The arguments over who should be in or out of the 2025-26 College Football Playoff are over, or at least moot. The field is set, and now it's time to turn our attention to a different question: Who's actually gonna win this thing?
It's never been more difficult in this sport's history to win a national championship, and the changes to the bracket have made it even more difficult for all the combatants. The loop-hole of facing the committee's 9th- or 12th-ranked team in the semifinals has been shut. To win the national championship, it's going to require beating an elite team, and then doing it again, and again.
Ohio State's epic run last December and January taught us two things: 1) How you finished the regular season does not necessarily carry over to the postseason, for better or worse, and 2) If you're going on a month-long gauntlet, it really helps to have two or three dozen future NFL players on your roster.
To actually win the national title, each team must answer five questions
1) Can you stop the run?
2) Can you affect the passer?
3) Can you consistently find explosives in the pass game?
4) How comfortable are you dropping back and passing on 3rd-and-9?
5) Do you have a fatal flaw that's bound to be exposed?
Finally, the Playoff is a lot like the real estate game -- your success is often determined by your location on the bracket.
12. James Madison: Look, I hope the Dukes enjoy their trip to Eugene and take a moment to appreciate all they've accomplished this season. They've earned it.
11. Tulane: Tulane gets Pete Golding in his first game as a head coach. That's not nothing. If you're able to upend your 45-10 loss from September, you to play in the Sugar Bowl for the first time since the 1939 season. That would be neat.
10. Alabama: Not only is Alabama the first 3-loss team to make the CFP, they're the first team to make the College Football Playoff without a running game. Saturday's minus-3 performance dropped the Tide to No. 117 in rushing yards per game and No. 120 per carry.
9. Oklahoma: Perhaps John Mateer becomes a totally different person over the break. If not, Oklahoma will continue needing significant help from its defense and special teams to score. OU's defense feasted upon compromised offenses all season, and Alabama qualifies. Still, there exists scant evidence Oklahoma will be able to move the ball on Indiana.
8. Miami: Miami is seventh nationally in rush defense, 17th in sacks, and seventh in FEI defense. They beat Notre Dame more decisively than Texas A&M did (although the Hurricanes got the Irish at home). Carson Beck has been in college for 25 years and thrown 1,275 passes along the way. If he can Malachi Toney can get hot, the Hurricanes have a prayer.
7. Texas A&M: I have the Aggies above the Hurricanes simply because the Hurricanes would have to win at Kyle Field first. The Notre Dame game showed the offensive explosion necessary to beat a title-worthy team, but can Marcel Reed sit back and pick apart three of those squads in a row? Reed was 3-of-9 with two interceptions on passes of 10-plus yards down the field in the loss to Texas.
6. Texas Tech: Look, that defense is ferocious, and we all love and respect the story, but we can also see how it's going to end: with FEI's No. 34-rated offense trading seven for three or zero in the red zone of a quarterfinal or semifinal game. Texas Tech is the No. 101 team in the country in producing red zone touchdowns -- they went 3-of-12 in the two games against BYU -- and that's unlikely to get better as the difficulty increases.
(For the record, I would've had Notre Dame here if the qualified, and the Irish at No. 5 would've been the lowest-ranked a team could be in this field to, you know, actually go out and win this thing in my opinion.)
5. Ole Miss: Unfortunately, we will not get to live in a reality where this Rebels team gets to go through the CFP with a present Lane Kiffin. The Rebels get a home game against a team they've already defeated by five touchdowns, and then another shot at a team they went toe-to-toe with for three quarters in their stadium. Trinidad Chambliss can give the entire team lessons on how to navigate prolonged playoff runs with his 2022 and 2024 Division II national championship rings on.
4. Oregon: Oregon went to Kinnick Stadium in a driving, freezing rain and out-Iowaed the Hawkeyes, and the Ducks are as good as anyone in the pass game, assuming they're healthy or healthy-ish. After last season's experience, Dan Lanning and co. no doubt prefer the home game they'll get in two weeks as opposed to taking all of December off. Only the Ducks and Indiana enter the CFP ranked among the top six nationally in offense and defense, per FEI. An X-factor to monitor: both coordinators have since taken head coaching jobs. Dan Lanning will surely offer notes having done this dance himself as Georgia's defensive coordinator on their way to the 2022 national title, but that was in a different system.
3. Ohio State: Disappointing as Saturday night was, it's not as if Ohio State hasn't been here before. The Buckeyes shrugged off a heartbreaking end to the regular season and won the national title last time around, and this year they have more time to reimagine the offense with a first-round bye. However, the problem is there's no reimagining a lack of run game and pass protection. But, while it's never been more difficult to win a national title than it is today, let's not discount the advantage that only Ohio State has the corporate knowledge of actually going out and climbing this particular mountain.
2. Georgia: Georgia has held four consecutive opponents to 10 points or fewer, and Mike Bobo has done a masterful job building Georgia's offense, which can go power run and play-action to those thoroughbred tight ends when they need to, RPO with Stockton's legs and Zachariah Branch in the screen game when they need to, and do traditional drop back stuff with London Humphreys and Noah Thomas when they need to. They beat Georgia Tech 16-9, and out-raced Ole Miss 43-35. Georgia is also (Les Miles voice) undefeated since halftime of the first Alabama game.
1. Indiana: I'm done doubting this team. We just saw them bottle up the most efficient passing game in college football, bully their run game in the red zone, and hit the drop-back pass game when in the most high-leverage situations imaginable (without their best receiver). And they beat Oregon by 10 in their place. Indiana has the most favorable path and -- gulp -- the best team.