The Oregon Ducks have a legitimate shot at the College Football Playoffs this season. In this edition of DSA Roundtable staff members A.J. Jacobson, Scott Reed and Dale Newton give their estimates on how likely the Ducks make the playoffs.

Jacobson

The Ducks have a serious shot at the College Football Playoffs with their current No. 3 position in that ranking. I am going to apply some estimates and math to figure out what their odds are. The assumption I make is that if they win out, they go to the playoffs. That means beating Washington State, Utah, Oregon State and winning the Pac-12 title game.

I will start by predicting the odds of winning for each game:

WSU: Home game against a team that always seems to cause the Ducks trouble: 75%

Utah: Road game against a team who can be good: 65%

OSU: Home game they should win but you never know with the Beavers: 80%

Pac-12 championship game: They will be favored but will be facing a good P12 South team: 60%

So given these probabilities and the fact that the Ducks have to win them all to go, I estimate the chance they go to the playoffs at 23.4%

Reed

This is a tricky one, if Oregon wins out, I think that the odds are above 75% that they make the playoffs. They got the help they needed from Purdue and only need one more assist to all but lock in their spot. If Oklahoma loses – which seems probable with a Bedlam matchup later this season – the Ducks would lock in the number 2 or 3 spot by winning out.

But therein lay the rub – winning out. Right now, the Ducks are heavy favorites over Washington State and will be against Oregon State; but their FPI chances against Utah fell to 37.7% following the Utes dominance over Stanford last week. Ye4s, the Cardinal were without their starting quarterback, but the Utes were just that good. While the transitive property has little value in football, a late November trip to high altitude does and is why the Ducks odds of getting to the playoffs are closer to 35-percent.

Newton

ESPN and Allstate's Playoff Predictor has the Ducks at 4% (https://espn.com/espn/feature/story/_/page/cfbplayoffpredictor/cfb-playoff-predictor).

That isn't very high, well below Georgia, Alabama, Ohio State. Oklahoma and Cincinnati, which are all above 50%.

The difference is not East Coast bias but the remaining road to the playoff. The Ducks have four tough games left beginning with upset-minded Washington State on Saturday. The Cougars have won four of their last five and are coming off a bye week.

If the Ducks handle business this weekend they have to beat surging Utah twice sandwiched around the rivalry game. The Utes are always tough, particularly at 4,637 feet.

It's hard to guarantee that Oregon won't have a down week, another devastating injury or an off week from their quarterback in four games without a break. They'll likely encounter more cold weather or slantwise rain.

All their remaining opponents are going to sell out to stop the run and make the Ducks rely on their passing game, which hasn't always been reliable.

I like Oregon to win any one of the games, but winning all four in four straight weeks in November and December is a challenge, probably too much of a challenge. Put the DSA odds at 7.5314%.