College Football Playoff: Building the perfect chaos scenario

1. Notre Dame and UCF win out, both make the Playoff

Let’s start with the teams obviously disadvantaged by the current system. The committee has said they value conference championships in the past. That was part of what led them to choose a 1-loss Ohio State over a 1-loss TCU and a 1-loss Baylor in 2014. That inherently makes it more difficult for teams without a major conference affiliation to earn a chance at the Playoff.

Notre Dame is an independent, but if they win out there won’t be another team in the nation with a better resume than the Irish. There lone loss came by 1-point to currently undefeated Georgia. Since then they’ve beaten three currently ranked teams: Michigan State, USC and NC State. The Irish close the year with a game against No. 7 Miami in Week 11, Navy and Stanford.

In this scenario, Stanford wins the Pac-12. That gives Notre Dame six wins over ranked teams and a win over a conference champion. There’s no debate. They’re in.

UCF hopes to drive the nail in the proverbial coffin of the four-team playoff. To do so they’ll need to win out and get plenty of help. An undefeated UCF won’t have as strong of a case for the Playoff as a 1-loss Power 5 champion. But what if there aren’t any 1-loss Power 5 champions?