA is ranked. I am sure BAMA will be #1.

A lot can happen between then and the playoffs, but this will give us a glimpse of how the committee is thinking going in. I just hope BAMA wins out and is undefeated, including a win over UGA, so that we don't have to worry about if 2 teams from SEC get it. I don't think they would put in 2 teams from the same conference, but then again, I did not think they'd put Ohio State in last year.

92tide · Oct 17, 2017

selmaborntidefan said:
Not if we're up against Clemson and OU we won't.

Both teams beat us the last time each played us. OU gets some sort of benefit of the doubt I absolutely cannot fathom. And in Clemson's case, it's the defending champs.

Ordinarily I would agree with you. This time? Not so sure.

I doubt it will matter. Every single time this happens, Georgia manages to lose to some team they should beat.

i wondered how long it would take for an actual fact to be presented in this thread.

CajunCrimson · Oct 17, 2017

B1GTide said:
That is what got OSU in last year. There is something to this. But we had an extraordinary road win last year. Alabama's schedule this year has been its easiest in over 10 years. It is a shame that Francios got hurt or the FSU win would look totally different.

Ironically it didn't look easy at the start. Was supposed to be LSU's resurgence, Auburn was supposed to be right on our doorstep, OM was not supposed to fall back so far so fast, A&M and Arkansas were both slotted to be better. At the beginning of the year it looked much more challenging.

But, I'm sort of happy that we have an easy schedule. Much more fun to watch this year.

B1GTide · Oct 17, 2017

Fun thread, but I will be very surprised if GA is undefeated going into the SECCG.

RammerJammer14 · Oct 17, 2017

B1GTide said:
Is the GA/ND game totally meaningless if ND makes the playoffs at 11-1 and GA does not after losing to Alabama with a final record of 12-1?

Every game matters - not just 5 games/year.

Skeeterpop said:
I completely understand where you are coming from here. However, are you telling me a Clemson team who lost to Syracuse, an Oklahoma team who lost to Iowa St, or any other one loss team would be more deserving than Alabama to get into the playoffs who would have just lost to the new #1 and undefeated team in the country? That would be the best loss of any other one loss team and it would have been to an undefeated team. Of course Alabama would deserve a spot over any other 1 loss team. Who cares when the game was played.

While numerically one loss is one loss, there IS a difference between losses at the beginning to midpoint of the season and the end of the season and championship games. I think we can all agree that teams are not the same team at the beginning of the season that they are at the end of the season, whether better or worse. The Florida team that lost to Ole Miss in 2008 was not playing at nearly the same level as the Florida team that beat Alabama for the SEC championship. However, the way a team plays in their last 3 games of the season and championship games is much more indicative of their performance than a loss from the beginning of the season that the team could have well and truly grown from. See Bama- Ole Miss in 2014 & 2015 (and arguably 2016). The ND team that lost to UGA could very well be a much better team in Dec than they were in Sept.

I don't have an issue with getting into the nitty gritty to decide who is the best 1-loss team by comparing quality of losses and quality of wins between teams. What I do have an issue with is completely ignoring a head-to-head win between two teams who just got done playing each other to see "who really is the better team". Really? We just decided that, I thought? Lets take it back to 2012. Should Alabama have played Georgia in January for the national title when Alabama just beat Georgia for the conference title the very last game? I mean, what are we playing the games for if the results get tossed out? Why don't we just have Bama and UGA play best of 3? Best of 7? IMO, its just silly.

What we are really arguing here is, "This team is #1, and this team is #2, but we gotta play 2 games now so which teams get to give it the old college try one more time against #1 and #2?"

At the end of the day though, its all love, man.

bamamc1 · Oct 17, 2017

selmaborntidefan said:
Not if we're up against Clemson and OU we won't.

Both teams beat us the last time each played us. OU gets some sort of benefit of the doubt I absolutely cannot fathom. And in Clemson's case, it's the defending champs.

Ordinarily I would agree with you. This time? Not so sure.

I doubt it will matter. Every single time this happens, Georgia manages to lose to some team they should beat.

I wonder what UGA will think if Richt and Miami get in and they don't.......

