Well, just like that, without playing a single minute of football, the Notre Dame Fighting Irish went from being the No. 10 team in the nation to getting bumped out of the College Football Playoff.
After ESPN revealed the final bracket following Championship weekend, the Fighting Irish had seemingly swapped places with the Miami Hurricanes, despite neither team playing on Saturday. It was based entirely on the fact that Miami defeated Notre Dame in Week 1.
When Nick Saban, legendary college football coach turned analyst, joined the rankings reveal, he blasted the CFP for keeping Notre Dame out and repeatedly defended the Irish.
Nick Saban thinks Notre Dame deserved a spot in the CFP
“I think the fact of the matter is, all three of those teams (Alabama, Notre Dame, and Miami) should have gotten in and deserve a right to play in the College Football Playoff,” Saban said. “For years now, we have kept tweaking the criteria of how we select teams to get into the Playoff, whether it was a two-team BCS or four-team Playoff, and now a 12-team Playoff.
“Really, I think you’re going to have two teams in the Playoff, and no disrespect to the Group 5, that are ranked nowhere near as high as the other teams that are much better than them. I think maybe something we can learn from this because to me, this has got to be devastating for Notre Dame’s team not to get an opportunity to get into the Playoff. We can learn something from this that will help us to come up with a little better criteria of trying to make sure we get the 12 best teams in the Playoff and also address this idea of conference championship games.”
He's right, Notre Dame deserved to be in one of those 12 Playoff spots. Yes, the Irish lost their first two games of the season, but then they went on the most dominant run in all of college football, winning their last 10 games by an average of 29.7 points.
Also read: Marcus Freeman sends his final plea for Notre Dame to rightfully play in the CFP
The Fighting Irish got screwed over, snubbed, and cast aside this season, and it showed a huge flaw in the world of college football.
Why should any team schedule big-time opponents (just like Notre Dame playing Miami and Texas A&M and losing by a combined four points) and risk losing to some of the best teams in the country if it could spell ruin for their postseason, even when they dominate for the rest of the year?
Not to mention, because the Virginia Cavaliers lost to the Duke Blue Devils in the ACC Championship, two Group of Five conference title winners made it into the Playoff bracket (James Madison and Tulane), while Notre Dame is staying home.
Saban is right, this is devastating for the Fighting Irish and this Notre Dame team, alongside head coach Marcus Freeman, truly deserved better.