Fox Sports analyst blasts CFP committee over LSU’s top-10 ranking
Joel Klatt is Fox Sports’ lead college football game analyst and color commentator alongside Gus Johnson on Saturdays. On Tuesday night, the college football playoff committee released their first rankings of the 2022 season with a top four consisting of Tennessee, Ohio State, Georgia, and Clemson.
The biggest surprise in the top 10, though, would have to be the LSU Tigers at No. 10. LSU is ranked as the No. 17 team in the country according to the coaches poll, yet somehow the playoff committee, has it at No. 10.
Klatt was not happy at all about that and the fact the SEC has so many teams in the top 10.
“The SEC coalition is strong. Really strong, and rightly so,” Klatt said on “Breaking The Huddle with Joel Klatt” Wednesday. “They’ve got a lot of great teams this year, and I’m not going to say that they’re not. Having said that, five teams in the top 11, I thought, was a bit of an overreach. I thought five teams in the top 15 was more accurate. But there’s LSU, over-ranked — to a great degree, by the way. The biggest outlier as it relates to the AP poll and what they rose into the CFP. They’re at No. 10. And guess what LSU does for the SEC and, more specifically, Tennessee. It presents a really good backstop for Tennessee because Tennessee’s got that great win in Baton Rouge against LSU.
“So now, with LSU at 10, you’ve got this coalition where even if they were to lose to Alabama this week, they’re not dropping past 20, right? Now, Tennessee — even if they lose to Georgia — they’re not falling below TCU. But that’s only there if you’ve got the backstop of LSU. If LSU would’ve been more properly ranked at 14, 15, 16 and let’s say they lose to Alabama, they would’ve fallen into the low 20s, maybe even out of the rankings depending on the style of the game. But no, no, no, no. That’s not allowed because we’ve got to backstop Tennessee because heaven forbid that they were to fall below TCU if they would’ve lost. The coalition, the firewall, the SEC firewall, it is strong, it is built and it is real.”
I get it, people are tired of seeing the SEC so highly ranked, but think about this, the SEC has won three national titles in a row. Georgia, Alabama, and LSU are the last three champions of college football, and ‘Bama and the Bulldogs played against each other for the championship twice.
Five out of the last seven national championships have been won by SEC schools. If you are tired of hearing about the SEC teams, then beat them.
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