It all could’ve been so easy.
No. 4 Southern California could’ve avenged an earlier loss to No. 12 Utah by beating the Utes, claiming the Pac-12 championship and punching a ticket into the College Football Playoff.
If so, the Bowl Subdivision would’ve entered Saturday with almost zero intrigue surrounding the playoff: No. 1 Georgia, No. 2 Michigan, No. 3 TCU and USC would’ve completed the field almost regardless of what happened in the weekend’s larger slate of conference championship games.
But the USC's 47-24 loss brings late-in-the-day chaos to the playoff, setting up a comparison between the two-loss Trojans and No.