There have been a lot of crazy things said these last few weeks as the College Football Playoff rankings have been released. But none of them trump the discussions surrounding strength of schedule among all the CFP teams.
Most people would agree that this is an extremely important metric. But unfortunately the only people’s opinions who actually matter don’t seem to care about this metric at all. And that is the CFP committee.
What other explanation would there be for Georgia football to still only be ranked No. 10 when they have the most difficult schedule and best resume?
Georgia however isn't the only team not receiving enough respect for their strength of resume, but the rest of the CFP contenders in the SEC aren’t either. And None other than SEC commissioner Greg Sankey came to the defense and posted the below graphic comparing the strength of schedules for the 15 playoff contenders.
Interesting to read analysis from others as they examine “strength of schedule” in college football…it does seem there is a trend to be identified… pic.twitter.com/pXSfxRMxvL
— Greg Sankey (@GregSankey) November 21, 2024
Greg Sankey shows shocking difference in strength of schedules
There are currently six SEC teams in contention for the 12 CFP spots. And those six SEC teams have happened to play the six most difficult schedules so far this season out of the 15 teams listed.
However, that still isn’t enough for the committee to respect these SEC teams. Only one SEC team (Texas) is inside the committee’s top 5, with the four other teams all coming from the Big Ten. This data shows that there isn’t a good reason for why that is the case.
Sure these SEC teams all have two losses (outside of Texas who has one), but most of these losses came against each other. The four Big Ten teams inside the committee’s top five however have mostly avoided playing each other so far, or any good teams for that matter.
So what this tells us is that the SEC teams are proven and battle tested while some of the Big Ten schools still have a lot of unknowns about them 10 games into the season.
Don’t worry though, there likely will be a lot of first round matchups in the playoffs this year putting Big Ten and SEC teams against one another. So the SEC will once again have their chance to assert their dominance over that conference up north very soon.