Arizona State deemed worst team to ever make College Football Playoff | Sporting News

Arizona State has more bulletin board material to work with ahead of its quarterfinal College Football Playoff matchup against the winner of Texas vs. Clemson in Austin, Tex. December 21.

ESPN’s Bill Connelly ranked the 52 teams that have qualified for the postseason since its initial iteration a decade ago. Unfortunately for Arizona State, it got the short end of the stick when Connelly ranked Arizona State dead last.

His reasoning was simple: two weeks before the chaos in the Big 12 started to unfold, the Sun Devils barely had a pulse. They only had a 2.9 percent chance of making the College Football Playoff, much less winning a conference title.

Arizona State did more than expected. It not only accomplished both, but it got breakout performances from running back Cameron Skattebo as part of a six-game winning streak between November 2 and last Saturday’s 45-19 rout against Iowa State.

Five of those six wins saw Skattebo rush for over 100 yards and average nearly three touchdowns per week. This included a dominant performance in the Big 12 title game, where he scored two rushing touchdowns and added one through the air from quarterback Sam Leavitt to put the game out of reach.

For a team that was once an afterthought in the Pac-12, the Sun Devils are doing all they can to shock the college football landscape.

The Sun Devils will likely play the underdog role against brand names like Clemson, Tennessee, Ohio State, Oregon, and Penn State.

To them, though, it’s part of the story.

“I really don’t care who we play,” coach Kenny Dillingham said on Bussin’ With The Boys. “I mean, either way, we’re going to be not favored. We’re probably going to be double-digit underdogs in either team versus either squad.”