The latest edition of the College Football Playoff rankings were released this past Tuesday and it still has fans talking.
For the first time in the conference's history, the Big Ten has four teams ranked inside the Top-5 with Oregon, Ohio State, Penn State, and Indiana rounding out the Top-5. Outside of that, we've got a couple of newcomers who entered the rankings for the first time in Tulane and South Carolina, while we also saw significant drops for losers of games, including Georgia and LSU.
Right now, the College Football Playoff is setting up to stuff a ton of Big Ten and SEC teams with the minimal amount of teams from other conferences getting a bid, but much of that might simply be based off of name brand, not from results on the field.
Here's a look at three teams that would be ranked higher if it weren't for their name brand getting in the way, and we'll actually start with a team from the Big Ten that is ranked highly.
The Indiana Hoosiers come into this week's College Football Playoff rankings sitting at No. 5 in the nation. Now, you might be saying: Isn't that a high ranking, being Top-5 in the land? Sure it is, but if you changed that logo and resume with, say, Ohio State, where would the Buckeyes be ranked?
If Ohio State was 10-0 with Indiana's same exact schedule, the Buckeyes would likely be the No. 1 team in the country and at the very least in the Top-3. There would be riots in Columbus if the Buckeyes were undefeated at this point in the season and still ranked behind three teams with one loss, two of which reside in their same conference.
But, because it's Indiana, they're somehow not in the same stature.
Indiana will have a chance to prove itself next weekend when the Hoosiers go on the road and take on Ohio State, but until then, the College Football Playoff committee will continue to treat them like second-class citizens who just have to be ranked somewhere highly because they're undefeated.
SMU's lone loss of the year came to an undefeated and Top-10 ranked BYU team early in the season. Since that point, the Mustangs have handled business and they control their own destiny to reach the ACC Championship game in their first year in the conference.
But, somehow, SMU is still ranked behind Miami — a team that just lost a game to an unranked Georgia Tech — even though the Mustangs have a better resume.
Right now, there's no reason that SMU shouldn't be ranked ahead of two-loss teams and inside the Top-10. The Mustangs do, in fact, have a bad strength of schedule (81), but that's honestly not all that far off from, say, a Notre Dame (73) and the Fighting Irish still have a loss to NIU the last time we checked.
Take SMU's record and resume, and pair it with Miami, Clemson, or Florida State's logo, and you've got a Top-10 team.
BYU is undefeated and has the No. 2 strength of record in the country, just behind the Oregon Ducks that sit at No. 1.
Yet, the Cougars are ranked behind three teams with one loss.
BYU likely should've lost to Utah this weekend. There are certainly arguments to be made that the Cougars might not really be the sixth-best team in the country, but that still doesn't mean that their ranking wouldn't be different if it wasn't for their name brand.
If this were an undefeated SEC team with a strength of record that high, would they be ranked outside of the Top-5? What about a team from the Big Ten?
BYU is a victim of its conference and lack-of brand power. While the ACC still has a couple of big brands that can stand up, the Big 12 lacks some of that star power at the top. As a result, teams in the Big 12 are already facing an uphill battle in the eyes of the College Football Playoff rankings, whether the committee wants to admit it or not.