Tennessee beat Alabama head-to-head, so the Vols deserve to have a leg up on the Tide in the rankings if the committee uses common sense and doesn’t fall into the Bama bias.The committee will likely decide on two or three of the following teams: Alabama, Georgia, Ole Miss, Tennessee, and Texas A&M. To put it simply, Georgia should be in with Tennessee, Alabama, and Ole Miss, but Tennessee has a better resume than everyone except Georgia.
Tennessee’s win over Alabama is better than any win on the Crimson Tide’s schedule. It matches Ole Miss’s win over Georgia and Texas A&M’s win over LSU. Tennessee’s loss at Arkansas isn’t as bad of a loss as Alabama’s loss to Vanderbilt, Ole Miss’s loss to Kentucky, or A&M’s blowout loss to South Carolina.
I don’t write this to disparage any other SEC team, but it’s impossible to have the first 12-team College Football Playoff and exclude a 10-2 Tennessee football team. Tennessee’s defense has been one of the best in the country, and its offense has the potential to catch fire at any point.
The Vols have two high-quality losses, a big win over top-25-ranked NC State and Oklahoma, and a top-ten Alabama team, which should be a big enough boost to their resume to get Tennessee into the dance.
It’s hard to argue that any of those teams won’t make the playoff, especially if A&M beats Texas at the end of the season, but one or two teams will likely be left out. If that’s the case, Tennessee should be the third SEC team in the dance behind Texas and Georgia.
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