Tulane’s road trip Saturday to Oxford, Miss., proved frustrating and disappointing just about from start to finish.
But even a 45-10 loss and missed opportunity against No. 13 Ole Miss (4-0) far from removed the Green Wave (3-1) from the potential College Football Playoff equation.
In fact, coach Jon Sumrall’s squad could very well still control its own destiny in that regard with a pair of Power-Four wins already under its belt and a head-to-head date with Memphis (4-0) in November.
“That’s a hurt locker room,” Sumrall said following Saturday’s game. “Those guys have worked really hard, and they know they didn’t perform their best today. And that’s everybody. It’s me. None of us were at our best today. And that really sucks because we missed an opportunity that it was a special one. We’ve got conference play starting next week. That’s pretty special too.
“I already kind of hit on this, but I’ll address with them that conference play is the beginning of a new day, and when you get into conference play, conference championships are one of the biggest goals you have every year. So I think this group will focus and turn our attention towards conference and be ready to attack it and give it everything we’ve got and be ready to go back to work. But I think it comes back to, ‘Hey, what did we not do well. Take your hat off to Ole Miss, good football team, respect ’em. What did we not do?'”
Tulane will focus on correcting its own shortcomings and playing to its potential and allow other chips to fall as they may as a long regular season continues with plenty further twists and turns certainly in store around the country.
But the Green Wave dipped only slightly — from +300 on Friday to +425 on Sunday — in the updated DraftKings odds to earn a College Football Playoff berth this winter.
Tulane entered the weekend with the best odds among Group of Five teams and fell behind only Memphis, whose 32-31 defeat of Arkansas (2-2) was among the other most notable outcomes of Week 4 action.
The Green Wave are scheduled to visit the Tigers on Nov. 7.
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BEST GROUP-OF-FIVE PLAYOFF ODDS
(according to DraftKings)
Before Week 4 After Week 4
Tulane +300 #1 Memphis +350
South Florida +450 #2 Tulane +425
Boise State +750 #3 South Florida +450
Memphis +750 #4 North Texas +600
James Madison +900 #5 Boise State +700
Navy +900 #6 James Madison +750
UNLV +1000 #7 Navy +800
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Three other American Athletic Conference teams among the CFP betting favorites — South Florida (+450), North Texas (+600) and Navy (+800) — are not on Tulane’s regular season schedule in 2025.
But the two teams with the highest winning percentages in league play will face in a conference championship game likely to carry major Playoff implications.
“I think that’s what’s made our non-conference schedule entertaining is it’s as challenging of a Group of Five non-conference schedule probably out there,” Sumrall said last week when discussing the Green Wave’s early-season gauntlet.” I think us and I would say South Florida’s, but we don’t have an FCS game and they do. So I would say we both have really put ourselves in situations where you’re measuring yourself against good people each week.”
Tulane beat Northwestern (Big Ten), South Alabama (Sun Belt) and Duke (ACC) in their first three weeks of the season.
