The irony is so perfectly profound, it’s almost as if someone in the great gridiron in the sky is moving the puzzle pieces.
With a sick sense of humor.
A year after whining and moaning about Indiana’s viability in the College Football Playoff race, after spending the entire offseason badgering the CFP selection committee into focusing more on strength of schedule, the SEC now has its own one-loss, historically lovable loser trying to crash the joint.
Without a resume to show for it.
Vanderbilt, meet Indiana, 2024. And never the twain shall be compared, if the SEC has anything to do with it.
Because what was once a hill to die on, has now become an exit ramp to avoiding all of that CFP traffic. Don’t believe what your eyes tell you, everyone.
Just look at the record. The ― I can’t believe I’m writing this after the SEC’s tantrum last November ― wins.
Hell, Vanderbilt nearly lost Saturday afternoon to Missouri, which lost its starting quarterback in the middle of what can only be described as a game of two teams who think they’re playoff worthy, but aren’t.
Indiana won 11 games and beat one team with a winning record in 2024, yet was awarded one of the seven precious at-large CFP spots. Vanderbilt, if it finishes the regular season with an 11-1 record, will have beaten (maybe) one ranked team — depending on how the seasons at LSU and Tennessee unfold.
Before we go further, I recognize the overall schedule Vanderbilt will have faced is more difficult than what Indiana went through. But to be fair the Hoosiers, they beat the ever-loving crap out of everyone they played, with the exception of Ohio State.
Vanderbilt is winning one-possession games.
Indiana had brash and boorish coach Curt Cignetti telling everyone to go suck it. Vandy has calm and stoic Clark Lea, the Mr. Clean of college football.
“They fought down the stretch,” Lea told the ESPN sideline reporter moments after yet another Vandy gut-check win. “If we can build off this, there’s a lot to learn.”
If that doesn’t make you want to root for the program that has never won the SEC championship, never won 10 games in a season, and isn’t that far behind Indiana in the annals of suck, I don’t know what will.
Indiana has more losses (715) than any other program in Division I history. Vanderbilt (671) is close in the Crimson wake.
Indiana did what it was told it had to do in 2024 to reach the CFP, and then got blasted for doing it. So if I was a card-carrying member of the you’ve got to be kidding me club then (I was), I can’t very well back off now.
Because you better believe the narrative from the SEC is going to be wins, wins, wins — when last year with Indiana, it was some good losses are better than wins. It’s almost like we were all living through our own Animal Farm.
All college football games are equal, the great George Orwell wrote, but some college football games are more equal than others. Or something like that.
Forget that Alabama last year lost three times as a double-digit favorite, the last by 21 points to the worst Oklahoma team in three decades — with a spot in the CFP on the line.
Or that Ole Miss lost to a putrid Kentucky team at home, then lost to a reeling Florida team (that nearly fired its coach) — with a spot in the CFP on the line.
Then, when those arguments didn’t hold water, the SEC shifted to South Carolina, whose resume was no better than Indiana’s. But the Gamecocks, everyone, were the “hottest team” in college football.
Absurd. All of it.
So now we’re going to hear the SEC spin of Vanderbilt beating South Carolina when the now five-loss (and counting) Gamecocks were ranked. And beating LSU when the Tigers — who have beaten no one — were ranked.
Or the gutty, gritty win against No.15 Missouri, which lost its starting quarterback early in the second half and wasn’t the same thereafter. Frankly, Missouri hasn’t beaten anyone either.
“That’s a really good Missouri team,” Lea said after the game.
Of course it is, because it’s on the Vanderbilt schedule. And from here moving forward, everyone on the Vandy schedule is or was world beaters.
Which brings us all the way back to Indiana, this season’s bully on the block. A year after fighting weekly for his team that played no one, Cignetti has the best team in college football.
They’ve left no doubt in big games, and if all goes as planned, will be playing Ohio State in the Big Ten championship game for the No. 1 seed in the CFP. Meanwhile, the SEC will be fighting for Vanderbilt to reach the big show, highlighting those wins against teams that were better when the Commodores beat them.
Really, they were.
What a wicked sense of humor from the college football gods.
Matt Hayes is the senior national college football writer for USA TODAY Sports Network. Follow him on X at @MattHayesCFB.