The Playoff Committee Must Explain When Head-to-Head Counts

The College Football Playoff committee did not owe Notre Dame a berth. It owed the Irish a consistent standard. The Irish finished 10-2^[1] with a 10-game winning streak,^[2] yet missed the 12-team field while Alabama qualified. Alabama had just fallen to 10-3 with a 28-7 loss to Georgia in the SEC championship.^[3] I would not disqualify a team automatically for a third loss. The committee does a central planner’s job: it must turn competing measures of merit into one ranking, then award scarce playoff places by that ranking. It cannot make the ranking itself the explanation.

Notre Dame ranked above Miami in all five preliminary CFP releases.^[4] In the December 7 final rankings,^[1] Miami rose to No. 10, Notre Dame fell to No. 11 and Alabama stayed ninth. Conference champions Tulane and James Madison,^[2] ranked Nos. 20 and 24,^[1] took two automatic places, leaving No. 10 as the last at-large place. Neither Miami nor Notre Dame had played that weekend.^[5] Committee chairman Hunter Yurachek explained the turn: “Once we moved Miami ahead of BYU, we had that side-by-side comparison.” He said head-to-head settled it and asked members to rewatch the August game. The game had not changed. Its weight had.

College Football Playoff rankings of four teams, November and December 2025

Miami has an excellent answer: it beat Notre Dame 27-24 on August 31.^[6] Notre Dame lost fair and square, and a loss does not expire because the losing team improves. Alabama had beaten Georgia 24-21 in September,^[7] while BYU’s title-game defeat was its second loss to Texas Tech, as Yurachek noted.^[5] Holding Alabama steady while dropping BYU was not inherently inconsistent. The CFP also said before the season that idle teams could move, provided the change was evidence-based.^[8] A weekly ranking was never a promise to Notre Dame. That permission explains why the committee could change the order, not why Miami’s old win became decisive only after BYU dropped.

Notre Dame also has to accept the cost of independence. The 2025 format reserved places for the five highest-ranked conference champions and the seven highest-ranked remaining teams.^[9] An independent had no conference-title route, and Notre Dame’s athletic director sat on the management committee that unanimously approved the seeding rules in May. On December 7, athletic director Pete Bevacqua told Yahoo Sports the school intended to remain independent.^[10] He also said an agreement signed that spring assures the Irish a playoff place whenever they finish in the top 12, starting with the 2026 season.

I can live with a selection I dislike. I cannot assess one whose explanation depends on which teams have become neighbors in a list the committee itself wrote. The committee’s protocol^[11] names head-to-head among the criteria for “otherwise comparable teams” without specifying what makes them comparable or which criterion prevails when they conflict. If schedule strength outweighs a third loss, explain why. If head-to-head decides between comparable teams, say what made Notre Dame and Miami comparable on December 7 but not December 2. Publish that test and the criteria’s order before next season, then use the weekly releases to show how they operate. Let schools read the terms before the committee withholds an invitation.