RollTide_HTTR · Oct 17, 2017

RammerJammer14 said:
It holds value when you are just going to pit the team that lost the conference championship game against the team that just beat them in the very next game. We just played this game, why are we playing it again in two weeks? Do head to head wins count or not? It is needless deja vu because frankly in college football there are seldom more than 2 teams who should be playing for the title in the first place, and now you are just scrambling to fill game slots with teams who already played themselves out of contention.

People are making this too complicated by (ironically) trying to oversimplify it. There is no answer to "Do head to head wins count?" or "Are Conference Championship games more important?"

Context is the most important factor IMO. It is not and shouldn't be black and white. Sure, if you have two comparable 1 loss teams and one is a conference championship then that team should be ranked ahead. However, if the conference champion team has a horrible schedule and the other has a lot of top wins then the conference championship should not trump the rest of their resume. Quality wins > bad losses.

Basically, a conference championship game win against a mediocre team should not outweigh a quality win against a top tier team. So, in this hypothetical with Georgia I think their win over a 1 loss ND team should be worth more than a win over a 3 loss team in a conference championship game.

B1GTide · Oct 17, 2017

bamamc1 said:
I wonder what UGA will think if Richt and Miami get in and they don't.......

They will probably think, "Good luck against Alabama!" :biggrin:

RammerJammer14 · Oct 17, 2017

selmaborntidefan said:
The comparison is not exact because of the four-team playoff but let's go back to 2011 for just a moment, okay? This argument came up - hell, I used it myself - but it's not "exactly" correct.

There was a HUGE stink as I'm sure you recall that Alabama somehow benefited from losing to LSU (as if we could have planned that). But what so many forget as time goes by is that the REAL thing that helped Alabama was the fact that Oregon had played AND LOST to LSU in the season opener. That game made it close to certain that Alabama WOULD, in fact, get the nod over Oregon because there were multiple rematch scenarios.

The claim is that the Alabama-LSU clash in November didn't count....but it most certainly DID (just not in the way most people think). Once we lost, we were in "hope somebody loses" mode.

How did we get back in the game?

1) Oregon took out Stanford, 53-30
2) TCU took out Boise on a missed kick, 36-35
3) Baylor took out OU, 45-38
4) Iowa State took out Okie St in OT,
5) NC State took out Clemson, 37-17
6) USC took out Oregon by 3
7) Clemson took out Va Tech in the ACCCG, 38-10

So if you REQUIRED a conference title then......

Pac 12 champion - Oregon (who LSU had already smoked)
ACC champion - Clemson (with 2 losses)
SEC champion - LSU (unbeaten)
Big 10 champion - Wisconsin (2 losses)
Big 12 champion - Okie St (loss to Iowa St)

Literally there was only ONE game that could have required conference champions, LSU-Okie State. And let's be honest....if we had been up against OKLAHOMA rather than Okie State????? The voters pick OU.

But it's NOT right to say that the LSU-Alabama first game didn't matter. In fact, the entire sequence mattered. Without even ONE of those games, Alabama doesn't wind up back in the title matchup. In that sense, they ALL mattered.

And btw - if Arkansas had upset LSU......we were probably done for, too, because it would have created a three-team vacuum that LSU would have won out.

I agree with you here. Some really crazy stuff went down for Alabama to get the rematch in 2011 because it was literally last man standing, and I of course think Bama was the best team that year (as proved on the field). I simply don't think it really relates to the scenario being discussed this year between Alabama and UGA, because here we are talking about a head-to-head matchup for the final game of the season, then comparing that 1-loss conference champ loser to other 1-loss conference champ winners, and simply comparing losses and saying one is better than the other. It makes no sense to me to do an immediate rematch of the previous game like it never happened.

If UGA out-gains Bama by 200yds then loses on a missed field goal in overtime after multiple missed FGs in full time, and every other team out there has one or more loss, you know what, sure, give em a second try. Otherwise, hey, enjoy the citrus bowl.

I want to be clear, I am NOT talking about a 1-loss conference champ loser should never make it in. I AM talking about a 1-loss conference champ loser not making it in when the team they lost to is in as well. I think there is a difference in the two scenarios.

selmaborntidefan · Oct 17, 2017

92tide said:
i wondered how long it would take for an actual fact to be presented in this thread.

I heard you (and Jon) right in my ear, man.......LOL!!!!

81usaf92 · Oct 17, 2017

I get the feeling that UGA is going to lose before the title game

CFN Article - What if Bama and UGA both go 12-0?

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