How do coaches on non-playoff teams keep their players focused?

Every college football team starts the season with its list of goals. You needn't go any further back than every news conference of every coach at every top-shelf program at every summertime media day to hear the list aloud:

-- Win the division

-- Win the conference

-- Make the College Football Playoff

-- Win the national championship

So, what happens when those goals become impossible as they are eliminated one by one, in reverse, from the top down? What do you do when you're Houston, and before you go to bed Saturday night, you turn on SportsCenter and hear Heather Dinich saying your playoff hopes have been sunk by Navy? What do you do when you're Louisville and you just lost to Clemson by…