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Greetings from "Can't Wait For Saturday," your morning morsel of college football, courtesy of longtime Illini beat writer, AP Top 25 voter and Heisman state rep Bob Asmussen. He'll give you his views each day on the game he loves
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If the College Football Playoff selection committee has an agenda, it sure didn't show Tuesday night. That's when the committee, led this year by Michigan athletic director Warde Manuel, released its initial CFP standings.
The Big Ten -- not the SEC -- was front and center holding down the first two spots on the 25-team list.
Oregon is No. 1 and Ohio State, which has only lost to Oregon, is No. 2. Many would have guessed SEC power Georgia would slide in behind Oregon at No. 2. But as Manuel explained on ESPN, Georgia's loss to two-loss Alabama was worse than Ohio State's loss to undefeated Oregon. Makes perfect sense to most of us.
Oregon and Ohio State were joined in the rankings by No. 6 Penn State and No. 8 Indiana. If the playoffs started today, the upstart Hoosiers would be in the field, playing a first-round game on the road.
If the standings hold -- a hint, they won't -- Oregon, Georgia, Miami and BYU would have first-round byes. Ohio State would be the No. 5 seed and play Boise State at home in the first round.
Why no bye for the No. 2 team? Well, the odd CFP rankings give the free passes to the four highest ranked conference champions. Only one bye per conference, a rule the CFP needs to seriously reconsider. As a college football fan, I want the best teams to have the easiest path to the title. By limiting the number of byes to one per conference that goal becomes less likely to happen.
To be fair, this is the first year of the 12-team playoff-orama. I can cut the committee some slack for the first try.