Bowl projections: Tennessee, Notre Dame join College Football Playoff field as Clemson, Texas A&M exit

There is no change to the top eight from last week’s College Football Playoff projections, but a couple of tough losses have caused changes near the cut line.

Texas A&M, coming off their big win over LSU, laid an egg at South Carolina in a 44-20 defeat. What really hurts for the Aggies is now they must beat Texas in the regular-season finale to have a shot at a CFP berth. A win over the Longhorns could even put Texas A&M in the SEC Championship Game, but a loss drops them to no better than 9-3, and I do not expect to see any teams with that record in the field.

Even worse, Clemson lost to Louisville 33-21 at home, which drops the Tigers out of the ACC title race … for now. Miami and SMU are both undefeated in league play and Clemson plays neither of them, nor do they play each other. All the Tigers can do is watch and hope for the best, but 10-2 with double-digit losses to the two best teams they played, one at home, is not likely to be good enough.

New to the field this week are Notre Dame and Tennessee. The Fighting Irish have the worst loss of any team that will be considered for the CFP and it’s not even close as Northern Illinois has proven to be a mid-level MAC team, at best. However, the Fighting Irish’s win at Texas A&M to start the season stands out, while their victory over Louisville looks better after this week.

Iowa State also took a tough loss on Saturday, falling to Texas Tech 23-22 at home. I still think the Cyclones are the best team in the Big 12 and will eventually win the conference, but their margin for error just to get to the title game is gone.  

Again, I do not believe 9-3 will be good enough to get into the CFP this season, which means that the showdown between Alabama and LSU in Baton Rouge on Saturday can be considered an elimination game

Quarterfinals

First round

Stop me if you have heard this one before — Penn State lost to Ohio State on Saturday. That is eight wins in a row for the Buckeyes over the Nittany Lions. That result does not change this week’s CFP projections, however, because it was already baked in, but Penn State could be one of those 11-win teams without a great win to hang its hat on.

A better example of that is Indiana. I have the Hoosiers projected at 11-1, losing at Ohio State, but without a win over a team with more than six wins. That list of victims would include a sluggish Michigan team, which IU hosts this week. The Hoosiers’ strength of schedule is by far the worst of any team under consideration in these projections. They have been mostly dominant in their wins, with none closer than 14 points, and that does help their cause. While the committee does not consider margin of victory specifically, they do like to see teams dominate their opposition.  

Besides Texas A&M, Clemson and Indiana, other teams on the bubble are SMU, a big winner over Pitt on Saturday, Washington State and Missouri.

Don’t see your team? Check out Jerry Palm’s complete bowl projections.