That article isn't looking at the picture 100% accurately for WSU.
We "need" Alabama to win out. The SEC is going to get a spot so it might as well be them. A one loss 'Bama team gets in before WSU no matter what. To hell with Georgia. They'll drop behind WSU if they lose to Alabama in the SEC championship. 10-2 LSU isn't going to stay ahead of 12-1 WSU and they might be behind us tomorrow night.
We need two of the three below to occur to get into the playoff.
We need USC to beat Notre Dame. A close loss to Syracuse might keep ND in the conversation but a loss to the Trojans would finish the Irish. Syracuse beating ND by 10+ points might be enough. We'll get enough benefit of the doubt over the targeting controversy to forgive our early loss to USC.
We need the winner of the upcoming OU/WVU game to lose to whomever they face in the B12 championship game.
We need the winner of the Michigan/Ohio State game to lose in the B1G championship to Northwestern. There's an outside shot that we would stay ahead of Ohio State if we crush Arizona and UW in the next couple weeks, but I wouldn't bet on it.
If chaos reigns and ND loses to Syracuse, it will be interesting to see if that's enough to get us ahead of them. At the end of the day, I don't think we'll get enough cards to fall in our favor for us to get into the CFP....and the Rose Bowl is one hell of a consolation prize.