College Football Playoff Rankings 2023: Official Committee Releases Week 12 Poll | News, Scores, Highlights, Stats, and Rumors
Sophia Dalton At some point this season, there is going to be a major shift in the College Football Playoff rankings.
It just hasn't happened yet.
That is because the primary championship contenders continue to win with Georgia, Ohio State, Michigan, Florida State and Washington all still undefeated and one-loss teams in Oregon, Alabama, Texas and perhaps even Louisville lurking. The list of CFP contenders likely ends with those nine teams, and there is still plenty to be determined in the season's final three weeks.
The biggest question ahead of Tuesday's rankings was whether Ohio State would still hold onto its No. 1 spot.
While the Buckeyes did nothing wrong themselves during a blowout win over Michigan State, Georgia made quite the statement with a 52-17 victory over an Ole Miss team that was previously in the Top 10. Ohio State's road wins over Notre Dame and Wisconsin also don't look quite as good as they once did, hurting its overall resume.
The selection committee responded by moving the Bulldogs up to No. 1:
- Georgia
- Ohio State
- Michigan
- Florida State
- Washington
- Oregon
- Texas
- Alabama
- Missouri
- Louisville
- Oregon State
- Penn State
- Ole Miss
- Oklahoma
- LSU
- Iowa
- Arizona
- Tennessee
- Notre Dame
- North Carolina
- Kansas State
- Utah
- Oklahoma State
- Tulane
- Kansas
College football fans hoping for massive changes in next week's poll are probably going to be left disappointed considering the upcoming slate.
Ohio State is home against Minnesota, Michigan is on the road against Maryland, Alabama hosts Chattanooga, Florida State welcomes in North Alabama and Oregon travels to Arizona State. Those should all be fairly straightforward wins, while Texas and Louisville hit the road for road games against Iowa State and Miami, respectively.
While conference road games are never guaranteed, the Cyclones and Hurricanes each have four losses. Serious CFP contenders should not have trouble in those matchups.
That leaves Georgia and Washington from the list of top teams, and they will face the biggest challenges in road matchups against Tennessee and Oregon State. Yet even the three-loss Volunteers aren't that imposing coming off a blowout loss to Missouri and entering Saturday's showdown against the Bulldogs without any notable wins.
So anyone hoping for an upset should turn their attention toward the Beavers.
Oregon State is 8-2 on the season, and its two losses came by a combined six points to Washington State and Arizona. It defeated the same Utah team that just gave Washington trouble by 14 points and would surely love nothing more than to play spoiler to the Huskies before they depart the Pac-12 for the Big Ten.
For as excellent as quarterback Michael Penix Jr. is, Washington looked vulnerable in a one-score win over Arizona State, nine-point win over Stanford and seven-point win over Utah. Even a 10-point win over USC saw its defense give up 42 points.
Going on the road into a raucous Oregon State environment will be much more difficult than what the other CFP contenders are facing on Saturday. If the Huskies can survive, they will likely be just two wins away from a spot in the four-team bracket.