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Warde Manuel indicates CFP rankings are final for Alabama, other teams not playing in conference title games
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Warde Manuel spoke about the latest College Football Playoff selection committee rankings with ESPN’s Rece Davis on Tuesday evening.
This set of rankings was particularly revealing, as there are only a few more games left to be played before the final CFP rankings are set. The only games on the schedule for this weekend are conference championship matchups.
According to Manuel, the selection committee will not “adjust” the ranking of teams who are idle this upcoming weekend.
“Any team that is not playing right now, we don’t have a data point to re-arrange where we have those teams ranked,” Manuel said on Sports Center. “So that is set in terms of how we see them going into the final week of championship week. There’s nothing that’s going to change, Rece, for us to evaluate them any differently than we have now. Those teams who are not playing can not be adjusted in terms of where they are compared to other teams who are not playing.”
That’s welcomed news for Alabama, who slotted in ahead of other bubble teams Miami, Ole Miss and South Carolina in latest CFP rankings on Tuesday night.
Manuel’s answer indicates that Alabama could only be knocked out of the bracket if a bid-stealer situation occurs. Clemson and UNLV both have the potential to win automatic berths this weekend over opponents (SMU and Boise State) who are currently ahead of Alabama in the rankings.
The final CFP rankings will be revealed on Sunday afternoon.
Spenser is a news editor for Saturday Down South and covers college football across all Saturday Football brands.
