It’s Time… Let’s Talk College Football Playoff and Indiana Football
/
Written by: Nate Comp (@NathanComp1)
Indiana fans have happily stepped in to defend their Hoosiers when naysayers have pointed out a soft schedule. They’re armed with statistics, the eye test, and an enjoyment of calling others daunted. Anything it takes to back what we have watched for nine weeks now – this Indiana team is a real contender in the national college football landscape.
But, like a pitcher that has a perfect game going into a late inning of a baseball game, there seems to be a hesitation amongst Hoosier faithful when allowing the excitement to boil over into what this could ultimately mean. Even us at Hoosier Huddle have been guilty of this hesitation – each week we have released our updated bowl projections, and it took until last week that we finally accepted the reality.
This Indiana Hoosier football team could be a College Football Playoff team.
It’s okay to say it.
Now sitting at 9-0 with just three games left on the regular season schedule, it is no longer acceptable to ignore the very real possibility that Indiana could find itself amongst the newly expanded 12-team College Football Playoff.
Open ESPN this morning and the sentiment will be reciprocated. Between the thirteen opinions shared on the 12-team field, there are now zero ESPN experts that exclude Indiana from the field. In fact, there are now zero ESPN experts that exclude Indiana from hosting the first round of the playoffs (projected 5 through 8 seed). Their statistical model, ESPN Football Power Index, has the Hoosiers as the team with the 5th best percentage to make the playoffs – an 86.6% chance.
Check out The Athletic and you’ll see the same thing – Indiana hosting a first-round playoff game as the 8 seed against Texas. Right there in a field with powerhouses Notre Dame, Alabama, Tennessee, Georgia, Ohio State, and Penn State.
The national college football experts are saying it, but what does the history of the College Football Playoff tell us? Of course, this is a bit more difficult to use to project a field, as historically only four teams have made it in, and the committee purposefully keeps their criteria for determining the field a bit of a secret. However, in the history of the four-team playoff, only one team has finished the year as a 1-loss team in the Big Ten or SEC and been ranked lower than #7 in the final College Football Playoff poll. (Unfortunately, that team was 6-1 Indiana, but that was the weird 2020 season. And the old Indiana).
So, let’s allow ourselves the possibility. On Tuesday, the nation may see an unbelievable thing on their televisions.
No, I’m not talking about that – stick to sports.
You’re likely to see the Indiana Hoosiers in the top 12 of the College Football Playoff rankings. Where is yet to be determined, but it could be near the top.
It’s okay to say it.