Upon Further Review: Notre Dame Opts OUT Of Bowl, College Football Playoff Bracket Reaction & More!

Summary

Cover 3 College Football Podcast

Episode: Upon Further Review: Notre Dame Opts OUT Of Bowl, College Football Playoff Bracket Reaction & More!
Date: December 8, 2025
Hosts: Chip Patterson, Tom Fornelli, Danny Kanell, Bud Elliott

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Episode Overview

This episode dives deep into the seismic news that Notre Dame has opted out of bowl participation, reactions to the College Football Playoff (CFP) bracket, ongoing bowl season changes, and the evolving landscape of postseason college football. The crew also reviews the impact of recent playoff expansion, shifting bowl priorities, and debates the legitimacy of both selection committee practices and current playoff structures.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Notre Dame Opts Out of Bowl Game

• Opening Theme (00:25–02:58)

  • The hosts tackle the headline: Notre Dame declining to participate in any bowl games for the postseason. This move follows recent opt-outs by Kansas State and Iowa State, both fined by the Big 12, while Notre Dame, as an independent, avoids conference penalties.
  • Athletic Director Pete Bavacqua’s candid comments and public engagement on this issue are highlighted, suggesting significant fallout in the school’s relationship with the ACC.

• Immediate Reactions

  • Danny Kanell (03:00): “There's permanent damage that has been done to the relationship with the ACC.”
  • Hosts reflect on the mutual resentment: the ACC is deemed right to campaign for Miami, while Notre Dame’s non-conference status and selective scheduling are scrutinized.

• Reasons & Ramifications (04:14–06:47)

  • Sympathy from the crew for both sides: Notre Dame didn't want 15 "bad practices" and a loss to a motivated team like BYU, paralleling last year’s bowl blowouts.
  • Critical talk about the expanded playoff format and whether it’s penalizing Notre Dame and rewarding lesser schedules.
  • Notable Moment: The crew lampoons the forced enthusiasm for CFP matchups with lower-profile Group of Five teams.

• Debate Over Scheduling & Fairness

  • Back-and-forth on Notre Dame’s strength of schedule, cherry-picking weaker P5 and G5 opponents, and whether they are unfairly advantaged or simply deserving based on performance.

• Notable Quote

  • Bud Elliott (06:17): “JMU's probably gonna be a record setter...123rd in strength of schedule...hard to be worse and still make the playoffs. So, congrats on your record.”

• Rivalry & Historical Scheduling

  • Discussions about traditional games (e.g., vs. Navy and Stanford) and whether they meaningfully contribute to Notre Dame’s playoff case.

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2. The Playoff Bracket and Committee Transparency

• Weekly Rankings & Committee Practices (10:05–15:37)

  • Strong criticism for the CFP’s weekly rankings TV spectacle, which the crew claims are for network profit, not transparency or accuracy.
  • Memorable Exchange:
    • Chip Patterson (11:22): “It was weird to see Herbstreit call out, like, why are we doing these weekly rankings?…The network you work for paid an arm and a leg for the playoff.”
    • Bud Elliott (15:07): “These rankings week to week are complete. They don't matter. Keep playing hard. This is fantasy land...just for TV.”

• Notre Dame’s Playoff Worthiness

  • Heated arguments on whether Notre Dame deserved selection over teams like Bama or Miami, referencing power ratings, win quality, and the muddled “strength of schedule” metric.

• Future Concessions

  • From next year, if Notre Dame finishes in the top 12, they're automatically in—a change noted as a “hell of a concession” (15:37).

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3. The State and Future of Bowl Games

• Bowl Season’s Declining Relevance (07:24, 19:56–25:38)

  • Consensus that playoff expansion has diminished the importance of most bowls, as playoff participation is now the primary goal for all major programs.
  • The panel recalls the “player empowerment movement,” early player opt outs (Fournette, McCaffrey) as setting the precedent now being followed by teams. Teams in transition (coaching changes/player transfers) are particularly likely to opt out, with financial penalties levied as deterrents.

• ESPN’s Influence & Bowl Proliferation

  • The explosion in bowl games is traced to ESPN’s content strategy, rather than on-field demand. Bowls serve as lucrative TV filler and “promotional pieces for the College Football Playoff” (24:12), with community/tourism benefits now secondary.

• Nostalgia vs. Modern Reality

  • The panel acknowledges the value bowls have in local communities but ultimately see them as “just a marketing expense” (24:12).
  • Possible future: equilibrium with fewer, but more meaningful bowls.

• Notable Quote

  • Tom Fornelli (20:23): “The bowls have been dying since the playoff was created. This is just the latest symptom.”

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4. Bowl Schedule: Matchups and Opt-Out Watch

• Games that Stand Out (31:23–39:55)

  • Notre Dame BYU would’ve been a draw, but with ND out, attention shifts elsewhere.
  • The crew highlights interesting bowl games unlikely to see significant opt-outs (e.g., Tennessee–Illinois, Iowa–Vandy, Michigan–Texas, BYU–Georgia Tech, UVA–Missouri).
  • Opt-outs and superfluous bowls remain concerns: the effect on betting, TV viewership, and team motivation.

• Fun Sidebars

  • Short digressions about fan bases, rivalry games (App State–Georgia Southern), and future bowl viability as more teams mimic recent opt-out precedents.

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5. Systemic Issues: Playoff Structure, Conference Dynamics, and Selection Committee

• Should Notre Dame Join a Conference? (51:39–53:19)

  • The recurring call for Notre Dame to join a conference is debated—hosts argue it would not have helped versus Miami or BYU and point out that being in a conference hasn’t necessarily protected other schools from playoff exclusion.
  • Tom Fornelli (52:16): “Anytime anything happens to Notre Dame...you scream join a conference...but it has absolutely nothing to do with this situation.”

• Playoff Expansion: Too Far, Too Soon?

  • Calls for a 24-team playoff are met with skepticism—hosts note the 12-team field already feels large and worry expansion as a “reactionary business” dilutes season meaning.

• Strength-of-Schedule Hypocrisy

  • The committee’s inconsistency in weighing SOS for Texas, Alabama, Florida State, and Notre Dame frustrates the panel—especially as prior weekly rankings do not align with final bracket explanations.

• Notable Rant

  • Danny Kanell (05:41): “This politically correct crap. It’s so stupid that we have to put JMU in. I was the same guy arguing for expansion, but damn it, now that they're in there—damn it—why do I have to talk about them?”

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6. Upon Further Review: Odds, Coaching, and Weekend Wrap-up

• Coaching Carousel and Preps (57:45–61:06)

  • Indiana’s coaching staff is praised for defensive mastery, with a note that their coordinators rarely get mentioned for bigger jobs despite outperforming better-resourced programs.

• Expert Brackets & Odds (61:06–64:44)

  • Debate as to whether only the top five to six seeds are true national title contenders; circumstances (coordinator turnover, opt outs) matter as much as talent.
  • Big Ten teams are seen as having a talent retention edge in current structure.

• CFP First-Round Matchups Outlook (64:44–66:41)

  • Discussion on potential early-round upsets (e.g., JMU over Oregon), but consensus is these are rare. The group welcomes the speedier playoff calendar—less time waiting between selection and kickoff.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

| Timestamp | Quote/Exchange | Speaker | |-----------|--------------------------|---------| | 03:00 | “There's permanent damage that has been done to the relationship with the ACC.” | Danny Kanell | | 04:14 | “Notre Dame's right to opt out of the bowl game... if their players’ heads are not going to be in it... you don't want them out there.” | Bud Elliott | | 06:17 | “JMU's probably gonna be a record setter...123rd in strength of schedule—that might be a record that will never be beaten.” | Bud Elliott | | 15:07 | “These rankings week to week are complete. They don't matter. Keep playing hard. ...This is fantasy land up here. It’s just for TV.” | Bud Elliott | | 20:23 | “Bulls have been dying since the playoff was created. This is just the latest symptom.” | Tom Fornelli | | 24:12 | “Bowl games... are nothing but a promotional piece for the College Football Playoff. ...It’s a marketing expense on the ESPN events tab.” | Chip Patterson | | 52:16 | “Anytime anything happens to Notre Dame...you scream join a conference...but it has absolutely nothing to do with this situation.” | Tom Fornelli | | 05:41 | “This politically correct crap. ...I spent years arguing for playoff expansion, but damn it, now that they're in there—damn it—why do I have to talk about them?” | Danny Kanell |

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• Notre Dame Opts Out & ACC Fallout: 00:25–06:47
• Debate over Schedule Strength & Committee Transparency: 10:05–15:37
• Bowl System Discussion, Team & Player Opt-outs: 19:56–25:38
• Bowl Schedule - Matchups & Analysis: 31:23–39:55
• Notre Dame/Conference Debate & Committee Critique: 51:39–54:36
• Weekend Wrap (Coaching, Odds, Brackets): 57:45–62:45

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Final Thoughts

This episode offers an unfiltered breakdown of the complex issues surrounding the current college football postseason, including Notre Dame's unprecedented opt-out, the implications of playoff expansion, the declining prominence of the bowl system, and growing discontent with selection committee processes. The hosts blend fan frustration, inside knowledge, and irreverent humor, making this a must-listen (or read) for college football faithful seeking clarity on the sport’s shifting landscape.

