Sorting out the bowl picture after another weekend of surprises

The overriding inclination of the 2025 assemblage shot play -- thing goes -- continued successful Week 6 with 2 sure-fire preseason College Football Playoff contenders losing to antecedently disappointing opponents.

Penn State's nonaccomplishment to winless UCLA was the large shocker, with Texas' decision astatine Florida not acold behind. Other cardinal results for the postseason representation included Alabama handing Vanderbilt its archetypal loss, Cincinnati doing the aforesaid to Iowa State and Miami winning astatine Florida State.

As successful past season's inaugural 12-team CFP, the 5 highest-ranked league champions, positive the adjacent 7 highest-ranked teams, volition marque the field. Unlike past year, the 4 highest-ranked teams (not needfully league champions) volition beryllium awarded first-round byes. The different 8 teams volition conscionable successful first-round games astatine the field sites of seeds Nos. 5 done 8.

From there, the quarterfinals and semifinals volition beryllium played successful what had been the New Year's Six bowls, with this season's nationalist title crippled scheduled for Jan. 19 astatine Miami's Hard Rock Stadium.

All of that is conscionable the extremity of the iceberg, though. Apart from the playoff is the 35-game slate of vessel games, opening with the Cricket Celebration Bowl connected Dec. 13.

We're present for each of it.

ESPN vessel gurus Kyle Bonagura and Mark Schlabach are projecting each postseason matchup, including their breakdowns of however the playoff volition play out, and we'll beryllium backmost each week of the play until the existent matchups are set.

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Playoff picks | Quarterfinals
Semis, rubric game | Bowl season

College Football Playoff

First-round games (at field sites)

Friday, Dec. 19/Saturday, Dec. 20

Times and networks TBD.

Bonagura: No. 12 Memphis astatine No. 5 Oklahoma
Schlabach: No. 12 South Florida astatine No. 5 Texas A&M

Bonagura: No. 11 Texas A&M astatine No. 6 Texas Tech
Schlabach: No. 11 LSU astatine No. 6 Oklahoma

Bonagura: No. 10 Georgia Tech astatine No. 7 Alabama
Schlabach: No. 10 Georgia astatine No. 7 Indiana

Bonagura: No. 9 Georgia astatine No. 8 Indiana
Schlabach: No. 9 Texas Tech astatine No. 8 Alabama

First-round breakdown

Bonagura: The monster effect of the week was Penn State falling astatine UCLA, which came into the crippled looking similar a squad that mightiness spell winless. But Penn State's shocking nonaccomplishment wasn't the lone important setback among playoff hopefuls, with Texas (to Florida), Iowa State (to Cincinnati) and Vanderbilt (to Alabama) each falling.

This leaves the tract with chiseled SEC spirit successful my bracket with each 4 first-round games featuring an SEC team. From my perspective, that is not bully for the sport, but 9 SEC teams are a combined 41-5 and lone 1 of those losses came successful nonconference. It has been a ascendant tally truthful far.

Schlabach: Penn State's stunning 42-37 nonaccomplishment astatine antecedently winless UCLA shook up my 12-team bracket. I'd already dropped the Nittany Lions to No. 11 aft past week's 30-24 nonaccomplishment successful 2 overtimes to Oregon, and present they're retired of my bracket altogether. It's a stunning autumn for James Franklin's program.

LSU replaces Penn State, though I powerfully considered Missouri, Tennessee, Georgia Tech and adjacent two-loss Notr...