College Football Playoff Projections 2018: Georgia rising in Week 14

The final weekend of the college football regular season resulted in a handful of teams being eliminated from a possible playoff spot. Who’s left standing?

Three of last week’s College Football Playoff top 10 teams lost in Week 13: No. 4 Michigan, No. 7 LSU and No. 8 Washington State. And with those losses, Michigan and Washington State will no longer have an opportunity to play in and win a conference championship game.

The Ohio State Buckeyes won in impressive fashion against Michigan in Week 13. However, the embarrassing, 49-20 loss against Purdue truly tarnishes their record. The one point, overtime win over 5-7 Maryland doesn’t help either. Both Georgia and Oklahoma, who also have only one loss, have much better “quality losses” than Ohio State.

The Oklahoma Sooners did not lose their game, but did raise serious doubts about their ability to play defense in their 59-56 win over West Virginia. We’ve all heard the phrase “Defense wins championships”. The Sooners chances to impress the College Football Playoff Committee, earn the fourth spot playoff, has decreased due to their one-sided style of play.

For these reasons, they will be left out of this week’s top-four. We are now left with the UCF Knights.

UCF won, again — 24 straight wins by many FBS teams would easily lead to a top-four ranking. But, with a relatively weaker Strength of Schedule, and now a star quarterback out with an injury, the Knights slowly continue their uphill battle to convince the committee they deserve a place in the playoff. This week, they will remain outside of the top-four.