CINCINNATI -- While burying the Cincinnati Bengals after back-to-back losses might suddenly be the popular thing to do, ESPN's Football Power Index has a word of advice.

Don't.

While the Bengals have pulled off a rather abrupt about-face following consecutive prime time losses to the Texans and Cardinals, the FPI isn't yet ready to throw in the towel on what it still believes will be a special season in the Queen City.

OK, so the Bengals won't go undefeated this season. They won't be a one-loss team, either. But if the FPI's projections stand, their season still will reach heights the franchise hasn't seen in a generation.

Despite the last two losses, it's still looking like AFC Championship or bust.

According to the most up-to-date FPI projections, the Bengals are expected to finish the regular season with a 13-3 record. They also have a 95.1 percent chance to win the AFC North, even after seeing their division lead shrink to two games with Sunday night's loss at Arizona. The FPI gives the Bengals 99.8 percent odds to make the playoffs. Only the undefeated Patriots and Panthers have better odds of doing that.

It isn't only in the regular season where the projections favor the Bengals. The FPI believes they can make noise in the playoffs, too.

The FPI is currently giving Cincinnati an 86.4 percent chance to reach the divisional round of the playoffs; something that hasn't happened for the organization since long before Marvin Lewis took over as head coach. The Bengals also hold a 51.4 percent projection to reach the conference championship game. Naturally, their likely opponent would be the Patriots. And with New England rolling and not appearing as if it will string multiple losses together during the stretch run, it seems like a foregone conclusion that the title game would be held at Gillette Stadium in this scenario.

Quite simply, the Patriots would have the highest seed in the AFC. Not far behind? The Bengals.

Of the three AFC teams most in the mix for the top two seeds, the Bengals and Patriots are most favored to make it to the conference's title game. In the FPI version of that matchup, the Patriots hold overwhelming odds to win and advance to the Super Bowl.

When it comes to seeding, the FPI doesn't have the Bengals dipping too far below the No. 2 spot. They have a 55.7 percent chance to grab the No. 2 seed, which is the highest percentage. Next on the list was the No. 3 seed at 28.1 percent.

All of this is to meant to simply suggest the sky isn't falling in Southwest Ohio and Northern Kentucky. Yes, the Bengals will want to avoid dropping a third straight on Sunday, when they play the Rams, but the advanced metrics aren't expecting that to happen. The projections say a run to the conference title game is still very much a possibility, even after the sting of recent defeats.

http://espn.go.com/blog/cincinnati-bengals/post/_/id/20241/bengals-patriots-afc-championship-fpi-espn-projected-reach-despite-losses