The 2017 College Football Playoff field is set, and this season’s field looks a lot different than what we’ve seen in past seasons. We have two teams from the SEC with Alabama sneakin’ into the field at the last minute, and two power conferences, the Pac-12 and the Big Ten, not represented at all.
Auburn’s Playoff resume was one of the strongest (and weirdest) in college football
Auburn beat two Playoff teams, lost to two Playoff teams, talked about firing their head coach midseason, and only just missed the Playoff.
Photo by Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images
And we have Auburn. Let’s take a moment to admire Auburn’s resume, which is probably one of the very best for a team that didn’t even finish in the final six.
Auburn beat two of these playoff teams!
Trying to find clarity and apply precedent to a fickle, constantly changing playoff committee is a bit of a fool’s errand, but one thing it has reiterated every season has been the idea of quality wins. And Auburn has the best pair of those in the country.
The Tigers absolutely demolished Georgia, 40-17, in a game that was even less close than that lopsided score indicates. Then, Auburn beat hated Alabama in the Iron Bowl, 26-14, to win the SEC West. That game was also not really as close as the score might lead you to believe. Auburn knocked Alabama around.
The Tigers ran roughshod over most of the rest of their SEC schedule too, for whatever that’s worth. Every single one of their other wins came by at least 14 points.
Auburn also lost to two of these playoff teams!
A schedule that includes two matchups with playoff participants would be judged as pretty tough by most folks, I think. But Auburn also played No. 1 seed Clemson before SEC play. That was a sloppy, close game that Clemson won, 14-6. After that, nobody thought much about Auburn for a month.
The Tigers also had a rematch with Georgia in the SEC Championship game and lost badly, 28-7. If this was soccer, Auburn would still have Georgia beat on aggregate points or something, but that’s not how college football works, most of the time.
Why weren’t we talking about Auburn as a potential playoff team? Because they also lost to LSU.
Almost forgot about that one.
Also the Tigers played Mercer and won, 24-10. (That’s not especially germane to Auburn’s playoff resume here or anything, but an awful lot of Big Ten fans seem to think Mercer is one of the most important teams in the country right now, so it seems important to note that the Tigers also beat them.)
What happens next? Heck, nobody knows. This is Auburn!
Tigers fan must feel pretty exhausted after this season. Midway through the schedule, wondering if Auburn might straight-up fire head coach Gus Malzahn was a perfectly credible thing to do. And yet, just 48 hours ago, Auburn was one win away from making the dang Playoff, probably as a top-two seed, despite those two pesky losses.
Now, its archrival, who doesn’t have nearly as many impressive wins, is in the playoff, and Malzahn might leave anyway if Arkansas throws him a gazillion dollars.
Those are enough twists and turns to last half a decade, and Auburn managed all of that in one year.
That’s pretty impressive.
See More:
