ESPN's Brad Edwards, a numbers guru, provides a nice preview of what the BCS standings would look like if they were released this week, instead of next Sunday.
His conclusion? He writes, "[It] feels like the national title hunt is already down to just three conferences and Notre Dame."
That's the Pac-12, SEC and Big 12 plus the Fighting Irish, who play Stanford on Saturday and USC on Nov. 24.
He projects that if the national title game were played tomorrow, it would be Alabama vs. Oregon.
He also projected that Oregon State would rank ninth, USC 11th and Stanford 12th in the standings.
Oregon fans surely will like the sound of that.
The question then would be if Oregon wins out and stands as the 13-0 Pac-12 champion on Nov. 30, are the Ducks certain to be in the title game?
Maybe. Perhaps even probably. But maybe not, too. Writes Edwards:
The Mountaineers or Irish probably would have a computer edge on the Ducks, so they can't be counted out of the race, but they'll need style points to close that poll gap.
So, Oregon fans, assuming the SEC is going to put its champion in the title game, you probably should root for Notre Dame to lose, and it would boost your standing if that happened to Pac-12 teams, by the way.
And, as cool as Geno Smith is, you might want the Mountaineers to slip, too.