College football winners and losers: How conference title games stand

Clemson? It won’t be making up its canceled game at Florida State on Dec. 12. Notre Dame? It can forget about heading to Wake Forest to play a game originally scheduled for September.

Instead, the ACC made things simple. No. 2 Notre Dame (9-0, 8-0 ACC) is already in the ACC title game, regardless of what happens Saturday against Syracuse (1-9, 1-8). No. 3 Clemson (8-1, 7-1) will secure its rematch with the Fighting Irish if it can win at Virginia Tech (4-5, 4-4) on Saturday night.

Yes, this smooths the playoff path for both Clemson and Notre Dame, at least a little. It also saves Florida State from what would have probably been a historic beatdown on its own field.

But the best short-term reason for the ACC to cut short its regular season is to do everything possible to ensure its league title game is played. Clemson and Notre Dame will not be traveling next week, which can’t help but reduce the risk of virus exposure at least a little.

While No. 10 Miami could still theoretically make the ACC title game (with victories over Duke and North Carolina, coupled with a Clemson loss), there’s a good chance Clemson-Notre Dame, Part II, will be locked in by night’s end. As for other conferences? The push for league title game berths varies.

Big Ten: No. 4 Ohio State (4-0) will claim the East Division with either two victories (the Buckeyes are scheduled to finish with Michigan State and Michigan) or one victory coupled with an Indiana loss. One caveat: Justin Fields and Co. need to play two more games to be eligible. In an appropriately bizarre twist for this season, No. 14 Northwestern (5-1) all but clinched the West when its game against Minnesota this week was canceled. The Wildcats finish with Illinois on Dec. 12.

Big 12: No. 9 Iowa State (7-2, 7-1) can lock up its first conference title game trip with a victory over West Virginia this week. The second spot in the Big 12 championship has plenty of permutations, but No. 11 Oklahoma will get there if it beats Baylor this week and West Virginia on Dec. 12.

Pac-12: If Washington (3-0) and Oregon (3-1) both win this week — the Huskies at home against Stanford, the Ducks on the road against California — their Dec. 12 encounter will decide the Pac-12 North. Washington can effectively clinch with a win and an Oregon loss this week. The two remaining undefeated teams in the South — Southern California (3-0, 3-0 Pac-12) and Colorado (3-0, 2-0) — already had their game canceled. The Pac-12 could be going deep on its tiebreaker list next week if both win out.

SEC: With No. 8 Georgia’s game against Vanderbilt postponed, the math in the East becomes easy. No. 6 Florida (7-1) clinches an SEC title game spot with a victory over Tennessee. It’s a similar situation in the West; No. 1 Alabama (8-0) can close things out with a defeat of LSU on Saturday night since it holds the tiebreaker on one-loss Texas A&M.

American: No. 7 Cincinnati (8-0, 6-0 American) isn’t going to squeeze in more than one more conference game, so the Bearcats have a spot in the AAC title game. No. 24 Tulsa (5-1, 5-0) can claim the other berth with a defeat of Navy this week. That could plausibly set up a two-game series between the Golden Hurricane and the Bearcats — the first Dec. 12 at Tulsa to determine home-field advantage for the title game the following weekend.

Conference USA: The virus snarled the C-USA schedule as much as any league. Some teams have played as many as seven conference games (Texas-San Antonio) and as few as three.

No. 21 Marshall (7-0, 4-0 C-USA) can seal the East Division title with a defeat of Rice on Saturday. The West Division will (hopefully) be settled next week. UAB (4-3, 2-1) locks up the division with a victory over Rice. But it needs to play (and win); otherwise, Texas-San Antonio (7-4, 5-2) will finish with the best conference winning percentage in the division.

Mid-American: The annual cap to #MACtion is the same as ever — a matchup between the East and West division champions. The late-starting league in the Upper Midwest has lost only one game to a cancellation in its four weeks.

Both divisions could get wrapped up this weekend. Buffalo (4-0), suddenly better known because of Jaret Patterson’s 409-yard rushing day Saturday against Kent State, all but clinched the East Division when its game against Ohio (2-1) was canceled. The Bulls have already beaten two other one-loss teams in the MAC East and have played one more game than Ohio.

