It’s the time of year when we are splitting hairs to determine which one-loss teams make our expanded College Football Playoff mock bracket.
For the first time since we started this weekly post, our at-large selections are not all undefeated, as Oregon, Wake Forest and Alabama advance into the bracket despite defeats.
It was a painstaking call to add the trio into the field over teams like USC, Oklahoma State and Illinois, but the determining factor was the quality of losses. How can a loss have quality? The Ducks (vs. Georgia), Deacons (Clemson) and Crimson Tide (Tennessee) lost on the road against teams within our Top 5. That’s not the case for any other one-loss squads. Illinois (vs. Indiana) and Kansas State (Tulane) have the worst losses. While USC dropped a game Saturday to Utah, the Utes have two losses despite being scrappy at home. Penn State has the best loss of those left out (at Michigan), but the game was a rout.
