2. We have the first crazy College Football Playoff shocker
The first eight years of the College Football Playoff were totally chalk.
Beyond that, the conference championships have gone to form over the eight seasons. Maybe there was a mild Pac-12 upset here, or a Big 12 Championship win there, but form almost always held.
A College Football Playoff upset was when Clemson beat Alabama, or Alabama beat Clemson, or Ohio State beat Clemson, or … something like that.
Cincinnati? Nope.
Notre Dame? It wasn’t even close in its two tries. Michigan State and Washington came in and was promptly shown the door.
TCU? It was supposed to lose to big, bad Michigan. It was the program that might have been left out if Clemson had just one loss and/or if USC won the Pac-12 Championship. It was the kid that got the seat at the adult table, and …
It won. The supposedly lesser team doesn’t win in meaningful games with everyone fully focused and trying. That’s not how that works – that’s for the NCAA basketball tournament and the first round of the NHL playoffs.
And with this win, TCU does two big things. 1) It shows it’s possible that the out-of-the-blue upstart can win one of these games, and 2) it paves the way for the expanded College Football Playoff to potentially be a lot more interesting.
The narrative that adding more playoff games would automatically lead to more blowouts and more mismatches now doesn’t work.
TCU paved the way for what’s possible.
Yeah, really …
Fiesta Bowl College Football Playoff 5 Thoughts
5; Michigan was off from the start
4. Michigan got hosed on 2 calls, but …
3. TCU’s defensive front held up
2. The first College Football Playoff shocker
1. TC-freaking-U is in CFP National Championship