Hunter Yurachek reveals why Notre Dame is ahead of Alabama in third College Football Playoff rankings

Following last week’s loss to Oklahoma, Alabama dropped down to No. 10 in the third College Football Playoff Top 25 rankings. That meant the Crimson Tide fell behind Notre Dame, and CFP committee chair Hunter Yurachek explained why.

Both Alabama and Notre Dame have two losses on the year, as well as long winning streaks. The Crimson Tide won eight in a row following a season-opening loss while the Fighting Irish extended their win streak to eight with last week’s victory.

But Yurachek said the quality of opponent in those losses was the difference. Alabama’s losses came to a now 5-5 Florida State team and ranked Oklahoma, while Notre Dame lost to Texas A&M and Miami – which are both ranked.

“We probably spent more time in our committee room comparing two or three teams at that band with Oklahoma, Notre Dame and Alabama. … Alabama had that string where they had four really strong wins at Georgia, against Vanderbilt, Missouri and Tennessee,” Yurachek told reporters on a Tuesday teleconference following the reveal show. “Then, you look at Notre Dame, they’ve got a win against Southern Cal and a dominating win against a Pitt team that was ranked in our Top 25.

“Really, when you break these teams down and the comparison [between] Notre Dame and Alabama, Notre Dame has two losses to teams that are within the Top 13 – a three-point loss against Miami to start the season and then a one-point loss against Texas A&M. Alabama, obviously, has the two-point loss at home last week to Oklahoma, but they had that loss at the beginning of the season, 31-17, at Florida State – a team that’s now 5-5. Florida State was up in that game 24-7 and they held to Alabama to less than 100 yards rushing in that game. That, really, was a sign of some of the struggles Alabama was going to have rushing the ball.”

Yurachek noted Alabama’s issues in the run game during his assessment of the Crimson Tide to this point. Their 108.7 rush yards per game rank 14th out of the 16 SEC teams this year, and it became apparent again in the last two games.

But the evaluation as a whole came down to the losses. That’s why Notre Dame was at No. 9 and Alabama was at No. 10 in the latest College Football Playoff rankings, Yurachek said.

“You go back and look at Alabama’s game against South Carolina where they score two touchdowns late to win that game and then, the next game against LSU, where they won both of those but didn’t rush the ball for 100 yards,” Yurachek said. “And again, against Oklahoma, was not able to run the ball on the ground. So you think you look at the games that Alabama has struggled in, starting the season against Florida State where they struggled to [run] the ball.

“They’re two really good 8-2 teams. But you look at the losses of Notre Dame vs. the losses of Alabama, and that was really one of the defining metrics that we used.”