Notre Dame football officially finds the road it needs to take to the CFP

The official format for the new College Football Playoffs was announced on Tuesday morning. Alongside that announcement, the Notre Dame football team found out exactly how it will make the playoffs and what it will need to do once it gets there, to win the whole dang thing.

A restructuring was needed thanks to the implosion of the Pac-12 and the watering down of several other conferences due to realignment. While Notre Dame football has stayed above the realignment fray, there was some concern that a new structure, with just four power conferences would somehow make it harder for the Fighting Irish to make the playoffs.

It turns out that the new structure might actually make it easier, mainly because no conference is going to get multiple automatic bids. The new format, called the 5-7 format also gives the Notre Dame football team a very good chance of hosting a playoff game as soon as next season.

Notre Dame football officially finds the road it needs to take to the CFP

Starting this fall, the four conference champions that are ranked the highest will get a first round bye. The teams that are ranked five through 12 will then play in the first round at the higher ranked teams' home fields.

#5 will host #12, #6 will host #11, #7 will host #10 and #8 will host #9 in this new format. The quarterfinals and semifinals will then be played at the site of the New Year's Six bowls. The championship will then be played at a neutral site.

While it's true that there is some implied benefit to being a member of a conference if you want that first round bye, this format would certainly allow the Notre Dame football team to host a playoff game as long as they finished ranked 5th through 8th.

It feels like Fighting Irish fans should be pretty happy this is what the CFP committee decided on.