Aggies just miss College Football Playoff, will head to New Year's Six bowl game

A seven-game winning streak and a dominant victory over Tennessee wasn’t enough for Texas A&M to earn a place in the four-team College Football Playoff field.

The College Football Playoff committee on Sunday (8-1) denied A&M a chance to contend for the national championship by keeping the Aggies fifth in the rankings.

Alabama was ranked No. 1, followed by No. 2 Clemson, No. 3 Ohio State and No. 4 Notre Dame.

A&M’s consolation prize figures to be an invitation to the Orange Bowl in Miami to face an ACC representative, likely North Carolina, on Jan. 2.

The Aggies’ 34-13 victory over Tennessee closed out a seven-game winning streak to complete the regular season. The last six of those wins were all by double-digit margins.

But A&M could not overcome a 52-24 loss to No. 1 Alabama in the second week of the season.

But A&M coach Jimbo Fisher argued that loss should not have eliminated the Aggies from the field.

“You’re 8-and-1 in the SEC,” he said after the win over Tennessee. “We lost to the No. 1 team in the country. I’d want to see somebody else doing that in this league. We can play with anybody. We do deserve it.”

A&M had been No. 5 in the playoff standings since the initial rankings were announced on Nov. 24.

The Aggies, who defeated then-No. 4 Florida 41-38 on Oct. 10 to start their seven-game winning streak, entered this weekend needing a victory over Tennessee and some help in the Big Ten championship game or the Atlantic Coast Conference championship game to climb into the top four.

A&M did its part with a convincing 34-13 victory over Tennessee and possibly could have benefitted from the results of the Big Ten and ACC championship games.

Ohio State, which has played just six games, struggled to post an unimpressive 22-10 victory over Northwestern in the Big Ten title game.

Also, then-No. 3 Clemson blew out then-No. 2 Notre Dame, 34-10, in the ACC title game.

But those results did not sway the selection committee.