Transcript

[A]

Welcome Back to the COVID 3 podcast with your hosts, Chip Patterson, Tom Fornelli, Danny Cannell, and Bud Elliott. It's your call for the best college football coverage from national signing day to the national championship and everything in between. CBS Sports presents the COVID 3 podcast.

[B]

And welcome back to the COVID 3 podcast here on CBS Sports. That's Tom Fenelli, that's Bud Elliott, that's Danny Canal. I'm Chip Patterson coming to you [e-mail] cover3 and everywhere. Get your podcast on demand. Thanks for hanging out. Smash that subscribe, smash that like and come and join us in the chat, aka the COVID 3 tailgate, where it looks like Evan went through and started putting together a Cover 3 dictionary. You can scroll up. He jumped in the tailgate, started throwing out, and, and he brought back Barton the Bouncer, which is some real day one stuff. Barton the Bouncer at the Slayer concert. Maybe once we do get into your February's, your March, your Aprils, we'll get a visit from our own Barton Simmons. We'll dive back into the big old bag of mail where Barton the Bouncer was launched. But we got too much to get through today because we got more reaction to the College Football Playoff. We've got bowl games, you know, just sort of a, a general who are we looking at? What matchups really jump out to us? Maybe a little bit more from the coaching carousel. And yes, as always, upon further review and Pole assassin, our normal Monday content. But in the, you know, in the spirit of just trying to dive right into the conversation, it is not necessarily about the playoff matchups. It is not necessarily about the bowl game matchups. No, the, the biggest topic in college football right now is about the teams, but really specifically the team that has opted not to participate in the postseason. That would be the Notre Dame Fighting Irish. Now, Notre Dame is not alone in this. We've already Kansas State and Iowa State, as we talked a little bit on Sunday's show, they are opting out of a bowl game. And the Big 12 is finding each of those schools a half a million dollars for their lack of participation. Notre Dame does not have a conference. Notre Dame removing itself from selection for the bowl games. There's been a lot to unpack here. Athletic director Pete Bavacqua has already offered some comments. He also has a press conference on Tuesday. I mean, he, he is not shying away from this conversation. He is absolutely going to keep it going. There are layers to this. Dk. I'll let you get first word. I, I just was on CBS Sports hq. I, I couldn't help but start by saying I'm disappointed as a fan. I mean, just the, the where we are, how we got here and what this means moving forward, none of it is fun or good. And those are things that we generally like about college football. But I think there's also some pieces of this that I get. What's. What's really jumping out to you.

[C]

I am reading a quote with Pete Fabqua 29 minutes ago on Dan Patrick where he said there's permanent damage that has been done to the relationship with the acc. He has not been shy about that. Brady Quinn was. You know, I saw him in Indianapolis, been following him as well. I do think this is a sentiment. And I remember when, when I saw Jim Phillips out there campaigning for Miami, I was genuinely wondering, I wonder how Notre Dame feels about this. But at the same time I'm like, screw you guys. You guys have the best of both worlds by being in our conference like in and getting the best of utilizing our resources and our teams to schedule and beat up against easy wins for you and then go ahead and waltz into the playoff and take all the money to yourself. So I understood that aspect, but I do. Notre Dame being left out, I think is going to have. There's going to be a lot of consequences from the decisions that were made yesterday and the way the format is with two group of five. But I think Notre Dame being on the outside maybe has the most significant, you know, like immediate action that's taken. We already saw them opt out of the bowl as you mentioned. Like that was big deal. But I do wonder what this means moving forward and what sort of it could spark and is there a break off even more with the acc?

[A]

I mean, look, if you're the acc, you know Notre Dame is never going to join you, right? So I think the ACC is totally right to campaign for Miami and I think Pika Vacuum is right to say what he said because obviously like they are their scheduling partner. So I think he's right to be. I think both sides are right to do what they did. I fully think Notre Dame's right to opt out of the bowl game. You know, like if their players heads are not going to be in it, you don't want them out there. You're not going to have good practices. You got 15 shitty practices, right? And ultimately you're going to get embarrassed by BYU team that's going to play hard. You know, we saw last year BYU takes bowl games seriously. It's kind of their culture. Colorado did not take the bowl game seriously. And they dump truck the Buffaloes there in San Antonio. So, you know, if you're Notre Dame, you don't want to come out, not want to be there, not have 15 bad practices come out, and then, like, you know, get smacked by byu, which, if you didn't try hard, you don't care. Totally. You know, But I. I think, like, if we get meaningful change out of this, where we get these G5 teams out the paint and we don't have half our first round matchups, be awful.

[B]

I'm sorry.

[A]

Crap. I don't. Like, we would never do big game breakdown in our light. You would never even, like. Like, we've never even think about doing an Oregon JMU big game breakdown through some random week four, but now we got to do one and pretend like this is a good game for a month. I don't like doing this.

[D]

God, I feel so terrible for. He's got to do a big game breakdown.

This crap. This politically correct crap. It's so stupid that we have to put JMU in. I'm the same guy that spent the last four years arguing that we should expand the playoffs so we can give these teams a chance, but damn it, now that they're in there, damn it. Why do I have to talk?

You know what's great about this podcast? We talk about all these schools. We talk about everybody. It's just. I don't have to.

[B]

That is true.

[D]

Damn it.

[A]

I think it's.

[D]

I think it's crap that a team that actually won its conference got into the playoff instead of a team that didn't. It's crap. Damn it.

[B]

Oh, man.

[D]

It's so not fair to me.

[A]

Jamie's probably gonna be a record setter, though. Like, being 123rd in strength of schedule. That might be a record that will never be beaten. Like, it'd be very hard to be worse than that in strength of schedule, make the playoffs. So, like, congrats on your record.

[D]

Maybe if they play in the acc, they can match that. Right?

[A]

Right.

[D]

Because Danny's talking about, like, Notre Dame gets to take advantage of beating up on the acc. Florida State and Clemson couldn't beat up on that same league.

Everybody's mad at Notre Dame for playing Syracuse and Boston College. It's not their fault the ACC sucks.

[A]

It is Arkansas, Stanford, and. And Navy.

[B]

I don't. I don't think Purdue, by the way.

[D]

I don't think Notre Dame shouldn't play their rivals.

[A]

But how is Navy arrival? They're 46 and 4.

[D]

They've been playing each other for 75 years and it's.

[A]

It's never competitive. Navy sucks compared to Notre Dame.

It's like polar bears and seals.

[C]

Sorry.

[A]

I was watching nature documentary with the kids. Like, if that's not a rivalry, I mean, it's technically a robbery, but they get absolutely destroyed.

[D]

Seals get away sometimes.

[A]

Sure.

[D]

Yeah.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

So then they were injured.

[B]

They're not.

[A]

You don't have to eat the bear to beat it.

[B]

The impact for me is not playoff. I don't think we're going to change the playoff because of Notre Dame. I think the bowl season is what we're looking at, and that's where we're all trying to look at who did this. You expanded the playoff. The bowl games don't matter anymore, by the way.

