Would 9-3 get Kentucky into the 12-team CFP?

This year marks the beginning of the 12-team playoff era in college football. Whether that actually expands the pool of teams capable of winning a national title or not - likely, NIL did more for that - remains to be seen. But playoff expansion certainly makes the debate over the sport's postseason that much more exciting.

For Kentucky, there's a major question we should ask this year but really in the big picture: Would 9-3 be good enough to get Kentucky into the playoff?

There will be some out there whose first response is, "They're not going 9-3! Not against that schedule!" And maybe not. But still, in the big picture, the expansion of the playoff has led to the creation of a new potential benchmark for the program.

Stoops got the program to 10 wins twice. The next step is no longer winning the East. With Kirby Smart at Georgia, that's a good thing for Stoops. The next step would be finding a way to squeak Kentucky into that 12-team playoff.

Most of the teams that make the playoff are going to have double-digit win totals.

The 12 spots are reserved for the five highest-ranked conference champions and then the next seven highest-ranked teams in the country.

For our purposes here, we will imagine that Kentucky will not be SEC champions under a playoff scenario. It's not impossible, but with Georgia, Alabama, and others in the league, an at-large bid is always going to be the most likely path.

So the most realistic big picture question we can ask about Kentucky, as it relates to the playoff, is whether nine wins will be enough this year, or ever, to get UK into the event.

The answer is a simple and unsatisfying "maybe".

We could dig back into many seasons in the past for a more precise answer, but what you need to know for now is that, sometimes, 9-3 would put Kentucky into the playoff and sometimes it wouldn't. Just like sometimes 9-3 would have put Kentucky into a New Year's Six bowl, but the way it worked out in 2018 and 2021 was that the Cats were just barely on the outside looking in.

The 2018 team would have had the best case for the playoff on the strength of its quality wins.

If the 2023 team were to somehow manage a 9-3 record one would have to imagine Kentucky would be a very strong playoff contender. Because if Kentucky only loses three games, that means Kentucky likely has: 1) No bad losses, and 2) Some really quality wins.

The fact that Kentucky competes in the new 16-team SEC means there will always be opportunities for marquee victories, and 9-3 would likely mean that Kentucky would have some combination of wins against elite programs armed with lofty rankings.

Here's what a 12-team playoff would have looked like in 2023, with an emphasis on the resumes of the teams that would have made the event:

(5) Florida State vs (12) Liberty in Tallahassee

Florida State was the lowest-ranked Power Five conference champion at the end of the season and Liberty would have been the last at-large playoff selection based on their ranking.

(8) Oregon vs (9) Missouri in Eugene

(6) Georgia vs (11) Ole Miss in Athens

This proves there will still be plenty of debate. Expanding postseason tournaments does not eliminate debate. It only shifts the focus of the debate. Georgia could have won the national championship last season and only had one loss, by three, to Alabama. But because the Bulldogs did not win the SEC, they would have been seeded no higher than sixth. That's a tough draw for No. 11 and also a tough draw for the team in the next round.

(7) Ohio State vs (10) Penn State in Columbus

The teams with byes would have been: (1) Michigan, (2) Washington, (3) Texas, (4) Alabama.

Now here's a look at the regular season resumes for all of those teams, so you have an idea for the ballpark Kentucky needs to shoot for in terms of resume if 9-3 is to ever allow for the playoff:

1. Michigan (13-0)

Michigan had a perfect 13-0 record going into the playoff. The Wolverines had wins against No. 2 Ohio State, No. 9 Penn State, and No. 18 Iowa. That's not a "lot" of top-25 wins but the Wolverines were undefeated.

2. Washington (13-0)

Washington entered the playoff unblemished at 13-0 as well. The Huskies had plenty of close calls but did have wins against Oregon when the Ducks were ranked No. 5 and when they were ranked No. 8. They also had wins against No. 10 Oregon State, No. 13 Utah, and No. 24 USC.

