MADISON, Wis. – After a crazy weekend of action in college football, the Wisconsin Badgers are still within striking distance of making the College Football Playoff at the end of the regular season.
The Badgers held steady at No. 7 in the selection committee’s weekly rankings after their 48-3 win over Illinois - on the outside looking in at the playoff, but still with a chance to make one of the two semi-finals if they win out.
Last week No. 2 Clemson, No. 3 Michigan, and No. 4 Washington all lost on the same day, forcing the committee to re-shuffle what had looked like a pretty stable Top 4. No. 1 Alabama remains entrenched at the top spot, but the committee kept all of the teams that lost this weekend in their top six. Clemson dropped to No. 4 and Michigan held steady at No. 3, with Washington falling to No. 6. Ohio State moved up to the No. 2 spot, and looks like they have a good chance to make the playoff- even if they don't make the Big Ten championship game.
And while they’re not on the inside of that Top 4 at the moment, the Badgers said on Monday that they're not stressing about what the rankings say at the moment. To make the playoff they’ll need to beat Purdue this weekend and Minnesota next weekend to make the Big Ten Championship Game, and a win there over Michigan, Ohio State or No. 8 Penn State might be enough to put the Badgers in the Top 4 – even though UW lost two games earlier this season.
But after seeing what can happen to highly-ranked teams if they lose their focus for too long, the Badgers have said that they’re trying to block out the noise and just focus on this weekend’s matchup against the Boilermakers.
“For me personally ... this week is Purdue week,” senior cornerback Sojourn Shelton said Monday. “This is all we can worry about. You need to control what you can control - I can't control what the committee members rank such-and-such. Right now the goal is to win this week, win Minnesota week ... put ourselves in a position to go to Indianapolis.”
But it’s all noise to the Badgers at the moment, especially since there’s only so much they can control as the rest of the season plays out. So even though having a few teams stumble last weekend might have opened the door a little wider for the Badgers to make a playoff run, don’t expect them to focus too much on where they’re ranked.
“I don’t think it can hurt when other teams are losing that are ahead of us,” junior outside linebacker T.J. Watt said Monday. “At the same time, like I said, (we’re) kind of blocking everything out and just working on our own craft and trying to get better each and every week.”
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John Veldhuis covers Wisconsin football, basketball and recruiting for BadgerBlitz.com on the Rivals.com network. Follow him on Twitter at @JohnVeldhuis.