[C]

It isn't just Notre Dame. Notre Dame's been a big one. But Iowa State opted out. Right. I mean, there's been multiple coaches left.

[D]

I. I don't agree with it. I think it is soft, but I understand it. Because you got a coaching staff that is in the Tran, in the process of looking for new jobs. You've got a roster full of players who are in the process of figuring out, am I going to have a gig here? Do I have to find a new home? So making them play in a bowl game, I understand why they're not interested. And they're paying 500 grand. They're suffering a consequence for it. Notre Dame's taking its ball and going home. They're just crying and they're in their. They're in their feelings and feeling bad about it, and they're doing what they have to do to kind of justify their decision. They just got their feelings hurt and now they went home.

[A]

I also blame them for doing scheduling wise.

Like Irish, you knew what you were doing scheduling wise. Right. Stanford, which you scheduled, that's not one of the ACC rotation. Right. Arkansas, which is, you know, 08 or 1 and 7 more than half the time in the SEC. Right. A team that, like, they never compete in the SEC, they don't try. Right. You know, a G5 team, but you're.

[D]

Just running through talking points.

What does Arkansas caring about baseball have to do with Notre Dame?

[A]

I'm saying if you're Notre Dame, you knew what you got with this schedule. Like, you got what you got.

[D]

If you should, they schedule NFL teams, will that be good enough for you?

[A]

No, what I'm saying is, like, they purposely scheduled light after the top two.

Or top three. I'm sorry.

[D]

So they schedule SEC teams, they schedule Big Ten teams. They schedule ACC teams. Who the hell should they be scheduling?

[A]

I'm saying you cherry picked.

[D]

Should they play Alabama times. Should they play Georgia 12 times? Who is Georgia? Georgia doesn't play Arkansas. Ohio State doesn't play Purdue. Georgia State doesn't play Syracuse. What are you doing?

[B]

What are you even saying?

[A]

Look, I. I agree with you lost.

[D]

In your opinion, that you're, like, backtracking into trying to make it make sense, but it doesn't.

[A]

Okay. I. I think they. They get what they got, you know, on purpose. Honestly.

[D]

They got what they got because they lost two games. That's it. Period, point blank.

[C]

Yeah, we don't need to do this.

[D]

We do this crap.

[A]

They were one and two against the three decent teams. They played.

You, you, Danny. We got to give them credit for USC like that. That is a good win.

[B]

I would be happy if Notre Dame. And by the way, on the campaign for people vacua includes farce and waste of time as the sticky quotes for the weekly rankings release.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

I would take that. Notre Dame's got me on the bus. Hey, yeah. Yeah. Let's. Let's keep firing it up. Let's. Let's keep talking about how the. The weekly rankings release, and even more than that, specifically asking the committee to put explanations behind their rankings. Waste of time. The.

[C]

But the PR firm that works with the college football selection committee did a phenomenal job of coaching up Hunter. Your check. So that when Reese Davis asked him on college game day, very pointed questions, he just regurgitated the same three answers back to back to back, and basically said, zero. And good for ESPN and all the guys on the set for calling him out, but that was a rough look.

[B]

Was this yesterday? I. I did not.

[C]

Because that was on college game day, the day before this conference championship started. Yeah.

[B]

Yeah, because I'm gonna use my indoor.

[D]

Voice for the rest of the show. I'm sorry for yelling.

[B]

No, it's all right. You can't help it. That's genetics.

[A]

See, he's smart with this. My. My voice is shot to Tom's. I'm gonna drop him out.

[D]

Can't out yell me.

[A]

Yeah, no, look, it was weird to see Herb street call out, like, why are we doing these weekly rankings? I'm like, bro, it's because the network you work for paid an arm and a leg for the playoff and has to make money around the playoff rights, dude.

[D]

Like, it's part of the contract that they do these shows.

[B]

I wish selection committee had given us that bracket and not given us anything leading up to it, we would have been like, oh, okay, yeah, the community valued head to head.

[A]

It's the false sense of movement. It also like they screwed it up by putting Notre Dame eight spots different from Miami in the initial rating and.

[B]

They both won out and they both looked good.

[A]

They gave the Irish pre credit for the likelihood that they would win out and then started to give them additional credit for when they actually did the thing that they were basically given pre credit for.

[C]

Right.

[A]

Getting double credit for beating these crap teams down the stretch and they beat the hell out of. And Notre Dame's clearly a really good team. Right. And it does suck that I think for the first time in the 12 team era we have a team left out that could actually win the whole thing. You know what I'm saying? Like, like I do truly think if Notre Dame was in, they could win the whole thing now. I don't think they deserve to be in over Bama or Miami, honestly.

[D]

Oh, I think they deserve, I do.

[C]

I think they deserve to be in over Bama easily.

[A]

So that b. If, if you take the note of the power ratings that Notre Dame wants to cite, Bama has seven wins over team with a rating of 10 or higher. Notre Dame has one.

So if you want to go with this power rating stuff, you can agree that Bama is not power rated as high as Notre Dame, but Bama's resume is way better.

[C]

I think all of the campaigning for strength of schedule, the new metric, I think that's the reason Alabama's in over Notre Dame. Their schedule was significantly harder because they had two. Like if I'm Texas, I'm irritated as a three loss team because the reasoning for Texas was, well, you had a bad loss against Florida and you got blown out against Georgia. Like those were, those were disqualifying. Alabama has a bad loss against Florida State got blown out by Georgia and it didn't matter at all. And like, and again, some of the things you referenced with Texas, like overtime against Kentucky, like they were to the wire with Auburn didn't even come up. Like I, I, I do think Alabama should have been left out. I would. And I. The thing I don't understand is how it looked like it was because if I feel like if you're the person explaining it away, the easy explanation would have been Miami. Like all the things needed to happen. BYU ugly loss out. Like you're not treating them differently. It was a, you know, then you're giving them the same treatment that you're giving to Alabama. Look, we needed to see how you're playing. Now we know you've been limping down the stretch. Boy, you showed us something with a great performance against Georgia. They didn't do that. You could have said you are playing some of the worst football in the final month of the season. So you guys are done. And you could have referenced the losses to Florida State. They could have easily done that, kept Bama out. Then you still have four SEC teams in. Like, I don't think Greg's saying get mad, but you can't get that mad. I just, I think that was the easiest explanation, the easiest path, and for whatever reason they tried to go this direction.

[A]

Did you see? Well, okay. Do we think that they're gonna, gonna kill this weekly ranking stuff?

[B]

I don't know.

[D]

They can't. It's in the comments.

[A]

Do you think Pete Revaca actually believed that these ranks last week were real.

For two years, that they don't mean a damn thing?

[B]

Well, no, no, I think, I think what's true is that the players in that meeting room saw that they were 10, saw that, you know, they didn't lose, and now all of a sudden they're out. I, I think that that is true, that the, all the players on that Notre Dame roster are as, as much, if not more than 20, 23 Florida State, you know, sitting there just like, what is this?

[A]

I mean, if you're a coach out there, you need to be telling your team, guys, this is Love Island. This is Dancing with the Stars. This is just for entertainment. These rankings week to week are complete. They don't matter. Keep playing hard. We are not in.

[B]

Right.

[A]

Which Notre Dame, to their credit, did keep playing hard, you know, but like, this is, this is fantasy land up here. It's just for tv. It's all make believe until the final one. And they're going to do whatever they want to do. Like, don't rely on this. But it, it's hard for them to see, like they put out a bracket. They represent that they're like actual.

Yeah, yeah, right. It, it's, it's kind of ridiculous. I will say though, the most important thing come out of box comments was what Dellinger dropped where if they are in the top 12 starting next year, they are automatically in.

That's a hell of a concession.

[D]

That's a whole other kettle of fish right there.

[C]

Do you.

[A]

And if you look at their schedule next year.

[C]

Unless they get hit by.

[A]

An asteroid, they're going 11, 1 or 12, 0. I mean, dude, like, they have purposely put like absolute garbage in that schedule next year. Have you seen this schedule?

[B]

Well, and yeah.

