Ohio State, Georgia, Michigan, Florida State are initial top 4

By RALPH D. RUSSO AP College Football Writer

Ohio State, Georgia, Michigan and Florida State sat atop the season’s first College Football Playoff rankings on Tuesday, with unbeaten Washington (8-0) and its Pac-12 rival, Oregon (7-1), next up.

Texas (7-1) was seventh and Alabama (7-1) was eighth with the Longhorns owning a road victory over the Crimson Tide in September.

The Buckeyes (8-0) are No. 1 for the fourth time in the 10-year history of the CFP, and the first time since 2019.

Two-time defending champion Georgia (8-0) and Michigan (8-0) have been Nos. 1 and 2 in The Associated Press college football poll since the preseason, but schedules light on big-time competition to this point worked against them with the 13-member selection committee.

The Wolverines head into the final month of the season with the program being investigated by the NCAA for a sign-stealing scheme that allegedly involved impermissible in-person scouting.

Florida State (8-0) is in the CFP’s top four for the first time since the 2014 season.

UCLA (6-2) and USC (7-2) are among six Pac-12 teams in the first rankings, but they are 19th and 20th.

The first of six rankings sets the table for a month of scrutiny about the top teams and their performances.

“We looked at it, the big win over Notre Dame, and the win over Penn State, and they have difference-makers on offense,” CFP chair Boo Corrigan said, referring to the Buckeyes on ESPN’s rankings release show. “We looked at it, Ohio State deserved to be number one.”

With five undefeated Power 5 teams headed into the first rankings, the biggest question was how the committee would choose to separate them. Clearly, strength of schedule played a big role.

“As a group, the 13 of us in the room, we felt this was the order for the top four slots,” Corrigan said.

The Buckeyes have played a much stronger schedule to date than Georgia. They have two Top 15 victories over Penn State (No. 11) and Notre Dame (No. 15). Georgia has zero Top 25 victories at the moment and a strength of schedule that currently ranks No. 100, according to ESPN metrics. The Bulldogs have only beaten two FBS teams with winning records.

Michigan has played an even weaker schedule than Georgia, ranking No. 111 right now.

Those metrics will change in the coming weeks, though as both teams hit the hardest part of their respective schedules. Georgia has games against No. 12 Missouri, No. 10 Mississippi and No. 17 Tennessee over the next three weeks. Michigan has No. 11 Penn State and No. 1 Ohio State remaining.

Corrigan also made reference to Michigan’s investigation on the show and what it might mean down the line.

“We really view it as an NCAA issue, and not a CFP issue,” Corrigan said. “At this point in time, when we’re looking at it, we want to find the top four teams.”

Washington has a better victory (over No. 6 Oregon) than Florida State (over No. 14 LSU), but the Huskies have struggled the last two weeks against losing teams – needing late comebacks against Arizona State and Stanford to win. Perhaps that played a role in the view of the committee. Like Georgia and Michigan, Washington has major matchups coming up that could help its strength of schedule – especially when compared to Florida State.

“It’s exactly that. It’s initial. As quickly as the season is going by, there’s a lot of football to be played,” Washington coach Kalen DeBoer said on the show. “We’ve done what we’ve had to do. And this next month for us is going to be a big month for us.”

Washington faces No. 20 USC on Saturday at the Coliseum, with games against No. 18 Utah and No. 16 Oregon State to follow.

“We’re in a different spot than we were a year ago. There’s a target on our backs,” DeBoer said. “We really have to rise up, and so far, we have.”

The final rankings will be released Dec. 3, after the conference championship games, and those set the four-team playoff field, with semifinals at the Rose Bowl and Sugar Bowl ahead of the national championship game on Jan. 8 in Houston.

This is the final season of the four-team format before the playoff expands to 12 teams next season.

Four is the magic number for now and rarely in the nine previous years of the playoff have all four teams in the initial rankings actually made it to the playoff.

Last year, Tennessee was the committee’s first No. 1, followed by Ohio State, Georgia and Clemson. Only the Bulldogs and Buckeyes made the playoff.

Overall, 21 of the 36 teams (58%) that have appeared in the first CFP rankings of a season have made the playoff.

Among the 36 teams that have made the playoff in nine years, 29 started in the top six.

The longest climb to the CFP was Ohio State in 2014, when the Buckeyes were 16th in the committee’s first ranking. Oklahoma was No. 15 in the first rankings in 2015 and made the playoff.