The College Football Playoff format has been altered once again.
This is a look at the biggest winners and losers of the new seeding method, with odds provided by the DraftKings Sportsbook.
College Football Playoff Seeding Change
The College Football Playoff has been an ever-evolving format over the past few years. Another change was announced on Thursday, one that many football fans called for after last season. The 2024-25 season featured the first-ever 12-team playoff. While it was largely a success, the biggest complaint was over the automatic byes given to conference champions, rather than the top four teams. In fact, all four teams that were given first-round byes ended up losing their first game. Specifically, Boise State and Arizona State would not have been ranked among the top four teams if the conference champions had not been automatically given those seeds.
Going forward, the top five highest-ranked conference champions will still make the College Football Playoff, but the top four conference champions will no longer be given a first-round bye. So, using last year’s teams, Boise State and Arizona State still would have been given automatic bids to the playoff by winning their conference, but they would not have been given first-round byes. Instead, Texas and Penn State would have taken their spots in the top four.
Winners
Notre Dame
The biggest winner from this decision might just be Notre Dame. The Fighting Irish are the only perennial contender who do not play in a conference. Due to their independent status, they would never have been able to earn a top-four seed under the old format, even if they were the No. 1 ranked team in the country. Under the new format, if they are ranked inside the top four, then they will get a first-round bye.
SEC and Big Ten
The SEC and the Big Ten have started to achieve a bigger advantage over the rest of the country. These two conferences have been the most dominant in the sport for decades now, but the gap does seem to be widening. A team from one of these conferences has won each of the past six National Championships, and outside of two titles won by Clemson, they have won every National Championship since 2014. One disadvantage that they faced in the old format was that only one team from each conference could get a bye. Now, under the new rules, multiple teams from either of these conferences could get a bye. If this rule were in place last season, it would have been two teams from the SEC and two teams from the Big Ten getting the four byes.
Losers
Group of Five Conferences, Big 12 and ACC
The biggest loser in this scenario is basically anybody not named Notre Dame who doesn’t play in the SEC or Big Ten. It is already a huge challenge to win a title in the 12-team College Football Playoff. Rather than just having to pull off one upset, you need to win at least three games to win a title. If you don’t get a first-round bye, you need to win four games to win a title. The Big Ten and SEC will likely get a majority, if not all, of the first-round byes for the foreseeable future. That will make the task even harder for a team from another conference to get all the way to the mountain top. The only silver lining is that a team like Boise State will likely get an easier first-round matchup next season, giving them a chance to pick up a “playoff win.” However, if the ultimate goal is a National Championship, that task just got even harder for teams outside of the two big conferences.
2025 National Championship Odds
The current odds to win the National Championship at DraftKings Sportsbook reflect the lopsided nature of college football at the moment. The top six teams with the best odds all come from either the SEC or the Big Ten. Of the 18 teams with odds of +8000 or better, only Notre Dame, Clemson and Miami are not from the SEC or Big Ten. That means that for any team from the Big 12 or the Group of Five conferences, it is considered an extreme long shot for them to win a title.