[A]

Okay, pull up the Notre Dame 2026 schedule. I looked at it this morning to like try and calculate the likelihood they would be top 12.

[B]

Well, we know it because Florida State's not on it. News broken here by bottom three during the locks pod.

[A]

All right, so Wisconsin, Rice, Michigan State, Purdue, North Carolina, Navy, Miami. Okay. Boston College, smu, which is in South Bend. Syracuse, Stanford, usc.

So they are three score favorites ten.

[D]

Times, at least ten power four opponents.

[A]

They do a great job of cherry picking the bottom of the Big Ten in the sec. Man, that is brilliant.

[D]

They don't, they don't pick, they don't pick their ACC rotation. The ACC does that well, they always.

[A]

Put Stanford on there. And Stanford's historically correct rival. It's a rival. This is genius by Notre Dame. We're rivals. Remember the south park episode about student athletes?

[D]

But they've been playing forever.

[B]

Did they plan this? When did they play in this? 75 years ago.

[D]

USC's arrival too. USC's on the schedule for the same reason Stanford is. They're rivals. They've been playing forever. Right.

[C]

Gotta play them with the, with the. USC is a good opponent. That was. We don't want that one to go away. That's a good one.

[A]

Right?

[C]

With, with the committee, with the, with the conversation about doing away with it until Sunday and just not having the Tuesday show. Does that solve anything? Because the, because I think one of the advantages and what was supposed to be a benefit of the Tuesday show was you get some transparency, see what they're thinking, let's hear what they're saying, and then we can evaluate it on the way down the road. I think more than ever, like, if you differed significantly from the AP top 25, then I think you'd get if, like, if you're ESPN, like you would be worried about, oh, look how much SEC favoritism they did. Or, you know, because I don't think, I don't know. It would be curious to see how much things would change based on the committee versus the at top 25. Because I do think they start mirroring each other. Like, I think the committee pays attention to the ratings, the rankings. Like, that's one of the reasons you said why they had them so high, because Notre dame was ranked at 02. And so like the AP showed a tremendous round of respect for them. So I think it almost overflowed into the committee room. Like, I think they mirror each other. So if that's the case, you keep your TV show and you keep doing your thing. You just do a better job of explaining, which is an impossible job.

[A]

What if they did their own mock TV show every Tuesday with their experts?

It would be like, I don't think it would be due quite as good numbers because it's not official, you know, but like Leonardi does bracketology for them or whatever. Or you know, like Jerry Palm does bracketology for us on hq. Right. Like people still pay attention to that. That still gets aggregated, that still gets put out there onto social media. Like, I don't think you would build quite the expectation in like, like to provoke was point about disappointing the roster. It would still do some numbers, I guess.

[D]

I've done some thinking and I've come around. I actually agree with Bud now.

It's, it's. I'm sick and tired of Notre Dame using their relationship with the ACC to their advantage. What they should do instead is sue the ACC and then force the ACC to give them more money than the rest of the teams in the league.

[A]

Right.

[B]

Because you know, it's the winning playbook.

[D]

Because if Florida State was 10 and 2 right now, Bud would sit here be arguing about how they're taking advantage of the ACC by playing their rivals.

[A]

Exactly.

[D]

Talking with my indoor voice.

[B]

The.

Do you. Tom, you wrote for cbsports.com I do occasionally.

[D]

Yeah.

[B]

The bowl season. This sort of brings that. And again, you understand, you mentioned the coaching transition, the coaching changeover, but it's, it's tough. That was when beware college football expansion. It's gonna ruin the bowl season. And people said it and some of that was brushed aside. But if everything's all about making the playoff, then these bowl games are in trouble.

[D]

Bulls have been dying since the playoff was created. This is just the latest symptom. And that's what I wrote. It's not like, oh no, woe is me. Bowls are going away. But it' just. That's the simple fact of the matter. And they're going to expand the playoff again, which is going to take more teams away from bowl games. And we are seeing a precedent now where it's no different than with players. When the first player opted out, it told other players it was okay to opt out. Now the teams are opting out, it's telling other teams to opt out. And I don't think it's going to be a situation where every year we're going to have like 10, 15 teams opting out of games. But I do think you are going to see teams with coaching Changes start opting out a lot more often. I don't think you'll see more crybaby opt outs like Notre Dame's doing.

[B]

But no, but I. The thing that jumped out to me was the five and seven teams saying, no, that don't.

[D]

Yeah, but that makes plenty. Those teams have already gone home. They thought their seasons were over. You can't call them all back to campus and be like, all right, we're going to practice. Instead, you've sent them home. Your off season began. It makes no sense for those programs.

[C]

The Bulls died back with the player empowerment movement. How the players are getting screwed. They need to get paid. And everybody was like, good. I mean, there were people that suggested Leonard Fournettes it out the entire. So then when he and Christian McCaffrey, I think it was 2016 when they sat out the Bulls and everybody's like, yeah, I get it. That kind of opened up the Pandora's box where everyone's like, wait, the only thing I would push back now is like, that was in an era where the players were exploited. They weren't getting anything. I'd be a little bit irritated if I was a booster and had paid, you know, big money to bring in. And I don't want to pick on Notre Dame. Let's say it's Iowa State. Let's say you paid to help, you know, fund some of their roster and you had an opportunity to see another game and you wanted to support them. I'd be like, you know what? I paid for these guys to finish the season, not just to go through the regular season. So I. There's some things that have changed a little bit, but ultimately, I think the Bull system is in big trouble.

[A]

Some of these guys, Danny, some of these guys have clauses in their contract where they lose money if they opt out. Right.

[B]

Of a bowl game.

[A]

Some of these, some of these contracts have balloon payments that they forfeit if they, if they sit.

[B]

Interesting.

Nothing but first half bets in bowl games. Boys, we're worried about these halftime.

[A]

I, I agree with last year somewhat. I think Tom's column was good and I agree with it mostly. But also we have had playoff expansion. We've also had bowl expansion.

[B]

Right.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

There's too many boat.

[C]

Yeah.

[A]

In 2005, we only had 29 bowl games, including all the BCS bowls. Okay, so now you are taking what, your top 12 team? Well, really like your top 11 team, top 10 teams, plus a couple that are still in the top 25. Ish. Right. And you're putting them into non bowl games, just, you know, first round games. So you're lopping off like the best 10 to 12 teams in the sport and adding to that, we have a lot more bowls now additionally. So I think some of this is like we are asking some of these teams to play in bowls that we would never have asked to play in Bulls prior, you know, So I am like curious to see if this maybe doesn't kill the Bulls. Maybe we just reach some kind of equilibrium of bowl reduction. A lot of this is ESPN driven because ESPN needs content. Like ESPN owns a lot of these bowls and they need something to show when people are in their families are home from work during the holiday season. Like, you know what I'm saying?

[B]

Yeah, I'm glad that we can talk about this here because I haven't been able to distill this in a, in a, in a clear way in like a, like a short little, you know, hit or a conversation. But there, there's a split between the bowl as a ESPN owned and operated entertainment product and the bowl organizers, which are still in the community. Like if you, you've got friends at.

[A]

Citrus Sports, a bunch of them, yeah.

[B]

They are putting in work that is like, there's like tangible stuff that is happening around Orlando that involves these teams, that involves this game. There are, there's a charity run. You know, there's like, there's always just a lot of stuff that's packed around it. And I understand when people who work for these bowl games point to that like, see, this does have value. And I, I agree with that. But it is also a television product which the way it is presented is just to fill time during the holiday season and now promote the College Football Playoff. Every dagum halftime show of every single bowl game is going to involve some promotion for whatever the closest, most upcoming college football playoff. It is dagum a marketing expense where that they put on the ESPN events tab of your like spreadsheet. So if Notre Dame. And again, like, I don't want to get into unpacking Notre Dame's actual decision making here, but if Notre Dame were to say, hey, we feel like we got screwed by your thing, the playoff, I don't want to just go and dance for you to make money off this during the holiday season, forget it, we're out. Like, I get that. Because the Bulls as they currently exist in 2025 are nothing but a promotional piece for the College Football Playoff. Now that all because it used to be. You talk about 20 years ago. The Bulls weren't all owned by the same entertainment, sports, opera, like Operation. So it's. I understand why Notre Dame might feel vengeful about that part too.

