Jay Dieffenbach

azcentral sports

College football is trying to get its act together. Credit where credit is due, a playoff is coming (although it should be eight teams).

Numbers matter – the Big Ten has 14 teams; the Big 12 has 10, but let's get past that for now – and there is still a great deal of work to do.

The college football season is far from over, and the concern here is that the Associated Press rankings could very well influence the initial College Football Playoff Committee rankings to be rolled out Tuesday at 4:30 p.m. (Phoenix time).

I can see a problem if/when the committee voters glance at the AP rankings for measure and/or guidance.

Here's the main issue: Arizona State, Oregon and Arizona could suffer the "traditional power" influence down the road, perhaps costing one of them a shot at the College Football Playoff, all because the Ohio State Buckeyes used to be a good team.

Ohio State is now a top 30 team in a bad, bad conference – and it is at No. 13 in the AP poll this week.

The Buckeyes are playing in a conference ranked a distant fourth or fifth by most power rankings.

What have they done?

-Lost their star quarterback, Braxton Miller, at the beginning of the season.

-Lost -- at home -- to a very pedestrian Virginia Tech team.

-Managed to win games by scoring 66, 50, 52, 56 against Kent State, Cincinnati, Maryland and Rutgers (the Kent State game capped a murderer's row of non-conference games that also featured Navy and the aforementioned Virginia Tech).

-Then, the capper: They went double overtime to survive against an awful, slow, scholarship-reduction-addled Penn State team.

OK, all that is fine. It's not Ohio State's fault that it's a fine top-30 team in a woeful conference, but let's avoid rewarding the Buckeyes via "traditional power" thought.

Did you see what happened in the poll?

(Side note: The poll includes 60 voters. There are voters in cities/areas that cover more than one conference, but here is a rough mathematical breakdown: 18 from SEC areas, 15 from Big Ten areas, 10 from ACC areas, eight from Pac-12 areas and seven from the Big 12. There are also voters from New Mexico, Wyoming, Connecticut and Hawaii, among others. Then there are "national" category votes from four others: ESPN, Sports Illustrated, ABC and a St. Petersburg, Fla., newspaper. Not exactly a West Coast-inclusive "national" set of voters, right?)

Last Saturday, Arizona and ASU, each with only one defeat, took care of business on the road (UA by 59-37 at Washington State and ASU 24-10 at Washington) and still are ranked behind Ohio State.

Arizona's loss is to USC when the UA kicker (KICKERS!!!!) shanked a 36-yard field goal attempt that would have the Wildcats unbeaten today.

ASU's loss is to UCLA, which was a top 10 team at the time and continues to be a legitimate top 25 school.

To gauge the level of pollsters' competence/consistency – and the idea that voters are not swayed by blowouts is a joke – look at the rankings last week vs. this week. Ohio State was 13 and stayed there. UA was 15 and jumped past ASU into 14th but neither moved past Ohio State.

Much of the national chatter is how, if Ohio State can somehow handle Illinois – another awful Big Ten team – on Saturday, that the Nov. 8 Michigan State-Ohio State game could well determine one of the four representatives in the college football playoff.

Please don't let that happen, fine people of the College Football Playoff committee.

Michigan State, a strong top 10 candidate, decided to play at Oregon and the truth came out: Oregon is a much better team than the Big Ten's very best. So please, don't say that a Michigan State or Ohio State victory will vault the winner into the conversation.

I'd even take Notre Dame and the Big 12 champ over the "best" of the Big Ten this season.

The dominoes will continue to fall, meaning the SEC should have, at the most, only two teams among the final four. And yes, a two-loss SEC team should absolutely be included ahead of a one-loss ACC, Big Ten or Big 12 team.

Since Florida State is likely to run the table, they're in, and that leaves one more school to fill the playoff positions. That representative needs to be the Pac-12 champ.

And if either the Sun Devils or Wildcats win the South and find a way to beat Oregon in the Pac-12 title game, they had better be offered a seat at the playoff table – even if they enter that game with two losses. There just is not a better choice this season.