2025 College Football Playoff Takeaways: Round 2
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Happy 2026, everybody!
The 12 team playoff is in the second year of its existence, and it has given us one doozy of a final four.
Two schools have no national championships, one has no undisputed national championship, and one hasn’t won a title since 2001.
Should be a fun one!
Miami defeats Ohio State 24-14
That Miami defensive line is absolutely ridiculous.
Ohio State had no answers to the pass rush, they couldn’t run the ball at all, and a poorly missed block from Jeremiah Smith led to a brutal pick 6.
Not to mention, the Canes had no penalties either (even though they should have had one on an egregious missed offsides call on third down).
Mario Cristobal deserves a lot of respect for how he had his team ready to play against the defending national champions.
And he also hasn’t had any game management miscues! That’s huge!
Oregon defeats Texas Tech 23-0
Texas Tech’s defense was amazing all year, and it was amazing against Oregon.
But your defense can only be so amazing for so long. If your offense doesn’t help you out, it won’t matter.
Even though Oregon was 4/19 on 3rd down and only 4/8 on 4th down, they had the ball for almost 40 minutes of the game.
Tech couldn’t move the ball, turned it over four times, and that great effort by the defense was for naught.
Pity.
Indiana defeats Alabama 38-3
This shouldn’t be a surprise in the slightest.
Indiana’s line play is completely dominant, and Alabama can not run the ball whatsoever.
So, shock surprise, Indiana took away the passing game because there was no threat of Alabama running on them, and then used their great offensive line to control the clock and run it down Bama’s throats.
Anyone who thought Alabama could win this game simply isn’t living in this reality.
Indiana is by far a better football team than Alabama.
What a sentence that is, huh?
Ole Miss defeats Georgia 39-34
Do I think Georgia is the better overall team? I do.
But the problem with Georgia all year was their lack of offensive explosiveness.
And when the offense went dry in the second half, and Trinidad Chambliss went superhero mode, it brought Ole Miss right back into it and into the final four.
It’s a great season for Ole Miss, and now it’s up in the air considering LSU might take Ole Miss assistant coaches away from the team before their game against Miami this week.
I hope they don’t, but they might.
It’d be a damn shame considering the season those kids have had.
