The announcement of the 2025 College Football Playoff bracket on December 7 triggered immediate backlash across the sport. Notre Dame, finishing the regular season with a strong record and positioned in the top tier of national rankings, found itself excluded from the 12-team field. The Fighting Irish, who had been viewed as a likely participant heading into the final weekend, will now sit out the entire postseason.
In their place, the selection committee included Miami as the last at-large selection, along with automatic qualifiers Tulane from the American Athletic Conference and James Madison from the Sun Belt. This outcome exposed ongoing debates about how the expanded playoff format weighs conference titles against overall team quality and historical program strength.
Legendary coach Nick Saban, now an analyst for ESPN’s College GameDay, voiced sharp criticism during an appearance on “The Pat McAfee Show.” He drew a pointed analogy to illustrate his concerns about the inclusions.
“Look, would we allow the winner of the AAA Baseball League, the International League, whatever they call it, I don’t even know the name of it, would you let them in the World Series playoff? That’s the equivalent of what we do when JMU gets into the College Football Playoff, and Notre Dame doesn’t.”
The current 12-team structure reserves automatic spots for the five highest-ranked conference winners, regardless of their overall ranking. The remaining seven positions go to the top at-large teams based on the committee’s evaluations.
This season, that rule opened doors for Tulane, who ended 11-2 as American champions, and James Madison, who went 12-1 to claim the Sun Belt title. Both earned seeds despite lower positions in the final rankings, pushing Notre Dame to No. 11 and out of contention.
Miami secured the final at-large berth partly due to its early-season victory over Notre Dame, a head-to-head result that swayed the committee in the closing deliberations.
In response to the exclusion, Notre Dame quickly declared it would not accept any bowl invitation. Athletic director Pete Bevacqua conveyed the program’s profound shock and frustration, noting the team felt stunned and deeply disappointed by the outcome.
Saban’s remarks highlight a core conflict in the playoff model: how to fairly incorporate guaranteed berths for mid-major conference winners while prioritizing perceived elite competition from power programs.
As influential figures like Saban challenge the decisions to favor teams such as James Madison over established names like Notre Dame, calls are growing for the committee and playoff organizers to revisit the balance between access for champions and merit-based selection for the strongest overall squads.
The debate underscores evolving tensions in college football, where the push for broader inclusion clashes with desires to showcase the most competitive matchups possible in the national championship chase.
