Q&A: How the CFP Selection Committee Ranked Alabama, and Why

College Football Playoff (CFP) Selection Committee chair Warde Manuel and CFP executive director Rich Clark met with reporters after the latest rankings

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It wasn't surprising that the College Football Playoff Selection Committee ended up placing Alabama football at No. 11 in its latest rankings released Tuesday night, but it was a bit controversial. Should the Crimson Tide make the 12-team tournament it would be with three losses and not having made its conference championship game.

However, strength of schedule is a big part of the selection process, and the Southeastern Conference finished the regular season with seven teams ranked in the various polls. Alabama was also No. 11 in the AP Top 25 and the coaches polls. Miami, which hasn't played a ranked opponent all season, was No. 14 in the polls, but No. 12 in the rankings.

"Obviously, we think highly of both teams; one's at No. 11 and one's at No. 12. But what it really came down to is Alabama is 3–1 against current Top 25 teams and Miami is 0–1," CFP Selection Committee chair Warde Manuel said on ESPN'sCFP Rankings Show on Tuesday night. "Alabama is 6–1 against teams above .500, and Miami is 4–2.

"Both have had some losses that weren't what they wanted out of those games. But in those last three games, Miami has lost twice. For us, in evaluating their body of work, we felt that Alabama got the edge over Miami."

However, the No. 11 ranking doesn't mean that the Crimson Tide can start packing for a first-round game to be played on campuses Dec. 20-21. The Big 12 champion will receive an automatic bid, which combined with the outcomes of the conference championships could still knock Alabama out of the brackets.

Here's what Manuel and CFP executive director Rich Clark had to say about anything Alabama-related, directly or indirectly, about the rankings:

Q. My question is how will you evaluate SMU relative to Alabama if SMU loses in the ACC Championship game?

WARDE MANUEL: You know, that is something that we
will decide in the room at the conclusion of those games
when we evaluate what happens in the championship. I
can't sort of go into the future and tell you exactly how the
outcome of that discussion will be. It depends on the
outcome of the game and how it's played and the results
themselves.
We will just have to wait and see how the committee is
going to analyze that game depending on the outcome,
where things will go in terms of rankings and how people
will move or will not move.

Q. I want to make this clear. It's not a projection question, but it does bounce off of what you had said about if teams aren't playing, there's no datapoints. I think there are some fans who might think, well, Clemson is playing, Clemson has played South Carolina; couldn't Clemson's results sort of change South Carolina's resume? I understand what you're saying about, yeah, you should be able to move teams around if they're not playing, but I think there is probably some question from fans about whether these teams could impact other teams' resumes. I wanted to ask how the committee thought about that when you talked about not moving some of these teams that aren't playing.

WARDE MANUEL: Well, you know, it's a question that I
understand it, but we've already included that. We know
which teams have beat which teams who are playing in
championship games, and so we've already evaluated how
those teams have played throughout the season.
Them beating somebody else at this point in time adds to
the resume of the two teams, the one who wins, the one
who loses in the championship game, but it doesn't change
our evaluation. We know who has won games against
teams that are in these championships, and we've already
taken that into account this week as we evaluated them.

Q. Some people say, well, it changes the evaluation of Clemson, so doesn't that by circumstance change the evaluation of the teams Clemson plays. But I just wanted to clarify that.

WARDE MANUEL: Right, I get the question. The
converse of that, if we held it against teams that a team
that they beat lost, I think people would be equally as
outraged that we're doing that. In other words, we have to
-- we've already in our deliberations this week considered
those teams' resumes as it relates to who's playing in the
championship games and how they performed as we
ranked the teams this week, so we're not going to give -- I
get it. Some people think we should give them a boost if
they beat a team who wins, but again, on the flipside, they
don't want it to take away credit or demote them because
the team lost in the championship, that kind of thing.

Q. I want to get straight something here that you said a few minutes ago on the broadcast. I want to make sure that I understand. If a team that is in the top 12 right now loses in the conference championship game on Saturday, you're not saying that it would not fall out of the top 12, are you?

WARDE MANUEL: No, sir. I'm saying -- in answer to the
question, if you take, for example, Tennessee is ahead of
SMU, Indiana is behind SMU; Tennessee will not drop
below Indiana at any point. Neither team is playing.
But SMU could move up, depending on how we evaluate
the game. They could stay where they are or they could
move down depending on the outcome of the game. But
Tennessee and Indiana in this example would never flip.
Indiana would never move ahead of Tennessee and
Tennessee would never drop below Indiana because we've
already evaluated them. There's not another datapoint
because they're not playing in the championship games.
So we don't have anything else to add to the evaluation of
those teams, so we can't move them above or below each
other.

Q. But could SMU drop below Alabama if it loses?

WARDE MANUEL: Potentially, yes. And they can move
above teams, as well. Again, it just depends on the
outcome of the game.

Q. You mentioned on the ESPN broadcast that a deciding factor between Alabama and Miami was Alabama's win against ranked teams and teams above .500. How did the committee factor in losses considering two of Alabama's three losses were to teams that are unranked at .500 while Miami's losses were to teams above .500 and being ranked?

WARDE MANUEL: We talked about it just like you laid it
out. It's something we evaluate, both the wins, the losses,
how it teams play, where they're playing. All those things
go into consideration as we're debating and discussing
these teams.
Look, both of them are very good, and I understand
Alabama, the committee ranked Alabama one ahead of
Miami, but it doesn't diminish how we see Miami, even with
the last three weeks they have two losses. We still think
Miami is a very strong team.
It came down to a difference in their body of work as we
evaluated Alabama and Miami, not just wins, not just
losses but the totality of the season and how those teams
performed.

Q. Warde, in comparing playoff contenders, when one contender made their conference championship game and the other one didn't, obviously the team that wins the title game will get an automatic bid if it's a Power 4 title game. But for the team that loses, does the team that got to the conference title game have an advantage in the committee's eyes over the other contender that didn't make it to the title game?

WARDE MANUEL: Listen, the committee has coaches,
athletic directors, former players who have played the
game. We have great respect for the teams that make
their championship games, and we give them a lot of credit
for what they've done throughout the season.
But we've been asked by the commissioners to rank the
top 25 through the end of the championship weekend, and
so we have an obligation to take a look at those datapoints
and the outcomes of those games in order to rank the final
top 25, and that's what they've asked us to do since the
inception, and that's what we'll do this weekend once all
the games are played.

Q. Earlier I know you said if SMU were to lose to Clemson in the same way, they could drop out. By the same token, would that help Clemson get more datapoints because maybe if there's a blowout and Clemson should win?

WARDE MANUEL: I actually didn't say SMU would drop
out. If they drop out if they lose, I'm not sure. What we'll
do is evaluate them in the performance, again, watching
the game, having high regard for those teams who are
playing. There are 18 teams that are playing this weekend,
and we will be watching all of them and evaluating the
results of those games, and we'll see how they move, if
they move at all, as I referenced on the interview on ESPN.
Two years ago TCU lost and stayed at 3 in that particular
year, and so those things can happen. People can lose
and maybe stay where they are. They can move as we
have done in other years and go down big or they can go
down just a little. It just depends on the outcome of the
game.

Transcript courtesy of the College Football Playoff.

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