3. Texas (12-1)

The Longhorns entered the playoff 12-1 with wins against No. 3 Alabama, No. 19 Oklahoma State, and No. 24 Kansas. They did have a loss going in, a 34-30 defeat at the hands of unranked Oklahoma. The fact that Texas won at Alabama counted for a lot.

4. Alabama (12-1)

Like Texas, Alabama was 12-1 going into last year's 4-team playoff and would have been seeded fourth in the 12-team format we see this year. Alabama had wins against No. 1 Georgia, No. 13 LSU, No. 15 Ole Miss, and No. 17 Tennessee. The Tide's only defeat came at the hands of Texas but that was a home game.

5. Florida State (12-1)

Jordan Travis' injury overshadowed what FSU did last year but the Seminoles were a perfect 13-0 and left out of the playoff. They would have been the No. 5 seed in this year's format. Florida State had wins against No. 5 LSU, No. 15 Louisville, and No. 16 Duke with no losses.

6. Georgia (12-1)

UGA was a controversial omission last year but there were lots of teams in the conversation. Georgia was 12-1 and its only loss was by 3-points to playoff team Alabama. UGA had wins against No. 10 Ole Miss, No. 14 Missouri, No. 20 Kentucky, and No. 21 Ole Miss. It won't be surprising to routinely see the SEC's No. 2 team in that 5-6 spot as a nightmare selection for an opponent.

7. Ohio State (11-1)

The Buckeyes' only defeat in the regular season came at the hands of then-No. 3-ranked Michigan, 30-24. So it's a similar story for OSU compared to UGA last year. The Buckeyes had wins against No. 7 Penn State and N o. 9 Notre Dame but there weren't many impressive wins after that. The fact that an 11-1 Ohio State team would be the 7th playoff team in the 2024-beyond format is a bit of a sobering reminder for programs like Kentucky: There won't be many realistic at-large spots available most years. There's still a small margin for error.

8. Oregon (11-2)

Oregon couldn't beat Washington last year. That's why the Ducks were on the outside looking in during the last season of the four-team era. Both losses came to Washington, ranked No. 2 in the CFP rankings. Both losses were by three points, too. Oregon had wins against No. 13 Utah, No. 15 Oregon State, and No. 19 Colorado, but that means the Ducks would have been in the 12-teamer with zero top-10 wins. That tells you that you'll be able to get into the playoff without what would be classified as an "elite" win.

9. Missouri (10-2)

Missouri's losses last year were against No. 1 Georgia (30-21) and No. 23 LSU. The Tigers would have made the playoff because they won 10 regular season games and had victories against No. 14 Tennessee, No. 15 Kansas State, and No. 24 Kentucky. So the lesson here is that 10 wins with none against top-10 teams could still be enough.

10. Penn State (10-2)

Penn State only had one ranked win a season ago. They beat No. 24 Iowa in the first month of the season but subsequently lost to Ohio State and Michigan by eight and nine points, respectively. The Nittany Lions did run a bulldozer over most of the other teams on their schedule, but there's good news here: Penn State would have been a 12-team playoff team with a single ranked team, and that team wasn't even inside the top-20.

11. Ole Miss (10-2)

Ole Miss got to 10-2 very differently than did Penn State. Its loss to an elite team was much uglier: 52-17 at the hands of Georgia. But the Rebels had more quality wins than the Lions, with victories against No. 13 LSU as well as No. 24 Tulane. Ole Miss did show some dominance against the less impressive parts of its schedule so that has to be factored in as well.

12. Liberty (13-0)

If Kentucky is on a quest for the playoff and is having a special season, a program like Liberty could be a thorn in its side and a spoiler. Going through a smaller conference like that is a completely different experience than enduring the SEC grind, but the way the rankings work, they might sneak onto the back half as an undefeated or even maybe a 12-1 team at times.

The lesson from 2023 is that 9-3 for Kentucky probably wouldn't be good enough most years but because the Cats are in the SEC, if they pull a major win or two, it's no outside the realm of possibility.