Sometimes you have to look outside your comfort zone to learn something.

That’s my way of saying that in order to learn something about the College Football Playoff picture in Week 5, you had to look outside the SEC.

Disagree? Well, here were five SEC takeaway points that impacted the Playoff picture on Saturday:

  1. Alabama is still really good.
  2. Georgia can sleepwalk to an SEC East title.
  3. LSU is capable of scoring points against a really bad defense.
  4. Auburn is not.
  5. Benny Snell’s Heisman Trophy/national title run is going to be EPIC.

Those weren’t necessarily things that we learned on Saturday. If anything, we just got a bunch of pre-weekend confirmation bias in terms of how SEC teams impact the Playoff picture.

So let’s get uncomfortable and look outside the SEC to figure out what was learned about the Playoff in Week 5:

1. The Big Ten is down to one? No, but yes in a way

Ohio State somehow escaped Happy Valley with a victory, which means that the Big Ten is down to just one remaining unbeaten.

In other news, it’s still September.

Certainly that doesn’t bode well for a conference that lost 12 nonconference games, 11 of which were to unranked teams — in the first three weeks of the season!

Ohio State is clearly in the driver’s seat with both a marquee nonconference win away from home (TCU) and a win against a top-10 team on the road (Penn State). The Buckeyes absolutely have a loss to give, and after last year’s Iowa performance, it can certainly happen when we’re not expecting it.

Though considering Urban Meyer is now 48-3 versus the Big Ten having never lost multiple conference games in the regular season at Ohio State, the Buckeyes are sitting pretty. Compare that to Penn State, who will need Meyer to finally lose multiple conference games just to have a chance at a potential Big Ten championship.

I don’t want to rule out Michigan or Michigan State, though we’re still waiting for the first Power 5 team to go 9-0, win the conference title game and make the Playoff. Neither appear to have that kind of upside just yet.

In other words, get ready for a boring narrative of Ohio State again as the conference’s overwhelming favorite to make the Playoff.

2. Clemson/the ACC is walking the tight rope for the rest of 2018

Yikes.

Trevor Lawrence’s injury on Saturday was a good reminder that without Kelly Bryant, the Tigers are suddenly a turned ankle away from becoming a completely different team. That’s not a knock on Chase Brice, who came in and somehow led Clemson to a comeback win against Syracuse.

But if Lawrence misses time or not, this can get ugly in a hurry. Even though they survived Saturday, there’s no guarantee that Brice, who had eight career pass attempts before replacing the injured Lawrence, can lead the Tigers to the Playoff promise land.

And on the flip side, Clemson coach Dabo Swinney put all of his eggs in the basket of an 18-year-old quarterback. As talented as he is, Lawrence made a huge mental mistake on Saturday by not sliding or getting out of bounds to avoid that hit. That’s not to say that age or will hold Lawrence back, but I’d argue Clemson is now more prone to those costly mistakes now.

Credit: Brett Davis-USA TODAY Sports

It’ll be interesting to see how this plays out for Clemson, which doesn’t have much wiggle room because of how poor the ACC has been in the first month (just three ranked teams in the conference won’t help). The Tigers’s schedule isn’t loaded with top-25 teams like they were last year. In fact, after Duke’s loss to Virginia Tech on Saturday, there’s a decent chance that come Sunday, there won’t be a single AP Top 25 team on Clemson’s remaining schedule.

With the quarterback situation and the schedule softness, the margin for error is getting awfully slim for Clemson.

3. Notre Dame is a problem for the Power 5

The Irish will be a problem for the Power 5. That much we learned after No. 8 Notre Dame thumped No. 7 Stanford 38-17 to improve to 5-0. By the way, that’s 5-0 with wins over a pair of top-14 teams in Michigan and Stanford. And with new starting quarterback Ian Book, the Irish look more dangerous than ever.

No, the selection committee won’t care that Notre Dame beat Vanderbilt and Ball State in tight, one-score games. This is about quality wins and not suffering a second loss. After Saturday night, the Irish’s odds look better than ever. Why?

Like Clemson, there won’t be a single ranked team on Notre Dame’s remaining schedule when the AP Top 25 is released on Sunday. Does that mean the Irish have it made? Of course not. Brian Kelly has developed a nice habit of squandering prime opportunities. Lord knows he could do the same this year.

But we spend more time talking about Notre Dame crashing the party because the lack of a conference title game makes this road easier. As long as the selection committee doesn’t make that a prerequisite for the Playoff, Notre Dame has an advantage. The Irish could easily be sitting in the top four at 11-1 — or maybe even 12-0 — without a conference title game to risk that mark.

That could put a road block for a second SEC team to make the field. Shoot, maybe Notre Dame can serve as the de facto ACC team. It pretty much is anyway, right?

It might not be a bad idea for fans of SEC contenders — and every fan of a Power 5 contender t— o root for Virginia Tech to humble the Irish in Blacksburg next week.

4. Will Grier, Kyler Murray one step closer to playing for a Playoff spot

Just a couple of former SEC quarterbacks battling for a Playoff spot, right?

West Virginia’s Will Grier and Oklahoma’s Kyler Murray, both of whom balled out again on Saturday, have done a nice job of handling high expectations and keeping their teams in the driver’s seat.

Even though neither Oklahoma or West Virginia are currently in the top four, they both did win their “marquee” nonconference games. It just happened that Oklahoma and West Virginia won those games against programs that had first-year coaches in UCLA’s Chip Kelly and Tennessee’s Jeremy Pruitt. Neither will win a lot of games in 2018.

Still, that nonconference win is key for both programs. Just ask Texas about that.

Credit: Kevin Jairaj-USA TODAY Sports

Both West Virginia and Oklahoma are extremely interesting Playoff contenders as programs with Heisman Trophy contenders at quarterback. One would think that will prevent them from getting slighted by anyone nationally.

Who knows where West Virginia and Oklahoma will be when they meet in the regular season finale on Nov. 23. The Big 12 is interesting in that it doesn’t have divisions, meaning those two squads could theoretically meet in consecutive weeks.

That would be a new dynamic for the selection committee to chew on.

5. Sorry, but I have to bring up UCF

Why? Because UCF actually played a Power 5 team!  Ok, so it wasn’t necessarily a “good” Power 5 team, but it still counts, right?

UCF blew the doors off Pitt for a 45-14 victory, which means that the Knights are over both of their key September hurdles. Here’s something to consider that will at least make the Knights a more interesting option for the selection committee if they can run the table.

The biggest argument against UCF is the lack of Power 5 evidence. We got more Power 5 evidence on Saturday.

If UCF wins the AAC Championship again and takes a 26-game winning streak to the selection committee, it will have outscored teams from three different Power 5 conferences by a score of 107-51. That last number isn’t changing unless the Knights somehow add a Power 5 matchup to make up for their Hurricane Florence-fueled cancelation against UNC.

This is going to become a legitimate storyline as the season progresses, and not just because of the claimed national title. We haven’t seen a Group of 5 team play this well for this long in the Playoff era. It’s certainly a new dilemma for the selection committee, and it’s different than what it dealt with when ranking an off-the-radar 2017 UCF team.

I can’t help but think that UCF, as long as it’s undefeated, has much more Playoff-related noise to make.