College Football Playoff: Where will Sooners land in initial 2019 rankings?

Where will Oklahoma football be when the first College Football Playoff rankings for the 2019 season are unveiled Tuesday night?

That is the question that is foremost on the minds of Sooner fans as four-time defending Big 12 champion Oklahoma gets ready for the final stretch drive of the 2019 season that will determine its plans

Some will tell you that the only national ranking that really matter in college football is the one determined by panel of 13 men and women who comprise the College Football Playoff selection committee. OU athletic director Joe Castiglione is a member of the committee, not that that will help the Sooners’ cause.

Two weeks ago, the likelihood was high that Oklahoma would have found itself right on the line between four and five in the first CFP rankings of the season and embroiled in a hot debate over which team between Clemson, the Sooners and Penn State is more Playoff worthy at this snapshot in time.

Oklahoma Sooners Football

While that was wishful thinking after opening the season 7-0, the reality now is that Oklahoma is just hoping to fall somewhere in the top 10 in the initial Playoff rankings. That conversation that once would have included the Sooners over who would sit in the No. 4 spot in the first of the five scheduled CFP rankings for this season will now just involve defending national champion Clemson and Penn State.

With several top-20 matchups coming up this month involving teams currently ranked in the top 10 of both the Associated Press and Coaches Polls, the initial Playoff rankings, including the top four teams, will almost certainly be different four weeks from now, when the final rankings get etched in stone.

So where will the Sooners be when the ESPN college football analysts count down the top 25 teams in the first Playoff rankings of the season on Tuesday night (8 p.m. CT on ESPN)?

First, a couple of compelling Playoff ranking facts to consider: In the five years the College Football Playoff format has been in existence, 11 of the 20 teams that ended up in the top four of the final CFP rankings were among the first four teams in the first Playoff rankings of the season, and six of the last eight Playoff semifinalists were ranked in the top four in the initial rankings.

The Sooners were fifth and seventh, respectively in the first CFP rankings in each of the last two seasons — both times with a single loss on their resume — and made the Playoff both seasons.

This year is a little different, however, because OU’s seven win include just one over a ranked team, and that team, Texas, has since lost one other time and fallen out of the top 25. The Sooners’ 2019 schedule has not been as strong as other teams in Playoff contention.

With K-State now ranked 20th in the AP Poll, and with just two losses on the season, it will be interesting to see how the loss to the Wildcats, by just seven points on the road, will affect the Sooners in the view of the Playoff selection committee.

Oklahoma ranks 10th in the latest Associated Press Poll and ninth in the Coaches Poll, falling to the No. 5 position after the stunning loss to a Kansas State team that has since broken into the top 25 in both polls. The Sooners are listed seventh in the ESPN Football Power Index.

All things considered, I believe the Sooners will be the seventh ranked team in the initial Playoff rankings behind No. 1 LSU, Alabama, Ohio State, Penn State, Clemson and Georgia. The battle for seventh will be between Oklahoma and Oregon. The Ducks’ lone loss was to 12th-ranked Auburn on a neutral field, while the Sooners’ loss was on the road at 20th-ranked Kansas State.

Regardless of where Oklahoma falls on week one of the College Football Playoff rankings, the Sooners will have opportunities to move up in the weeks ahead as long as they keep winning. The major hurdles will be road games at undefeated and 11th-ranked Baylor on Nov. 16 and at Oklahoma State in the regular-season finale on Nov. 30.

If OU makes it through the next four weekends unscathed, it will still need to win the Big 12 Championship and get some outside help to have any hope of making a third consecutive appearance, and fourth in six seasons, in the College Football Playoff.

Even if they fall short of the fourth and final Playoff spot, by winning a fourth consecutive Big 12 crown, the Sooners would assure themselves of a spot in the New Year’s Six Sugar Bowl against a top team from the SEC, most likely a rematch of the 2017 national semifinal game against Georgia.