College Football Playoff Power Ratings and Projections

College Football Playoff

The College Football Playoff field is set and you can argue that one of the four best teams in the nation is not part of it. In my College Football Power Ratings, I have Notre Dame ranked fourth in the nation. Not only are they not in the field of 12, but they said the hell with it and decided to bypass the bowl season altogether. Given how poorly Alabama played against Georgia, the Crimson Tide shouldn’t be in. But, they are, and that’s the way it goes with a SEC bias and seemingly a punishment towards Notre Dame for not being willing to join a conference.

I’ve updated my power ratings for the CFP and the Army/Navy game. I’ll have to make adjustments for the bowl season once all of those matchups are set and we start to get an idea of who is sticking around to play and who isn’t. I’ll be putting my power ratings together for that later in the week and will post another article.

For now, this is an update after conference championship week, but it does list all 136 FBS teams.

College Football Playoff Power Ratings

Rank	Team	PR	HFA
1	Ohio State	92.5	3.5
2	Indiana	91	2.5
3	Texas Tech	90	3
4	Notre Dame	88.5	3
5	Texas A&M	88	2
6	Oregon	87.5	3.5
7	Georgia	87.5	3
8	Vanderbilt	84.5	1.5
9	Mississippi	84.5	3
10	Miami (Florida)	84.5	2
11	Alabama	84.5	3.5
12	Texas	84	3.5
13	Oklahoma	82	3
14	Utah	80.5	3
15	USC	80	3
16	Missouri	79.5	3.5
17	Michigan	79.5	3
18	Iowa	78.5	3
19	Auburn	78	2
20	Penn State	77	3.5
21	Tennessee	76	3.5
22	South Florida	76	1.5
23	Pittsburgh	76	2
24	Arizona	75.5	2
25	Washington	75	3.5
26	BYU	75	2
27	Illinois	74.5	2
28	Clemson	74	2.5
29	North Texas	73.5	2
30	LSU	73.5	3.5
31	Mississippi State	73	2
32	Georgia Tech	73	2
33	Arkansas	73	2
34	Florida State	72.5	2
35	Florida	72.5	2
36	SMU	72	3.5
37	TCU	71.5	3
38	James Madison	71.5	3
39	Tulane	71	2.5
40	Iowa State	70.5	2
41	South Carolina	70	2.5
42	Kentucky	69.5	2
43	Virginia	69	2
44	Nebraska	69	2
45	Louisville	69	3.5
46	Kansas State	69	3.5
47	Arizona State	69	2
48	North Carolina State	68.5	2
49	Cincinnati	68.5	1.5
50	Kansas	67.5	2.5
51	Wisconsin	67	2
52	Northwestern	67	1.5
53	Houston	67	2
54	East Carolina	67	2
55	Baylor	67	2
56	Duke	66	3.5
57	Boise State	66	3.5
58	Wake Forest	65.5	2
59	Toledo	65.5	3
60	San Diego State	65.5	2
61	Old Dominion	64.5	1.5
62	Navy	64.5	2
63	Memphis	64.5	2.5
64	Connecticut	64.5	2.5
65	Michigan State	64	2
66	Purdue	63.5	1
67	New Mexico	63.5	2
68	UNLV	63	2.5
69	Rutgers	63	2
70	Minnesota	63	2
71	Virginia Tech	62.5	2
72	West Virginia	62	2
73	North Carolina	62	2
74	Washington State	61.5	3
75	UTSA	61.5	3.5
76	UCLA	61.5	2
77	UCF	61.5	2
78	Maryland	61	2
79	Utah State	60.5	2
80	Texas State	60	2
81	Army	60	2.5
82	Hawai’i	59.5	2
83	Kennesaw State	58	1.5
84	Colorado	58	2
85	California	57.5	2
86	Western Michigan	57	2
87	Temple	57	2
88	Stanford	57	1
89	Fresno State	57	2
90	Southern Mississippi	56.5	2
91	Ohio	56.5	3.5
92	Florida Atlantic	56.5	2
93	Boston College	55.5	2
94	Miami (Ohio)	55	2.5
95	Western Kentucky	54.5	2.5
96	Tulsa	54.5	1
97	Troy	53.5	3
98	South Alabama	53	2
99	Arkansas State	53	2
100	Marshall	52.5	3
101	Louisiana-Lafayette	52.5	2
102	Oklahoma State	52	2
103	Jacksonville State	52	3.5
104	San Jose State	51.5	2.5
105	Central Michigan	51.5	2
106	Oregon State	51	3.5
107	Georgia Southern	51	3.5
108	Missouri State	50.5	2
109	Wyoming	50	2
110	Rice	50	3
111	Liberty	50	3
112	Florida International	50	2
113	UAB	49.5	2.5
114	Syracuse	49.5	2.5
115	Nevada	49.5	1
116	Buffalo	49.5	2
117	Air Force	49.5	2
118	Louisiana Tech	49	2
119	Appalachian State	49	2
120	Delaware	48	3
121	Eastern Michigan	47.5	2
122	Coastal Carolina	47	2
123	Northern Illinois	45.5	1
124	Middle Tennessee	45.5	2
125	Colorado State	45.5	2
126	UTEP	44.5	2
127	Bowling Green	44.5	2
128	Akron	44.5	2
129	New Mexico State	44	2.5
130	Louisiana-Monroe	42.5	2
131	Kent State	42	1
132	Georgia State	42	1
133	Ball State	39.5	2.5
134	Sam Houston State	37.5	0.5
135	Charlotte	36.5	1
136	Massachusetts	28.5	1

Here are my power ratings adjustments:

Up: Kennesaw State +1.5, Troy +1, Tulane +2, Boise State +3, Texas Tech +2, Georgia +1.5, Indiana +1, Mississippi +3, Oklahoma +1

Down: James Madison -3, North Texas -1.5, UNLV -1, BYU -2, Alabama -1.5, Virginia -2, Ohio State -1.5

Some notes on the biggest movers:

Boise State +3: The return of Maddux Madsen pushed the Mountain West Championship Game line all the way out to 6. I had it Boise State -2.5, so 3 or so seemed like a fair adjustment.

Mississippi +3: I had gotten a little lower on Ole Miss with the whole Lane Kiffin fiasco, but the team should have moved on now with Pete Golding and they have the biggest chip of any CFP team’s shoulders.

James Madison -3: This is a tough one and I’ll expand some here. So, we’ve been seeing a lot of teams in conference play for a while now. How they stack up against their peers will be a lot different than they stand up nationally. I still can’t get to the market number on this game, even with this adjustment. My Tulane line against Ole Miss is the same way.

A team like James Madison that is a massive favorite against every other conference member has to be given that respect, but they are indeed out-talented in this type of playoff environment. They didn’t cover against Troy, and weather was part of that, but I did downgrade them a little bit.

My College Football Playoff Lines

(note: games are ordered chronologically)

I did feel like I should add Army and Navy here, even though that is not a College Football Playoff game.

Date	Away Team	Home Team	Line
12/13	Army	Navy	-4.5
12/31	James Madison	Oregon	-19.5
1/1	Tulane	Mississippi	-16.5
	Alabama	Oklahoma	-0.5
	Miami (FL)	Texas A&M	-5.5

Some games to consider based on my lines vs. the market:

As of right now, I don’t have any CFP bets. Alabama at a short price might be a take for me (despite my line) given the huge yardage disparity of the first game, but that’s about it for now.

I do lean towards Texas A&M at present, mostly looking to fade Mario Cristobal, but I don’t have any key number equity comparing my line to the market or anything like that.

I’ll be posting a separate article with my College Football Power Ratings and lines for the bowl season later this week.