College Football Playoff Schedule

The Eight Team Bracket You Wanted

Imagine a world where Alabama Crimson Tide fans rang cow bells and Auburn Tigers fans wore red and blue bow ties. What if we woke up on November 29, and Bama fans find their school colors looking more maroon than crimson and Tiger fans discovering a fondness for hot toddies.  Well, that latter maybe not be so far-fetched, but you’re getting the picture. What sort of bizarro world would it be?

One-Loss Teams in The SEC West

Half-way through the 2014 college football season and the grades are in —  Auburn 5-1 and Alabama 5-1.  Well below expectations for the season, but everything still on the line for both schools if they can win out.  It was predicted going into the 2014 College Football Season that no team in the SEC Conference would win all their SEC games, but it’s obvious now that the schedule in the SEC West is a harder road to traverse than anybody could have imagined two months ago.

Road Blocks on the Road to The College Football Playoff

Every year for the last five years, the Iron Bowl, the in-state rivalry game between Alabama and Auburn, determined who would play in the BCS National Championship, so wasn’t it destiny for Alabama and Auburn to compete for the SEC West in the Iron Bowl and then play in the SEC Championship this year? Since the SEC West is the best division of the best conference in the country wasn’t Alabama or Auburn or even both supposed to play in the College Football Playoff in Arlington on January 14, 2015?  Seems that the two SEC schools from Mississippi, Ole Miss and Mississippi State, who have typically ranked toward the bottom of the conference got together and constructed road blocks to Title Town.  Oct 11, Auburn lost to MS State, 38-23, and the week prior Alabama lost to Ole Miss 23-17.  The SEC West is officially upside down.

 

 

How Much Wilder can the SEC West Get?

If Auburn and Alabama can both pick themselves up by their bootstraps and Win Out the rest of their games going into the Iron Bowl, and Ole Miss and MS State only have losses to Auburn and Alabama respectively, then things are going to get very interesting in the Wild West. There would be a four-way tie with Auburn, Alabama, Ole Miss and MS State going into the last games of the season on November 29, The Iron Bowl between Auburn and Alabama and The Egg Bowl between Ole Miss and MS State.

The SEC West Playoff Schedule

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AU at Ole Miss, Nov 1,

AL Vs Ms State  November 15

November 29, Iron Bowl in Tuscaloosa and Egg Bowl in Oxford

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The SEC West Tie Breaker

In the rules for the SEC Conference the tie-breaker for the division champion is head-to-head competition for equivalent records, so Auburn will desperately need MS State to have two losses and Alabama will desperately need Ole Miss to have two losses.

What Auburn Needs

If Auburn wins out, even with a win in The Iron Bowl this year and MS State drops just one game to Alabama, but then beats Ole Miss in The Egg Bowl, then Auburn will be left out of the SEC Championship Game in Atlanta on December 6^th.  Or could the Magic from the 2013 season live on for Auburn beating Bama two years in a row as well as gift wrap a little magic for Hugh Freeze for The Egg Bowl to help catapult Auburn to The SEC Championship Game and beyond?

How Alabama Gets There

And, if Alabama wins out, even with a win in The Iron Bowl this year and Ole Miss drops, just one game to Auburn, and beats MS State in The Egg Bowl then Alabama will be left out of the SEC Championship Game. Or could Alabama catch all the breaks it needs, like it always seems to do, with any team that it needs to lose, actually losing on the last week of college football to propel them into Atlanta and on to the Four Team Playoff?

One thing is for sure. Alabama needs Ole Miss to have two losses at the end of November.

Our House is Still Divided

So Auburn fans would turn into some of the Biggest Ole Miss fans you have ever seen and Alabama fans would turn into the biggest MS State fans you have ever seen. The outcome of The Egg Bowl will for the first time ever have implications for Auburn and Alabama getting to the SEC Championship as well as a possible 4 team playoff berth.

Eight Team College Football Playoff

The states of Alabama and Mississippi are in the middle of their own four- team college football playoff in the SEC West. The Mississippi teams have emerged as the front-runners half-way through the season.  They still control their own destinies.  Make no mistake the SEC West is still wide open and Auburn and Alabama may still beat the two Mississippi teams and win the remaining games leading up to the last week in November.  When The Iron Bowl and The Egg Bowl are center stage for the nation to watch college football fans will get a sample of an 8-Team playoff that everyone is already clamoring for in the first year of the Four Team Playoff.

The New House Divided in Alabama

So, don’t be surprised if Auburn fans put their Iron Bowl tickets on Craigslist and buy up the most expensive Egg Bowl ticket in the history of the game. The caravan of orange and blue decked out motor homes and magnet-covered cars will cross the state line over to Mississippi to cheer on the Ole Miss Bears in the Egg Bowl in Oxford.  Of course they will have to watch the Iron Bowl on a football app on their new I-Phone Six Plus to cheer on their beloved Tigers since the two games are the same day.  But face it, most Auburn fans don’t really want to go to Tuscaloosa anyway.

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