For the 2024-25 college football season, we’re rolling into uncharted territory with a newly established 12-team playoff scene. Here’s the catch! Every week the playoff committee ranks the top 25 squads, and those ranks determine the bracket. The top four conference champs? They get the VIP treatment with relaxing byes directly into the quarterfinals. The fifth-best conference team gets in too, but without a bye, they need to start from one. With that, let’s learn from the experts their say on the current CFP thing. Especially clarifying Ryan Day led Ohio State and Dan Lannig led Oregon’s scenario.

College football experts Chipp Patterson, Bud Elliott, Tom Fornelli, and Danny Kanell had their say on it. They hit it right on the head when they started by saying, “There are so many teams still alive, vandalism, and obviously they pull down the odds of the team that are just locked in, but 24 teams plus like the seven that are basically locked…”

It’s wild that a quarter of the teams are still in search and yet that doesn’t mean the stakes are higher. When the playoff increased to 12 teams, it almost seemed as if the urgency was underwater. You could still notice the actual amount of drama in the season, but it was all packed in a system that felt a bit too bloated.

“A change you could have made that would have led to the same results this weekend and the same games mattering would have been to leave it at four; just make it the four conference champions.” 

That’s something serious these men have pointed out. Back in the day and even just a year ago, each game held so much value. With wins and losses, we’re just concerned over the peripheral details, like who’s in; it was about who’s done. No wild cards and if you lose, there is no chance of bouncing back. Furthermore, they discussed that teams like Ohio State are locked in but there are other teams also that are theoretically in. The best guess as per the analyst is either Ohio State or Oregon; one of them is going to land a final spot in the CFP.

Moving forward, highlighting the big takeaway from the current system, they argued, “If your actual goal is to determine the best team in the country, you don’t need a 12-team playoff.” They just said this in clear bold words! The whole idea was to find the best of all the teams and as per these analysts, the four teams set up were doing that for them. Sure, you can throw more teams to build up the drama when the field is this big, but at times it brings the intensity down. With that, let’s learn what the latest CFP picture looks like ahead of the final stretch of the season.

What does the current CFP image look like ahead of the actual scenario?

So here’s the catch: using the latest ratings of the committee that came out on November 19, the bracket looks like this. The highest of them, Oregon, the Big Ten champion, stands in the No. 1 spot, followed by Texas, an SEC team at No. 2, the ACC champ Miami at No. 3, and the Mountain West champion, Boise State, at No. 4. So these teams enjoy their fruits by enjoying the perfect byes.

Slightly below these four top rankings, Ohio State, Penn State, and Notre Dame fill the next few spots. Alabama, Ole Miss, and Georgia are the SEC teams ruling the last CFP predictions, while BYU, the Big 12 champ, takes the No. 12 spot. Moving forward, the first set of games that will be played at campus sites on December 20 and 21 are between BYU and Ohio State, Georgia against Penn State, Ole Miss against Indiana, and Alabama against Notre Dame.

The winners will automatically go to the quarterfinals and play against the four teams that were on byes. So after these games, there will be quarterfinals that’ll take place on December 31st and January 1st. As you know already, these games will be played at the Fiesta Bowl, Rose Bowl, Peach Bowl, and Sugar Bowl. Followed by nail-biting semifinals, which are going to be on January 20th at the Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta. Let’s see what kind of surprises this new format brings.