Georgia football needs Alabama's help just to make it to the SEC Championship game

As it stands today, Georgia football sits in second place in the SEC standings at 4-1 behind Texas A&M who is a perfect 5-0 in conference play. With the SEC divisions now gone, that would be good enough for Georgia to qualify for the SEC Championship game due to being one of the top two teams in the conference standings.

But the only reason Georgia is in second place right now is because all of the other teams with one loss in SEC play have played fewer games. This includes Texas, Tennessee and LSU all at 3-1.

So there is a very real (and likely) possibility that Georgia ends up tied with at least one team at 7-1 for second place in the regular season SEC standings. Now the question is if Georgia would win the tiebreakers set by the SEC conference or not.

Tiebreaker scenarios

Let's assume that Texas A&M finishes conference play undefeated and No. 1 in the SEC standings. Let's also assume that Georgia wins out and finishes 7-1. Would that be good enough to make it into the SEC Championship game to take on the Aggies?

To figure that out, we have to go through the tiebreaker scenarios with the three other teams already mentioned that have one conference loss.

Tennessee and Texas are easy to figure out. Obviously Georgia has the head-to-head tiebreaker over Texas already, so UGA would get the nod over the Longhorns. Georgia's final SEC game this season is against Tennessee, so that tiebreaker will sort itself out on the field with one team getting their second conference loss. But in this case, we are assuming Gerogia wins out, so that means Tennessee will end the season with at least two losses in conference play.

That leaves us with LSU, a team that Georgia does not play this season. The first tiebreaker according to the SEC is the head-to-head matchup, but since UGA doesn't play LSU we need to move on to the second tiebreaker.

The second tiebreaker is the team's records against common SEC opponents. This is where things fall apart for Georgia. To figure out who wins based on this tiebreaker, we have to look at each team's one loss and see if the other team beat that opponent.

In LSU's case, their one loss came to Texas A&M, but Georgia doesn't face the Aggies this season, so UGA gains no advantage there. Georgia's loss on the other hand came against Alabama, a team LSU plays in two weeks on Nov. 9. So it's as simple as this, if LSU beats Alabama the Tigers now have the tiebreaker advange over Georgia.

What does this mean for Georgia?

In this scenario, this would mean Georgia could finish the season at 11-1 (7-1), as high as No. 1 in the College Football Playoff rankings, but still wouldn't get a chance to play for an SEC Championship. The highest seed Georgia could earn in the 12-team CFP then is the five-seed, because the top four seeds (and coveted first round bye) are resevered for conference champions only.

Georgia's rooting interest going forward

Obviously the first priotiry is Georgia winning their final three SEC games. This conversation is irrelevant if they lose one more conference game as they would likely be left out of the SEC Championship game with two losses.

The part that feels a little gross however is that Georgia really needs Alabama to beat LSU on Nov. 9. Alabama is one of the last teams we ever want to cheer for, but when it comes to making it into the SEC Championship game we should be able to make an exception.

Sure LSU could lose to one of their other SEC opponents to drop below Georgia in the standings, but their other conference games are against Florida, Vanderbilt and Oklahoma. LSU will be big favorites against all three.

So as it stands today, Georgia's SEC Championship hopes relies on them winning their final three SEC games and LSU losing to Alabama in two weeks. Georgia would be able to pass Texas A&M in the conference standings if they lose two more games or lose their season finale to Texas, so there is a lot of hope left for Georgia there as well.

The most likely outcome still is Georgia qualifying for the SEC Championship game, but as it stands today, Kirby Smart and his team do not have complete control of their destiny just yet.