CFP Bracket: Field set, still grumbling

We have seen the white smoke from the College Football Playoff committee.

Now we will see and hear the fire because there will be heated reactions whether the playoffs have four or 12 teams.

Here is a snapshot of the 12-team bracket.

 

In the biggest news, SMU is in, Alabama is out, and the first round is set. However, Clemson beat SMU in the ACC Championship, and yet SMU gets the better seed and higher ranking.

Former Alabama coach Nick Saban was quick, but polite, to point out that the result of this bracket punishes teams who have the tougher strength of schedule. His best examples are SEC teams who have a rugged conference schedule and also schedule top non conference teams.

“It is good for the fans and for football to schedule Notre Dame, Ohio State. …,” Saban said. “But now athletic directors may need to reconsider, maybe even cancel some of those teams to assure better records and to get into the playoffs.”

The matchups are fascinating. Even with all of the controversy and all of the yelling, it's a great field, it should be a blast, and now it's about settling it on the field.

Indeed, the biggest debate entering Sunday's reveal was what the committee would do with SMU. Headed into the ACC championship game, the Mustangs were ranked No. 8 and went undefeated in league play. SMU coach Rhett Lashlee and ACC commissioner Jim Phillips insisted that that should be enough to make it regardless of what happened against Clemson.

CFP selection committee chair Warde Manuel admitted during the ESPN selection show it was "quite a debate" between SMU and Alabama for the final at-large spot.

"We value strength of schedule," Manuel said. "That's why Alabama is a three-loss team ranked ahead of other teams that have two losses. It is something we talked about quite a bit. But in the balance of it and the way SMU played in that game, losing on the last-second field goal, great win by Clemson, great game. We just felt that in this particular case, SMU still had the nod above Alabama. But it's no disrespect to Alabama's strength of schedule. It's merely looking at the entire body of work for both teams."

Though the committee had previously said teams should not be punished for losing in a conference championship game, it left itself wiggle room by saying much of that would be determined based on the game itself.

SMU trailed Clemson by 17 points before rallying to tie the game with 16 seconds left. Clemson, however, got into field goal range in two plays and won 34-31 to earn the ACC's automatic berth. Afterward, Lashlee said it would be "criminal" and "wrong on so many levels" if the committee chose to leave SMU out of the playoff.

"We showed up, and we competed our butts off. We should be in. They know we should be in," Lashlee said Saturday night.

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Alabama (9-3), meanwhile, did not play Saturday but had been the last team in the field in the penultimate rankings.

A quick schedule comparison shows Alabama with the edge over SMU in a few categories -- ranking higher than SMU in strength of record (No. 9; SMU was 15th) and FPI (fourth; SMU ranks No. 13).

While Alabama has a 41-34 victory over SEC champion Georgia and two other Top 25 wins, the Crimson Tide have three losses, including two to .500 teams — 40-35 to Vanderbilt and an ugly 24-3 road loss to Oklahoma on Nov. 23.

SMU, meanwhile, has two losses by a combined six points to ACC champ Clemson and 10-2 BYU. While the Mustangs do not have a win over a team currently ranked in the Top 25, they do have a 5-2 record against teams over .500. Alabama is 5-1 against teams over .500, but with two additional two losses to 6-6 teams.

The ACC was in a similar situation on Selection Day just last season, when its undefeated conference champion, Florida State, was left out of the four-team playoff in favor of one-loss SEC champion Alabama.

There had been consternation throughout the week that the ACC might once again lose a playoff spot to the SEC and Alabama, but also real questions about the value of conference championship games if teams that are ranked in the Top 12 entering those games could drop out with losses.

Among other teams that felt they had a case to make it into the 12-team field, Miami (10-2) was the next team out after Alabama. Manuel said last week that those teams would essentially be locked in with no opportunity to move up into the top 12.

South Carolina finished the season with six straight wins, but it lost head-to-head to Alabama and Ole Miss. Miami, meanwhile, lost two of its final three games but had a better record against bowl teams on the road (4-2) than Alabama (1-3).

Boise State beat UNLV 21-7 in the Mountain West championship game to earn its bye. The Broncos have the 81st-ranked strength of schedule, but they have been in position for a first-round bye since Nov. 19, when they moved ahead of the highest-ranked Big 12 team.

Arizona State, which was ranked No. 15 entering Sunday, beat Iowa State 45-19 in the Big 12 championship game and moved to No. 12 in the overall rankings, giving it the final first-round bye over the ACC champion Tigers.

The four quarterfinal games will be staged at the Vrbo Fiesta Bowl (Boise State-SMU/Penn State winner), Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl (Arizona State-Clemson/Texas winner), Rose Bowl presented by Prudential (Oregon-Tennessee/Ohio State winner) and Allstate Sugar Bowl (Georgia-Indiana/Notre Dame winner) on Dec. 31 and Jan. 1.

The two semifinal games will take place at the Capital One Orange Bowl and Goodyear Cotton Bowl on Jan. 9 and 10.

The CFP National Championship presented by AT&T is scheduled for Jan. 20 at Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta.