CFP Committee chairman Gary Barta says there has been 'a lot of discussion' regarding number of games played

This college football season has been unlike any we’ve seen, especially when it comes to games played and how that’s factored in with regards to the rankings.

There’s already been some displeasure with Ohio State and how they’re at No. 4 in the latest College Football Playoff Rankings despite only having played in four games. The same goes with Georgia as they’re at No. 8 but have only beaten teams with a combined 12-29 record.

On the CFP show on ESPN, CFP Committee Chairman Gary Barta spoke about the hot topic of the number of games that a team plays and how it’s evaluated:

“As everybody knows, we did not have an additional game to evaluate so the last game we watched was a good win over Indiana,” said Barta. “A lot of discussion about the number of games that a team plays. It’s not anybody’s fault, but trying to evaluate a team that has four games in vs a team that has 7, 8, or 9 games in is definitely a problem, and it’s created by the pandemic. The more games a team brings to the Committee, the more we have to evaluate.”

After that, Barta spoke about the committee’s decision to have the Buckeyes at No. 4 and the Texas A&M Aggies at No. 5:

“It was talked about a lot, specifically talked about in the room about whether Ohio State goes to No. 4 or Texas A&M flips and goes to No. 4 and Ohio State goes to No. 5, a lot of discussion about that,” explained Barta. “At the end of the day, Ohio State’s offensive firepower, all the weapons they have, the win over Indiana. And then, we did have an additional game to evaluate for Texas A&M…At the end of the day, the Committee just decided that Ohio State was still a better team than Texas A&M and deserved to be No. 4, but definitely, a lot of discussion about the number of games played.”

This will no doubt be a talking point again for the next few weeks as a new edition of the rankings come out every Tuesday.