The day is upon us: Selection Sunday! We’ll have our 12-team College Football Playoff field punctuated by the college football playoff selection committee, but in the name of irresponsibility, let’s project how they may select the matchups in the first ever 12-team playoff bracket.
Our College Football Playoff Bracket Projection takes into account all the same criteria that the committee is expected to use as their guiding light.
12-Team College Football Playoff Bracket Prediction
- No. 1 — Oregon Ducks
- No. 2 — Georgia Bulldogs
- No. 3 — Boise State Broncos
- No. 4 — Arizona State Sun Devils
These four teams have earned their right to not only play in the College Football Playoffs by winning their conferences, but they also are the leaders in the clubhouse to receive the illustrious first-round bye week.
Oregon punched their ticket weeks ago by finishing as the only undefeated school in the FBS, while their shootout with Penn State only solidified their No. 1 ranking at 13-0 this year.
Georgia — without starting QB Carson Beck for the second half — took care of business in overtime against Texas and will almost certainly be granted the No. 2 spot ahead of Boise State and Arizona State. The Bulldogs have two losses, compared to Boise’s singular loss to Oregon, but the committee has shown what they think of multi-loss SEC teams since the first iteration of the rankings.
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Boise State handled nemesis UNLV as they have since the 1970s, in dominant fashion, to win the Mountain West Championship. What felt like a dream is now a real scenario that we have a Group of Five conference champion, not only outrank one Power Four champion but two, as the Broncos are set to receive a higher ranking than the Big 12 and ACC champs.
Arizona State was picked to finish deal last in the Big 12 in preseason polls, only to win it outright by dominating Iowa State in the title game. They entered the picture ranked just inside the top 15, but with SMU’s loss to Clemson, find themselves as the fourth-highest-ranked conference champion and are set to receive the fourth seed.
First-Round College Football Playoff Prediction
- No. 5 — Texas Longhorns
- No. 6 — Notre Dame Fighting Irish
- No. 7 — Ohio State Buckeyes
- No. 8 — Penn State Nittany Lions
- No. 9 — Tennessee Volunteers
- No. 10 — Indiana Hoosiers
- No. 11 — Alabama Crimson Tide
- No. 12 — Clemson Tigers
Now is when we get into the messy part of the College Football Playoffs: What will the committee do with the teams who have lost their conference championship games and how will the committee justify their rankings? While we will find out the former of that two-part question, odds are we never find out the latter.
So, let’s go with what we know: Texas, Notre Dame, Ohio State, Penn State, Tennessee, and Indiana are in as at-large teams. Clemson is in as the ACC champions.
What we don’t know is what the committee will do with the SMU vs. Alabama conundrum. In our prediction, we think the effects will be two-fold:
- Penn State drops below Ohio State
- SMU falls below Alabama
Why are these two events combined you ask? It’s simple, really. If you’re going to fault one team for playing in their conference championship game, you have to fault the other.
If Penn State is to fall after beating Ohio State, they likely have to fall below Ohio State — a two-loss Big Ten team that the Nittany Lions lost straight up to. And if Penn State falls, SMU has to fall in a similar fashion as the loser of their conference championship game.
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That means, SMU falls to right around No. 12 or 13 in the rankings. This is because they likely have to be ranked lower than the Clemson team they lost to in the same head-to-head scenario where Penn State sees itself as lower than OSU.
And a 12 or 13 seed would be the end of SMU’s playoff dreams.
There is another possibility, of course, and that’s the following:
- No. 5 — Notre Dame
- No. 6 — Texas
- No. 7 — Penn State
- No. 8 — Ohio State
- No. 9 — Tennessee
- No. 10 — Indiana
- No. 11 — Clemson
- No. 12 — SMU
This would boot out Alabama entirely, and give credit to all three teams — Texas, Penn State, and SMU — for playing in their conference championship games. Though this one is a bit harder to stomach and fathom from the committee.
It all remains to be seen, but in these scenarios, the No. 5 team hosts No. 12, No. 6 hosts No. 11, No. 7 hosts No. 10, and No. 8 hosts No. 9.
No matter which way we slice this prediction, the first-round of the College Football Playoff will be must-watch television.
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