College football’s two-loss tier is crowded, messy and, this year, still very much alive in the Playoff picture. With the expanded bracket and tougher conference slates making defeats harder to avoid, a handful of teams carrying two losses still have real paths forward. Others are already fading out of the conversation.
Duke sits near the bottom of the group, and the schedule doesn’t offer much comfort. The Blue Devils still have to play at both No.
1 Miami and No. 14 Wake Forest, and their losses to Georgia Tech and North Carolina make them look like one of the weaker two-loss teams in the bunch.
Cincinnati is in rough shape too. The Bearcats still have No.
6 Utah, No. 8 BYU and No.
18 Houston ahead of them, and their résumé isn’t exactly shouting contender. A narrow escape against Miami of Ohio in Week 3 and a 27-point loss to Arizona leave them looking more like a team headed out of CFP contention than one rising into it.
Virginia Tech has a similar problem. The Hokies have no marquee win to lean on, and losses to Cal and Pittsburgh make the profile hard to sell.
With trips still looming to No. 19 SMU and No.
1 Miami, there’s not much evidence that Tech is about to make a serious jump.
Nebraska, though, is a different kind of frustrating. The Huskers have lost by three points to both Indiana and Oregon, which means they’ve stayed close to top competition. Their road still includes a home date with Ohio State, and they could really use a statement win to strengthen their case.
Iowa’s season has been uneven, but not without bright spots. The Hawkeyes are coming off a loss to Minnesota, and ranked Wisconsin and Northwestern still sit ahead. At the same time, the wins over Michigan and Iowa State remain the kind of results that keep a team in the conversation.
USC is slipping quickly. The Trojans just dropped out of the top 25 after losing to Wisconsin, and the path ahead is brutal: three of their four remaining games come against teams in the top 7 of the latest AP poll.
Missouri has a couple of notable results, but the overall shape of the résumé is working against them. The Tigers were beaten by 28 points by Ole Miss and also lost to Mississippi State. Their best moment so far is a 28-point win over Florida, but with Texas, Georgia and Kentucky still on the schedule, the road back into serious CFP talk looks steep.
Minnesota has some juice after beating Iowa, but the calendar hasn’t gotten any easier. The Golden Gophers still have to go to Indiana and Wisconsin, and they also have home games left against No.
7 UCLA and No. 20 Northwestern.
Florida’s profile is one of the most uneven in the group. The Gators have wins over Texas and Ole Miss, but they also got blown out by Missouri and lost by 19 to South Carolina. With Georgia and Kentucky coming in the next three games, the early shine could fade fast.
Oklahoma State is sitting at No. 24 and still has a real opening. The Cowboys may need to win out, including a victory over No.
13 Texas Tech, but the path isn’t dead. Their Week 2 win over Oregon drew plenty of attention, and the three-point loss to Houston doesn’t damage them nearly as much as the Week 1 loss to Tulsa does.
Even so, the CFP door is still open.
Wisconsin is in a strong position among the two-loss teams. The Badgers are 5-2, and there isn’t a ranked team left on the schedule. Iowa and Minnesota are the toughest remaining opponents, but the wins over USC and Penn State give Wisconsin a sturdy foundation.
Tennessee has a case for being even higher. The Vols beat Alabama by 16 points, and that kind of result matters. Their losses to Texas and South Carolina are real blemishes, but with Kentucky and LSU still ahead, Tennessee still has a solid shot at a Playoff berth.
Ole Miss might have been slotted higher if not for the latest setback. The Rebels just lost to Texas, but wins over LSU and Missouri keep them firmly in the mix. The biggest challenge left is a game with Georgia in Week 10.
Texas has worked its way back into the picture after taking back-to-back losses to Oklahoma and Florida. The Longhorns answered with a win over Ole Miss, and if they handle business and beat LSU in mid-November, their CFP landing spot should look much better.
Alabama remains one of the heavyweight names in this entire group. The Tide absorbed back-to-back losses to Georgia and Tennessee, but they’re still very much in the hunt. Their trip to LSU could go a long way toward showing which team really sits at the top of the two-loss heap.
And then there’s Missouri, which at this point is still riding the energy of an impressive win over Auburn. The Tigers still have Alabama, Texas and Tennessee left, giving them a chance to stack marquee victories quickly. The question hanging over them now: Are Kiffin and Sam Leavitt ready?
In Other News...
Wisconsin Gets A Huge Opening In Iowa Rivalry But One Problem Remains
Wisconsin heads into this weekends trip to Iowa with a chance to do something it has not done in four tries against its rival. Both teams arrive at 5-2, and the Badgers have built their case on one of the nations best run defenses, the kind of strength that usually travels well in a Big Ten game where possessions are precious and field position matters. Iowa, meanwhile, is coming off a loss and has already taken a hit to its backfield, giving Wisconsin a better opening than it might have expected in a series that has often tilted the Hawkeyes way.
Still, the matchup has the feel of another low-scoring slog, which helps explain why oddsmakers have only nudged Iowa ahead. The Hawkeyes remain built for defensive football, and that makes Wisconsins path clear in theory and frustrating in practice: survive the trenches, avoid mistakes and find a way to finally break the streak. The problem is that against Iowa, almost every possession turns into a test of patience, and the Badgers will have to prove their edge on the road before the rivalry turns in their favor. [Read more 🡒]
Wisconsins Quarterback Carousel Keeps Raising An Uncomfortable Question
Since Luke Fickell took over, the quarterback spot at Wisconsin has been anything but stable, and the ripple effects have reached well beyond Madison. A string of departures and injuries has pushed the Badgers into constant turnover at the most important position on the field, while former Wisconsin passers have scattered to new programs in search of better fits and clearer paths to playing time. Braedyn Locke, Cole LaCrue, Mabrey Mettauer and Nick Evers are among the names who moved on, each landing in a different situation with different levels of opportunity.
For Wisconsin, the more uncomfortable part is how familiar this has started to feel. Some of those transfers have found modest success elsewhere, others have seen limited action, and the churn only reinforces how much the Badgers are still trying to sort out the position under Fickell. The current quarterback picture is no easier to project than it was a year ago, and with former options continuing to surface in other places, the question hanging over the program is not just who starts next, but when the revolving door finally slows down. [Read more 🡒]
Kentuckys New-Look Roster Just Got An Encouraging Preseason Sign
The preseason conversation around Wisconsins perimeter game got a little more interesting this week when data analyst Evan Miyakawa released a ranking of college basketball teams with the most elite 3-point shooters on their rosters. In a sport where spacing can change everything, those kinds of lists tend to say as much about a teams ceiling as any early preview, and Wisconsin found itself grouped with some familiar names such as BYU, Kentucky, NC State and West Virginia in the broader top-end discussion.
For the Badgers, it is another reminder that shooting still matters in the Big Ten, especially with the roster landscape shifting before the season. Several of the players highlighted in the ranking, including Milan Momcilovic, Paul McNeil Jr., Finley Bizjack and Eian Elmer, are also being watched as potential 2027 NBA Draft prospects because of their shooting and long-term upside, which only adds to the intrigue around how quickly these teams can stretch the floor when the games start to count. [Read more 🡒]