Playoffs look predictable with top four teams earning spots
A season filled with uncertainty brought on by the pandemic will end with a perfectly predictable College Football Playoff.
Alabama vs. Notre Dame. Clemson vs. Ohio State. Four of the bluest of blue bloods and the teams that have comprised the top four in the rankings for nearly two months. Notre Dame was picked Sunday over Texas A& M for the final spot, ending what little drama there had been.
“It’s been a unique season in so many ways,” Ohio State coach Ryan Day said.
Not not when it comes to the teams playing for the national championship.
The top four teams in the selection committee’s first rankings of the season were the same teams at the end, just in different order. Alabama, Notre Dame, Clemson and Ohio State have also held the first four spots in the AP Top 25 since Oct. 25.
Only 11 schools have ever reached the playoff and all four of these participants have been there before.
The Fighting Irish and Crimson Tide will meet Jan. 1 at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas, after a late pandemic-related relocation from the Rose Bowl in Pasadena. The Tigers and Buckeyes are set to play the same day at the Sugar Bowl in New Orleans if all goes according to plan.
The national champion is scheduled to be determined Jan. 11 in suburban Miami.
The Fighting Irish (10-1) are back in the playoff for the second time in three seasons, becoming the first team to lose a conference title game and make the final four. It was a novelty made possible only because of the pandemic, which pushed the famously independent Irish into a conference for the first time in school history.
The Atlantic Coast Conference is the second league to have two teams in the playoff, joining the SEC in 2017.
After sitting second in the CFP rankings for a month, Notre Dame was blown out 34-10 by Clemson in the ACC championship. That opened the door for No. 5 Texas A&M (8-1), but the Aggies were unable to become the third team in the playoff’s seven-year history to make the field without even winning its conference division.
Selection committee chairman Gary Barta, the Iowa athletic director, said Notre Dame’s extra victory against a ranked opponent helped give the Irish an edge over Texas A&M.
“A great part of our discussion was related to those two resumes,” Barta said.
Notre Dame beat Clemson and North Carolina, which had been 15th in the previous playoff rankings. Texas A& M’s only victory against a CFP team was Florida. The Aggies played Alabama in October and lost by 28 points.
The decision didn’t go over well in Aggieland: Texas A& M quarterback Kellen Mond tweeted: “JOKE.” The Aggies can take out their frustrations on North Carolina in the Orange Bowl on Jan. 2.
Barta said the disparate number of games played by contenders — along with far fewer cross-conference games than usual —- was a challenge for the committee all season. But Ohio State’s six-game schedule was not as important to the panel as the Buckeyes going undefeated and winning the Big Ten.
Oklahoma surged to sixth in the final rankings after closing with seven straight victories and a Big 12 title. The Sooners will face seventh-place Florida in the Cotton
Bowl on Dec. 30.
Unbeaten Cincinnati finished eighth, making the Bearcats the top-ranked team among Group of Five conference champions and guaranteeing them a spot in one of the New Year’s Six bowls. Cincinnati will meet Georgia in the Peach Bowl on New Year’s Day.
Pac-12 champion Oregon will face Iowa State in the Fiesta Bowl on Jan. 2.
Notre Dame’s reward will be a matchup with Alabama (11- 0), the Southeastern Conference champion that is back in the playoff for the sixth time after missing out last year. The last time the Fighting Irish and Crimson Tide played was the 2012 BCS championship game and the Tide won 42-14.
Clemson (10-1) is in the CP for the sixth straight season, only missing out on the first playoff. Ohio State (6- 0) is making its fourth appearance. The Tigers have won two playoff titles and the Buckeyes won the first after the 2014 season.
Clemson-Ohio State is a rematch of last season’s dramatic semifinal in Arizona, won 29-23 by the Tigers. The two teams also met at the Fiesta Bowl in the 2016 playoff and Clemson beat the Buckeyes 31- 0.
Instead of having more than three weeks to prepare for the playoff, the altered regular-season schedules mean the semifinals are 12 days away.
“It’s very different to prepare,” Clemson coach Dabo Swinney said. “It’s basically like an open date.”
