In a few short hours, Ole Miss will make it history with its first trip to the College Football Playoff and a game at Vaught Hemingway Stadium.
The Rebels (11-1) were ranked No. 6 in the last CFP rankings and nothing happened on championship weekend to change their ranking.
That doesn’t mean there wasn’t any drama or upsets that’ll shake up the rankings behind Ole Miss.
Duke beat No. 17 Virginia to win the ACC Championship game. That’ll likely means no ACC team will have a spot in the playoff and James Madison will.
Who will Ole Miss play?
Probably Tulane.
Looking at CFP playoff projections, the Green Wave are the most common first-round opponent that’ll face Ole Miss.
ESPN’s Heather Dinich projects Ole Miss to be the No. 6 seed and host Tulane, the American conference champion. It’ll be a rematch of an earlier game this season that saw the Rebels win 45-10.
However, Dinich does not the chance of the Rebels moving ahead of Oregon since the Rebels now have two wins against playoff teams.
“Now that Tulane is the American champ, the committee could consider giving Ole Miss a boost above Oregon for beating the Green Wave. That’s the kind of result that could impact an idle team’s résumé.”
Should that happen, Ole Miss will be the highest-ranked team in the first round (top four get byes) and host James Madison.
Either way, Ole Miss fans have to be feeling good about their team’s chances at winning a playoff game.
Sports Illustrated’s Pat Forde and Bryan Fischer have a similar projected playoff field with Ole Miss ranked No. 6 and facing Tulane in a first round game.
Ramifications of no ACC team in CFP
The playoff format for the upcoming season still hasn’t been decided and the Big Ten will likely find a friend in the ACC to support its preferred format.
The Big Ten’s proposals have all featured multiple automatic qualifying bids for each of the Power 4 conferences. The SEC, meanwhile, prefers formats with only conference champions earning automatic bids. Or no automatic bids at all.
Is it a big guess which format the ACC will be in support of after none of its teams make the playoff and James Madison does?
The big debate
A lot has been discussed about the bubble teams, specifically Alabama, Notre Dame, and Miami.
Last week the committee moved Alabama up one spot to No. 9 ahead of Notre Dame. It was a highly questioned decision, but the committee might’ve done it to keep Alabama in the playoff despite losing the SEC title game.
Last season, SMU lost the ACC Championship game to Clemson. The ACC was guaranteed a playoff spot for its champion, which is how Clemson got into the tournament. The committee dropped SMU one spot for the loss, but not out of the playoff entirely.
The committee is likely going to do the same to Alabama.
We’ll find out the official CFP rankings when they’re revealed live at 11 a.m. on ESPN.
