College Football Playoff executive director Bill Hancock cited UCF's strength of schedule on Tuesday when discussing the Committee's decision to leave the undefeated Knights out of the playoff, per Heather Dinich of ESPN.com:
"The selection committee respected UCF. After all, they're the group that put the Knights in the Peach Bowl. To qualify for the playoff, teams need to play tough schedules against good teams—that is the way for all teams to stand out and be ranked high by the committee. UCF is an excellent team, but you still have to take into account who each team played and defeated during the regular season.