Projecting the new College Football Playoff rankings: How close can Texas get? - NBC Sports
The Longhorns are the only three-loss team with a shot at making the 12-team CFP. And they should be squarely on the bubble after their win over Texas A&M this weekend.
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Projecting the new College Football Playoff rankings: How close can Texas get?
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Nicole Auerbach,
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Nicole Auerbach
Published November 30, 2025 12:15 PM
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College football’s regular season is in the books, which means we can turn our full attention to the College Football Playoff field.
At this point, there appear to be eight teams locked into the 12-team bracket (with seeds TBD):
- assuming the CFP selection committee doesn’t penalize Ole Miss for Lane Kiffin’s departure
Those eight teams should be in the field — regardless of what happens in conference championship games. That means title game participants on this list have enough wiggle room that they can lose next weekend and still be fine.
We can also pencil in two conference champions for the Nos. 11 and 12 seeds. Right now, I’m projecting Virginia as the ACC champion (and No. 11 seed), but if the Cavaliers get upset by a 7-5 Duke team ... then I think we are looking at a very real possibility that the ACC is left out of the CFP entirely. The Blue Devils would not be ranked in the committee’s Top 25 and could be ranked behind two Group of 5 conference champions — the American, and perhaps the Mountain West or Sun Belt champion as well. Only the five highest-ranked FBS conference champions are guaranteed spots in the 12-team field.
Rating: 5