Real Kato Blog: College Football 2018 Week 11 Playoff Picture

This week's conference standings breakdown.

Big Ten
It'll be Michigan vs. Ohio state for the East, unless OSU loses to Maryland this week, which is unlikely but not impossible.

Northwestern clinched the West by beating Iowa. At 6-4, they might be the saddest division champion ever, but there's no questioning that they're playing some good football right now. I still don't relish the prospect of Michigan facing them again; there's almost no good that can come of that game.

ACC
Clemson has clinched the Atlantic. Pitt has almost clinched the Coastal; they'd have to lose twice, and Virginia would have to win twice, to change the outcome.

Big 12
It's still looking like a Oklahoma-West Virginia showdown at the end of the year, but other possibilities exist. If Oklahoma somehow loses to Kansas, then there's a possibility of a three-way tie between Oklahoma, WVU, and Texas (since Texas beat Oklahoma). If WVU loses to Oklahoma State (which is very possible), then there's the possibility of a three-way tie between Oklahoma, WVU, and Iowa State (since Iowa State beat WVU). So in all, four teams are theoretically still in the hunt.

Pac 12
In the North, it'll be the winner of Washington State vs. Washington, unless Washington somehow loses to Oregon State, in which case it'll be Washingon State for sure.

In the South, it's still chaos. Colorado and UCLA have 5 losses and are eliminated. The other four teams are still in contention. They have five total conference games remaining collectively, so I had to run a Perl script to tally up the 32 possible outcomes. In 14 scenarios, Utah wins; in 12 scenarios, Arizona State wins; in 4 scenarios, Arizona wins. In one scenario, there's a three-way tie between Utah, Arizona State, and Arizona. In one scenario, there's a four-way tie at 5-4, and I don't know what all the Pac-12 tiebreakers are, but that's the only chance that USC has.

The breakdown is:

- If Utah and ASU win out, ASU wins.

- If Utah wins out but ASU drops either of their remaining conference games, Utah wins.

- If Arizona wins out (beating ASU) and Utah loses to Colorado, Arizona wins.

- If Utah loses to Colorado, ASU beats Oregon, ASU loses to Arizona, and Arizona loses to Washington State, then it's a three way tie if USC loses to UCLA, or a four-way tie if USC beats UCLA.

SEC
Alabama and Georgia, as we knew last week.

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