Where Alabama stands in the first College Football Playoff rankings of 2021

The first installment of this year’s College Football Playoff rankings was released Tuesday, and to no surprise, Alabama finds itself squarely in the playoff picture.

The Crimson Tide sits at No. 2 in the initial rankings behind No. 1 Georgia. Michigan State came in at No. 3 while Oregon is in the final playoff position at No. 4. Ohio State and Cincinnati are the first two teams on the outside looking in at No. 5 and No. 6 respectively.

"Georgia was seen as the No. 1 team hands down," College Football Playoff committee chair Gary Barta said. "And then Alabama, even with the loss to Texas A&M, the committee looked at the quality across the board, their strength of schedule, their strong record — we ranked them No. 2, and it was a strong consensus."

Alabama currently has two wins over ranked teams, beating No. 16 Ole Miss and No. 17 Mississippi State. The Tide's only loss was at the hands of Texas A&M, which was ranked No. 14. Alabama will travel to No. 13 Auburn at the end of the month and will face Georgia if it advances to the SEC Championship Game.

Mississippi State is not ranked in either the Associated Press Top 25 or the the USA TODAY Coaches poll. Following the release of Tuesday's rankings, Barta explained that the committee valued the Bulldogs' wins over Texas A&M as well as No. 18 Kentucky and No. 19 North Carolina State over their three losses. Mississippi State being ranked as high as it was contributed to Alabama's No. 2 ranking.

This season’s College Football Playoff semifinal games will be held on Dec. 31. The two designated semifinal bowl games are the Cotton Bowl in Arlington Texas and the Orange Bowl in Miami Gardens, Fla. The national championship game will be held on Jan. 10 inside Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis.

Alabama earned the No. 1 spot in last season’s College Football Playoff, beating No. 4 Notre Dame in the Rose Bowl before taking down Ohio State in the national championship game. The Tide has made the College Football Playoff in all but one of its previous seven years of existence, missing only the 2019 playoff.

The second edition of the CFP rankings will be released next Tuesday (Nov. 9) at 8 p.m. CT on ESPN.