Four teams were knocked from the ranks of the unbeaten this past weekend, and it certainly affected our bowl projections through ten weeks of college football action. TCU and LSU were looked at as possible CFP contenders heading into the week. Barring a ton of chaos between now and the selection committee’s final rankings in early December, that does not appear to be the case anymore. In fact, both John and Yesh don’t even have the Horned Frogs falling all the way down into a non-New Year’s Six bowl.
For the first time this season, Notre Dame and Alabama make our CFP projections. They were clearly the biggest beneficiaries of there being fewer unbeatens, but were also ranked unexpectedly high in the committee’s first rankings which came out last Tuesday. You can expect the Irish and the Tide to be in the mix should both teams run the table from here on out.
With 40 bowls and 80 slots available, it’s possible that there won’t be enough teams with .500 or better records to fill them all. The NCAA has a contingency plan for such a scenario whereby which teams with a 5-7 record can qualify for a bowl if their student-athletes perform well in the classroom as evidenced by the school’s APR score.
As of right now, 52 schools have won the requisite six games to get to bowl eligibility, while 19 are one win away from that threshold. That means 71 teams are either safe from a bowl qualification standpoint or have a month to get there without having to rely on APR. John is of the opinion that each bowl slot will be occupied by teams with six wins or better, while Yesh has a few five win teams whose players’ academic performance will see them through to a bowl.
Four schools are projected to qualify for a bowl via APR this week and are listed below along with their corresponding score in parentheses. They will also have an asterisk next to their names in our projections.
Nebraska (985), Rutgers (980), Virginia Tech (977), Minnesota (975)
Where do we have your school heading for the holidays? Be sure to have a look below.
LWOS Bowl Projections (after Week 10)
Note: all games are on ESPN unless otherwise noted.
College Football Playoff
New Year’s Six
Rest of the Bowls
Main Photo:
