Ole Miss, $350K lighter, rises in playoff rankings after defeating Georgia

The $350k fine Ole Miss paid for its fans storming the field – twice – may end up being worth it.

The Rebels (8-2, 4-2 SEC) were ranked No. 11 in the College Football Playoff committee’s updated rankings after beating then-No. 3 Georgia 28-10 last weekend. The rankings would pit the Rebels against Penn State (8-1, 5-1 Big Ten) at Beaver Stadium in the first round of the playoff.

Ole Miss beating Georgia also knocked the Bulldogs out of the playoff. Georgia was ranked No. 12, but since the committee’s highest-ranked Group of 5 team was ranked No. 13, Georgia would be kicked out of the playoff.

(The highest-ranked Group of 5 conference champion, no matter its ranking, will receive an automatic spot in the playoff. If that team is ranked No. 13 or lower, whoever is ranked No. 12 will be booted out of the 12-team playoff. This week, that team would be Georgia.)

However, with three weeks left in the regular season these rankings could still drastically change.

Ole Miss’s spot in the playoffs isn’t secure. In fact, it’s far from secure. The Rebels must beat Florida and Mississippi State. We’ve already seen bigger upsets (Kentucky at Ole Miss, Alabama at Vanderbilt, etc.) so the Rebels can’t take either the Gators or Bulldogs for granted.

The bad news from the committee’s rankings is that just winning its final two games may not be enough to secure Ole Miss’s spot in the playoffs.

The SEC is already one crazy upset (Arkansas beating Texas this weekend) away from being on a realistic path to an eight-team playoff. That path includes Ole Miss winning out and it’s a path that may not bode well for the Rebels. As the latest SEC Roll Call helpfully pointed out, an eight-way tie would result in Alabama and LSU playing in Atlanta for the SEC Championship game.

If that happens, the winner will get an automatic bid into the playoff. If that’s Alabama, would LSU be out of the playoff for one of Ole Miss, Georgia, Tennessee or Texas? If that’s LSU, would Alabama be out of the playoff for one of Ole Miss, Georgia, Tennessee or Texas?

Ole Miss is off this weekend, but what happens in Saturday’s game between No. 12 Georgia and No. 7 Tennessee, and what the committee’s rankings look like will be very telling for Ole Miss.