The latest College Football Playoff rankings were released Tuesday night on ESPN, and Alabama came in at No. 10 after suffering a shocking home loss to Oklahoma on Saturday.
This means that if the College Football Playoff started today, Alabama would grab the last at-large bid to the CFP and would play a road game in Eugene, Oregon, against the Ducks.
Oklahoma was bumped up to No. 8 after its win over the Crimson Tide.
At 8-2, Alabama will likely get the nod to play for the SEC title if it finishes off the season with wins against Eastern Illinois and Auburn. Newly appointed CFP committee chair Hunter Yurachek talked after the rankings were revealed about the process that could go into evaluating a team if it were to lose a conference championship game.
“The data point of a conference championship game will be just like it has been in the past,” Yurachek said. “It is another data point. For most teams the 13th data point will be used to compare them to other teams in the rankings.”
On the broadcast, former Alabama quarterback and ESPN analyst Greg McElroy took Yurachek’s words to mean that the Crimson Tide can only “strengthen their resume” by getting the invite to the SEC Championship Game. He said things could get “tricky” for Alabama if the team were to get blown out in the conference title game.
For now, Alabama will continue its playoff push Saturday at home versus Eastern Illinois at 1 p.m. CT. The game can be streamed on SEC Network+.