[A]

So running the numbers here, 2005, 29 bowl games, including all the BCS games. Now if you put those BCS games in 40.

So we've expanded it like a lot.

[D]

Yeah, the numbers.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

You know, do you know how you make more money? Just make more of it.

[A]

Right.

[D]

You know, I do think like, I think there are a lot of threats to the bull system in general. I don't think they'll all go away. But like you mentioned, these are events to advertise the playoff. They're also events to fill time on television blocks. We've seen in college basketball this year a whole lot more big games scheduled in December. I think that continues and that gives maybe some networks thought process like we don't really need Eastern Michigan playing, you know, Utah State. We could put a basketball game here. It'll do the same numbers. And I also think that the coming super league will probably really kill the bowl system for good because they're going to have a playoff system and all that kind of stuff. And then I also wonder if like you mentioned, ESPN owns all these games. A lot of like 99% of them they own.

[B]

Hey, listen, our beautiful sunball.

[C]

That's right.

[D]

Yeah. But like when ESPN goes to its app full time, how important do these games remain to them? Because it's no longer about filling blocks as much as it's just having content on its app.

[A]

Part of it I think depends on how like how integrated do they get with their DraftKings partnership. And like do they have in app betting on ESPN app through DraftKings? If so, then these bowls are really important because people have free time. Because people have free times on their hands during the season and they want to get the end game laying on.

[B]

The couch on December 27th. Just doing this number right here.

[A]

Exactly.

[B]

It's all right. In anything else on this specific part we can hit a break, do a little palate cleanser and then dive a little bit more into.

Either the, the playoff itself, but also some of the other bowl games and more the business of the show. Anything else on the Notre Dame opt.

[A]

Out side of this, I thought Brady Quinn made an excellent point that you really don't need to be comparing Notre Dame to Bama and Miami. If you compare them to Ole Miss, it's actually a really interesting one.

[B]

It's just 11 and one.

[C]

11.

Or group of five teams four. Group of five.

[B]

I know, I know.

[C]

But.

That'S a good point.

[A]

And a super easy schedule in the league.

[B]

Yeah, that's. That's tough.

[C]

Make the same case with Tex A M. But the problem is you lost them. Yeah, because Texas A M's resume isn't exactly stellar.

[B]

Brady also had it down to the SEC refs who are officiating the Notre Dame Texas A M game.

Love you, Brady. Yeah. College Football Playoff expansion. I saw this. I apologize. I can't give credit for the joke. College Football Playoff expansion made all these two and three loss teams feel like 2003 USC, you know? And guess what, Yank? 2003 USC. Yeah. All right. Coming up on the other side, more of our thoughts on the College Football Playoff bracket upon further review. Pole Assassin and more next.

[D]

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[A]

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[D]

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[E]

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[B]

Back here on the COVID 3 podcast, have y' all had a chance to take a look at the bowl schedule?

[A]

I did.

[B]

You did what? What? What are some of the games that stick out to you?

[A]

I. I didn't we have a bowl game this Friday.

[B]

I did.

[D]

What are they doing there?

[B]

But I did.

[D]

Disrespecting the troops.

[B]

I agree.

[D]

By the way, it's pretty nice helmet back there, don't you think?

[B]

Boise State playing Washington this Saturday too.

In prime time. After Army Navy, I mean.

[A]

Yeah.

[C]

Wait, when's the Heisman? Right before that.

[D]

The Heisman's usually on Saturday evening, so it'll probably be right.

[C]

It'll probably be like a pre game show.

[D]

Yeah.

[C]

At seven o'.

[B]

Clock.

[C]

Great lead in.

[D]

They'll be there holding the trophy and then you're gonna go right to Las Vegas and like Dave was shoes in.

[A]

I think there are a couple really, really good ones that I'm excited to see.

[C]

We're going to California.

[D]

Sorry. Yeah, it's la, but my bad.

[B]

Yeah.

[D]

Sorry Bob.

[A]

Sorry Bob and Dave Pash.

[D]

Yeah, see I got, I got my confused.

[B]

Danny and I will be on on CBS Sports Network later today starting at 2pm picking every dago say Saturday night. Geez.

So yeah, I got it. I got a quick little quick little glance. What are some of the. What are some of the ones that stand out to you, bud? You do have a couple of bangers in Orlando. You know, you get Michigan and Texas in the Citrus bowl and you get Georgia Tech and byu. It's an ain't the Notre Dame BYU game that Pop Tarts wanted but from a like for the four of us. But I you mentioned BYU takes both seriously. I don't think Brent Key is going to have his boys ready to go and lay down. I think Georgia Tech, BYU is a fun one.

[A]

So the five that I wrote that that I thought are really good and I don't think there's a high chance we get quarterback opt outs. Okay. Which does impact this quite a bit. Tennessee, Illinois. I think it's gonna be a good.

[B]

Game advantage for Illinois.

[A]

I think both those staffs are pretty good, but yeah. All right. Iowa. Vandy I like a lot. Like I. Pavia is not gonna opt out.

[B]

Right.

[A]

He's gonna play.

[B]

I would say.

[D]

I wouldn't expect him to.

[A]

Michigan, Texas, you got two, you know, quarterbacks who aren't going anywhere and can't go pro. So they're not gonna opt out. Byu, Georgia Tech, like, I don't think Haynes King's a pro. He's probably gonna want to go out on top, right. And like, like play with his guys one last time. And then I think uva, Missouri is not bad either.

[C]

How could you leave off a battle of preseason national champion caliber?

[B]

It's very funny.

[C]

Those literally were my two teams to square off in the national championship game.

[D]

And you got it right.

[A]

Oh, so if Jennings plays, if Jennings plays for smu. I think, I think Arizona. SMU is also really nice.

[B]

Penn State, Clemson. Danny had him playing in Miami Gardens on January 19th. Instead it's Yankee Stadium on December 27th.

[D]

Stadium Danny likes even better.

[C]

That's right.

[B]

Oh, there we go. Danny, what. What games have jumped off the page to you?

[C]

I think he nailed I. That's the ones I was coming up with. I mean when we were. I was going through to make our picks, a lot of these you're trying to figure out who does it mean more for like who's you think are going to be the potential opt outs and those. I did have that Penn State, Clemson 1 is one that I think, I do think those cultures, you know, I think they should give their best effort. I would think you'll see players playing Penn State probably might have a couple guys out, but I think for the most part you'll get pretty full participation.

If Clemson wins.

[B]

It fulfills my midseason prediction that Clemson's gonna finish 7 and 5, win the bowl game and act like it's a national championship, go into next season, everything's fine, not change a single thing. Like it's. There's going to be no reckoning. It'll be like that Gator bowl season all over again where they beat Kentucky at the end of the year and it like signified some kind of magical turnaround. So we'll. We'll see what they do. We'll see what Penn State brings. But I agree with you. I like that one. I think Duke, Arizona State. Obviously we're not going to have Sam Levitt. We will have Darian Mintz against Jeff Sims. That's a. Yep. That's a. That's a quarterback matchup. That's our. That's the sun bowl game on New Year's Eve in the afternoon December 31st, 2pm that game on on CBS. Any, any other games that jump off.

[A]

The page to you if Sorsby plays for Sensi. I I think Navy Sensei is pretty good one.

[D]

Just happy Tennessee fans finally get to watch Luke Altmire play quarterback this year.

[B]

Oh, because they said they were gonna go grab him.

[D]

They tried to.

[B]

Did they try to after Nico left. I guess in like.

[C]

Yeah.

[A]

Do you know what might be really bad?

[B]

What?

[A]

Nebraska's D line against Utah's run game.

[C]

That could be.

[D]

Yeah, but you know who's going to save Nebraska?

[A]

Emma Johnson.

[D]

Yeah, he's gonna put on a Heisman worthy performance run all over the utes.

[B]

I this, this is not going to shock you, but Kyle Whittingham has been very, very good in bowl games.

[D]

Is this Kyle Whittingham's last game at Utah?

[C]

Maybe.

