Scheduling. At this point in the season, Miss St. is not in the top 8, but they played Georgia pretty well, showing they aren’t that far removed from the upper tier in the SEC, but they don’t get counted because their OOC losses make them (and the conference) look bad. Sure there is the odd tilt with Clemson, which made Clemson look bad this year, but on the whole the top SEC gets highly ranked because they play weak OOC and play each other. This closed system favors them each year and has kept good teams outside the CFP.