16 winners and 12 losers from college football’s HATE WEEK

College football’s regular season is over, pending a few stray games and Army-Navy next weekend. The postseason picture, which has inched toward clarity every week and had little drama at the top, is even clearer now. But a lot’s still to be decided.

Michigan was rightfully the favorite in The Game for the first time since 2011. The Wolverines spent 11 weeks looking a lot better than the Buckeyes. This was absolutely Michigan’s best shot in years. And then Ohio State outclassed its northern rival from start to finish, leaving no doubt who still owns one of sports’ most famous rivalries. After the Buckeyes probably deal with Northwestern next weekend, they’ll probably make the Playoff again, despite spending much of the year looking not at all like Ohio State.

While it was fair to knock the Buckeyes for looking iffy throughout the year and almost losing to Maryland in Week 12, it’s also fair to praise them for what they did on Saturday. They rang up one of the two best wins of the year, and maybe the best period, depending on your view of what LSU did to Georgia in October. Little-used freshman receiver Chris Olave made himself a Columbus legend with two touchdown catches and a blocked punt that turned into another Buckeye TD. Michigan appeared overwhelmed in the moment that seemed to present its best chance to win this game.

Maybe I’m naive for being surprised about what Ohio State did here, given nearly two decades of Buckeye dominance over Michigan. It wasn’t going to be some big upset for Ohio State to win. But that was really something. It was such an impressive effort that it will largely negate the sketchy feelings Ohio State had inspired previously.

Perversely, given OSU’s recent history against Michigan, it was one of the most surprising moments of the season. The scale of the blowout made it so.

The 12-0 Irish will play in the Playoff for the first time, two years after going 4-8. A 24-17 win at USC wasn’t thrilling on its own, but when you don’t lose, you make the field. (Notre Dame gets treated like a power conference team despite not being in a conference.)

How cool is it to know you’re in the Playoff and not have to do anything while everyone else who will play in that event has to spend next weekend slugging it out with someone else? There’s enough time between now and the start of the Playoff that Notre Dame probably won’t be any fresher, but nobody will have a more enjoyable week in college football.

USC’s coach wrapped a 5-7 season by losing a game he reportedly had to win in order to keep his job. So, he seems destined to be fired.

Update: USC won’t fire Helton. That’s a bit of a surprise!

Though it’s now been tied for the second time in two years. After Western Michigan and Buffalo did it in 2017, Texas A&M did it in a bananas meetup in College Station on Saturday.

A&M won 74-72, and those 146 points are the most ever by two teams. That trounces the 137 Pitt and Syracuse put up in 2016, which had been both a regulation- and OT-game record.

So many of us (your author included) made fun of Arizona State hiring Herm Edwards. So many of us (again, your author included) thought Arizona had made a really savvy hire in Kevin Sumlin. Guess who just finished ahead of the other in the Pac-12 South? And guess which one’s not even going bowling, despite having Khalil Tate?

Michigan State won, but everybody lost. Don’t Google this game.

(This has described pretty much every Spartan game this year.)

The Broncos gave Utah State its second loss and took a spot in the Mountain West Championship Game. If — and it’s a really big if — UCF loses to Memphis in the AAC’s title game, the winner of the Boise-Fresno State MWC game might take the New Year’s Six bowl slot that goes to the Playoff committee’s top-ranked Group of 5 champion.

The Commodores have taken control of Tennessee’s SEC rivalry, now winning three in a row and five of seven. They also got to bowl eligibility, while the Vols missed out.

Everyone here clinched bowl eligibility Saturday and all the extra practices, money, and bowl swag that comes with that. (Players get paid in value-capped gifts, not money.)

The Flames stayed alive for bowl eligibility by beating New Mexico State in the teams’ weird second meeting of the year. (They’re also playing twice next year.) A win against FCS Norfolk State next week would but Liberty in a bowl, as the Flames have a contract with the Cure Bowl. One potential thing, though ...

At least three will miss out, because too many teams are eligible. Wyoming’s on that list above but might be one of the teams to not get a spot.

Kiffin is paid well to coach a sport in Boca Raton, so he’s a winner in life’s grand scheme. But he went from 10 wins and a Conference USA championship to missing bowl eligibility by way of losing at home to a Charlotte team that had just fired its coach.

These teams were among those that had shots to get eligible for bowls. All failed.

These teams all played on Black Friday. A detailed recap of that day’s action is here, but let’s quickly run it back in case you were fairly on a post-leftover nap:

The Sooners won a 59-56 barnburner at West Virginia to clinch a spot in the Big 12 Championship Game over their hosts. The Sooners’ defense gave up 8 yards per play, but that was OK, because the offense rang up 10. Will Grier lost despite 539 yards, four TDs, and no picks. For OU, this was the football equivalent of getting into a Morgantown bar fight and stumbling out to the street with scratches but no real damage on you. (Did that also happen somewhere in Morgantown on Friday? It’s certainly possible.)

And from the UW-WSU Apple Cup:

The Huskies were underdogs against the rival they’re almost never underdogs against. The Cougars remained in the Playoff race, and though it wasn’t as simple as win-and-in for them, they were playing at home and would’ve been favorites in the Pac-12 title game, too.

It didn’t work out for Wazzu. Gardner Minshew had by far the worst game of his Cougs career against UW’s excellent pass defense. Jake Browning and Myles Gaskin had big numbers. Chris Petersen’s team remained the usual gold standard of the North, even in a year that included three quick losses and saw UW become an early national afterthought.

Much like in Michigan-Ohio State, it seemed like Washington-Washington State would be different this year. That turned out not to be true at all.

Virginia lost to rival Virginia Tech for the 15th time in a row, despite being favored and having numerous golden chances to win. If you combine drama, history, and rivalry stakes, there hasn’t been a more devastating loss this year than UVA’s, which came mere months after the Hoos’ men’s basketball team lost in the NCAA tournament to a No. 16 seed. I cannot believe I’m saying this, but I feel horrible for UVA’s fans.

Keeping with the theme of this season, there was little of that. The teams who were supposed to win the biggest games went ahead and won them, though LSU and A&M gave rabble-rousing a good effort with their basketball score in College Station.