Following the Alabama Crimson Tide’s 46-41 loss to the LSU Tigers, many college football fans are left wondering: Can Alabama find a way to make the College Football Playoff? Alabama’s remaining schedule consists of FCS opponent Western Carolina and #13 Auburn. For the first time since 2017, Alabama’s fate is in the hands of others, including the committee. Tuesday night the College Football Playoff committee slotted Alabama at #5 in the most recent rankings.

Alabama sits behind two SEC teams in #1 LSU and #4 Georgia. Although Georgia’s loss is much worse (a South Carolina team that just lost to Appalachian State), the Bulldogs also have two wins over top 16 teams. Those wins were more important to the committee as Alabama doesn’t have a single ranked win. Alabama will most likely not play in the SEC Championship Game, if LSU wins the remaining games on their schedule. However this wouldn’t be the first time Alabama would slip in to the fourth playoff spot without winning the SEC Championship. In 2017 Alabama made the playoff without winning the SEC. Alabama ended up taking down #1 Clemson in the semi-final and putting together a famous comeback in the national championship against #3 Georgia to win it all.

Strengthening Alabama’s case is the fact that they play in the SEC, which in the committee’s eyes is the best conference in college football. The SEC is the only conference in the position to get two teams into the College Football Playoff with undefeated LSU at #1, a one loss Georgia at #4 and a one loss Alabama at #5. However LSU and Georgia are likely to meet in the SEC Championship if both win out. 

With two teams from the SEC ahead of Alabama who should the Tide root for? LSU winning would help Bama’s case as Georgia would have two losses. A two loss Georgia team that didn’t win their conference, with a bad loss against South Carolina would prevent them from getting in. LSU would be undefeated and would most likely claim the first seed in the eyes of the committee. This would allow Alabama to possibly slip in at the four spot. However, if Georgia were to beat LSU, LSU would get the advantage over Alabama because of the head to head win and strength of schedule. 

Another thing that could prevent the Crimson Tide from making the playoff is a 12-1 Oregon or Oklahoma that have conference championships. However, Oregon lost to Auburn who Alabama plays in their last regular season game of the year. If Alabama were to beat Auburn the committee might give the nod to Alabama. Oklahoma, however, has a loss to a mediocre Kansas State team. Conference championships have become less valuable over the past few years as three teams have made it without a conference championship. However, Alabama’s weak strength of schedule would not help them as they will end the year with one or two Top 25 wins.