[B]

And if so, he's going to try to win by 40. There ain't a lot of big spreads on the board but Danny, I'll give you a spoiler. That was when I felt comfortable. Yeah, we're gonna, we're gonna say lay them there. Given Nebraska's turnover and what Utah tends to do. I love a Remember when the Hawaii bowl for some reason was not on Christmas Eve? Oh, because it was a Sunday. We got a Christmas Eve Sunday. That was what it was. Hawaii bowl back on Christmas Eve. And by getting Cal there, what do you have? Jaren Kiave Saga Politelli playing in Hawaii. So I think that'll be fun. You know, JKS is already committed to Tosh Lupoi and the Bears moving forward. So to, to have him playing in that, that nice Hawaii Bowl Christmas Eve, I think that's a, that's a, that's another fun one. I know some people like to throw it on no matter who's playing in it. You got good reason to think that Cal Hawaii could be a, an entertaining game to sit down and watch on the 24th.

[A]

Is Bailey playing for NC State?

[B]

Is Bailey playing for NC State in against Memphis? Yeah.

I, I imagine that pack of wolves might be. Those might be conversations that are ongoing.

[D]

Okay.

[A]

If so like that, that could be Fun.

[B]

Dave Doran is on a five game losing streak in bowl games right now.

[D]

Hot seat.

[B]

No, no, Boo Corgan's already said they're all in for year 14. And all those retirement rumors that were going around mid season. Dave, they pissed Dave off, honestly. And now it only made him more likely like if he was even thinking about it. The fact that everyone started talking about it. My read on this, just. My read is that it only gave him more of an edge and more of a spark to, to keep going.

[A]

One other thing that'll impact this is when the injunction on the five or five gets heard. I think there are some quarterbacks who like this would be their last college game. Who if they get the extra year, do they all of a sudden hit the portal?

Who.

[B]

Let's see who, who you got your eye on for that one.

[A]

Shoot. I had this circled earlier. Where are we at?

All right, come back to me on this because I, I had this circle, now I can't find it.

[B]

Okay.

Tom, any others stand out to you?

[D]

Honestly? I mean, they've all been mentioned. All the better games, I think. No. Nothing else. Right. You know, it's. I'll be honest with you, like now that I don't have to write the bowl rankings. You didn't look at it on Sunday. I just had like the, the complete like 5 year old pushback of now that I don't have to do it. I didn't pay any attention to it at all. I was just like, whatever. I'll find out when they're. I'll turn on the TV and see what's on when it's on and I'll watch it.

[B]

We. We. For those who weren't following the, the drama of trying to fill all of the bowl slots as teams one by one were saying no to, to being. Getting in there. Does anybody know who actually saved the day? You know who saved the bowl season? App State.

[D]

Oh, okay.

[B]

App State. App State.

[C]

Rematch.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

For a rematch against a confidence.

And. Oh, and do you know what that is, bud?

[D]

You know what?

[B]

Georgia Southern App State is a rivalry. It's an old rivalry. They've been playing for decades.

[A]

Fcs.

[B]

Yeah, that's right.

[D]

Has it snowed in the mountains lately?

[B]

We've got snow in North Carolina right now. I think it's wondering if.

[D]

I'm wondering if App State agreed to play in the game simply because nobody was able to go home because they were trapped in the mountains by the snow.

[B]

I don't know what App State's calendar is, but December 8th they might still have another day or two of, like, exams before the semester wraps up. It was always around this time, I remember, at North Carolina that we concluded things. All right, we have one final AP top 25 at the end of the season, but let's look one last time. It's a Monday. Let's check out Pole Assassin.

So obviously, as we told you, the shifting in the AP Top 25 was going to be minimal due to the fact that, you know, most teams were not playing. However, it is historic because Indiana, 66 first place votes unanimous. Number one team in the country. Reaching that number one spot, yet another. Another marker for Kurt Signetti. Danny, can we show the shirt for everybody? YouTube.com cover three if you're watching. I mean, that's. It's pretty simple. I win badass shirt there. Did you pick that up in Indianapolis while you were there?

[C]

I. I got. There was. I got some. I'm. I'm a. I'm a slut for swag. Like, I like stuff, so I end up spending a lot of money. So I got.

So I went to. So there was two different hotels. So we went and we got to see Signetti before the game at our hotel. They had some Ohio State gear. So I did the things that I saw. This shirt was sweet. I also had. I don't know why the bison tie in with Indiana. I just wasn't that familiar with it. So I got a pretty sweet shirt with the bison on the front of. That one's pretty cool. But then probably my favorite thing, and I was gonna wear whatever one today of who won the game. There's a Nike hoodie, and it's black, and it says. Just saying. It's pretty sweet. I'll break that one out later in the week.

[A]

It was pretty cool.

[C]

So, yeah, I did. I did buy a bunch of swag when I was there free.

[B]

Speaking of what.

Give us some. Give us some color. Give us some takeaways, you know? Like, I just. And I realized I was like, we haven't even, like, heard from dk, and he was there for the best game of the day. So what'd you think?

[C]

The biggest takeaway of for real, Cardell Jones? You walk around an Ohio State fan base with Cardell Jones, you might as well be with Elvis. Yeah, I mean, he's big dude, so he gets recognized. And I mean, it is everybody's card out. So that was awesome because he, you know, anything we needed.

[B]

He entertains it, too.

[A]

Yeah.

[C]

Oh, yeah. He's great.

[B]

Like, a great way. Like, he. He Says no. Like, I'm gonna take this photo, I'm gonna say hey to these people.

[C]

I got a couple still lives in Columbus. He's still involved with the nil. Like he just does it. He's a great job. He's a great dude. He crushed it out there. The atmosphere was awesome. You know, there was a lot of speculation. It was hard to tell. I thought it was going to be very, very heavy. Indiana and I would give it a slight edge. I don't know if it was like I thought it would be 70, 30. It was probably closer to 60, 40. And it's hard to tell because the Reds, like, they kind of look the same. So that was their thing that jumped out to me was before the game, we're on the field and you're walking around, kind of get a look at each team and just watching Ohio State warm up. I was like, oh my gosh, I might switch my pick. Like, holy. And then you walk around the Indiana's guys and you're like, man, I saw Urban Meyer before the game and I asked him, I'm like, hey, you know who he was going to pick for the game? So I just said, do you think Indiana can keep it close? And he goes. And I was just walking around this field just like I was. And he goes, that team is so good. And he was talking about Ohio State. And so that was like before the game. That was what jumped out to me was how much better looking off the bus Ohio State was. But then when you watched it unfold and you see what happened, the one Mike, Mike keys to the game that we had to do for the pregame show was Indiana had to make Julian saying uncomfortable. And boy, did they ever. I mean, that was. That was pretty remarkable. The other thing I did have a conversation with Tony Petiti, who came out of his way. I think he realizes he might have an ally because I am starting to grow to it. The expansion. And they have been the ones that have been proposing the 24 team playoff, much to Tom's chagrin. I can tell his blood is boiling. We might get him shouting again if we bring this up. But he was, he was very appreciative of the support. He said, I think it could be a great idea. So I think it could really help fix a lot of our issues. So that was, that was the other thing that stuck out when you were.

[B]

Talking to the supreme chancellor, to Petiti.

Is it. Is it 24 with automatic qualifiers? Is that. That's because you want to talk about the selection committee you do take it out of the committee's hands, that becomes like a big part of their argument moving forward. Yes.

[C]

And that was. I actually had the conversation with Urban Meyer as well. The growing sentiment. Rhett Lashley had said this on a radio show. We got to get rid of the committee. Like that is. The growing sentiment is we got to get rid of the committee. How does every other sport have a true playoff? How can we figure it out? Petiti's come up with this model that suggests it, but I think even in his model, I didn't.

[B]

We didn't.

[C]

We didn't break it down round by round, but I think he's got a portion, maybe significantly less minor portion of it is selected. And then I think the rankings, you have to rank them still.

[B]

Right.

[C]

Who gets the first round buys? I believe so there would be some influence. But as much as we can get away from this being an invitational, I think is better. So that's where I've kind of grown.

[A]

It's.

