Anger is a frustrating mess. After Tuesday night's second College Football Playoff rankings of the season, ESPN's David Hale has worked himself up into a lather over who should be ranked No. 5. He prefers to see the Texas Tech Red Raiders slotted ahead of the Georgia Bulldogs for reasons that do not make a ton of sense right now. In time, maybe Texas Tech usurps Georgia, but not right now, man.
Georgia is 8-1 on the season with three games left, while Texas Tech is 9-1 on the campaign with only two conference games left to be played. They both have a pair of signature wins and one conference loss. Georgia has ranked wins over Tennessee and Ole Miss, but a loss to Alabama, while Texas Tech has ranked wins over Utah and BYU, but a much worse loss to Arizona State. It is close, but no cigar...
Hale tries his best to make a compelling argument, but it is one that he is not going to win right now
ESPN's David Hale paints himself into a corner over his Texas Tech affinity
Hale argues Texas Tech should be ranked ahead of Georgia because they do not play in close games.
"Texas Tech has played two top-13 teams now and beaten them by a combined score of 63-17. Georgia's two best wins (vs. No. 7 Ole Miss and No. 23 Tennessee) came by a combined 11 points."
This should come back to the fact that Georgia plays in the SEC and has the far better loss today.
"Texas Tech has a loss to Arizona State that looks bad on paper, but the Sun Devils actually profile well, and they won that game with a healthy Sam Leavitt. Surely that's a better loss than Alabama's defeat at the hands of slumping Florida State, right?"
Naturally, it was only a matter of time before Hale completely unraveled his flawed Texas Tech case.
"Yes, who you play matters, and in this case, Alabama (No. 4 SoR) and Georgia (No. 5) have had the tougher road. But how you play has to matter, too, and the Red Raiders have been far more dominant. Texas Tech has the second-best average in-game win probability in the country, trailing only Ohio State. Alabama's is 17th. Georgia's is 36th. Yes, credit to the Tide and Dawgs for winning close games. But more credit to Texas Tech for avoiding close games altogether."
Let it be known Utah has no earthly business being ranked inside of the top 15 at this point in time.
Why Georgia might be able to hold off Texas Tech in the end in CFP race
For the sake of simplicity, let's assume chalk the rest of the way. 8-1 Georgia wins its final three regular-season games of the season over Texas, Charlotte and Georgia Tech to finish the year at 11-1 (7-1). Texas Tech wins its final two regular-season games over UCF and West Virginia to finish the year at 11-1 (8-1). Since Texas Tech holds the tiebreaker over BYU and Utah, it shall be getting to Arlington.
Even if Texas Tech wins the Big 12 championship by beating presumably BYU or Utah for a second time, is that certainly going to be definitively better than Georgia going 11-1 in the SEC with ranked wins over Tennessee, Ole Miss, Texas and Georgia Tech in the non-conference? While the Volunteers, Longhorns and Yellow Jackets could conceivably fall out of the top 25, the Rebels shall be staying in.
Overall, beating the snot out of teams with not as impressive of a schedule does not matter when it comes to strength of record. This metric is a point of emphasis in the latest College Football Playoff rankings. In the end, if Georgia and Texas Tech win out, they will be top-six teams anyway. Yes, the Selection Committee could give Texas Tech a gold star of approval for winning its league, but okay...
Georgia has made it a point to always schedule worthy opponents in the non-conference most years.