Very interesting tiebreaker that can be in our favor.

[Concussion Protocol]

Why would Cincy have the tiebreaker over Denver? If three teams have the same record, head to head doesn't count. Not saying you aren't correct, but until you know who each team loses to, you won't know their rankings if they all end up the same.

Conference record?

 

[QuantumMechanic]

Why would Cincy have the tiebreaker over Denver? If three teams have the same record, head to head doesn't count. Not saying you aren't correct, but until you know who each team loses to, you won't know their rankings if they all end up the same.

Here's the 3 team tiebreaker list (it talks about wildcards, but the same rules are used to seed the four division winners):

Three or More Clubs:
(Note: If two clubs remain tied after one or more clubs are eliminated during any step, tie-breaker re-starts at Step One of two-club format. If three clubs remain tied after a fourth club is eliminated during any step, tie-breaker re-starts at Step One of three-club format.)

1. Apply division tie breaker to eliminate all but the highest ranked club in each division prior to proceeding to step 2. The original seeding within a division upon application of the division tie breaker remains the same for all subsequent applications of the procedure that are necessary to identify the two Wild-Card participants.
2. Head-to-head sweep. (Applicable only if one club has defeated each of the others or if one club has lost to each of the others.)
3. Best won-lost-tied percentage in games played within the conference.
4. Best won-lost-tied percentage in common games, minimum of four.
5. Strength of victory.
6. Strength of schedule.
7. Best combined ranking among conference teams in points scored and points allowed.
8. Best combined ranking among all teams in points scored and points allowed.
9. Best net points in conference games.
10. Best net points in all games.
11. Best net touchdowns in all games.
12. Coin toss

So if DEN beats CIN then DEN will have the #1 seed by virtue of step (2) since DEN will have beaten both NE and CIN. At that point you restart the tiebreaker chain between NE and CIN using the two-team version. Head-to-head is inapplicable so you go to conference record. Next in the 2-team version is common games but that's also inapplicable so you go to SoV.

If CIN beats DEN then (2) will be inapplicable because none of NE, DEN, CIN would have beaten the other two and we move to the conference record tiebreaker. If we're tied there we go right to (5) SoV because step (4) is inapplicable because there aren't a minimum of 4 common games between the three teams.

Right now NE is 7-1 in the AFC, CIN is 8-1, and DEN is 6-2. NE and DEN only have AFC games left while CIN has one NFC game left.

 

[moosekill]

So, as I was saying, you don't really know, there are too many unknowns at this point to figure it all out.

 

[New England Pride]

We need a win Sunday night and this will be a little easier to decipher.

 

[PatsGirl2011]

It should have never come to this, but they just need to win a game on Sunday.