Alabama will cover against Georgia on Saturday, The Post’s Howie Kussoy predicts.
Next season, the 12-team College Football Playoff will debut, which means that conference championship games will never mean so much again.
Thank goodness.
It is ridiculous that in 2023 we face the possibility of Texas (11-1) claiming its first Big 12 title in 15 years — in addition to owning the nation’s most valuable win of the season (at Alabama) — and being excluded from the four-team field, potentially at the expense of the Crimson Tide. There is a chance Florida State (12-0) barely squeaks by Louisville and the undefeated ACC champion is left out for the sin of underwhelming in two games without its starting quarterback. It is also possible that top-ranked Georgia (12-0) loses to Alabama and still gets a chance to three-peat.
Maybe the committee will get lucky and end up with a clear-cut top-four. It could feature only undefeated teams (Georgia, Michigan, Florida State, Washington) or power conference champions with fewer than two losses (Georgia, Michigan, Oregon, Texas).
It likely will not be an easy process without Alabama going down in the SEC Championship, but for once, that isn’t hard to envision.
Georgia’s 29-game winning streak is the longest in SEC history. Its 24 weeks atop the AP poll ranks second-best all time. The Bulldogs have defeated six top-10 teams during their streak. They passed their three toughest tests this season (Ole Miss, Missouri, Tennessee) with a 24-point average margin of victory.
But Georgia’s streak obscures how incredibly vulnerable it has been on several occasions. This season, the Bulldogs were on the verge of upsets to South Carolina, Auburn and Missouri. Last season, Georgia was extraordinarily lucky to escape its semifinal against Ohio State with a win.
Georgia’s most recent loss came in the 2021 SEC Championship, when the undefeated, top-ranked Bulldogs were beaten convincingly by Alabama.
