What happens if Auburn upsets Texas A&M?

Heading into Week 13, it looks like the SEC Championship Game run could be pretty simple. If all goes well on Saturday, then it will essentially be set up for the Alabama Crimson Tide to face the winner of the highly anticipated showdown between Texas and Texas A&M in the regular season finale.

But what about the 2024 college football season would lead us to believe that we won’t have any chaos thrown into the mix.

Three of the potential SEC contenders, specifically in the College Football Playoff race, are all on the road in Week 13. Texas A&M will be on the road to face Auburn, Alabama will travel to Norman to play Oklahoma, and Ole Miss is in the Swamp against Florida after the Gators took down LSU a week ago.

Make no mistake, A&M, Bama and Ole Miss are all favorites in these games. However, upsets do happen, and if they did in this case, it could throw the SEC Championship Game race and the SEC standings into a bit of disarray and confusion. So let’s go game by game through these three potential upsets to see what would be set up.

Looking at this matchup, you’d probably think Texas A&M would at least be a touchdown favorite, even on the road at Jordan-Hare Stadium. But no, the oddsmakers have the Aggies as just 2-to-2.5-point favorites on the road against Auburn. It looks like there might be more in the cards than we thought, which would cause quite a bit of chaos and put even more pressure on the Aggies.

If A&M loses to Auburn and then loses to Texas in the season finale, that would give us one Texas vs. Alabama matchup in the SEC Championship Game. That in itself is not too crazy. Even if the Aggies win on Saturday in Week 13, that would be the case if they lost to Texas.

What’s more interesting, though, is if Texas A&M loses to Auburn, but then turns around and upsets Texas in Week 14, that would create a Georgia vs. Alabama rematch in the SEC Championship Game. The Bulldogs would sit ahead of A&M in the conference standings based on conference opponent winning percentage.

However, it’s worth noting that if A&M were to lose, while Alabama were also to be upset by Oklahoma, then a win over Texas would be crucial, as it would Georgia vs. Texas A&M SEC Championship Game matchup.

Now, let’s remove A&M for the occasion and focus on the game in Norman in Week 13. Alabama is a 14-point favorite against the Sooners, according to FanDuel Sportsbook as of Saturday morning. Then we all know that anything can happen.

If something happens and Alabama was upset, it would obviously remove the Crimson Tide from the SEC Championship Game conversation, as they would be taking a third conference loss of the season and would need mass mayhem to get to Atlanta with it. And the biggest beneficiary of an Alabama loss would be the Georgia Bulldogs.

With an Oklahoma win over Alabama, that would seemingly put Georgia in the spot currently occupied by Alabama. That means it Georgia would be set up to play the winner of Texas-Texas A&M matchup in Week 14 in the SEC Championship Game. Indeed, that is also the case whether or not A&M beats Auburn on Saturday.

Unfortunately for Ole Miss — or maybe fortunately, depending on what you believe from Lane Kiffin — the roads to the SEC Championship Game are already limited, and perhaps more importantly, a road loss at Florida wouldn’t have too much of an effect on the rest of the SEC race .

Perhaps the biggest ramifications for the Rebels would be for the College Football Playoff. A loss to Florida would make it extremely difficult to justify having Ole Miss in the 12-team Playoff field.