2025 Week 14 12-team College Football Playoff prediction: Alabama doomsday looming

Rivalry week has come and gone, and this year’s edition didn’t quite have the on-field chaos we’ve grown accustomed to. Sure, it had a head coach of a College Football Playoff team holding his program, Marty Smith, and the entire college football world hostage for about 72 hours as he decided to leave for their rival while still demanding to coach his now former team. 

But on the field, for the most part, the favorites won. Ohio State finally ended Michigan’s four-game win streak in that rivalry, Georgia handled Georgia Tech in Atlanta, and Alabama hung on to win the Iron Bowl. The only team in last week’s projected College Football Playoff field to lose was Texas A&M. 

Three-loss Texas didn’t get the help it needed

Though Texas’s win on Friday night keeps the Aggies out of the SEC Championship, at 11-1, Mike Elko’s team is a lock for an at-large bid into the CFP. Texas, now with wins over Texas A&M, Oklahoma, and Vanderbilt on its resume, should inch closer to the CFP, but three losses will be too much to overcome. 

Texas has a strong resume, and Steve Sarkisian has begun to argue that it’s unfair to punish his team for opening the season with a loss at Ohio State. On that point, he’s correct, but that’s not what Texas is being punished for. It’s being punished for losing to a Florida team that finished with four wins. It’s being punished for going to overtime with Kentucky and Mississippi State in consecutive weeks. And it’s being punished for getting blown out between the hedges. 

The Longhorns are also the biggest casualty of the lack of chaos in the final week of the regular season. Oklahoma did everything it could to lose to LSU, Alabama got a scare from Auburn, and Oregon let Washington hang around in Seattle. Yet, all three pulled out victories, so all three will stay in the field. 

When you lose three games, even if one of those is to the defending national champions at their place, you need help to make the CFP, and Texas didn’t get enough of it. 

Potential Conference Championship chaos to come

There are still chaos scenarios that could shake up the CFP, and Alabama could be at risk. Of course, with five-loss Duke making the ACC Championship Game, there’s the possibility that the Blue Devils beat Virginia in Charlotte, and the CFP committee gives the nod to the American champ and James Madison, if the Dukes win the Sun Belt, as the fourth and fifth highest-ranked conference champions. 

However, that would still just fill the final two spots in the field with more cannon fodder. The real shake-up would have to come from BYU in the Big 12 Championship Game. If the Cougars avenge their loss to Texas Tech, the Big 12 suddenly becomes a two-bid league. So, where does that leave Alabama, which is currently ranked No. 10, behind Notre Dame, as it heads to the SEC Championship Game? 

Would the committee drop Notre Dame from the field as the final at-large, or would it leave Alabama out in the cold if the Crimson Tide lose to Georgia in the SEC Championship Game? Alabama fans don’t want to find out the answer to that question. They’d rather Kalen DeBoer continue his brief stretch of dominance over Kirby Smart, which would likely catapult two-loss Alabama up to a top-four seed, earning the Tide a bye.