The Must Watch College Football Games of Week 13

November 25, 2017 Off By tailgatesports

The College Football regular season is unfortunately coming to a close. Conference Championships start soon, the list of teams in legitimate contention for the College Football Playoff are beginning to really narrow down, and Colorado Football just has one more game to play before it can finally be put out of its misery. Go CU Basketball.

However, despite it being the third to last week in the regular season, there are still some absolute must watch games this week. I’m going to break down the top 4 cannot miss games of Week 13 from the SEC to the PAC-12, and try, emphasis on try, to accurately predict the scores for these ridiculous matchups. Also, every player playing in these games today should be paid but that’s a rant for a different day.

#1 Alabama Crimson Tide vs #6 Auburn Tigers – 3:30 ET on CBS

This is a no brainer and really the only game you literally can’t miss today. This is not only a massive rivalry game between the two biggest programs in the state of Alabama, but this also could seriously alter the College Football Playoff. With Miami’s loss to Pitt yesterday, Alabama now has a chance to completely secure the #1 seed in the nation. With teams like Georgia and Miami, who were on the Crimson Tide’s heel all season, finally losing opens up the possibility of Alabama staying at #1 until the end of the regular season. Unfortunately, they just have to go through their rival, who is also the 6th seed, and they have to play them at Auburn. What possibly could go wrong?

Well if Auburn does win, and let’s say Wisconsin finally loses or they don’t beat unranked Minnesota by a big enough margin, Auburn could be in the top 4, possibly ranked ahead of Bama. If Alabama does win however, it’s far to say that Auburn’s playoff chances are even worse off than Miami’s. For both sides this is not only a must win game because it’s the Iron Bowl, it’s a must win game if either team wants to be contending for a National Championship this year. Now, Alabama has currently won 3 straight Iron Bowls, with their last loss to #4 Auburn being in 2013 in Auburn, and their all time record in the series being 45-35-1, but since 2013, Auburn has only been a top 6 ranked team once, which was in 2013 the year Alabama lost in Auburn. Since then, Alabama has been either a 1 or 2 seed whereas Auburn has either been a #13 seed (2016), a #15 seed (2014), or simply unranked (2015). So even though Alabama has the most victories as of late, they haven’t been playing an Auburn unit as elite as this year’s.

Auburn 33 – Alabama 30

#3 Oklahoma Sooners vs West Virginia Mountaineers AND #4 Clemson Tigers vs South Carolina Gamecocks – 3:45 ET on ESPN (OK vs WV) and 7:30 ET on ESPN (Clemson vs SC)

The only reason why I combined these two games is because they have the same reason as to why they are significant. With a Miami loss and a possible Alabama loss happening within 24 hours, all of a sudden the top 2 spots in the national rankings are up for grabs, and no one wants them more than the Clemson Tigers and Baker Mayfield and the Oklahoma Sooners. These games will be pretty interesting as Baker Mayfield won’t be a Captain during his senior night and Clemson is facing in-state rivals South Carolina, however I guarantee both Clemson and Oklahoma will win their respective games. Both games are total mismatches vs unranked opponents and there’s too much on the line for either team to mess this up. The goal for these two programs is to win by as much as physically possible to make the best bid for the #2 seed and to of course enjoy a win on their senior nights.

Oklahoma 34 – West Virginia 12

Clemson 43 – South Carolina 6

#14 Washington State Cougars vs #15 Washington Huskies – 8:00 ET on FOX

For the last must watch game of the day we head to the Northwest for another intense in-state rivalry game. This is my favorite matchup of the day. Is it because I’m a HUGE PAC-12 guy? Absolutely, but there’s also a lot on the line for these two middle of the rankings teams. First of all, congrats to Washington St. on surpassing everyone’s expectations for the season, especially playing in an extremely hard division in the PAC-12 North. Mike Leach is a fantastic Head Coach and has completely turned around this program. I can only wish that Colorado would hire a Head Coach half as good as Leach. Unfortunately, the Cougars’ hopes of the College Football Playoff, or even the PAC-12 Championship are completely dead, but they should be Bowl game bound. If they lose today they’ll probably play in a no-name bowl game, but for a revitalized program that used to be at the bottom of the PAC-12 that is actually a great accomplishment. If they win however, they have serious chances of making it to a more significant Bowl game like the Rose Bowl (or they’ll get absolutely disrespected like Colorado Football last year and have to play in a pointless Bowl game like the Alamo Bowl against a underrated team like the Oklahoma State Cowboys and get embarrassed on national TV right around Christmas. Yay). Regardless, it truly is a win-win for this Cougars team, and under the leadership of Leach I can see this program return to the top of the rankings next year.

For Washington, however, this is a must win game. Currently, USC has secured the top spot in the PAC-12 South and has punched their ticket to the PAC-12 Championship. In the North, however, things have yet to be decided. Stanford currently sits atop the division, but the Washington Huskies are only a game out. The tables could easily turn in this division, as Stanford has to hold off #9 Notre Dame while they are only ranked #20 in the nation. Lucky for them they are at home, but Notre Dame can still find a way to get a last minute impressive win and help Washington repeat as champs of the PAC-12 North. In the end I think Washington State’s ELITE shovel pass game will bring home the W. Go Cougars.