Alabama is in the CFB playoff despite SEC title game loss:
Bama is the 9th seed, has a playoff rematch with Oklahoma:
GDW Analysis:
Based on having a good SEC regular season and beating Georgia on the road, the college football playoff committee selected Alabama as the 9th seed for this year's 12 team postseason group.
Alabama got whipped in every phase by Georgia December 6 in the SEC title game 28 to 7.
But it's body of work with the Georgia win in late September and good victories over ranked teams such as Vanderbilt, Tennessee, Missouri puts the Tide as the first 3 loss team into the playoff setup.
Alabama will face 8th seed Oklahoma in a rematch on either December 19 in Norman, Oklahoma.
The playoff committee Sunday between 11:00 a.m. and 12:00 p.m. CST announced the teams that qualified for the road to the national championship game that will be played in Miami on January 19.
Indiana is the 1 seed, Ohio State 2nd, Georgia 3rd and Texas Tech 4th.
These 4 get a bye into the quarterfinal round of the playoffs.
The schedule for where the Top 4 will play in a bowl game has yet to be announced.
No. 5 Oregon will host No. 12 James Madison.
No. 6 Ole Miss will host No. 11 Tulane
No. 7 Texas A&M will host No. 10 Miami
No. 8 Oklahoma will host No. 9 Alabama.
The Bama-OU game will be at 7:00 p.m. CST on the 19th.
Miami at Texas A&M 11:00, Tulane at Ole Miss 2:30 and James Madison at Oregon 6:30 on December 20.
On the outside looking in are Notre Dame, BYU, Vanderbilt.
Despite a 10 game winning streak, Notre Dame lost to Miami in its opener and in the 2nd game, the Irish lost at home to Texas A&M.
BYU has 2 losses, both to Texas Tech by scores of 29 to 7 in the regular season and 34 to 7 in the Big XII championship game.
Vanderbilt has a school record 10 wins out of 12 games with the losses for the Commodores coming to Alabama and Texas.
Texas, a 3 loss team like Alabama, but only with 9 wins, was not seriously considered even though the Longhorns beat Texas A&M in the final week of the regular schedule.
Of course, not everyone that loves the game through cheering for a certain team or passionate driven acclaimed media experts can say they are in favor of the schedule for the 2nd year of the new format for NCAA Division I football.
Nevertheless, the elite conference of the Power 5, the Southeastern, has 5 teams locked in the playoff format with Big Ten getting 3, Big XII one, ACC one, American Athletic one and Sun Belt one.
Plenty of discussion to expand the field to 16 for next season will be going on immediately.
Photo of Alabama QB Ty Simpson against the Georgia defense in the SEC championship game December 06 in Atlanta.
Photo courtesy of Associated Press.
