As election results rolled in across America Tuesday night, arguably the nation’s most important reveal hit the airwaves: the first edition of the 2025 College Football Playoff (CFP) rankings.
Despite Texas A&M being the lone remaining undefeated team in the SEC, the playoff committee followed the AP poll’s lead and ranked the Aggies No. 3 — behind Big Ten unbeatens Ohio State and Indiana.
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You can feel however you want about the rankings, especially if you sense some disrespect, but everything will be settled on the field soon enough. If A&M wins decisively on the road against No. 19 Missouri this week, the Aggies stand a good chance of jumping the Hoosiers — or even the defending champion Buckeyes.
The perpetual mystery of the playoff
The College Football Playoff is complicated by design.
While professional sports rely on unambiguous standings and tiebreakers, major college athletics still prefer the path of committees and “experts” who powder their wigs and meet in secluded conference rooms to decide whether your team gets a shot at glory.
A flawed system, some have argued, but one that makes for must-see TV. And you can bet national media executives were thrilled to have an excuse to draw football fans to their screens and social feeds on a random Tuesday night just to hear a few college names read aloud.
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So, out of curiosity, I decided to dig through every year of the four-team and 12-team playoff formats (dating back to 2014) to see how often the teams in the initial rankings actually made the final playoff field.
Here’s what I found:
First playoff rankings vs. future playoff teams
2014
First playoff ranking: Mississippi State, Florida State, Auburn, Ole Miss
Final playoff teams: Alabama, Oregon, Florida State, Ohio State (2014 champions)
2015
First playoff ranking: Clemson, LSU, Ohio State, Alabama
Final playoff teams: Clemson, Alabama (2015 champions), Michigan State, Oklahoma
2016
First playoff ranking: Alabama, Clemson, Michigan, Texas A&M
Final playoff teams: Alabama, Clemson (2016 champions), Ohio State, Washington
2017
First playoff ranking: Georgia, Alabama, Notre Dame, Clemson
Final playoff teams: Clemson, Oklahoma, Georgia, Alabama (2017 champions)
2018
First playoff ranking: Alabama, Clemson, LSU, Notre Dame
Final playoff teams: Alabama, Clemson (2018 champions), Notre Dame, Oklahoma
2019
First playoff ranking: Ohio State, LSU, Alabama, Penn State
Final playoff teams: LSU (2019 champions), Ohio State, Clemson, Oklahoma
2020 (COVID-shortened season)
First playoff ranking: Alabama, Notre Dame, Clemson, Ohio State
Final playoff teams: Alabama (2020 champions), Clemson, Ohio State, Notre Dame
2021
First playoff ranking: Georgia, Alabama, Michigan State, Oregon
Final playoff teams: Alabama, Michigan, Georgia (2021 champions), Cincinnati
2022
First playoff ranking: Tennessee, Ohio State, Georgia, Clemson
Final playoff teams: Georgia (2022 champions), Michigan, TCU, Ohio State
2023
First playoff ranking: Ohio State, Georgia, Michigan, Florida State
Final playoff teams: Michigan (2023 champions), Washington, Texas, Alabama
2024 (First year of 12-team format)
First playoff ranking: Oregon, Ohio State, Georgia, Miami, Texas, Penn State, Tennessee, Indiana, BYU, Notre Dame, Alabama, Boise State
Final playoff teams: Oregon, Georgia, Boise State, Arizona State, Texas, Penn State, Notre Dame, Ohio State (2024 champions), Tennessee, Indiana, SMU, Clemson
Worth noting: The 2024 playoff format gave automatic bye weeks to the four highest ranking conference champions (hence Boise State and Arizona State’s high rankings). This rule has since been eliminated; now, the byes go to the top four teams overall.
2025
First playoff ranking: Ohio State, Indiana, Texas A&M, Alabama, Georgia, Ole Miss, BYU, Texas Tech, Oregon, Notre Dame, Virginia, Memphis
Final playoff teams: TBD.
What these rankings tell us
Wow, that was a lot of writing. If you made it to this point in the article, thank you. The KPRC 2 family appreciates your page view.
Within that mess of college football history, here are my biggest takeaways:
- During the four-team era (2014–2023), an average of two teams from the first ranking made the final playoff field each year.
- In the first year of the 12-team format, eight of the 12 teams from the initial ranking qualified.
- The top-ranked team in the first CFP ranking has made the playoff in eight of the last 10 years, but has only gone on to win the national title twice in that span (Alabama in 2020, Georgia in 2021).
- The eventual national champion has appeared in the top four of the first ranking every year except 2014.
- The No. 1 team in the final CFP ranking won the national title four times (2019, 2020, 2021, 2023); the No. 2 team won three times (2015, 2016, 2018); the No. 3 team once (2021); and the No. 4 team twice (2014, 2017).
- In 2024, Ohio State won the national title as a No. 8 seed, showing the rankings in the 12-team format can be misleading.
- In 2024, the committee selected three of the four SEC teams from the first ranking to the playoff.
What this means for Texas A&M
As the No. 3 team in the initial 2025 rankings, Texas A&M finds itself in a promising position. Historically, about half of the top four teams make the playoff, and with the 12-team expansion, the Aggies’ odds look even better.
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Last year, eight of the 12 teams from the opening ranking made it—including three of four from the SEC. Given the strength of the conference, a 10–2 record or better would almost certainly secure A&M a playoff berth.
The Aggies’ remaining schedule:
- at Missouri
- vs. South Carolina
- vs. Samford
- at Texas
They’re roughly a 6.5-point favorite at Missouri and should be favored against both South Carolina and Samford. The showdown with Texas in Austin is tougher to predict this far in advance, but that game could have the potential to swing playoff seeding — or determine whether either team even makes the cut.
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If history is any guide (and that’s a big “if” given all the recent changes to the format), the Aggies appear poised to punch their first-ever ticket to the College Football Playoff, barring a catastrophic collapse.
Of course, catastrophic collapses are something Aggie fans know all too well. “Battered Aggie Syndrome” didn’t appear out of thin air. But trauma-induced nicknames aside, maybe this year really will be different for the great people of College Station.
Second-year head coach Mike Elko has the Aggies playing disciplined football on both sides of the ball, and quarterback Marcel Reed is firmly in the Heisman conversation with four games to play.
Maybe — just maybe — this is the year A&M finally finds the formula to get out of its own way.
With every passing Tuesday night, the College Football Playoff rankings will bring us one step closer to finding out.