The Notre Dame Fighting Irish football team didn’t make it to the College Football Playoffs this year, and for good reason. Due to missing the playoffs, Notre Dame decided to pull out of its bowl game in protest. This prompts the CFP selection committee to reevaluate the process of selecting teams for the playoffs. However, Notre Dame shouldn’t receive special treatment because it isn’t in a conference.
Notre Dame is not in one of the power four conferences, which are almost guaranteed to have a team in the CFP. The school chooses to be independent and is allowed so because of a TV broadcasting agreement made with NBC years ago. While the football team is independent, the rest of the school's sports play in the Atlantic Coast Conference.
Notre Dame was rightfully left out of this year’s CFP bracket. The team finished the season 10-2, with its two losses coming against ranked teams. These losses are crucial to how the rankings turned out, mainly the game against the Miami Hurricanes, who did make it to the playoffs.
To fully understand the committee's choice of Miami over Notre Dame, you have to look at how teams are selected and how the ACC ended. When the CFP expanded to 12 teams, the rules for who made it were simple. It was the five highest-ranked conference champions, followed by the next seven highest-ranked teams.
This year in the ACC, the conference champion was the Duke Blue Devils, which didn’t receive a playoff spot because the team was unranked. The Virginia Cavaliers football team, which played against Duke in the ACC championship, was not placed because of its loss to the unranked Duke team.
Without an ACC champion and the BYU Cougars football team falling in rankings, due to their loss in the 2025 Big 12 Championship Game, it opened the door for Miami and Notre Dame. While there were a lot of factors that came into making the decision, it ultimately was made based on the head-to-head matchup the teams had at the start of the season. Miami then beat Notre Dame in a final score of 27-24, prompting the committee to select the Hurricanes over the Fighting Irish.
Notre Dame was not happy with the ending decision and opted out of its bowl game in protest. Since then, the CFP made a deal with the team: if they finish within the top 12 in the country in 2026, they will be guaranteed a spot in the playoffs starting next year. If these rules were in place this year, Notre Dame would’ve been in the playoffs, not Miami.
Creating this rule for Notre Dame isn’t fair. To be independent as a team means they choose their opponents, excluding their deal to play five ACC teams a year, which they don’t choose. Meaning they aren’t competing against big teams like the Georgia Bulldogs or the Ohio State Buckeyes every year. While teams in the ACC are certainly no easy competition, Notre Dame does stand out against those opponents and should play more competitive teams.
Notre Dame can’t say it deserves to be in the playoffs because of the 10-2 record from playing mainly unranked or low-ranked teams. To compare, the Kennesaw State Owls aren’t complaining they didn’t make the playoffs with a 10-3 record, because they know they didn’t play or win meaningful games.
Notre Dame lost two of the most meaningful games of its season and has one win against a high-ranked team. The team can’t be taken seriously when they are clearly playing teams they know they can beat.
Making a rule for Notre Dame to make the playoffs negates the whole point of a 12-team playoff, to make it more competitive among the conferences. Notre Dame doesn’t deserve special treatment when it chooses to be independent and have an easy schedule.
Cassie is a senior studying communications at Ohio University. Please note the views expressed in this column do not reflect those of The Post. Want to talk to Cassie? Email her at cb086021@ohio.edu.
