“We’ve scheduled tough,” Swinney said. “All you can do is play the schedule that you have. It is what it is. We basically have an SEC-Big Ten invitational; that’s basically what we’ve got in college football. So you’ve just got to focus on what you’ve got.”

For that, the conference can thank the 12-team College Football Playoff. Without it, this would be a much different season for the league. Were the four-team CFP still in effect this year, the SEC would likely be one Texas loss from missing the Playoff for the first time in the event’s 11-year history.

After a weekend of college football largely devoid of surprises, the latest College Football Playoff rankings revealed Tuesday looked mostly the same as last week, with the Big Ten and SEC taking eight of twelve playoff berths.