One of the semifinals was scheduled to be played at the Rose Bowl, but a move was announced Saturday night after coaches and school officials from playoff contenders complained about California’s COVID-19 restrictions that ban spectators from sporting events and would have made it impossible for players’ families to attend the game.
Playing the game at the home of the Dallas Cowboys will allow 16,000 fans to attend. Because of that, Barta said, the committee placed top-seeded Alabama there to give it the possibility of more of a home-field advantage.
The Superdome is currently set to have 3,000 fans for the Sugar Bowl, but that number could go up. BOWL GAME DAY MARRED BY CANCELLATIONS >> At a time when team after team had opted out of bowl games, Army found itself in a different sort of situation — left out.
The Black Knights have a 9-2 record and a nearly two-month-long commitment to the Independence Bowl. They seemed all set. But when the Dec. 26 game in Louisiana was called off Sunday night because there was not an available team to play, it suddenly left Army on the outside of the postseason landscape.
A sliver of hope remains: The Black Knights could be in line should some bowl-bound team find itself dealing with COVID-19 issues.
What is usually a joyous day for more than 60 teams around the country was far more surreal as organizers set the annual bowl schedule two weeks later than usual.
This only adds insult: With bowl contracts still in force, a South Carolina team with a woeful 2-8 record is going to the Gasparilla Bowl.
With the season winding down, more than 20 Bowl Subdivivion teams chose not to accept an invitation to a bowl, calling an end to this long season. That led to the unusual situation of postseason games not having enough teams to fill the slots.
This seemed to almost perfectly sum up what teams experienced all season: UTSA was set to play in the Frisco Bowl over the weekend when SMU withdrew due to COVID-19 concerns and the bowl was scrubbed. So UTSA accepted an invitation to the First Responder
Bowl, where the Roadrunners found out Sunday they will face No. 16 Louisiana-Lafayette.
That’s the typical playbook in ‘20 — plan, cross your fingers and have a viable backup plan.
Like with the Montgomery Bowl, which will serve as a substitute this season for the canceled Fenway Bowl and feature Memphis against Florida Atlantic.
The NCAA waived bowl eligibility requirements this year because of the coronavirus pandemic, which explained why Michigan State announced it was opting out — at 2- 5, no less. Then again, Mike Leach and his 3-7 Mississippi State squad are heading to the Armed Forces Bowl against No. 22 Tulsa.
No one lobbied harder to play this season than Nebraska. On bowl selection day, the Cornhuskers (3- 5) decided to wrap up the season.
“This year has been a long grind and it is time for our guys to have a break,” Nebraska coach Scott Frost said in a statement.
Nebraska joined a long list of teams who decided enough was enough, among them Arizona State, Boise State, Boston College, Georgia Tech, Kansas State, Louisville, Penn State, Pittsburgh, San Diego State, SMU, Southern California, Stanford, UCLA, Utah, Virginia, Virginia Tech and Washington. For the Hokies, the decision ended a 27 straight bowl game run.
Some of the canceled bowl games — 15 in all, including three on Sunday alone — included the Bahamas Bowl, Celebration Bowl, Hawaii Bowl, Holiday Bowl, Las Vegas Bowl, LA Bowl, Pinstripe Bowl, Quick Lane Bowl, Redbox Bowl and Sun Bowl.
Late Saturday game
ARIZONA STATE 46, OREGON STATE 33 >> Jayden Daniels passed for a touchdown and had two of Arizona State’s six rushing touchdowns in the Sun Devils’ 46- 33 victory over Oregon State on Saturday night.
Following a 70-7 blowout of rival Arizona, the Sun Devils’ offense was explosive once again in the season finale amassing 514 total yards.
Rachaad White had 158 of the Sun Devils’ 375 yards rushing, including runs of 51 and 55 yards.
Daniels’ 53- yard touchdown run early in the third quarter gave the Sun Devils a 33-15 lead.
Jack Colletto, who the Beavers often utilized at quarterback in short-yardage situations, scored on an 11-yard run to cut the lead to 33-21 midway through the