The Sooners have reached 8-0 and are one final October game away from the last month of the regular season. The eighth win wasn’t sexy, and it had no sort of style points at all. It may be one of the ugliest wins a major Power Five team has had this season. The Sooners were shut out at halftime and trailed the Kansas Jayhawks by double-digits.

They would eventually turn things around and win the game, but it was simply not pretty. Fortunately, when the polls came out on Sunday, it didn’t reflect too poorly as Oklahoma remained in the top four in the USA Today’s Coaches Poll and the Associated Press Top 25.

CBS Sports still believes that Oklahoma is one of the four most deserving teams to move on to the College Football Playoff, assuming they take care of business the rest of the way.

For most of the afternoon against Kansas, projected No. 2 seed Oklahoma was trailing as a 38-point favorite. The Sooners came back and won by a deceptive 35-23 score, holding on to the second seed in this week’s projections. – Jerry Palm

With the nature of Oklahoma’s wins, their margin for error is razor-thin. While winning ball games in any fashion and winning your conference should matter the most, it’s very likely a loss at any other point this season could derail Oklahoma’s chances to get to the College Football Playoff.

In their projections, Oklahoma would face off against a surging Ohio State Buckeyes team who suffered a loss to likely Pac-12 champion Oregon before finding themselves over the last few weeks. That game would take place at AT&T Stadium in the Cotton Bowl Classic.

The official CFP rankings will first be released Tuesday, Nov. 2, with the final rankings and selections on Dec. 5.

For Lincoln Riley’s Sooners, the path is crystal clear. Win, and they are in. As it stands, the Sooners could face three ranked opponents to finish the season. Win those games and secure a seventh-straight Big 12 championship, and the Oklahoma Sooners will be in the College Football Playoff. Before that happens, though, they’ll set their sites on Texas Tech, needing a bounce-back performance to restore their confidence as they head down the stretch.