Notre Dame moves to #10 because of college football playoff politics

The penultimate set of College Football Playoff rankings were released and the committee decided to move Notre Dame down to #10 and Alabama up to #9.

RANK

TEAM

OVERALL RECORD

1

Ohio State

12-0

2

Indiana

12-0

3

Georgia

11-1

4

Texas Tech

11-1

5

Oregon

11-1

6

Ole Miss

11-1

7

Texas A&M

11-1

8

Oklahoma

10-2

9

Alabama

10-2

10

Notre Dame

10-2

11

BYU

11-1

12

Miami

10-2

13

Texas

9-3

14

Vanderbilt

10-2

15

Utah

10-2

16

Southern California

9-3

17

Virginia

10-2

18

Arizona

9-3

19

Michigan

9-3

20

Tulane

10-2

21

Houston

9-3

22

Georgia Tech

9-3

23

Iowa

8-4

24

North Texas

11-1

25

James Madison

11-1

If you’ve been paying attention to me over the past few weeks — this is pretty much what I expected from the committee. They want Bama in the playoff because of the whole SEC thing. This way, if Bama loses to Georgia, they can swap the two teams once again. The swap would also take care of the ridiculous double rematch pairing that is going on right now with Notre Dame VS Texas A&M and Oklahoma VS Alabama.

The CFP Chairman said that idle teams can absolutely move following the conference championship games, so there is some talk about there still being a chance that Miami jumps Notre Dame with a BYU loss to Texas Tech… but that would be incredibly terrible optics (no matter what side of the argument you’re on).

So to be clear… Notre Dame is OUT if BYU wins the Big 12 Championship game against Texas Tech. Notre Dame is likely in if Texas Tech wins. Alabama is IN no matter what happens against Georgia, and Oklahoma with that terribly stinky offense is also IN. It’s politics and positioning, and despite what the people outside of the Notre Dame bubble think, it’s not the Irish that control these things — it’s everyone else.

Despite the still very fluid nature of Notre Dame’s playoff berth, the Irish are looked at as one of the best teams in college football and maybe one of the most dangerous. According to FanDuel Sportsbook, Notre Dame has the 4th best odds to win the National Championship at +1000 just behind Ohio State (+185), Indiana (+370), and Georgia (+750).