Rejoice Ohio State fans. After all the doom and gloom of getting bushwhacked by Michigan for the second straight year, it sure felt like the Buckeyes would be relegated out of the College Football Playoff and to a New Year’s Six Bowl. That would still be a great prize, but it’s not what the coaches, players and fans had in mind.
Now, however, with a couple of upset losses in the conference championship games — most notably USC’s loss to Utah in the Pac-12 Championship game, the Buckeyes are back in the final four and headed to Atlanta to play in the Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl against No. 1 Georgia.
It’s a daunting task, but you always want a bite at the apple, and that’s exactly what Ohio State has. It’s a chance at redemption and one that I have a feeling will result in a better showing than what we saw against the Wolverines Just a week ago.
But what went into elevating Ohio State over USC? What separated the Buckeyes from Alabama, Tennessee and Clemson, which had two losses but played at a high level at times?
College Football Playoff Committee chair, Boo Corrigan, met with the media to discuss the process of what went into the final rankings and why teams ended up where they did.
Here’s what was discussed and touched upon when it comes to Ohio State.
Opening Remarks
BRETT DANIELS: I’d like to welcome everyone to the final College Football Playoff selection committee teleconference for the 2022 season. Joining us again today we have Bill Hancock, the executive director of the College Football Playoff, along with Boo Corrigan, College Football Playoff selection committee chair.
At this time we’ll jump into our question-and-answer segment.
Q. It seems to be so obvious the top two. How easily were you able to set those first two teams into place, and how much debate, if any, was there between Michigan and Georgia?
BOO CORRIGAN: We go through the same process every week and just make sure that we’re thorough and talk about it. At the end of it, Georgia has those five wins over ranked teams that really kind of led us down that road, the way they played in the championship game against LSU. Michigan played really well, as well, but there was nothing in our mind that was really much of flipping the two.
Q. Having been through this process, I know you group teams often in threes; did you even have to do that to bring TCU or Ohio State into the discussion?
BOO CORRIGAN: Yeah, a lot of times we do. I think with the last week, it’s a lot of discussion about all the teams that were going through, and then we’ll go through kind of the more formal vote of what we’re doing, and being able to look at them, again, in groups, but with the first two, we wanted to make sure we got them right.
I can’t actually remember which team got pulled in for the third, but as we went into it, we wanted to make sure we got those first two set and then we moved forward.
Q. Wondering about TCU and Ohio State in the rankings; how much discussion was there between those two teams for the No. 3 spot, and what ultimately tipped things in favor of TCU ahead of Ohio State there?
BOO CORRIGAN: Yeah, the body of work by TCU, the way they had played all season leading into that game, the ability to, one, play in the championship game, the way they came back against Kansas State, a heroic effort, if you will, by Max Duggan and the way he played in that championship game.
Ohio State was not playing. We knew who they were. As we talked about it as a group, we came to the conclusion that we believed TCU was No. 3, and with that, kind of moved down the list and ended up with Ohio State at No. 4.
Q. Kind of a big-picture question, but when you get to this final weekend when everyone is talking about these final rankings and there's upsets and whatnot, how do you guys as a committee go about avoiding allowing outside noise to impact you guys' decision as you're watching games? I'm sure you hear what's being said, but how do you not let that impact what you guys are talking about when you meet together?
BOO CORRIGAN: Well, I mean, from the very beginning of this, we want to make sure that it’s the 13 voices in the room. We also have individuals in the room that deal directly with the conferences and take a couple conference reports during the year, so we get that feedback, as well, to make sure that we’re including everything that’s going in.
The thing for us is the reports come from the conference office and not from individual teams as we’re going through this, and again, it clarifies a lot for us.
Coaches are going to advocate for the young men in their program, and we understand that, and we should based on the relationships they have, but not at all as far as the impact from the outside noise.
But again, we do hear it, but we’re really focused on making sure that we get this right.
Q. Are there coaches who were involved in the conversation that were kind of politicking and making their case? Did you hear any of that in the conversation?
BOO CORRIGAN: Yeah, we were in the room watching a game, I believe it was at halftime of one of the games on Fox where coach Saban was on the Big Ten when he was on, and again, he’s advocating for his program, he’s advocating for the young men in his program just as other coaches are, and those are the relationships they care about, so I think it was perfectly understandable that that’s occurring. But our job, the 13 of us, is to make sure we’re focused in on the games and football judgment and make sure that we get that right.
Q. How close was it between No. 4 and No. 5 in your assumptions or your rankings?
BOO CORRIGAN: Yeah, we’re looking at everything throughout the entire year, and from a scale standpoint or percentage standpoint, we don’t look at that way. We want to make sure as a group we’ve talked through everything, that the voices in the room have been heard, and then use our football judgment from that point forward to make sure that we’re making the right decisions.
Q. Specifically to TCU versus Ohio State, I think you touched on this on the live broadcast earlier, but you guys aren't concerning yourselves with match-ups there like trying to avoid Ohio State and Michigan? Did that play any part in it whatsoever? Then I guess ultimately some people or Vegas would say that Georgia maybe got the tougher match-up drawing Ohio State, and you guys had them at 2 for much of the year, so obviously you valued that team very highly. Your thoughts on that specific breakdown?
BOO CORRIGAN: We do. Ohio State has been valued high by the committee, but as we looked at it, our goal was to get 1 through 4 correct, and then obviously 1 to 25. Really what it comes down to is making sure that you have them in the right order.
When you look at TCU, 6-1 over teams over .500, 2-1 against ranked teams, Ohio State had the good wins over Penn State and Notre Dame, played Michigan close for three quarters of the game, but at the end of the day we came back to TCU, and there was nothing that occurred during that game against Kansas State that we didn’t believe moved them out of the No. 3 spot.
Q. I was wondering, you said that you knew who Ohio State was already with them being idle this weekend. Just kind of trying to get a better understanding, if that's the case, is there a reason other than USC losing, I guess, that Ohio State was not previously at No. 4 last weekend, because people it seems have argued that it punishes USC for losing its Pac-12 title game appearance with them being at 4 and then falling out?
BOO CORRIGAN: Well, those decisions on conference championships are made by the conferences, so as we looked at it, all we can do is go on the information we have available and the games that have been played to this point. Again, Ohio State was idle this past week, so what we’ve got to do is deal with the new information we have, and the Southern Cal game against Utah and the 47-24 loss to Utah and how they played, which becomes another data point, and we move forward from there as a group and make sure that we’re evaluating — again, you’ve heard “body of work” over and over again as we we talk about it, and that’s really what we’re trying to do is to make sure that we understand everything in the game and throughout the season and make sure we’re doing a full evaluation from that point.
Closing Statement
BRETT DANIELS: I’d like just to thank everyone for their participation on today’s call. We will post the transcript shortly on collegepressbox.com. We’d also like to take the opportunity to thank you as well for your dedication and time covering college football this season, and we hope to see you in Los Angeles.
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