Bill Bender
The SEC and Big Ten championship games are shaping up to be rematches from top-five matchups in the regular season.
Oregon and Ohio State will revisit their 32-31 classic on Oct. 12 if the Buckeyes beat Michigan on Saturday. Georgia beat Texas 30-15 on Oct. 19, and they will have a rematch if the Longhorns beat Texas A&M on Saturday.
How do we sell these matchups in terms of the College Football Playoff bracket?
Honestly, we’re not sure, and that is reflected in our Week 14 Bowl Projections. For now, we are picking Oregon and Texas to win those games. Look at our bracket.
That means the SEC loser – Georgia – would fall to the No. 8 seed, where a win would earn a matchup against Oregon – the No. 1 overall seed in the bracket. That is not a favorable draw for either team.
The SEC winner – Texas – would have a favorable draw as the No. 2 seed, but not as good as Ohio State – which could face No. 12 Boise State and No. 4 Arizona State – in either order depending on how those projected conference champions are seeded. The Buckeyes have the best draw of any of these teams, and it exposes the true value of conference championship games and the need to just seed these teams 1-12 the proper way.
In the end, we think some combination of Oregon, Ohio State, Texas and Georgia will be the championship game, and perhaps Notre Dame gets in the way.
MORE: SEC title game scenarios | Big 12 | Big Ten | ACC
The third set of College Football Playoff rankings will be unveiled Tuesday. Sporting News will have weekly bowl projections leading up to the unveiling of the first 12-team playoff field on Dec. 8.
The first round of the new CFP will have one game on Friday, Dec. 20, and three on Saturday, Dec. 21. The quarterfinals will be played at the Vrbo Fiesta Bowl (Dec. 31), Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl (Jan. 1), Rose Bowl Game presented by Prudential (Jan. 1) and Allstate Sugar Bowl (Jan. 1).
The semifinals will be played at the Capital One Orange Bowl (Jan. 9) and Cotton Bowl Classic (Jan. 10). The CFP national championship is Jan. 20 in Atlanta.
Here are our bowl projections for Week 14.
There are 35 bowls involving FBS teams outside the College Football Playoff this season. A look at our projections for those matchups:
A look at the four College Football Playoff first-round matchups for the 2024-25 season. Those first-round games will be played on campus:
The best matchup would be Tennessee at Notre Dame. Those schools have split eight previous meetings and have not played since a home-and-home the Irish swept in 2004-05. Georgia would be the lone SEC school to host a playoff game in this scenario, and if they win the SEC championship game then Texas would be in that spot. They can compare schedules with Indiana. Boise State (41.2 ppg.) and SMU (39.3 ppg.) rank in the top six in scoring offense this season. How would they fare at hostile 100,000-plus venues at Ohio Stadium and Beaver Stadium?
A look at the College Football Playoff quarterfinal matchups for the 2024-25 season. Those games will be played at the traditional New Year’s Day Six bowl sites:
Ignore the seeding and just look at the field. Would an eight-team playoff be better? The Sun Devils and Hurricanes would be underdogs against Big Ten teams, and that matchup between Oregon and Georgia was our pick for the CFP championship game in Week 11.
A look at the College Football Playoff semifinal matchups for the 2024-25 season. Those games will be played at the traditional New Year’s Day Six bowl sites:
Three Big Ten teams in the semifinals? A potential three-match between the Ducks and Buckeyes? That is in the cards in this week’s projection. We considered picking Notre Dame against Texas, and we would not be surprised if the Irish could make it two straight victories against SEC teams. The Longhorns are the only team among these four that played in the four-team College Football Playoff last season. Would they take advantage of the close-to-home atmosphere at the Cotton Bowl?
A look at the College Football Playoff championship matchup for the 2024-25 season. That game is scheduled for Monday, Jan. 20 at Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta.
Yes, we have changed our CFP championship pick the last four weeks. Some of that is dictated on how those matchups are playing out each week. The Buckeyes have been the constant the last three weeks, and they could lose the Big Ten championship game and we still see them making this run. Ditto for Texas. Quinn Ewers – who played one year at Ohio State – would be the focus of this matchup, which would be a blue-blooded classic befitting of the first 12-team championship game.
Bill Bender graduated from Ohio University in 2002 and started at The Sporting News as a fantasy football writer in 2007. He has covered the College Football Playoff, NBA Finals and World Series for SN. Bender enjoys story-telling, awesomely-bad 80s movies and coaching youth sports.
