Obviously the selection committee weighted very heavily the late-season play. It's been said that in college football it is often more important how you finish the season than how you start, and this is an example.
The Wisconsin game was one of total domination and if you look at the stats and some of the replays you will see that. Everything clicked, passing, running, defense, special teams, whatever. You might see that kind of performance once in every hundred games you played, and done with a QB who had never started a game before for the team. It was obvious this was a team that was peaking at the end of the season and those are the kind of teams you want to see in playoffs and bowl games.
Right. Keep in mind that the playoff is to determine the national champion. If the late-season momentum of a team is disregarded, then there’s a damn good chance that you end up with a team out of the playoffs even though it would have beaten any of the four playoff teams handily.