Florida, Oklahoma could test College Football Playoff committee

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Considering their daunting schedules, Florida or Oklahoma could hold the College Football Playoff committee’s feet to the fire in 2025.Playoff has never included a 9-3 team, but Gators or Sooners might threaten to be the first if they could achieve that mark.SEC waged an offseason messaging campaign touting its strength of schedule and imploring the playoff selection committee to give it more credence.

Billy Napier chuckled when I asked him about Florida’s schedule. What else could the Gators coach do but laugh?

Florida’s gantlet in 2025 projects to be among the nation’s toughest, while its fourth-year coach tries to stay off the hot seat.

“I don’t have control over” the schedule, Napier said in May as we chatted in a hotel basement during the SEC’s spring meetings.

Hard to imagine any coach asking for a schedule like the one Napier’s Gators will play. Florida will face seven teams expected to be ranked in the preseason US LBM Coaches poll. With non-conference games against Miami and Florida State in the mix, the Gators are one of three SEC teams that will play 10 games against Power Four competition.

“Big-picture wise, it can be an advantage or a disadvantage,” Napier said of the schedule, “based off” how the College Football Playoff committee makes its at-large selections.

Oklahoma’s Brent Venables can relate. His Sooners will face seven, maybe even eight, teams likely to be ranked in the preseason Top 25.

Florida and Oklahoma serve as a backbone of the SEC’s quest for the playoff committee to more heavily weight strength of schedule when making at-large selections. The SEC…

Source link : https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/ncaaf/sec/2025/07/17/college-football-playoff-florida-oklahoma/85193201007/

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Publish date : 2025-07-17 10:06:00

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