Week 11 Preview and Rankings Forecasts
Now that the baseline has been set for the Playoff Committee Top 25, let's check in on which games will have the biggest impact for where the rankings might change
We finally have the launching point for the Playoff Committee! We’ve have all moved past the initial reaction to where each team was ranked, but now it’s time to focus on bigger and better things - where will the teams move from here?
Current Predictions
Here are the current predictions of how the Playoff Committee rankings will look after Week 11. As a reminder, here is how the Rankings Right Now algorithm figures out how to rank each team before, during, and after the games have completed.
For games that have not yet been played, it takes the Las Vegas spread for each game to identify an “expected” score
For games in progress, it uses the same “expected” score until the start of the second half, when it then references the live game score
For games that have completed, it uses the final score of the game
Two Main Focal Points
The most influential games of the weekend are happening down south. #3 Georgia vs #16 Ole Miss and #11 Alabama vs #15 LSU. The SEC has a lot of teams in the current 12 team college playoff after the first round of results, but there are some tough games on the schedule that could lead to some season knockouts.
Both Georgia and Alabama are two point favorites going into their games, but using the What If simulation tool, if we flip those two points the other way in each game, there opens up a lot of room for everyone.
Georgia with a two point loss would fall to #9 in the rankings. Georgia would now have two losses and would be behind a one loss Tennessee, a no loss Indiana, and an undefeated BYU
Alabama now has three losses on the year and falls into the bottom teens. Tough road environment to be playing at LSU, but nearly impossible to think about a three loss team being in contention for the playoff, no matter the strength of schedule
Ole Miss shoots up to #11 in the predictions, just behind Notre Dame and Georgia. That one could be interesting since they would have just beaten Georgia, would they move up even higher? Georgia even lower?
LSU with a solid win against Bama can only move up to 12 because of the blockage from Ole Miss. Another curious question is whether LSU and Ole Miss would be flipped there, with LSU beating Ole Miss at home earlier in the season
Holy War
If you would have talked to people at the beginning of the season about where Utah and BYU would be at this point, they would have politely corrected you and say “You’ve clearly mixed up the rankings.”
BYU is scorching hot and Utah has completely fallen off from where they’ve been in the last few years. BYU is a four point favorite in this game, and although I think BYU might run the score up in this rivalry game, Utah has had some surprises throughout the season. Once again using the What If simulation tool, if Utah can cause a huge upset and rush the field, it looks like it will be a tough fall for BYU all the way down to #18, right next to their Big 12 counterparts CU and Kansas State.
Major Complaints
A lot of the reaction from the first release of the Playoff Committee had to do with BYU and Indiana, both teams who are undefeated, being ranked much lower than people would have thought. However, it’s not where you start but where you finish, and both teams have a good amount of ground they can make up. Here are the results of 10,000 simulations of Week 11 using the Rankings Right Now algorithm, and where both of those teams sit based on the results.
You can view all of the screenshots from the top 25 teams on our X or Reddit social media accounts.
Simulations
After 10,000 simulations using the Rankings Right Now algorithm trained on historical Playoff Committee rankings data, here were the percentage of time each team was ranked in a given spot after Week 11 going into the next Playoff Committee rankings.
Oregon is almost a for sure lock for keeping the #1 ranking
Georgia and Ohio State are a coin flip for who will end with the #2 ranking
This is only with a Georgia win. If they lose, they’re most likely going to fall to #11
Alabama has the biggest potential to move up in the rankings, with a 7% chance of being ranked in the top five
There were a couple of simulations that had Tennessee in the top five, but they will need help from Ole Miss beating Georgia
Ole Miss and LSU have less than a 0.1% chance of breaking into the top five, even with impressive wins against their fellow SEC opponents
College Rank Em Challenge
Reminder for everyone to get their picks in for the College Rank Em Challenge! Deadline closes at noon ET kickoff.
Never heard of this before? Check out this video that walks through the fun competition!
What’s Next?
Watch football all day Saturday
Newsletter Sunday morning going through everything we watched over the weekend and the final Rankings Right Now predictions for the Week 12 Playoff Committee Poll
Newsletter Wednesday morning evaluating the Rankings Right Now final predictions with the true Week 12 Playoff Committee rankings
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