The final rankings for the 2021 College Football Playoff are officially locked in.
The No. 3 Ohio State Buckeyes (6-0) will face the No. 2 Clemson Tigers (10-1) in the Allstate Sugar Bowl, while the No. 4 Notre Dame Fighting Irish (10-1) will play the No. 1 Alabama Crimson Tide (11-0) in the Capital One Rose Bowl Game.
The first two teams left out were No. 5 Texas A&M (8-1) and No. 6 Oklahoma (8-2).
Yesterday, on championship Saturday, Alabama and Ohio State secured SEC and Big Ten championships in much closer games than expected. Even with the close games, that pretty much locked those two into playoff spots.
Clemson handed Notre Dame its first loss of this season as the Tigers went on to win the ACC Championship Game. The game was a blowout in favor of Clemson by 24 points and caused the Irish to drop two spots.
The biggest question marks on the final rankings are Texas A&M and Cincinnati. Jimbo fisher’s Aggies had a whopping victory over Tennessee, while Cincinnati took down Tulsa to win the AAC Championship.
Cincinnati finished the season undefeated but were left out of the top-6, having many fans outraged with the selection committee’s decisions. The biggest argument is that these non power-5 conferences will never have a shot of making it into the top-4. Cincinnati actually dropped in the rankings in weeks that they didn’t even play leading up to the fifth and final CFP Rankings.
Texas A&M only dropped one game to the Crimson Tide in the second game of the year, having their fans scratching their heads at what Notre Dame was still doing there following a blowout loss to Clemson.
Regardless of what fans, coaches, players and analysts say, the committee’s decisions are final. The seventh edition of the College Football Playoff is set to kickoff January 1st, 2021.