CHARLOTTE – Dabo Swinney looked into an ESPN camera to deliver a warning to the College Football Playoff selection committee, not about his team but the one his team just beat.
“Look,” he said, “this is a playoff football team. SMU better be in the playoffs.
It’s not often that a coach, immediately after a thrilling victory, not only congratulates his opponent but also lobbies on his behalf. But on Saturday night, in this strange new world of playoff expansion, that’s what happened here just before the clock struck midnight on the East Coast.
The story of this night should be how Clemson won the ACC championship game: in a wild and furious final few seconds, at the foot of freshman kicker Nolan Hauser, a Charlotte metro area native whose title game-record 56 yards down the field as time expired split the uprights and triggered an orange eruption at Bank of America Stadium.
But there is another story here, perhaps more important: with its 34-31 victory against SMUClemson became the first-ever College Football Playoff bid stealer. For some teams – SMU or Alabama – the bubble has burst. And for the ACC football dynasty – the Clemson Tigers – a playoff berth, improbable just a week ago, is assured.
Pummeled by Georgia in the season opener, whipped by Louisville midway through and beaten at home by South Carolina last week, Dabo’s Tigers couldn’t make the playoffs, could they?
Here they are. Swinney is back in the newly expanded big dance of football. The Tigers (10-3) will win the final five automatic bids designated for the five highest-ranked conference champions. We think. We won’t know for sure until around noon ET on Sunday, when the selections are revealed on ESPN.
There’s a good chance Swinney’s group will be the No. 11 or 12 seed with a first-round game on the road against several possibilities, including Notre Dame, Penn State and Texas.
Things are a little more suspenseful for SMU. Are the Mustangs still on the field? Ranked No. 8 entering this match, they had to avoid one thing on Saturday: having the doors broken down. Trailing 24-7 at halftime, it looked like the doors were about to be broken down. Alas, coach Rhett Lashlee’s Ponies came roaring back with a wild second-half effort, most of it resting on the shoulder of quarterback Kevin Jennings and his 31 completions and 304 yards.
They fought back to tie the game with 16 seconds left and seemingly send it into overtime before a series of crazy events: Clemson’s Adam Randall picked the perfect moment for his biggest kick return of the year, 41 yards, which set up a 17. -yard completion to position the Tigers, as the seconds ticked down, for the 56-yard boot.
The heart is racing. Heartbreaking.
Happy. Reward.
And now, back in Dallas, not far from SMU’s campus in fact, the selection committee’s Saturday night and Sunday morning – when they make their final choice – have become much more interesting.
They have two teams for one place:
– an 11-2 ACC runner-up with no top-25 wins and a ranking of 75th, with both of its losses coming against top-20 teams.
– a 9-3 SEC fourth place finish with two top 15 wins, an 18th place finish in the rankings, with two of its losses coming against unranked opponents.
Ranked No. 8 and already in the projected field heading into the title game, SMU finds itself in a precarious and precedent-setting situation: Will the committee fall out of the playoff field by losing the championship game?
Such a move could pave the way for eliminating conference title games in this expanded playoff world. something ACC Commissioner Jim Phillips (and others) suggested.
He reiterated this on Saturday evening: “It would create dangerous repercussions for the sport to reward teams who do not have to play an additional match,” he said in a statement.
The SMU argument has a lot of merit. While a host of playoff contenders stayed home Saturday — Tennessee, Indiana, Ohio State, Notre Dame and Alabama — SMU played an extra game. Why should he be penalized? And, oh, there was this match two weeks ago where Alabama lost 24-3 and Oklahoma 6-6one of the ugliest losses for any playoff contender.
Then again, there’s the other side of the Tuscaloosa folks: The Mustangs were beaten on neutral ground by a three-loss team that was hammered by SEC champion Georgia and beaten by South Carolina , fifth in the SEC.
SMU can count on itself for Saturday. In the first half alone, the Mustangs turned the tables twice, dropped three passes and committed three critical 15-yard penalties that put them within that 17-point lead.
But their return cannot be ignored, said Lashlee, who has passionately defended his club and its playoff chances.
“I think they showed their championship makeup by the way they fought back,” he said.
“It would be criminal if we didn’t participate. It would be bad not only for our team but for what college football stands for,” he said. “We could have not been there (in the ACC championship game) and based on what we saw Tuesday night (in the standings), we would be there. We showed it. We should be there. They know we should be there.
While speaking at the post-game press conference, Lashlee said his team was in the locker room dealing not only with defeat, but also with the possibility of being kicked out of the playoffs: “Their confidence in the system is shaken.”
In many ways, the SMU-Bama debate boils down to an SEC versus ACC debate. Last year, the SEC won this debate in one of the most controversial decisions (Alabama vs. Florida State) in CFP history.
Saturday night and into the early hours of Sunday morning, the 13-member selection committee will meet to decide such things in their spacious conference room at the Gaylord Texan, a resort in suburban Dallas.
Six athletic directors, four former coaches, two former players and one former member of the media will determine the fate of the Ponies and the Tide. But there’s much more to discuss, several key decisions that will make committee members squirm as they sip their free ice cream:
-How will they rank the other championship game losers, Penn State and Texas, compared to Notre Dame and Ohio State? Remember, Penn State lost at home to Ohio State and Texas has no wins in the top 25 this season.
– Does Arizona State pass Boise State for the No. 3 seed?
– Does Clemson move past Arizona State for the No. 4 seed and a first-round bye? The Tigers were 17th and the Sun Devils were 15th this weekend.
Decisions, decisions.
But the biggest of them could set a precedent for years to come when it comes to conference championship games.
Is SMU completely falling off the field?
In October, new CFP executive director Rich Clark was asked how the committee might deal with losers of conference championship games.
“Well,” he said, “it depends on how big the loss is.” »
Here’s what it looked like: The game-winning 56-yard field goal wouldn’t have been good from 58.