Florida football: Here’s what we want to happen this weekend

The College Football Playoff Committee did Florida football a huge favor this week. Now, we need a little help to get us where we want to be.

Never thought, as a Florida football fan, I would be rooting for Georgia.

But, here I am.

After the College Football Playoff Committee released its latest rankings Tuesday night, it became a little clearer what needs to happen for the Gators to earn that New Year’s Six bowl bid.

Now as it stands, the Gators are pretty close to being assured of an NY6 game, but which one depends on a few factors.

First and foremost, if Georgia upsets LSU this weekend in the SEC championship game, it’s a distinct possibility that Florida football heads to New Orleans for the Sugar Bowl.

The reason is that a Georgia win would keep the Bulldogs in the College Football Playoffs and LSU would not likely drop out of the top four, meaning the SEC would have two teams in the playoffs.

Currently, Florida is the third-highest ranked SEC team, meaning it would get the contractual spot in the Sugar Bowl.

There are other ways for Georgia to stay in the top four: If they lose to LSU, it certainly could not be a blowout. Three to seven points is about the margin. In that case, we would want to see Baylor beat Oklahoma to knock the Sooners down and Oregon to beat Utah in the Pac-12 title game to bring the Utes down.

Barring the committee not moving Baylor up to the No. 4 spot, Georgia would likely hold on to the position, keeping Florida in the Sugar Bowl.

The committee could throw a curveball and, if Georgia gets blown out by LSU, the Bulldogs could fall below Florida football in the rankings, keeping the Gators in the Sugar Bowl — but that is a very unlikely scenario.

The next slot for Florida football would be the Orange Bowl. This is a more palatable situation for the Gators.

The Orange Bowl takes the highest-ranked team between the Big Ten, Notre Dame and the SEC. With Notre Dame falling out of the picture, that leaves three teams — Ohio State, Wisconsin and Penn State — in the mix.

In this instance, we would want Ohio State to not just win but blow past Wisconsin in the Big 10 title game. This would leave the Buckeyes in the playoff and likely send the Badgers to the Rose Bowl as the next-highest ranked team in the Big 10.

Florida football would remain the next-highest team from any of the three, thus would get the Orange Bowl bid. But, even if Wisconsin beats Ohio State, it’s not likely the committee drops the Buckeyes below the Gators.

The wild card becomes Penn State and where the committee would rank them after the championship games Saturday.

My gut tells me they won’t move Florida or Penn State as neither of them plays and the committee hasn’t put that much of a premium on strength of schedule. Regardless, Florida football has losses to both Georgia and LSU while the Nittany Lions have losses to Ohio State and Minnesota.

It’s the loss to the Golden Gophers that would hurt Penn State if the committee decides to use the strength of schedule more prominently in their last rankings.

All-in-all, the most likely scenario is Florida football heads to the Orange Bowl where they could face Virginia from the ACC.

Now, I didn’t mention the Cotton Bowl, which would be the third option for the Gators. In order for that to happen, the committee would have to get wild and really shuffle things up in the final rankings — like putting Penn State ahead of the Gators for no real reason I can think of.

Nonetheless, Saturday is still a big day for Florida football, even though we aren’t playing.