College Football Bowl Projections 2019, Week 9: Big changes to NY6
A wild Week 8 in college football brought some major changes to this week’s bowl projections, with several new teams infiltrating the New Year’s Six.
Every week in college football seems to be crazier than the last, and week 8 delivered some bananas results that provided some major shifts in this week’s bowl projections, particularly with the New Year’s Six.
Last week saw Georgia fall to South Carolina, and that appears to have been only the beginning of a wild ride that could continue to see major upsets shift the established pecking order across the country.
Week 8’s upsets were highlighted by Wisconsin’s stunning road loss to Illinois, with the Illini shocking the Badgers with a game-winning field goal with no time remaining on the clock. It was Wisconsin’s first loss, and its dreams of a College Football Playoff — or even Rose Bowl berth — took a major hit as a result.
Boise State may not have had any illusions about sneaking into the playoff, but the Broncos looked like the cream-of-the-crop in the group-of-five, and its loss to BYU in Provo was a stunning result to end a stunning day of college football.
It was almost even wackier, too. Oregon had to overcome a two-score deficit to beat Washington in game that would have thrown the Pac-12 into all sorts of chaos had the Ducks been unable to prevail. Alabama struggled to put away lowly Tennessee after Tua Tagovailoa was knocked out of the game in the second quarter with an ankle injury.
And in what was nearly the biggest upset of the day — and perhaps the season — Texas needed a game-winning field goal from Cameron Dicker to subdue Kansas in Austin after a wild fourth quarter that featured 50 combined points.
The playoff race should only get more intense in the coming weeks, and there doesn’t seem to be much, if any, separation between the top few teams in the country this season. That should make for a fascinating race as the calendar gets closer and closer to flipping to November.
Let’s take a look at the major changes that occurred in this week’s bowl projections after a wild weekend of football.