The SEC absolutely will get two in unless Auburn and Alabama BOTH lose (and assuming Georgia doesn’t win the SEC Championship Game — don’t laugh, they’re flying under everyone’s radar). If the SEC Champion and Florida State are in, then there’s only two spots left for some combination of a second SEC school, the other three Power 5 champions and Notre Dame. A one-loss SEC team will have a better CV than anyone else in that group except maybe Oregon if they win out. Who’s gonna jump Alabama? TCU (with no championship game)? Michigan State (whose best win will be this weekend if it happens)? Us? Hell no.

I agree about TCU looking bad but I’m still not convinced that matters to the committee. They are ranked ahead of K.St. after all. They have a few common opponents on the schedule and nothing really jumps out but TCU’s 82 points against Texas Tech.
I’m guessing your point about the SEC is based onof concern they get 2 teams in. I really don’t see that happening. I think the bigger concern for ND is getting jumped by teams during the conference championship weekend.

I posted a long thing and then Disqus ate it. So here’s the short version. We want:

Wisconsin < Purdue (12:00, ESPNU)
Baylor Auburn (3:30, CBS) (ha)
Kansas State > TCU* (7:30, FOX)
Ohio State > Michigan State (8:00, ABC)
Alabama < LSU** (8:00, CBS)
Oregon < Utah (10:00, ESPN)

* I'm somewhat ambivalent about this because while I think jdthom is right and that K-State has more chances to lose, their one-loss résumé is solid, whereas TCU's last three games are awful, so they might get jumped by ND if the Committee isn't impressed by the Horned Frogs scoring style points 82 at a time.

** Personally, I'd rather Alabama win this, lose to Mississippi State next week, then win the Iron Bowl so everyone in the SEC West has two losses except MSU. But it won't hurt my feelings if Saban munches it in Death Valley.

I agree. I told a friend a week ago that they’ll put the SEC champ in even if it’s South Carolnia and I still believe that.
A couple of games you left out that will give ND a chance to make a move: Oregon @ Utah (this is the kind of game to which Oregon loves to miss the bus) and Baylor (another 1 loss team just needing a top25 win to jump us) @ Oklahoma. You should start a new column just breaking down the weekend’s slate and who ND should be rooting for. E.g., probably Kansas St. over TCU this weekend just because Kst has a tougher schedule ahead and more chances to take that second loss.

I have to think that the SEC champ gets in. I would find it so hard to believe they get left out.

Perhaps the reasoning there would be valuing a conference title, especially from the toughest conference in the Power 5, which, as I said above, the SEC is clearly in that driver’s seat.

I’m more or less in the same place. As of now, the committee is being consistent, which is all I can ask for. The Coaches’ and AP polls are always ridiculously volatile and full of all kinds of bias.

I’m sure there’s bias in the room here as well, but it doesn’t seem to be taking everything over.

Of course, I’m saying this now while fully aware that they could yank the rug out from under everyone at the end of the season!

I’m of this line of thought as well. I have a feeling this was another big debate in the room along with ND/ASU.

Re common opponents: Interesting point. With that said I put ASU ahead of the Irish because they have a top 25 win now (Utah) not because they beat Stanford more convincingly. ND was the highest ranked team without a quality win last week and I figured they would be again this week.

I was wondering the same thing about TCU and bama but one of the criteria the committee looks at (and did in the case of ND and ASU) is common opponents. Bama’s win, albeit on a neutral field, was more convincing than TCU’s. Had a facemask been called early in that game, TCU probably would have needed 7 to tie at the end instead of 3 to win.

Your question about Ole Miss is one I still can’t figure out. I had a discussion with NDTex last week about Ole Miss being sort of an anomaly then as well. LSU has 2 top 25 wins to Ole Miss’ 1 top 25 win and it beat Ole Miss head to head (another stated important criteria for the committee). I would say the committee did show Ole Miss mercy due to the fluke nature of its loss to Auburn by ONLY dropping it to 11 when its logic would normally put it around 16.

I love this column series and the chart really helps to analyze the rankings objectively.