COLUMBUS, Ohio -- Ohio State was left out of the College Football Playoff, finishing at No. 5 in the final rankings with No. 4 Alabama making it in to play No. 1 Clemson.

What did this tell us about college football and the committee, and what should it tell us about Ohio State?

* The rankings during the year matter. Alabama was No. 1 before losing to Auburn, which showed you how much the committee liked Alabama despite the fact it didn't have great wins. Alabama was No. 5 entering the weekend, while Ohio State was No. 8. And that was an indication that the Buckeyes had too far to climb, at least without a blowout win over Wisconsin.

"The committee just favored Alabama's full body of work over Ohio State," committee chairman Kirby Hocutt said on ESPN. "It was consistent over the course of the year as we saw Alabama play week to week and our rankings showed that."

* However, Wisconsin finished at No. 6. So Ohio State beat No. 6 on Saturday and finished No. 5. The committee didn't like Ohio State enough, but still liked Wisconsin a lot. That's surprising.

* A blowout kills you. For many, this choice strikes a blow for the college football regular season. The sport always brags about how it has the most important regular season, and this supported that. The Iowa loss by 31 points ruined Ohio State's hopes, and it proved you don't get a mulligan.

* They pick the four best teams, not the four most deserving. Hocutt said a lot on ESPN in his explanation. All his words boiled down to this - Alabama won the eye test. The committee thought Alabama was a better team. That's it.

* Who maybe should be really mad today? The 2015 Ohio State team that didn't make the playoff after losing to Michigan State in the next-to-last week of the regular season. Those Buckeyes would have needed an "unequivocal" top four argument to get in. Ohio State did not two years ago and finished No. 7 in the final rankings at 11-1.

This Alabama team, which was comparable in a lot of ways as a very talented team without many quality wins on the resume, was deemed an "unequivocal" top four team and made it.

* My rankings of the Ohio State teams the last three years: 2015, 2017, 2016. Only 2016 made the playoff and got blown out. The 2015 and 2017 teams would have been far more competitive in the playoff but didn't get the chance because those teams lost games they couldn't lose in the regular season.

* Conference titles have been devalued. The committee has done it twice, last year by putting in Ohio State over Big Ten champ Penn State and this year putting in Alabama over the Buckeyes.

Conference championships are at the top of the list of criteria, but the committee is showing it only matters as a tiebreaker, and they obviously didn't feel this was close enough between the Buckeyes and Crimson Tide to warrant a tiebreaker.

"We don't look at conferences, we look at the four very best teams," Hocutt said. "Conference championship are important. But we have the abilty to put non-champs in the top four if they are one of the four very best teams, and that's what took place."

* Geography doesn't matter. There are three teams from the South in the playoff in Clemson, Georgia and Alabama. People theorized the committee would be worried about the Midwest tuning out for the playoff. They weren't worried.