Gators have a path to the College Football Playoff if they take care of business

The last few weeks could not have gone much better for the Florida Gators.

With a convincing win over Missouri and a dominant defensive performance last week against Georgia, Florida has made a case to move up the national rankings. Meanwhile, several teams in the top fifteen have struggled and fallen back, vaulting them to tenth in the nation and eleventh in the playoff rankings. The suddenly tough play of the Kentucky Wildcats, who Florida dismantled in their second game of the season, has helped. Perhaps more importantly, Tennessee has fallen apart in their last three games, giving the Gators firm control of the SEC East moving forward.

The Gators are currently 6-1. Their final four games are at Arkansas, at home against South Carolina, at a surging LSU, and at Florida State. It is also likely they will finish the season a week later in the Georgia Dome against Alabama for the SEC Championship. That is a brutal final five weeks.

The good news is that that five game stretch, combined with their record and place in the standings, creates a real possibility that Florida could sneak into the College Football Playoff.

To do this, they will need to start by going into Arkansas and beating the Razorbacks. Arkansas (5-3, 1-3 in the SEC) was idle last week after being trounced by Auburn the week before, 56-3. They’re 1-3 in conference, but all three losses were to ranked teams in Auburn, Alabama, and Texas A&M. They’ve also beaten TCU (who was ranked 15th when they played) and Mississippi (12th at the time) on the season.

The Razorbacks feature a somewhat balanced offense, led by quarterback Austin Allen and running back Rawleigh Williams III. Allen is the star of the team, having thrown for 400 yards in a game earlier in the season (against Alabama, no less) and 2048 so far this season to go with 18 touchdown passes.

Senior wide receiver Drew Morgan has the most receptions by a wide margin, but the ball does spread around in the Arkansas offense. The top three receivers are all within 45 yards of each other on the season, suggesting a worthy challenge for the Gators’ world class secondary.

Rawleigh Williams III is averaging over 100 yards per game so far on the season, including a 180 yard performance against Mississippi. He averages 5.3 yards a carry, but he has been neutralized in every one of Arkansas’ losses. Once the Razorbacks get behind, they look to Allen to bring them back and tend to abandon the run.

To make Williams a non-factor, the Gators need to score early. They could look to the running game to do that, as Arkansas really struggles against opponents who commit to running the football. In their three losses, the Razorbacks have surrendered a combined 1173 yards of rushing. Three games. They’ve given up over 100 yards to four different backs in those three games as well. Arkansas ranks 107 in the country in rushing defense.

That should bring out the best in Florida’s offense, as a majority of their success on that side of the ball has been set up by a rushing attack that spreads the ball around. It could be a big day for Jordan Scarlett as well as Lamical Perine, who have between the two of them received the lion’s share of the carries for the Gators on the season and especially in recent weeks.

A game that sets up as a big rushing day for Florida can only help Luke Del Rio, who has had real trouble finding rhythm this year. The amount of missed weeks and byes have not helped in this regard, and one thing Del Rio needs more than anything else is time to get comfortable with his receivers again. At times early in the season, Florida showed flashes of what they can be in the passing game, but it needs to be more than a brief glimpse if Florida is going to really have a shot at the playoff, which remains unlikely. There’s a path now for Florida, and while it is an extremely difficult one they could have a real chance if they manage to run the table in an extremely difficult November.

The Gators would be 11-1 if they were to run the table. Under this scenario, there would be as many as three undefeated teams (Michigan, Clemson, and Washington are all without losses right now), followed by Florida and any other one loss teams such as Texas A&M and Alabama. The Gators would likely have an edge over Alabama in this scenario as they would have a head-to-head victory over the Crimson Tide as well as three in a row against nationally-ranked opponents. Even then, there would be no guarantee they would make the field.

Of course, three undefeated teams in major conferences would be a unique experience. Should Washington, Clemson, and/or Michigan also stumble, matters would be that much more complicated, and it would be up to the computers, but it would leave the Gators in excellent shape.