College football fans around the USA are watching the new 12-team playoff bracket make waves as new teams are making the playoffs and some regular playoff teams aren’t making the cut.
The NCAA implemented the new 12-team playoff format this year. In this new format, the four winners of the Power 4 conferences (ACC, SEC, BIG 12, BIG 10) will get a bye, meaning that the highest-seeded teams automatically move on, in the first round. There are seven wild card teams and the highest-ranked non-Power 4 school also makes the playoffs, even if they are the 20th seed.
The chaos in this year’s playoffs comes with SMU losing to Clemson in the ACC Championship, leading to Clemson getting a guaranteed spot in the playoffs.
Now the College Football Playoff committee has to decide between 9-3 Alabama or 10-2 SMU. Both teams make a great case to make it as SMU has fewer losses, despite being 0-2 against ranked teams, but Alabama has two losses to unranked teams with another loss to 7-ranked Tennessee. SMU was chosen to go to the playoffs against Penn State while Alabama was left to play Michigan on New Year’s Eve.
With this in mind, fans speculate who will win this year. With the amount of teams in the running, it will be interesting to see how the championship plays out.
Freshman Kenzie Bailes said, “Georgia would win because it seems like they are dominating.”
The odds of this occurring are likely because the Georgia Bulldogs have an 11-2 record with a bye in the first round. With that being said, fans will be seeing some new teams make the playoffs such as Boise State, Indiana and SMU.
Senior Hunter Martin believes Penn State will win “because it’s Penn State.”
The games goes as follows: 10th ranked Indiana at 7th ranked Notre Dame with the winner playing 2nd ranked Georgia, 11th ranked Indiana at 6th ranked Penn State with the winner playing 3rd ranked Boise State, 12th ranked Clemson at 5th ranked Texas with the winner playing 4th ranked Arizona State, and 9th ranked Tennessee at 8th ranked Ohio State with the winner playing the 1st seed Oregon.
This playoff bracket is most interesting in a long time, and it will be fun to see who wins the first ever 12-team
playoff.
