The Big 12 Will Not Have a Playoff Team, But The Conference Title Race Is Going To Be Awesome

I rattled this off Sunday night, and figured I would take some time to expand on it today. The Big 12 is as wide open a conference as you can get right now. A lot of that has to do with Saturday's wild action with Kansas State (who I gave out at 18-1 to win The Big 12) taking down Oklahoma, and Texas Tech beating Texas. 

Shoutout Dana Beers with an ALL TIME horns down. 

Unreal moment and timing. 

The conference is also off to a wild start in part to Kansas hot start, and TCU looking really strong under Sonny Dykes offense. The Horned Frogs are off to the hot start but have been without projected starter Chandler Morris essentially all year. 

Kansas was picked dead last in preseason polls and TCU was 7th. It's early, but both look really really good. 

On the flip side, Oklahoma was picked 2nd and Texas was picked 4th, each has a conference loss and in just a few short weeks one of the two is GUARANTEED to have a second before Columbus Day as the Red River Shootout is October 8th. 

The Red River isn't the only separation game in the next few weeks. 

Texas Tech or K State will have have a conference loss by Sunday. 

OK State or Baylor will have a conference loss by Sunday. 

On and on it goes … 

My point here is this. Will the Big 12 have a playoff team who runs through the conference undefeated ? Likely not. 

Baylor already lost to BYU in a non-conference game so they have zero wiggle room unless they run through the conference. I touched on one of Texas and Oklahoma will have 2 conference losses very soon. Oklahoma has very little wiggle room already have a loss under their belt and in my opinion needs to run through the Big 12 unscathed to be in the playoff conversation. 

Kansas is a great story , but do you really think they can go 12-0 ? 

The only real true candidate right now to go unbeaten this season is Oklahoma State. Feel however you want about that, The Cowboys are great but going unbeaten is a tall task. 

That essentially eliminates the Big 12 from the playoff conversation. Some Big 12 fans may think that sucks for the conference, and more so fans of Oklahoma and Texas and Oklahoma State have every right to be upset that the playoff is an uphill battle. On the flip side , for college football fans who love competitive games and a, true conference title race this is going to be an AWESOME fall. 

The Big 12 is a true round robin format. 

I really do think the Big 12 Title game will be a matchup of teams with a combined 4 conference losses. There's also a very real possibility that wacky tiebreakers come into play here. Their 100% could be a scenario with more than 2 teams tied for a spot in the title game. Feel free to brush up on all those situations here. 

Every week is going to be a defacto elimination game among the 5-6 maybe even 7 contenders. 

To me, Iowa State, Texas Tech, and West Virginia are the three teams I would be shocked to win the Big 12. Texas and Kansas would surprise me greatly. The rest ? It's anyones ballgame between Oklahoma, TCU, Baylor, OK St, and K State. I can't wait to see it unfold, and if you love college football you should too. 

Reminder … this is how the Big 12 Title Game ended last year . This conference loves chaos and I am here for all of it … ALL OF IT.