10 College Football Playoff guarantees for 2026: Notre Dame embraces villain role, 2 ACC teams get in
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- Notre Dame positioned as a national championship villain — under new CFP rules, two-to-three losses would likely be needed to keep the Irish out of the final top 12
- ACC could land a second CFP team behind Miami, with SMU (multi-year QB Kevin Jennings) and Louisville as the top candidates; neither faces Miami in the regular season
- Group of Six could produce a first-time CFP entrant, with UNLV (under Dan Mullen) and Memphis (first-year coach Charles Huff) as top contenders — the two meet Aug. 29 in Las Vegas to open the season
- LSU projected for the largest year-over-year viewership surge thanks to coach Lane Kiffin, though the Tigers would need to nearly double last year's average to top Alabama's 8.4 million per-game mark
- Big Ten favored to win a fourth straight national title, with Oregon, Ohio State, and Indiana as the top contenders
- Coaches are publicly pushing back on the postseason calendar — Dan Lanning wants the season ended by Jan. 1, while Curt Cignetti and Kirby Smart back further structural changes
- Miami or Notre Dame projected as the only unbeaten entering the CFP, with the two meeting in November; Miami added QB Darian Mensah from Duke and edge rusher Damon Wilson from Missouri
Why it matters: These predictions surface concrete structural pressure points before the season starts — coaches like Dan Lanning are publicly demanding the NCAA compress the postseason calendar, Kiffin's arrival at LSU could disrupt the sport's TV hierarchy built around Alabama and Texas, and as many as six nine-to-10-win SEC teams competing for at-large spots could force commissioner Greg Sankey to revisit his opposition to further CFP expansion.
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