ESPN’s Allstate playoff predictor has ranked the teams with the best chances to make the College Football Playoff. Last season, the playoff featured Georgia, Alabama, Cincinnati and Michigan.
This year, Georgia, Alabama and Ohio State are considered heavy favorites to make the playoffs. All three teams face challenging opponents in the first couple of weeks of the season.
ESPN gives 16 teams a better than 2% chance to make the playoffs. Five of these teams are from the SEC, while the Big Ten has four teams.
Overall, ESPN’s playoff prediction is fairly accurate in the preseason. The model has projected that every national champion, during the playoff era, had at least a 65% chance to make the playoff entering the season.
Here’s who ESPN considers the 10 teams most likely to make the playoffs: