Ohio State holds steady at No. 2 in the latest College Football Playoff rankings

There was not a ton of drama among the College Football Playoff hopefuls this past weekend, as every team seated within the top five in last week’s rankings emerged with a win on Saturday. In fact, the only team among the top 10 that lost was No. 6 Oregon, who dropped a 37-34 affair at home to No. 25 Washington. As a result, we didn’t expect much of any shakeup at the top of the heap, and that was proven true with the committee’s latest rankings on Tuesday night.

The top four teams in the country remained as follows:

1. Georgia
2. Ohio State
3. Michigan
4. TCU

Georgia easily dispatched Mississippi State 45-19 this weekend, and as you can see in the betting odds below, have far and away the easiest path to making the final field of four. The defending national champs boast ranked wins over Oregon and Tennessee, beating each by multiple scores, and will get to avoid Alabama entirely as they are set to face LSU in the SEC Championship Game. Even if the Bulldogs were to lose to the Tigers in the conference title game, they would still almost certainly make the College Football Playoff at 11-1.

Ohio State took care of business this weekend against Indiana, bouncing back from an ugly performance in the elements at Northwestern to defeat the Hoosiers 56-14. The Buckeyes’ big win is over Penn State, but their season-opening victory against Notre Dame is looking better by the week as the Irish have turned out to be a solid football team. With one final road contest this coming week against Maryland, everything is set up for them to head into The Game against Michigan at 11-0.

Speaking of Michigan, they are right behind Ohio State following a 34-3 win over Nebraska on Saturday. The Wolverines’ lone ranked win is against those same Nittany Lions, but unlike the Buckeyes, Jim Harbaugh’s group did not play any meaningful non-conference games. In fact, they played one of the worst non-conference schedules of any P5 school. There are already talks of the loser of the Ohio State-Michigan game still potentially making the College Football Playoff at 11-1, but the Wolverines would have a much tougher argument of the two with how their schedule played out.

Finally, TCU rounds out the current top four. Everyone keeps counting out the Horned Frogs and waiting for them to lose, but all them keep doing is winning football games. They were tested once again this weekend, escaping with a 17-10 win over Texas on the road, and will likely be able to overcome their final two opponents in Baylor and Iowa State en route to the Big 12 title game, which in all likelihood will be against Kansas State. If TCU remains undefeated and wins their conference, they will obviously be in. Any other path, and things will get tricky.

Teams like Tennessee, USC and even LSU are still lurking on the outside, but their paths are a bit more complicated than those above them. The Trojans still have two very tough opponents ahead of them in UCLA and Notre Dame, in addition to whoever they would meet in the Pac-12 title game. LSU would have to defeat Georgia in the SEC Title game, which seems unlikely, albeit possible. Tennessee would probably need other teams in front of them to lose, specifically TCU, but would have an argument to get in over the loser of Ohio State-Michigan.

As of Tuesday afternoon, here were the betting odds for the College Football Playoff, courtesy of the DraftKings Sportsbook:

To make the College Football Playoff

• Georgia -5000
• Ohio State -650
• Tennessee -350
• Michigan +130
• TCU +230
• Clemson +450
• USC +450
• LSU +650

To win the National Title

• Georgia -120
• Ohio State +240
• Michigan +700
• Tennessee +1200
• TCU +2500
• LSU +4000
• USC +4000
• Clemson +5000

Odds/lines subject to change. T&Cs apply. See draftkings.com/sportsbook for details.