Now that the penultimate College Football Playoffs rankings are released, there's a little something to make every upset. In Notre Dame head coach Marcus Freeman's case, it's more confusion than anger.
"Obviously, you're disappointed, but more so because of a little bit of confusion," Freeman said Wednesday about the Fighting Irish getting dropped one spot in the CFP rankings. "We’re never always going to agree, especially when your program is the one that's getting dropped after winning by 20-something points."
Freeman spent Wednesday directly addressing comments that CFP Committee Chair Hunter Yurachek made about why his group dropped Notre Dame behind Alabama this week. Yurachek credited Alabama, narrowly defeating an Auburn team that finished the regular season 5-7. Meanwhile, the Irish blew out Stanford 49-20, which ended 4-8.
Marcus Freeman pushes back on CFP explanation after Notre Dame slips to No. 10
"I think we were up 42-6 going into the fourth quarter. I don't spend time talking about other teams, but it's just like, OK, what could we have done differently? I don't know."
"You always look for cause and effect," Freeman added. "You look for a reasoning why you go up, or you fall. For me, you didn't see a great explanation for why we fell when we had the performance we did last Saturday."
One possible explanation for Alabama's climb to No. 9 while Notre Dame fell to No. 10 is that the committee may have sought to protect the Crimson Tide from falling out of the bracket in the event it loses to No. 3 Georgia in the SEC Championship Game. The committee set a precedent in previous years that it wishes not to punish title game losers for falling short.
That Notre Dame got caught up in some campaign to make sure Alabama stays in the College Football Playoffs bracket, no matter what, is certainly not fair. It's also plenty confusing why the Tide would get protection while a team that's won 10 straight, almost all by blowout, is hanging by a thread. Unfortunately, such is the way of the CFP in 2025.