Let's all take a deep breath. We aren't even halfway through the season and college football keeps giving us amazing games and heart-pounding finishes. Let's take a look at the state of the country.

Contenders

Unfortunately, the most clear cut contender remains Alabama.

Next we have, in my opinion, a showdown coming in the Big Ten for the second most legit contender. Ohio State and Michigan both look incredibly potent as title contenders, and their showdown at the end of the season may decide which one of them gets a shot at it. Depending on what happens in the rest of the country, they might both make it. Watch Wisconsin sneaking up on people, though.

Houston is an interesting team. Their win early against Oklahoma looked incredibly legit, but is now looking worse and worse. If they can win out, they will have a good shot at making the Playoff, but I can't see them hanging with Alabama, Michigan, or Ohio State. The deciding game for them will be against Louisville on November 17th.

In the ACC, Louisville, Clemson and even Florida State remain true contenders for the Playoff. One of these teams will need to win the ACC undefeated, or could possibly sneak in with one loss against the others. FSU is a long shot because of how bad they lost to Louisville, but if Louisville got killed by Clemson and FSU killed Clemson, we would have an interesting tiebreaker situation.

For the Pac-12, nobody truly looks like a contender. In my opinion, a Pac-12 champion would need to be undefeated to make it to the Playoff. Christian McCaffrey is super fun to watch though.

In the SEC, it looks like Alabama or nothing. Ole Miss looks great but already has two close loses, and so would need a TON of help to make the playoff. A&M looks good, but not good enough to beat Bama. If they were to only drop one game to Bama, and look impressive the rest of the season, they might have an outside shot of sneaking in. In the East, Tennessee is decent but doesn't look good enough to finish with a good enough record.

Lastly of the Power 5 conferences, we have the Big 12. A Big 12 team would have to be an undefeated champion to make the Playoff, and even then it might not be enough. Baylor and West Virginia are the only Big 12 teams that remain undefeated, and neither look dangerous enough to go undefeated.

In conclusion, this year feels weird so far. We think we have a few teams locked in to the Playoff, but we don't really know much of anything yet. Its been a great season so far, looks to be a great rest of the season!