ESPN’s Josh Pate Talks LSU-Bama, Ohio State, Miami-Notre Dame & More w/Rich

The College Football Playoff picture is a puzzle with too many pieces, and Josh Pate spent his visit to The Rich Eisen Show trying to fit them together. Lincoln Riley's prepared statement, Ohio State's three-loss problem, a loaded SEC Saturday, a Notre Dame resume that got drained of quality, and a BYU-Utah game that might turn out to be a knockout round for someone else.

The ESPN college football analyst also made his case for why UCLA should lock up Bob Chesney, and why he's thrilled to be heading to South Bend.

Lincoln Riley's Win and His Manifesto

Rich opened by asking whether Riley saved his job by beating Ohio State. "I was happy for them that they got the win. I'm not sure what it changed," Pate said. A win over a team with a backup quarterback, he argued, doesn't erase years of doubts about Riley in big games.

Then there was Riley's postgame prepared statement, which Rich described as "sort of a manifesto in a way to read at all of his haters." Rich said he doesn't even write anything out on Emmy nights, which Pate immediately called a flex. Rich's defense: "It's not a flex, man, if you're the Susan Lucci of sports television."

Pate said his USC friends in a group text hated the speech. "Why is he taking the one time that he's done what he's supposed to do, which is beat big-time competition, and turning it into this referendum on him?" The only thing that would really change Riley's standing, Pate said, is to keep winning and make the playoff.

Ohio State Won't Survive Three Losses

Rich asked whether any team could take a third loss and still make the playoff. "If we have, I don't think it's Ohio State," Pate said.

He expects the Buckeyes to lose at least once more and finish 9-3. The committee, he noted, has shown a willingness to judge teams by injured quarterbacks, "FSU being the most glaring example in 2023." Ohio State would be 3-2 without Julian Sayin, would probably miss the Big Ten title game, and would look like "a pretty ice cold commodity." Texas, maybe LSU, and possibly Alabama are the kinds of teams Pate thinks could survive a third loss.

Alabama at LSU Headlines a Loaded Saturday

Rich laid out the four SEC games that jump off the page: Alabama at LSU, Texas at Missouri, Georgia at Ole Miss and Kentucky at Tennessee. He also joked about how much has changed with Lane Kiffin now at LSU, "two angry fan bases ago."

"Alabama-LSU's just going to be insane," Pate said. Texas-Missouri would have maybe been the biggest game in the country a week ago, and "we could go through this entire conversation and not even touch on it."

The last time Alabama was on the road, at Neyland, "they were a mess, totally discombobulated," Pate said. Both teams are banged up. Pate said he'd been talking to someone down there about the chance of getting their center and Ryan Williams back, calling it an "if you can walk, you're going to be out there" kind of week.

LSU went into its bye red hot, beating Mississippi State and Auburn by a combined score of something like 60 to 18, though Pate noted those are two of the league's three worst teams. LSU's losses aren't an albatross, but the high-quality wins are missing. The opportunity is right there: "Bama, Texas, Tennessee. So get a load of that, boom, boom, boom."

Pate said LSU's quarterback has been carving people up in the pocket, LSU.s home field is a tough place to play "even at 2:30 Central Time," and if Alabama can't protect Russell, "it's going to be a long day for Alabama again."

How Many SEC Teams Get In?

Rich pointed out that eight of the top 19 teams are SEC programs. Pate has been on four SEC playoff teams for a while, with a growing path to five "if all the losses in the SEC kind of fall the right way." The league's top eight all play each other this weekend. "It's almost like it was written that way."

The rest depends on the other conferences. In the Big 12, Pate sketched a scenario where Texas Tech wins out, BYU beats Utah on Saturday and Utah wins a rematch, putting three Big 12 teams in. In the Big Ten, Ohio State and Indiana are in right now, and UCLA is undefeated. How many Big Ten teams make it will shape whether a fourth or fifth SEC team gets in.

Is BYU-Utah a Play-In Game?

Rich asked if BYU against Utah is effectively a knockout game. "Yeah, there is a way," Pate said, but he argued it might matter more for Notre Dame, which doesn't have a conference title to play for.

"Last Saturday was a low-key disaster for Notre Dame," Pate said, even though the Irish beat Navy by three scores. Wisconsin lost handily, and SMU lost to Syracuse, which Pate called "a huge knee capper." Those were supposed to be Notre Dame's ranked wins in case it lost to Miami. "Buddy, the quality got drained out of those data points."

His prediction: the committee would rank Notre Dame several spots lower than the AP poll, which he said "has been drunk for a few weeks on Notre Dame," somewhere around eighth. That makes Saturday the Irish's chance to springboard. Lose to Miami, and "we'll look back at the Brigham Young game and you could very well say, wow, that ended up being a knockout game and we didn't know it at the time."

Should UCLA Extend Bob Chesney?

Rich brought up Bill Simmons insisting on his podcast that UCLA will extend Bob Chesney. "I hope it's true," Pate said, extending the wish to Will Stein and Jake Dickert at Wake Forest. "One of the things I do like is you can win anywhere now. That's been proven."

His one wish is to see Chesney coaching in a Rose Bowl that's more than 50 percent full, which isn't happening yet. And if Chesney ever wanted to leave, where would he go? "You're insane if you leave Bob Chesney's current situation for Florida State," Pate said. Only the biggest of the big, like Michigan or Texas, would make anyone take a second look, and even then he said it's no guarantee. He thinks UCLA is "smartly just trying to get ahead of the whole thing."

South Bend, CJ Carr and a Key to the Game

Pate is heading to South Bend for Friday's show, and for a kid raised in the rural South "taught to hate Notre Dame from birth," it has become his favorite campus. "It's like a movie scene," he said, with Miami coming in for kickoff temperatures in the low to mid 40s. Rich, who remembers Convicts versus Catholics, said he'd love to see the matchup in the playoff too.

Pate's key comes from Dan Orlovsky, whom he admitted to besmirching the week before. Orlovsky said CJ Carr looks capable of more than Notre Dame asks of him, and Pate agreed. Quarterbacks like Billy Edwards have played big games against Miami's secondary, and Darian Mensah and Miami will probably score. "I fully believe Notre Dame's got the offensive juice, if they so choose to use it, to trade points with Miami," Pate said, noting the total is in the mid to upper 50s. "The total's going to be way higher than the air temperature is."

He closed with a story about Dabo Swinney's contract, which he said includes a clause requiring him to pay about 150 percent of his buyout if he leaves for Alabama. Pate texted Orlovsky to ask how 150 percent of something can exist on a scale of one to 100. Rich's verdict: "Well done, Josh Pate."