Western Michigan (4-0) would seal the West with a victory over Eastern Michigan coupled with a Ball State loss to Central Michigan.

Mountain West: Divisional play was scrapped this season, and the Mountain West championship will pair the two teams with the best winning conference percentages.

Boise State (4-1, 4-0) and San Jose State (4-0, 4-0) will be the title game participants if they win out; their game last weekend was canceled for virus-related reasons, and Boise State’s meeting with UNLV on Friday was also called off. Also in the mix: Nevada (5-1, 5-1), Fresno State (3-1, 3-1) and San Diego State (3-3, 3-2).

Sun Belt: It’s still a divisional setup in this Group of Five conference, which had teams playing in early September and did about as well as anyone at squeezing in all of its games (only three conference games will remain after this weekend).

Best of all, the title game is already set. No. 25 Louisiana-Lafayette (8-1, 6-1) clinched the West Division weeks ago, and No. 18 Coastal Carolina (9-0, 7-0) is enjoying a dream season entering Saturday’s visit from No. 13 Brigham Young.

1. Clemson. The Tigers have already used their playoff mulligan, and they head to Blacksburg for a prime-time game to close out the regular season. At most points of the 21st century, that would sound like trouble, but the Hokies have dropped three in a row and were steamrolled in their last outing Nov. 21 at Pittsburgh (which in turn was crushed at Clemson last week). Style points don’t matter for Dabo Swinney’s bunch, but winning does.

2. Ohio State. The Buckeyes are going to be shorthanded against Michigan State after having their game at Illinois canceled last week. The Spartans (2-3) have beaten Michigan and Northwestern but have been a mess in their losses.

3. Texas A&M. The No. 5 Aggies (6-1) can only keep winning and hope someone in the top four (preferably Clemson or Ohio State) trips up in the next few weeks. To do their part, they need to trounce Auburn (5-3) a week after the Tigers were drubbed in the Iron Bowl.

4. Florida. The Gators can sew up the SEC East against 2-5 Tennessee, which has dropped five in a row by double-figure margins. Florida does have some incentive for style points, but it mostly needs to win and remain on course for an SEC title game matchup with Alabama.

5. Brigham Young and Coastal Carolina. Bracket Busters meets college football in this rapidly assembled game. Brigham Young (9-0) is a last-minute substitute for Liberty, which was scheduled to play at Coastal Carolina this week. The winner gets a bit of a rankings boost and preserves its hopes of an undefeated season.

1. QB Kyle Trask, Florida; 2,810 yards, 34 TDs, 3 INTs passing. Was plenty crisp against Kentucky (256 yards, three TDs) and now gets a chance to torch struggling Tennessee. His chances could well come to how he fares in a potential SEC title game against Alabama. (Last week: 1)

2. QB Trevor Lawrence, Clemson; 2,236 yards, 19 TDs, 2 INTs passing; 80 yards, 4 TDs rushing. Safe to say there was no rust last week for Lawrence, who helped the Tigers score 31 points in the first quarter against Pittsburgh and wound up throwing for 403 yards and two scores in his first game in a month. (LW: 2)

3. QB Mac Jones, Alabama; 2,728 yards, 23 TDs, 3 INTs passing. No Crimson Tide quarterback has ever won the stiff-arming statue, but Jones’s chances improved when he torched Auburn for five touchdowns. (LW: 5)

4. RB Najee Harris, Alabama; 893 yards, 17 TDs rushing; 24 receptions for 244 yards. One subtle way to measure the lopsidedness of the Crimson Tide’s 42-13 defeat of Auburn? Harris only touched the ball 13 times in the Iron Bowl rout. (LW: 3)

5. QB Justin Fields, Ohio State; 1,208 yards, 13 TDs, 3 INTs passing; 135 yards, 3 TDs rushing. Plain and simple, the Buckeye star is not getting helped by cancellations. He’s logged only four games to date and will play a maximum of seven before the postseason. (LW: 4)

6. QB Zach Wilson, Brigham Young; 2,724 yards, 26 TDs, 2 INTs passing; 191 yards, 8 TDs rushing. A sentence never before conceived before 2020: This player’s last, best chance to make an impression for the Heisman against a touted opponent comes this week against Coastal Carolina. (LW: 6)