Gruen: Can Iowa Crash The College Football Playoff?
By Seth Gruen--
(CBS) The College Football Playoff Rankings are fuel for mass speculations. Every Tuesday night when the College Football Playoff selection committee releases its latest rankings, a massive game of "What if?" is played.
That's an inevitably polarizing path because if your team appears to to control its fate, you rejoice. And if there's an inkling of doubt that your team' national championship aspirations could possibly be left to the whims of the selection committee, you scream. You shout. You take to Twitter in nonsensical rants as if the four playoff teams have been decided.
But amid the helter-skelter of a Tuesday that gave us few answers, we were able to arrive at one incontrovertible conclusion: If undefeated Iowa and undefeated Ohio State play in the Big Ten championship, the winner will go to the CFP.
As the reigning national champs, the Buckeyes knew before the season started that an undefeated record would net them a chance to repeat. Each Tuesday, that should only be reaffirmed.
But Iowa and its relatively paltry schedule were a wild-card. Moving up to No. 5 in the CFP rankings -- Clemson, Alabama, Ohio State and Notre Dame took the top four spots -- means the Hawkeyes are in the exact same spot as the Buckeyes. It's a fact, a conclusion that we can make even with three weeks remaining on the Big Ten regular-season calendar.
Conclusions, though? What fun would that be?
The Big Ten may know a little more about its playoff chances, but both Iowa and Ohio State still have questions to ask.
If the two, presumably undefeated, play a close Big Ten championship game, would the loser have a chance at making the CFP?
The committee has made it clear that as it pertains to one-loss teams, the quality of a loss matters. It's why we see No. 4 Notre Dame currently in the playoff picture. The Irish lost to the No. 1 Clemson Tigers and presumably have the country's "best loss."
(Note: Eliminate any one-loss SEC team from this conversation. Even though No. 2 Alabama's loss came to unranked Mississippi, the best SEC team — provided it has only one loss — will get into the CFP.)
So would that mean, potentially, a one-loss Ohio State or Iowa would eventually get in too? Each of those teams would have the second-best loss in the country, assuming Clemson wins out.
It raises a question that really hasn't been asked.
Notre Dame plays No. 7 Stanford in the final game of the regular season on Nov. 28. It's reasonable to speculate that the winner of that game, based on the way the rankings have set up the past two weeks, will play in the playoff.
But what if Stanford wins? Its lone loss was to Northwestern in the season opener in Evanston. Many think the Cardinal are a different team now, but would a one-loss Stanford have a better resume than a one-loss Iowa team?
Iowa was a 40-10 winner at Northwestern on Oct. 17. A common opponent should mean something, but then again, Stanford's schedule has been much harder.
It doesn't matter if the road for the Buckeyes and Hawkeyes CFP is the least obstructed. There's still much they can't see in the distance.
Seth Gruen is columnist for CBSChicago.com, focusing on college sports. You can follow him on Twitter @SethGruen.