So we are about the mid-point of the season now and if the playoffs started this weekend the playoffs would look like this (using AP poll rankings)
Top 4 teams with a Bye - Ohio State (C), Miami (C), Indiana, Texas A&M (C)
1st Round
5 v. 12 - Ole Miss v. South Florida (C - it is almost certainly them, Memphis, or Navy who are all on a collision course for American title) - winner players A&M
8 v. 9 - Oregon v. Georgia - winner plays Ohio State
6 v. 11 - Alabama v. Tennessee - winner plays Indiana
7 v. 10 - Texas Tech (C) v. LSU - winner plays Miami
That is a pretty nice bracket though obviously things will change especially as all the SEC teams keep playing each other. Right now though they'd have 6 teams, the Big Ten would have 3, and then 1 each from ACC, Big 12, and AAC. The 3 from the Big Ten would have to have a Penn State type collapse to not be there at the end of the season and it isn't likely someone like USC makes it high enough, so those 3 seem solid (obviously rankings will likely change, but who knows IU and OSU might play for the Big Ten title and both be unbeaten). I can't imagine 6 SEC teams make it. Georgia Tech is well positioned at 6-0 and ranked 12th to make the playoffs. As we've seen the committee tends to not hold title game losses against teams so if they make the ACC title game and lose (even if they lose 1 along the way), they will probably be in over some 3 loss SEC school. The most interesting thing to me is if one of the Big 12 teams behind Texas Tech moves up. Both BYU and Cinci are unbeaten in the conference (and BYU is unbeaten overall) and Utah is ranked. BYU has a gauntlet left, if they win out they'd start to have an argument for a bye as they play Utah, Iowa State, TTech, TCU, Cinci, and then close with UCF. That is a lot of schedule strength. Even 1 loss and they probably move into the playoffs.
Setting up to be a nice close to the season with a fair amount intrigue. Shame PSU collapsed and Allar got hurt as they should have added more intrigue. This weekend is a bit light outside of SEC. Best games of the weekend are
Ole Miss at Georgia
Tenn at Bama
LSU at Vande
Utah at BYU
USC at Notre Dame (who is ranked 13th and still lingering on the cusp and the Miami and A&M losses to open the season have gotten a lot better looking especially since they combined lost those games by 4 points)