The first College Football Playoff rankings came out Tuesday night, and there were very few surprises at least in the top four.
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The Alabama Crimson Tide earned the top spot, followed by the Clemson Tigers, LSU Tigers and Notre Dame Fighting Irish rounding out the top.
The only real surprise from last night was LSU being ahead of Notre Dame, which didn't sit well with some people last night because of LSU's one loss.
Notre Dame starts at #4 in the CFB Playoff. I like it. None of this matters right now. It probably pisses off the ND players that they were jumped by a 1-loss team. Keep winning.
— Nathan Erbach (@Nathan_Erbach) October 30, 2018
See the Complete CFP Rankings Here
In the real world, this really isn't an issue because LSU will either move up or down in the rankings after playing Alabama on Saturday, so people can save their overreaction until then.
The first two out shouldn't come as a surprise — That was Michigan at No. 5 and Georgia at No. 6. Again, both teams have a chance to move into the top four easily because of the loser of the LSU/Alabama game, and both teams are in good positions.
The interesting part of the rankings come after the top six where you have Oklahoma, Washington State, Kentucky and Ohio State.
The Kentucky Wildcats are in the top 10 in ALL of college football! Whoever would have thought that would happen in this or any other lifetime, but they have earned it.
.@UKFootball = No. 9⃣#CFBPlayoff pic.twitter.com/0d0f1Ny153
— Southeastern Conference (@SEC) October 30, 2018
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So, what message was the committee sending? Well first of all, keep winning as is the case at Alabama, and you keep your spot. Alabama may have the weakest schedule until this point, but they have been impressive in their victories and deserve to be No. 1.
Another message the committee sent was who you beat matters. LSU is ranked higher than Notre Dame because of who they beat. LSU has the most top 20 wins on this list, so no one, including Notre Dame fans, should have an argument about LSU being ahead of them.
And the last message sent by the committee's rankings is that your schedule matters if you want to be considered for the playoffs. Despite being undefeated, UCF was once again left out of the top 10 by the committee because of their weak schedule.
Football, where every game counts (except for non-Power 5 games). In basketball, every game truly counts, and no team (UCF) is excluded from the title chase. https://t.co/o1LQgwkvCo
— Jay Bilas (@JayBilas) October 31, 2018
Again, there were cries of unfairness by some folks but the committee has made itself perfectly clear: If you want to play with the big boys, you gotta be willing to play a big boy schedule.
The College Football Playoff picture should clear up somewhat after this weekend's games.
