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Last night locked up one of the four spots in college football's first playoff bracket as QB Marcus Mariota led the #2 Oregon Ducks to a 51-13 drubbing of the #7 Arizona Wildcats in the Pac-12 Championship.
With #2 and #7 having played, the rest of the top seven is in action today with the other conference title games. Here's every game in action today:
12:00pm ET
Iowa St. (2-9) at #3 TCU (10-1) - ABC
Houston (7-4) at Cincinnati (8-3) - ESPN
Conference USA Championship: Louisiana Tech (8-4) at Marshall (11-1) - ESPN2
SMU (0-11) at Connecticut (2-9) - CBS Sports Network
Feel free to skip football until later in the afternoon. If ISU can at least get some points early against TCU, that could be watchable. Don't bet on it. And if you're a CUSA fan as I am (and if you are, you should definitely be part of the Underdog Dynasty community...), then the conference championship could be worth your time. But that's about it.
It's thin on NFL talent. Iowa St. TE E.J. Bibbs is their only NFL-legit senior, and he's probably early day 3 material. TCU, despite having put up a fine season this year, isn't a huge NFL draft player this year. Cincy OT Eric Lefeld will be a day 3 factor. And UConn CB Byron Jones is the only other serious NFL prospect, and he's out for the season. Perhaps the biggest prospect though is Cincy RS sophomore Gunner Kiel. I'd be stunned if he declares, but anything's possible.
So yeah, check back in a couple hours from now.
3:30pm ET
Oklahoma State (5-6) at #20 Oklahoma (8-3) - FOX Sports 1
Much better.
| Name | POS | Yr. | School | 3k's Proj. Rd. |
| Dorial Green-Beckham* | WR | RS Jr. | Oklahoma | 1-2 |
| Eric Striker | OLB | RS Jr. | Oklahoma | 1-2 |
* - ineligible for 2014
Remember when Oklahoma had playoff aspirations? Plenty of TSTers do. But three losses to their only three ranked opponents later, here the Sooners are. OSU doesn't have a ton to feed the NFL right now, but Oklahoma's in good position. And my goodness has Samaje Perine had a hell of a freshman season at RB. If you missed it, he went for a record 427 rushing yards (that's not a typo) and five touchdowns last week. That comes after two 200+ efforts earlier in the season. He's gonna be fun.
4:00pm ET
SEC Championship: #1 Alabama (11-1) v.* #16 Missouri (10-2) - CBS
* - to be played at neutral location: Georgia Dome, Atlanta, GA
| Name | POS | Yr. | School | 3k's Proj. Rd. |
| Landon Collins | SS | Jr. | Alabama | 1 |
| Amari Cooper | WR | Jr. | Alabama | 1 |
| Arie Kouandjio | OL | RS Sr. | Alabama | 2 |
| T.J. Yeldon | RB | Jr. | Alabama | 2-3 |
| Shane Ray | DE | RS Jr. | Missouri | 1 |
| Markus Golden | DE | RS Sr. | Missouri | 3 |
It'll be a stiff challenge for Missouri, but Gary Pinkel has done a great job coaching them up this season and getting them through this season with just two missteps. They're playing strong defense and Maty Mauk has, well, he's done enough the last month or so.
I'll update this in a bit with tonight's game and go a bit deeper on the underclassmen. For now, let's football.