How Miami, Indiana were completely disrespected by the CFP committee

Apparently, wearing an SEC patch on your jersey gives you practical immunity from College Football Playoff consequences. We all knew the selection committee’s initial rankings were wildly incoherent, and now the attempt at course-correcting in its second edition has just made things worse.

Former No. 1 overall Miami dropped an insane six spots after losing to an underrated No. 11 Notre Dame team on the road. The Hurricanes were without star wideout Malachi Toney, but instead of giving them a break, the committee decided to apply the 2023 Florida State standard with a vengeance.

Reigning national champion Indiana sank an inexplicable five spots this week (from No. 4 to No. 9) — and the Hoosiers did not even play. Both Indiana and Miami have just a single loss each to their names and both came against highly respected and ranked foes. Clearly, the committee is ignoring that in favor of the over-pushed narrative that the SEC’s schedule is bulletproof. Hoosiers coach Curt Cignetti was brave enough to call that out this week.

Miami, Indiana disrespect proves CFP’s SEC bias without a doubt

Georgia is now the No. 1 team in the nation, yet its loss was to an unranked Auburn team. Just because the 5-4 Tigers also play in the SEC doesn’t mean the Bulldogs’ loss to them is better than Miami falling to a Top 15 Notre Dame. No. 3 Alabama is the highest-ranked two-loss team in the CFP era. The Crimson Tide deserve to be in the playoff hunt, but they don’t deserve to be slotted into what feels like an auto-bid this late in the year just because they are in second place in the conference.

No. 6 Texas lost in back-to-back weeks to unranked Oklahoma and Florida. While both of those teams had their (brief) time in the pre-CFP rankings by The Associated Press, they are no longer being considered for postseason play — which, by definition, makes them bad losses. The Longhorns, therefore, should not be ahead of a one-loss Miami or Indiana.

No. 8 Tennessee, on the one hand, was vastly underranked in the initial list, and after downing a vastly overranked Kentucky team, the committee has corrected its mistake. That being said, the other side of this double-edged sword is that Tennessee has been restored to a top-10 spot at the expense of a team that technically didn’t lose during the same weekend. That rationale makes sense during conference championship week, but it shouldn’t apply as heavily during the regular season.

There is, however, a very valid argument to be made that Miami and Indiana’s schedules are soft. Their losses were to the only good teams they’ve actually played this season. Therefore, their strength of schedule is weighed less favorably.

That’s all well and good. But why, then, is undefeated UCLA — which owns a ranked win over Oregon — not sitting at No. 3 while Alabama is? The Bruins haven’t suffered any type of loss, let alone a bad one like the Tide’s 16-point drubbing to Tennessee or the Bulldogs’ stumble against Auburn. This all boils down to a bunch of “voters” convincing folks for over a century that the SEC is good just because they said so. The perpetual cycle of the rankings being flooded with that league’s teams has insulated it from “bad losses.”

Of course, this is why the games are played. If Miami and Indiana lose in Week 11, then the entire argument goes out the window and a near all-SEC invitational playoff becomes practically justified.