Boo Corrigan explains why Tennessee is ranked behind Alabama
Tennessee’s 2022 regular-season schedule featured home games against Ball State (W, 59-10), Akron (W, 63-6), Florida (W, 38-33), Alabama (W, 52-49), UT Martin (W, 65-24), Kentucky (W, 44-6) and Missouri (W, 66-24).
The Vols’ 2022 schedule featured road contests at Pittsburgh (W, 34-27 OT) in the second edition of the Johnny Majors Classic, LSU (W, 40-13), Georgia (L, 27-13), South Carolina (L, 63-38) and Vanderbilt (W, 56-0).
The College Football Playoff released its latest top 25 rankings on Tuesday following Week 13.
Tennessee is ranked No. 7 behind No. 6 Alabama (10-2, 6-2 SEC) despite defeating the Crimson Tide.
Following the latest College Football Playoff top 25 rankings, Boo Corrigan, selection committee chair of the College Football Playoff, met with media.
Corrigan’s discussion of Tennessee’s ranking behind Alabama is listed below from a transcript provided by the College Football Playoff.
The Big Ten plays nine conference games, the SEC plays eight conference games; did that factor in at all in the Ohio State 5 versus say an Alabama or Tennessee 5 or is it based on Ohio State 11-1 versus other teams are 10-2?
“What we’re doing has nothing to do with conferences. We don’t look at that from that standpoint it could come into play around strength of schedule, those types of things, but it’s not something we sit there and how many conference games teams are playing. We try to evaluate every team on an individual basis as we go through this, and as we looked at it, Ohio State and their two good wins over Penn State and over Notre Dame overshadowed Alabama and Tennessee from the standpoint of two close losses for Alabama, a couple good wins over Texas and Mississippi State, and then with regards to Tennessee, I think that loss against South Carolina really weighed with the committee.”
About Alabama and Tennessee; they are one spot apart. Tennessee beat them head-to-head, and usually that's supposed to be one of the determining factors. Is Alabama ahead of Tennessee because Tennessee -- the magnitude of Tennessee's loss to South Carolina and losing its quarterback Hendon Hooker, and is there anything that could change that evaluation in the final standings?
“Well, one, it was very much debated amongst the committee, and a lot of conversation around that. The value of head-to-head is certainly one of the criteria that we look at. We’re looking at a full body of work, and when you look at their two losses by Alabama, including one on a last-second field goal to Tennessee, and then you’re measuring — somewhere in there you’ve got to measure the loss that Tennessee had to South Carolina, and as we went through that, that was part of the determination as to why to have Alabama ahead of Tennessee.”
Could that change in the final -- could it change?
“We deal with where we are right now. There’s a number of championship games to be played, and we’ll deal with the championship games and everything from that point moving forward.”
"We all lived through 2007 and the chaos that ensued at the end of that BCS year, but is there a line where if chaos ensues, Ohio State could move up, Alabama could move up into the top 4? Is there any chance that you see Tennessee moving into the top 4, or is that kind of the line between Alabama and Tennessee?"
“I think that’s a segment of what we’re going to see this weekend is all the games, and we’re going to see how it all plays out and be able to make our decisions next week and get back on a phone call with y’all explaining them.”
"It was suggested that Hendon Hooker's injury had something to do with the rankings of Tennessee; is that figured into it when a key player is out with an injury to determine the value of the team?"
“Well, I’ll go backwards to last week in terms of South Carolina game. It was certainly something that we considered during the game, and if you remember correctly, I believe they were down 49-31 at the time when he went out. We do have more information on their game based on with Vanderbilt, and we go off of what we’ve seen so far.”
Is Tennessee's ranking any different if Hendon Hooker is healthy now?
“Don’t know. Don’t know. That’s speculation on our side. Again, we’re taking the body of work that they have and the most recent game they had with Vanderbilt.”
To continue with the Tennessee discussion, especially with Hendon Hooker, obviously hurt against South Carolina, out for the remainder of the year. Tennessee responded pretty well, 56-0 win at Vanderbilt, especially the Commodores coming off back to back wins against Kentucky and Florida. How is that viewed as a win for Tennessee as a whole? Is that simply just a system-type win, offensive system under Josh Heupel or just a good performance with the backup quarterback?
“It was a good win by a football team is what it was, as we looked at it, and certainly there’s respect for Tennessee in the room, which is why they ended up ranked where they were, at No. 7.”
