What To Know About College Football Playoff

Ready for more football? Thought so. 

While the official release of the first installment of the 12-team College Football Playoff came with controversy, the revealed bracket touts an immense amount of intrigue, with big-time programs and big-time ballplayers set to face off across the country.

Although we won’t see what is expected to be the top three QBs in the 2025 NFL Drat—Colorado’s Shedeur Sanders, Miami’s Cam Ward, or Alabama’s Jalen Milroe—in the playoff matchups to come, the games are sure to represent a cinematic masterpiece set to unfold within the hashes over the next few weeks. With all 12 teams locked into the bracket, let’s get into a few immediate takeaways, matchups to watch, and more with the inaugural 12-team CFP locked, loaded, and ready to kick off.

Oregon’s Path to CFP Title Game

If I’m Oregon head coach Dan Lanning, a few things initially pop up when looking at the bracket. Sure, you enter the postseason as the top overall seed, you won a Big Ten title, and you are the only undefeated team left in the nation, but my oh my what a matchup they have coming up against either Tennessee or Ohio State. 

The Ducks went to the wire against the Buckeyes earlier this fall in Eugene, and Tennessee enters the playoff with arguably the second-best QB in the bracket in sophomore sensation Nico Iamaleava—along with one of the country’s elite ball-carriers in Dylan Sampson. Oh, and they also have pass-rusher James Pearce Jr., who finished the regular season with 52 pressures, second most in the SEC (LSU’s Bradyn Swinson). 

While a bye will be nice for rest purposes, long layoffs can hurt teams at times, and the Ducks will have a flat-out dogfight ahead of them no matter who comes into town. Lanning will have his group ready to rock, that’s not a question, but the road to a ring for the No. 1 overall seed won’t be a walk in the park.

Leaning On Ground Game

Looking across the landscape of the playoff, it doesn’t contain game-breaking signal-callers and projected top-10 picks at the position. Rather, the talent at running back draws the spotlight. From Heisman candidate Ashton Jeanty and No. 3-ranked Boise State, Cam Skattebo and the No. 4 Sun Devils, Notre Dame and junior sensation Jeremiyah Love, or the tandems of TreVeyon Henderson and Quinshon Judkins (Ohio State) or Nick Singleton and Kaytron Allen (Penn State), teams are going to get after each other up front. That also includes running QBs Kevin Jennings (SMU), Riley Leonard (Notre Dame) Cade Klubnik (Clemson), and Sam Leavitt (Arizona State), who won’t be afraid to create with their lower half, either. 

In a day in age where aerial attacks are the norm, the majority of the programs inside the bracket will lean primarily on their ability to run the football before opening it up over the top. 

QB Questions For Georgia & Texas

The SEC title game was a slug-it-out, slow-paced ballgame, but the main storyline from Georgia’s win shifts the focus to both signal-callers. For the Bulldogs, Carson Beck entered the year with first-round buzz, yet he was unable to find consistency throughout the campaign and left the SEC championship early due to injury. For scouts, he failed to meet expectations, and he failed to execute at a high level in the first half against Texas too before leaving with an injury. 

Georgia has a few weeks to rest, but if Beck is unable to go, it’ll be Gunnar Stockton, a sophomore who deserves credit for leading the Bulldogs back against the Longhorns but is limited at the position given the role he was prepared to serve this year. Beck is their clear starter, if healthy, but there isn’t a scout in the league right now who knows exactly what version of Beck will show up if he’s cleared to play. 

On the other side is a potential can of worms head coach Steve Sarkisian is doing his best to keep closed. Quinn Ewers entered the year with similar buzz to Beck, yet his senior season has been much more of a flash in the pan of what he could be, rather than finding a happy median as a player and producing with consistency. 

A five-star recruit out of high school, Ewers’ easy velocity, varying arm angles, and touch have remained on display this fall, yet there are points in times where his mechanics get sloppy, his internal clock extends, and Texas’ offense stalls for quarters at a time. The questions surrounding Ewers lead to potentially the biggest storyline of the playoff and backup quarterback Arch Manning. 

There isn’t a player in the bracket with more of a spotlight, and his presence sits in Ewers’ rearview mirror like a Mack Truck with its high beams on. Although Sarkisian has limited Manning to creating with his legs in the latter weeks of the season, should Ewers struggle early against Clemson, how long is the leash before making the switch to a player who, despite limited snaps, has proved he can lead the offense? It’s a move Sarkisian made earlier in the campaign to create a spark, and with a national title on the line, nothing remains out of the question for one of the most talented rosters in the country. In his last two starts, Ewers has thrown three interceptions compared to two touchdowns, with five turnover-worthy throws against Texas A&M and Georgia. 

Matchup to watch: Penn State QB Drew Allar vs SMU QB Kevin Jennings

Happy Valley is going to be absolutely rocking for this matchup, where the slow-paced, monotonous game of the Nittany Lions squares off against Jennings and the warp-speed attack of the Mustangs. The two offenses are on completely different ends of the spectrum when it comes to pace of play, where the Nittany Lions like to churn ground clock and wear down teams on the ground averaging 27.6 seconds per play (105th in the country), whereas SMU likes to run tempo, force favorable matchups, and score quickly, averaging 23.8 seconds per play—19th fastest in the country and the fastest of any team in the CFP. 

At quarterback, the same can be said as far as differentiation. Penn State’s Drew Allar is a primary pocket passer with the typical mold of a future NFL franchise signal-caller with the zip and touch to threaten all three depths. Kevin Jennings is one of the country’s premier dual-threat talents who can beat teams in the pocket, only to take it for six on QB counter—like he did against Clemson. Both quarterbacks enter the playoff off of excellent performances in their respective title games, and both could use the CFP as springboards for their draft stock.