Just win, baby.
Any bickering over who should be included in the 12-team playoff no longer matters. All that matters is advancing to the next round.
Four teams will do so this weekend. It started on Friday when alabama Defeated oklahomaTop seed advancing to play Indiana Jan. 1 at the Rose Bowl.
Starting from Saturday, three more teams will get a chance miamiTravel Texas A&M and the winner is playing Ohio State In the cotton bowl.
ESPN’s college football writers are already looking ahead, so here’s a closer look at those quarterfinal matchups.
When?: January 1, 4 PM ET. TV:espn
Road to playoffs: Coach Curt Cignetti and the Hoosiers heard the hate directed at them at the end of their historic 2024 season and decided to run it back and perform even better this fall. Indiana made its first 10-win season and first CFP appearance by becoming the only FBS team to run the table, posting a 13–0 mark, winning its first outright Big Ten title since 1945, and earning the top seed in the CFP field.
The Hoosiers navigated a far more difficult Big Ten schedule than 2024, beating Oregon, Iowa and Penn State on the road, en route to a no. 9 Illinois won by 53 points in Bloomington and finished things off with a 13–10 win against Ohio State in the Big Ten title game, a matchup that paired the nation’s No. 1 and 2 teams.
Despite all the talk about the soft non-league schedule, Indiana was not hampered at all, winning all but two of its regular season Big Ten games by double digits. The Hoosiers finished second nationally in points difference, outscoring their opponents by 404 points. They had to rally against Penn State and Iowa, but went undefeated at home, winning seven games by an average of 40.7 points.
Players to watch: After a team-record 11 wins in 2024, despite the strong performance of Curtis Rourke (3,042 passing yards, 29 touchdowns), Indiana looked to areas to upgrade, including quarterback. Hoosiers get even more coveted transfer quarterback at Cal Fernando MendozaWho further improved the passing attack and became the school’s first Heisman Trophy winner.
Mendoza has delivered four nearly flawless performances with over 85% completions and four or more touchdowns and no interceptions. He occupies the top three spots on Indiana’s single-game completion percentage chart. Mendoza helped Indiana lead key wins against Penn State and Iowa and overcame one of his few big mistakes – a pick-six at Oregon – to lead two scoring drives in the fourth quarter. Mendoza leads FBS with 33 touchdown passes, an Indiana single-season record.
The biggest question: There aren’t too many weaknesses in Indiana’s profile, as the Hoosiers’ offense and defense rank in the top 10 nationally in several key statistical categories. But if Indiana wants to advance in the CFP, it may face some key fourth-down situations and need to find more efficiency. The Hoosiers finished the season ranked 8th out of 16, tied for 90th nationally and well below other CFP teams such as Texas A&M, Georgia, Ohio State, and Alabama. Indiana failed on all three of its fourth-down opportunities in a 20–15 win at Iowa and went 0–1 at Oregon the following week. The good news is that IU then got much better on downs, converting its last five fourth-down attempts, including a fourth-and-2 attempt to set up a field goal in the first half against Ohio State.
They can win if…: The Hoosiers can successfully run a balanced attack, as they have for most of the season. Mendoza’s arrival and success has at times dulled Indiana’s run game, which is much better than it was in 2024. The Hoosiers rank 11th nationally in rushing (221.1 yards per game), up from 63rd (165.1) last season. Indiana is committed to the run even in low-scoring games, as it showed against Iowa (39 attempts), Penn State (31 attempts) and Ohio State (34 attempts). The offense can’t deviate from that approach against an Alabama defense that defends the run well but isn’t one of the nation’s best. Indiana is also great in the turnover game, tying Texas Tech for the national lead with a plus-17 differential. , adam ritenberg
What we learned in Round 1: Alabama’s Friday night may not have looked as good as it did in September and October, but the Crimson Tide still showed it had another gear to kick en route to the greatest comeback in CFP history against Oklahoma. Unforced errors crushed the Crimson Tide in a 23–21 loss to the Sooners in November. In the opening round rematch, Alabama flipped the script, coming back strongly from 17–0 down zbn brown50-yard pick-six and disciplined performance from the quarterback ty simpsonWhich started to look like itself two weeks after a disastrous performance in the SEC title game. The Crimson Tide played the kind of (largely) mistake-free football that had eluded them in the back half of the regular season. They’ll need to do it again when they meet No. 1 Indiana in the Rose Bowl on New Year’s Day.
Players to watch: With touchdowns either side of halftime in the first-round matchup with Oklahoma, the freshman wide receiver Lotzeer Brooks Joins some elite company as only the fifth Alabama pass catcher to record two receiving scores in a CFP game. Along with him in that list: devonta smith (twice), OJ Howard, Calvin Ridley and Amari Cooper. Brooks caught five passes for 79 yards in his CFP debut, finishing as the Crimson Tide’s leading receiver in the 34–24 victory. Within a pass-catching core that features jermay bernard, Ryan Williams And isaiah hortonBrooks is as dynamic as any other player, and he could once again be a difference-maker against the Hoosiers’ 19th-ranked pass defense.
They can win if…: Alabama limits its mistakes, and Simpson plays like the Heisman-caliber quarterback we saw in the first half of the season. The Crimson Tide defeated Oklahoma at its own game in the first round, forcing a quarterback john mater Making mistakes at times and pouncing on mistakes like grayson millerA wobbly effort before halftime. The duo of Simpson and the Crimson Tide’s composed, accurate quarterback play have the tools to give Indiana trouble. , eli lederman
