2024 12-team College Football Playoff rankings prediction week 1: What to make of Oregon's struggles
By Ethan Lee
What a start to the 2024 college football season, huh? We're not even two full weeks into the 2024 college football season and we've already seen the Florida State Seminoles suffer two embarrassing losses, which will almost certainly keep them out of the College Football Playoff (once again).
But while the Florida State losses to Georgia Tech and Boston College are going to get a lot of attention (as they should), they're not the only noteworthy games that have happened right out of the gate involving potential playoff contenders.
We also have to talk about the Oregon Ducks for a minute.
Entering the 2024 season, I was convinced that Dan Lanning and the Ducks were going to make a run to the national title game. Given the way that offense is assembled and the amount of talent that Dillon Gabriel is surrounded with, I just assumed Oregon would keep on rolling and successfully build on the success they had last season.
And there's still a chance that that's the case. But when the Ducks struggled to score against Idaho, I admittedly started feeling concerned about trusting Oregon the way I feel concerned about trusting Florida State.
Now, maybe Lanning and the Ducks get things figured out sooner rather than later, but barely beating Idaho 24-14? That's not the way they probably hoped to start 2024.
Anyway, here's what my latest College Football Playoff rankings predictions look like following the week zero and week one games.
2024 College Football Playoff predictions after week 1
Rank | Team | Why they're here | Previous rank |
|---|---|---|---|
1 | Georgia Bulldogs | SEC champ | 1 |
2 | Ohio State Buckeyes | Big Ten champ | 5 (At-large) |
3 | Miami Hurricanes | ACC champ | 11 (At-large) |
4 | Oklahoma State Cowboys | Big 12 champ | 3 |
5 | Texas Longhorns | At-large | 6 |
6 | Oregon Ducks | At-large | 2 |
7 | Utah Utes | At-large | 7 |
8 | Alabama Crimson Tide | At-large | 8 |
9 | Penn State Nittany Lions | At-large | 9 |
10 | Ole Miss Rebels | At-large | 11 |
11 | Clemson Tigers | At-large | 4 |
12 | Liberty Flames | Highest ranked G5 champ | 12 |
With Oregon struggling to score points against an FCS foe but still being unbeaten, I'm going to bump Ohio State into that Big Ten champ spot. At least until I have a reason to really buy in to Oregon again, that is.
Back to the ACC for a moment, right now, I'm not convinced that Dabo Swinney's Clemson Tigers are in a great spot either. Granted, they ran into the buzzsaw that is the Georgia Bulldogs, but they just looked abysmal on offense and sure seemed like an incomplete team.
Meanwhile, the Miami Hurricanes seemed sharp and had no issue dispatching of Billy Napier's Florida Gators to get the season started. I'm going to go ahead and pencil Miami in for that ACC champ spot given how they looked in week one and how nobody else that I expected at the top of that conference has had much fun so far this season.