I don’t think they could use the schedule quality against BYU, though. Our schedule (five PAC 12 teams, one Big XII team, one ACC team, and Boise State) would be comparable to an average P5 schedule.

But that last weekend of conference championship games would kill our playoff chances almost every year. Like you said, we’d need two or three of our wins to be over top-level competition. I agree with you, we’d need USC to win their other games, including over Notre Dame and Oregon. And we’d need Baylor and/or Virginia to make surprising runs to their championship games. It would’ve also helped if we gave Boise State their only loss, but it’s way too late for that now.

But any SEC team with fewer than three losses would make the playoffs over BYU, as would some other traditional P5 powers.