[C]

And it solves the conference championship games. They don't make sense. It doesn't work. What's at stake? That was a conversation we had a lot going in. Like what, you know, who really wants it. It solves that problem because it does away with them. So what we could have been watching were first round playoff games this past weekend where you lose, you go home, you win, you advance, which is how a playoff is supposed to work.

[A]

Are we having any of this conversation, like, seriously, like, entertaining 24 if the ACC just got their tiebreaker, right.

[D]

Are we having a conversation about how the G5 shouldn't be automatically in if the ACC got their tiebreaker, right?

[A]

Probably not.

[C]

This is a very reactionary business though, Tom, and we react to what we just see.

[D]

I've never been reactionary. Please do not accuse me of that.

[C]

I yell about the power, the decision makers. The decision makers.

[D]

Yeah, I know. And I. I think that's just. Yeah, like the Black Swan thing, the one in a million thing happens and we have to change everything because of that one in a million thing happening.

[A]

As opposed to changing the thing that allowed for the Black Swan to happen. Yeah, well, see, I feels like way too many. Have you guys seen this projected or. Sorry. 24 feels like way too many.

[C]

Yeah, yeah, I would agree. I think 24 is.

[A]

I looked at the 24 bracket today.

[C]

They have two group of five teams, right?

[D]

Brother, I feel like 12 is way too many. Of course, I think 24 is too.

[C]

Many, but it does include the player.

[A]

Both like eight over four Right.

[D]

I if we were going to expand past four, I was good with six. Give two. Like yeah, the top at the time there were five power five conferences. So six made a lot of sense to me. But Yeah, I guess 8 was probably makes a whole hell of a lot more sense right now. But ideally, again and we're talking about the AP poll in this segment, ideally I would put in and I know it would never happen. Every conference champion gets in and then you just have what, that's nine right now. And then you would add however many at larges after that.

[B]

So PAC12 is going to be back next year as a recognized FBS conference.

[D]

So it would be 10 and 6 at largest.

[B]

Yeah, I'd be fine with that.

[D]

At least then you have to play your way in. It's not just a committee choosing you.

[A]

I, I definitely don't like the committee, but I think a lot of it is just how it's presented week to week. You know.

If you look at the projected 24, that that's a lot of games that like okay.

[B]

No teams fell out of the top 25.

[A]

Virginia.

[B]

Virginia moved down four spots. North Texas moved down three spots. A little bit of shuffling elsewhere. Tulane made a big jump up after their impressive win against North Texas all the way up to number 17 as the green wave then prepare. JMU did not move.

So Dukes hanging tight at number 19. Two lanes move, you know, giving them a little bit of an edge there similar to what we saw in the cfp. Well, coming up on the other side, more of our reaction to Championship weekend and more next.

[E]

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[B]

Our friend Garrett in the tailgate said the AP poll right now is like me setting my 4 and 9 fantasy football teams roster.

[D]

Hey, there's still playoff spots at stake. You keep Setting your lineups. Keep, keep the competition fair.

[B]

Yeah. The, the. I will say this again and then I will stop saying it until we do our final poll Assassin the season. The AP Top 25 does preserve our final snapshot of the year. College Football Playoff rankings don't come back for a final ranking. So when we are talking about the end of season, the way that this will be remembered for eons to come. It's been around since 1936. So I, I, I, I give my respects to the AP top 25, especially when they got rid of that crooked Ralph Russo. So, you know, just a much, much cleaner operation at this point. One last chance to go under the hood. Things that we learned we call it upon further review.

There were terrible calls. Do you want to go ahead and jump in?

[A]

After further review, after further review, after further review.

[B]

Tom, did you get your Notre Dame? You mentioned in the, in the doc, the Notre Dame join a conference conversation. We didn't really get a chance to talk about that. And the opt out. Is that connected or do you want to? You want to.

[D]

It's connected to the playoff stuff. Yeah. There's like I, I think there's a Pavlovian response among college football fans in media now that anytime anything happens to Notre Dame and they become a topic of conversation, you scream join a conference.

[B]

Right.

[D]

And this week the joint of conference retort is to, you know, because they missed the College Football Playoff and they got left out. And I don't see how the two are combined because if you look at their schedule, you want to bring up their strength of schedule. It's the same as Miami's pretty much in every single one. You look at Saga and FBI, they're right next to each other. So they played the same difficulty schedule. And if you look at this very same playoff, the team that nobody's mentioned about getting screwed. BYU used to be an independent. It joined a conference, didn't do a damn thing to help it yesterday. So I don't see how being in a conference helped byu. A few years ago, Florida State in a conference, pretty big one, went undefeated, won it, got left out of the playoff. Didn't really seem to help them being in a conference. I, I don't understand why we think Notre Dame joining a conference changes anything. It maybe it helps keep them getting preferential treatment from like if they're in the top 12 now, they automatically get in. But it has absolutely nothing to do with this situation.

[A]

I, I agree.

[B]

Maybe more teams should be independent.

[D]

That's honestly. Yeah, I mean if you think about what's kind of happening to this sport where conferences have just been bending their will to serve the College Football Playoff. Maybe more teams should be sitting there looking around like, do we really need to be in this conference?

[B]

Maybe.

Danny. Any other just overall, like the. Do you think that Alabama getting left and not getting knocked down at all is a, is a fair, like, fair criticism of the final, final rankings?

[C]

No, I think they should have been docked.

[B]

Okay.

[C]

I think they should have been lowered. I mean, but again, I think they should have been all the way out. Well, like when I. Let's look at it from this way because when you look at like, all right, moving forward, they are in. Do I think they're a national championship contender? I say no. Like, and that's where I wanted teams that I like. To Bud's point, Mackenzie was on set with us the other day and she said 75 of their models that they run through had Notre Dame going all the way to the championship game. You know, like they had a pretty good chance to, to make it there. And I don't think Alabama is a team that I look at as a national championship contender.

[B]

The commit the selection committee and again, we've only got small sample size relatively, but conference championship game losers almost across the board have been dropped in the rankings, right? I mean, at least a spot even.

[C]

Right. And sometimes even if it's the SEC or Big Ten, they've dropped them.

[B]

Right? Yeah, that's what it was. I was like, huh? I didn't really. I mean, we, again, we went live at 12 o'. Clock. We had to vamp for like 28 minutes before they even started giving us the bracket for us to be able to react to. A lot of it was happening fast. But one thing that I had, I did not realize and did not get a chance to put together until after the show. Again, something that we tried to do on, upon further review is that the preferential treatment of the Alabama Crimson Tide goes beyond going getting bumped up for struggling with the 5 and 7 Auburn team. It continued with not getting docked after losing the SEC championship game when even like, even tighter margins, they got dog walked in that SEC championship game. No drop whatsoever. I thought that that was, you know, if we're going to offer criticism there. The selection committee, even as they've changed over throughout the years, has pretty routinely, at least, at least a spot or two, knocks teams down when they lose in conference championship games. And so for Alabama, that was a, that was a little bit of a benefit.

Anything else from the weekend? I Mean, this is sort of like it doesn't have to be tied to the games. It can be tied to the games. Playoff related. Otherwise, man, I gotta tell you, like.

[A]

The way Indiana, it's just so sound against the run. We talked about this right after with those linebackers. But like.

Those guys just see it, man. Like they are just in the right gap all the time. You just don't get freebie runs against these guys. It is, it's coaching. Yeah, yeah, it's coaching. It's instincts. I mean, like.

They'Re good up front, but like those backers just don't, they just don't blow it, man. Like they're just in the right gap. Like how many times it looks like, hey, like, like Ohio State might have something here. Like, it's a good run. Look, Ohio State runs the ball because they think they got a good run. Look. And like Indiana kind of baits them into it and they just get into the right spot, man. Like I, I went back and watched this morning, I was like, it's not like Ohio State is blowing blocks. Like Indiana just gets there. It's pretty impressive.

[D]

They are not fun to play against.

[A]

No.

[B]

And that's how you make up the gap or the get off the bus gap.

[C]

Right?

[B]

You know, just out. And. And Ohio State has good coaches too, right? You know, and it's just Indiana, they've, they, they do all of that small stuff at an extremely high level.

