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Alabama, Clemson, Notre Dame and Michigan hold steady in CFP

<p>For the record, the Citrus Bowl is still the most likely destination for Penn State, a Jan. 1 game in Orlando against an SEC squad.</p><p>But there&#8217;s still some football to played, and the latest College Football Playoff rankings have the Nittany Lions still alive for an at-large bid to a New Year&#8217;s Six bowl.</p><p>This past weekend went well for Penn State on the national landscape, leading to the Lions jumping up a full six spots to No. 14 in the committee&#8217;s latest top 25, which was released Tuesday night.</p><p>While the top 10 teams all remained the same from last week &#8212; a first in the four-plus years of the Playoff &#8212; losses in the 11-20 spots by Kentucky, N.C. State, Mississippi State, Boston College and Michigan State all benefited Penn State.</p><p>As it is, the Lions are now the second-highest three-loss team in the rankings, one spot behind Florida but one ahead of Texas.</p><p>One of the reasons for the high ranking is that Penn State&#8217;s schedule has remained strong in most metrics, a point that James Franklin brought up on Tuesday when asked why the Lions have struggled to score points since the end of September.</p><p>&#8220;Part of that is we play pretty good competition,&#8221; the Lions coach said at his weekly press conference. &#8220;I think we played the seventh toughest schedule in the country. And we had a stretch there that was pretty challenging. So sometimes it&#8217;s us that we gotta be better. There&#8217;s no doubt about it from a scheme and from an execution standpoint on offense, defense and special teams. But part of it, too, we played some of the better teams in the country over a four-week period of time.&#8221;</p><p>So what&#8217;s the Lions&#8217; path to a third-straight bid to a marquee bowl, possibly the Peach Bowl in Atlanta?</p><p>It&#8217;s not a simple one. Or a likely one.</p><p>On top of finishing 9-3 by beating Rutgers on Saturday and Maryland a week later, the Lions must root for the top teams to stay on top and for the next tier of teams to stumble.</p><p>A tidy Playoff bracket of Alabama, Clemson, Notre Dame and Michigan would be the easiest to sort through &#8212; no automatic bids being claimed by a surprise conference champion such as Northwestern or even Pitt.</p><p>Likewise, pulling for Washington State to win the Pac-12 would mean that conference would get just one bid with the Cougars heading to the Rose Bowl against, most likely, Ohio State.</p><p>The Sugar Bowl is locked into an SEC-Big 12 matchup &#8212; Georgia vs. Oklahoma in this scenario. That leaves two bowls left that have no conference tie-ins, the Fiesta and the Peach. Undefeated UCF is in line to take one of those spots, likely the Fiesta because the Knights played in the Peach last winter.</p><p>Two-loss LSU is also a favorite to grab an at-large bid with a No. 7 ranking. The Tigers do, however, have a trip to Texas A&amp;M in two weeks, but a loss there may not drop them below Penn State.</p><p>That would leave two at-large spots open for the likes of No. 9 West Virginia, No. 12 Syracuse, No. 13 Florida, No. 14 Penn State, No. 15 Texas and No. 16 Iowa State.</p><p>West Virginia has only one loss but must finish up against Oklahoma State and Oklahoma, possibly playing Oklahoma twice with a rematch in the Big 12 title game. Two-loss Syracuse plays Notre Dame on Saturday.</p><p>Florida closes with Idaho and Florida State. Of concern to Penn State is that Texas and Iowa State play each other on Saturday, meaning the winner could easily leap the Lions.</p><p><strong>No timetable for Johnson</strong></p><p>Penn State played six wide receivers against Wisconsin on Saturday. Five of them had freshman eligibility.</p><p>A major factor for that is injuries, most notably a lingering lower-body ailment for starter Juwan Johnson, who has missed parts of the last four games and was not dressed for the last two.</p><p>&#8220;Juwan, obviously, is fighting through some things,&#8221; Franklin said. &#8220;Juwan&#8217;s been through things like this throughout his career and throughout his life. And our team has been awesome with him. Very talented guy. He&#8217;s flashed some brilliance at times.</p><p>&#8220;But we&#8217;ve got to get him healthy. And once he&#8217;s healthy, he&#8217;ll be able to go out there and contribute at a very high level and we need him. But like I&#8217;ve talked about all year long, got tremendous faith in Juwan, got a lot of love for Juwan. But we&#8217;ve just got to get him 100 percent healthy so he can go out and be the type of player we know he can be. And when will that be, again, I&#8217;m not going to speculate.&#8221;</p><p>Less clear is the status of fellow junior Brandon Polk, who had been a starter for most of the season before dropping to second team against Michigan and third team against Wisconsin, based on pregame drills.</p><p>Asked if Polk was in the same situation as Johnson, Franklin said, &#8220;It&#8217;s hard to say the same, because there&#8217;s a hundred variables that go into it. But similar. There&#8217;s some similarities there, yes.&#8221;</p><p>The Lions went with senior DeAndre Thompkins and true freshman Jahan Dotson as starters on the outside last week with redshirt freshman KJ Hamler in the slot.</p><p>The second-team group had redshirt freshman Cam Sullivan-Brown and true freshman Justin Shorter on the outside with redshirt freshman Mac Hippenhammer in the slot.</p><p><strong>McSorley recognized</strong></p><p>Quarterback Trace McSorley was named a finalist for two national awards on Tuesday &#8212; the Pop Warner National College Football Award and the Johnny Unitas Golden Arm Award.</p><p>Only upperclassmen are eligible for the honors, both of which factor in off-field accomplishments as well on-field results.</p><style>
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<div class="neCaption">Penn State coach James Franklin trumpeted his team&#8217;s strength of schedule on Tuesday, one of the main reasons the Nittany Lions jumped six spots in the latest College Football Playoff rankings. </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo0>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/web1_AP18314745295857.jpg</photo0><caption0>Penn State coach James Franklin trumpeted his team&#8217;s strength of schedule on Tuesday, one of the main reasons the Nittany Lions jumped six spots in the latest College Football Playoff rankings. </caption0><photoCredit0>Chris Knight | AP photo </photoCredit0></div></div>
<div class="metaInfo"><bylineMeta><p>By Derek Levarse</p><p>dlevarse@www.timesleader.com </p></bylineMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><factboxMeta><p style="text-align: center;"><strong>UP NEXT</strong></p><p style="text-align: left;">Penn State at Rutgers</p><p>Noon, Saturday, BTN</p></factboxMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><shirttailMeta><p>Reach Derek Levarse at 570-991-6396 or on Twitter @TLdlevarse</p></shirttailMeta></div>

Penn State moves up to No. 14, still alive for invitation to a New Year’s Six bowl