[A]

We talk about like, what if Iowa ever got a quarterback, right? This is kind of similar. It's like, hey, you got a first round quarterback.

[B]

Receivers.

[A]

Sure. Yeah, exactly.

Yeah, they're. Those backers are good. Dude.

[D]

What's kind of strange to me, and it's actually not even strange, but if you think about the way that like the coaching carousel works and we're talking about Indiana being very well coached here. Like, when it comes to the carousel, you look at all the coordinators at all the top programs who are always getting mentioned for these jobs. Like, I don't even know that. Like the more casual college football fans, ones that aren't watching it all the time, even though Indiana's coordinators are. You certainly never hear their names coming up as candidates for these jobs. And yet they're the most well coached team in the country and they're able to beat Ohio State with players that aren't as good as Ohio State or as big as Ohio State's. But you don't hear Mike Shanahan's name. You don't hear Brian Haynes.

[B]

Brian Haynes will start popping up. I, I think that we'll start. It's just I think Haynes has been with them since iupui.

[D]

Yeah, they've been.

[B]

And they might have been very long taking another job somewhere else. But I do know that Bryant Haynes started his coaching career back with.

That just started with Kurt signetti back at D2. So that relationship might be one reason it doesn't get floated, because he's just not interested in seeking those opportunities at this point.

[C]

I was making sure because I was wondering because the Broyles Award is coming up and I hadn't seen Haynes. Haynes is on there. But like, it kind of goes to your point. They probably both should be, you know, like. And you don't hear people reference them with the regard that they do some of the other ones.

[D]

Also, I am also upon further review, I am glad to see that after their first loss in a very long time, Ohio State fans are back on the who's calling the plays because if you're an Ohio State fan and I, I understand where they come from, like when you're that talented, clearly the only reason you could lose a game is because the coach is making the wrong calls.

[B]

Speaking of coordinators leaving, I.

Danny, I thought that, I mean, I know, you know, Dan's watching the show, so I, I'll get to maybe get to offer this to him as well. But Danny, Dan Landing looks surprised that you picked his team to win the national championship. His eyebrows jumped like, really? Us? Are. Are you sure about that, Danny? No, no, I understand that Dan Lanning has the utmost confidence. He had a great answer for. He's like, hey, that's why you come to Oregon. You come to Oregon so you can get opportunities elsewhere. You know, he's very excited for Will Stein at Kentucky, for Tash Lupo at Cal. And you were able to reference to him the fact that he himself took the Oregon job before helping Georgia win the national championship in the 2021 season. But he did look surprised that he did.

[C]

I definitely noticed that. I think he probably was the first one they had heard. It was early there, but then even afterwards it is a different calendar than it was. That goes further into the off season. The new portal window is open January 2nd like it is. There are going to be some unique challenges that I think half the field has to deal with. You know, now he's unique because both of his coordinators are going to be double minded or distracted, whatever term you want to use. But that is going to be an issue that I think does impact somebody.

[B]

Yeah, that's I don't think anyone outside of the top five can win a national championship in this bracket. And one of those top five teams doesn't really have a. An elite top level game changing quarterback in offense. One of those top five teams has both coordinators going to take other jobs. So when all these expert brackets start getting rolled out and they've all got some different combination of Ohio State, Indiana and Georgia, I'm not really surprised and I'm not going to push back a ton because unlike last year which had the number seven seed and the number eight seed playing for the national championship because of the unbalanced bracket and the fast pass that were given to the number three and the number four seeds, I think this year we're going to see that just like most years in college football. There's tears to this thing and I would be surprised if, if we see. I mean Oregon's the only team I could see going from the first round to hoisting the national championship trophy. And so it'll look a little boring when all the expert brackets get posted on CBSSports.com later today. But I'm not sure I push back against it too much.

[A]

I. I think there's more. It could win.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

I. I think the gap between these teams is smaller. Like it, it's.

[B]

But they're so flawed. Like even the programs. Yes. But it's like Oklahoma. You're going to win four games against the rest of this field. Alabama. The way that Alabama's offense has looked. Ole Miss doesn't have a head coach like these. These teams that should have the talent to be able to do it. The circumstances around them make it seem unlikely, at least to me.

[C]

But they're also. They're not as talented as they were when we were seeing some of these programs dominate.

[B]

Sure.

[C]

You know, like so. And that's where I think Ohio State, India. I think the Big Ten teams do have that advantage. They've been able to hoard a little bit more talent because they haven't had to compete against many teams in the Big Ten yet. I think you're going to start to see that change. Michigan State made a big investment. You're going to start seeing that. But I think they just have been able to retain and keep more talent across the board.

[B]

Ole Miss does have a head coach. It's Pete Golding. I understand. But I'm just.

[C]

He ain't into that pickleball crap.

[D]

No. You ain't going to hot yoga. None of that BS.

[B]

I like football.

[D]

Looking at implied odds there are 5 teams that have a 10 chance or better of winning the whole thing.

[B]

Are they the top five seeds?

[D]

Ohio State, Indiana, Georgia, Oregon and Texas Tech. And then after that, Texas Tech, if you're looking at FanDuel, is 9 to 1. So 10%. Texas A&M is 17 to 1. That's the jobs makers. Feel like there's a pretty clear drop off between, between those five and the rest.

[B]

And I could see.

[C]

I will put Texas Tech in that group, though I. I wouldn't pick them.

[D]

To win it, but I think if you look at their defense, they're more capable than a lot of other teams because of that defense. Not do they have the offense to get through three of these games. That's where I get skeptical.

[B]

That's such a weird matchup too. Like, we're assuming Oregon takes care of business against James Madison. Can we operate under that? Like Oregon will be playing against Texas?

[A]

No, Chip. James Madison has a real shot.

[B]

According to Twitter or Oregon and Texas Tech.

[D]

Alabama doesn't have a real shot, bud. But you're not really upset. They're in fair.

[B]

Oregon against Texas Tech in the Orange bowl on New Year's Day at noon is a weird ass game. Anything could happen there. I have no clue. So that, that of course, plays into Indiana as long as Indiana is able to win its quarterfinal game. Lots of, lots of pieces there. Anything else from the go ahead?

[D]

Did Appalachian State have a chance to beat Michigan? Did Boise State have a chance to beat Oklahoma?

[B]

I think. What did Marcelo had it?

[C]

He.

[B]

He nailed the 2800 miles. I mean, just all the pieces of it, you know, 20, 2800 miles out to Austin Stadium.

[D]

The way I look at it, there's two options here. Oregon blows out James Madison and we just move on real quickly. Or James Madison pulls off one of the greatest upsets in college football history and we remember it forever. Why is this such a horrible situation to be in?

[A]

There's a third option. Oregon continues to sit at starters so that, like, until they're 100 healthy and they win by like, you know, 10.

[D]

Like, I mean, I don't know. I. I just don't get why it's such an inconvenience that for three and a half hours on a Saturday, you might have to watch a game that's not close.

[A]

I think it's because we have to hype it for a month. And the lead off, we don't have to hype it.

[D]

We could be honest about our feelings the entire time. We could say, hey, I don't think JMU has a chance to win.

[B]

This game is in 11 days, too, bud. I mean, we don't actually have to sit in this for a long time.

[A]

You're right.

[B]

So we'll, we will narrow the field very, very quickly. And I think that that is one thing that I'm, I'm appreciative of with this College Football playoff calendar. We don't sit on our hands for a month. We're, we're going to do Army, Navy, and then we're going to jump into it. So I appreciate that. All right. Anything else before we get out of here? We're going to be on CBS Sports Network. Hey, hey. Back at noon Eastern time on Tuesday. So watch it, you can follow it. If you can't watch live at noon Eastern time on CBS Sports Network, circle back. We'll have it for [e-mail] cover three on demand as well as wherever you get your podcasts. And you can follow him on Twitter at Tom Fenelli. You can follow him@bud elliot3. You can follow him at Danny Cannell. Follow me at Chip Underscore Patterson. Gentlemen, thank you very much.

[D]

Wasn't a single one score game in the first round of last year's playoff and none of those teams were.

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