The final college football playoff committee rankings were a political stunt and nothing more.

What happened yesterday should alarm every objective college football fan in America. It was yet another indefensible act of pure theft directly benefitting the University of Alabama and directly sabotaging what was arguably the best team in America.

First, the facts.

Since early September of 2024, the Notre Dame football team is 23-3. All three losses, by a total of 15 points, were to teams currently ranked in the CFB playoffs including one loss in the 2024 National championship game. Notre Dame has won their last 10 games by a margin of 30 ppg including 2 wins against currently ranked teams and another against a conference champion. No one else in CFB comes close to that. Those are the facts and they are indisputable. As far as the eye test goes, Notre Dame is probably the best team in the country right now.

However, it also cannot be denied that they did lose their first 2 games. In a head-to-head analysis, Miami always should have been ranked ahead of Notre Dame. However, they weren't.

What changed?

Miami's season was over on December 2nd and so was Notre Dame's. The only game result that should have had any impact on these teams was that Boise State won a conference championship. That should have benefitted Notre Dame as they beat BS by 3 scores. If you argued on Tuesday that Notre Dame was better than Miami, how can you argue on Sunday that they are not, when neither team played and the only registered new data point favored the Irish?

Hear me out here. I am not against arguing the merits of Miami being ranked higher. They played, Miami won. I know. I saw it in person. I also saw Notre Dame score 119 points in their last two games. So, if Notre Dame was worthy of #9, 3 weeks ago, they only closed out the season by making their case stronger.

What new event happened between Tuesday and Sunday that caused Miami to move ahead of Notre Dame? Was it BYU's blowout loss to Texas Tech? No. That caused Miami to move ahead of BYU. Was it Miami suddenly being compared to Notre Dame? No. At #9 and #12 respectively, they have been in the same comparative 4-team pool for a month, with Notre Dame being ranked higher each time. Again, in terms of objective truth, Miami has always had the case of being higher than Notre Dame. The problem for the committee is that Notre Dame and Miami played in August so that result has been baked in the cake for 4 months. Notre Dame didn't lose to Miami on December 3rd.

The real reason Miami moved up is what is so disturbing and the pundits on the football talk shows have been brazenly honest about it. Miami got in because Duke beat Virginia and the committee simply could not allow the ACC conference to be shut out of the playoffs.

Since when is it the job of the CFB committee to prop up the ACC? The job of the committee, boldly stated, is to give us the 12 best teams, not to ensure the viability of the ACC. The problem precedent is not that Miami was put in. Afterall, they are one of the 12 best teams. The problem is why they were put in. Miami didn't get in because of what Miami did to Notre Dame. Miami got in because of what Duke did to Virginia. Miami didn't jump up due to the loss of a team in front of them. They got in because of a loss by a team behind them.

Still, sometimes you can do the right thing for the wrong reason and Miami over Notre Dame is a case where exactly that happened.

The case of Alabama is a whole different story. While Notre Dame has been blowing teams out, Alabama has struggled all year against mediocre opponents. Yes, they do have a 3-point win against a very good Georgia team in September, but they squandered all the good will of that win by being absolutely mauled by the same team on Saturday. A game that really was not as close as the 28-7 score would suggest. They were also beaten by a very pedestrian Oklahoma team with no offense, and they were blown out by a Florida State team that not only lost to Miami but to Stanford as well!

Am I being unfair to Alabama? Hardly. The pundits have propped Alabama up all season while they have played mostly like hot garbage against also-ran teams.

In their last 8 games, Alabama has looked mildly impressive exactly twice. The first was against 4 loss Tennessee and the 2nd was against the twinkie they played between the loss to Oklahoma and the miraculous near-loss to dumpster fire Auburn. During that stretch they barely beat Missouri, LSU and a South Carolina that was dismantled by a terrible Clemson team

Revisiting the Auburn disaster, Alabama needed a 4th down miracle to beat a team that went 1-7 in the SEC. That 1 win was a 9-point win over a team Notre Dame beat by more than 40.

While Alabama was struggling to best this roadkill of a team, Notre Dame was hanging 49 on a team that beat Florida State. As we mentioned, Alabama couldn't do that.

At the same time, aforementioned Oklahoma (who also beat Alabama) looked pathetic against an LSU team without a coach. Speculation was that Notre Dame's far-more-impressive win might move them past Oklahoma into the #8 spot. That didn't happen. Instead, Notre Dame's 29-point win actually caused them to drop behind Alabama. Wait? Was Alabama's opponent that much better than Notre Dame's as to warrant the Tide's 7-point win more meritorious than the Irish's 29-point win? It's kind of hard to make that case when both finished within a game of the same record. I personally think Stanford would boat race Auburn but that's just me.

The point is that Alabama showed nothing in that last week (or even the last month) to warrant them jumping a Notre Dame team that averaged more than 51 ppg during the same span. It was SEC tampering and committee gerrymandering and nothing else.

It was one of the most egregious examples of outright and blatant cheating in the history of the sport and was done so only to protect the Alabama brand and the College Football Conference crime syndicate.

However, it was nothing compared to what happened a week later.

Alabama became the first team in the history of the sport to lose by 21 points and not drop. They became the first team in history to suffer a 3rd loss and remain in the top 10. The argument was that a team should not be punished for losing a conference championship game.

Stange. BYU was punished. North Texas was punished, Troy was punished. Virginia was punished. Even #1 ranked Ohio State was punished. Only Alabama gets a free loss. It's like it didn't even happen. They win in embarrassing fashion and move up to #9, they get absolutely curb stomped on national tv and remain at #9.

Nothing like this has ever happened before, in any sport, at any level and we know very well why. The pundits did not even try to hide it.

Danny Kannel said "This was done to send a message to Notre Dame". Another analyst admitted that it was a virtual certainty that if Notre Dame had been in, they would make it to the championship round. She continued that more than 70% of submitted expert brackets backed this up.

Notre Dame was excluded to protect the vested financial interests of the Conferences- the ACC and SEC in particular. It is just that simple. If Notre Dame was on the outside looking in, a month ago, it could be argued that someone thought their resume didn't measure up or they didn't pass some eye test. If Alabama, BYU or even Virginia had won their conference, it could have been argued as a swaying data point. They didn't. They all lost.

A last-minute switcheroo took place with literally no data to support it. Nothing has occurred over the last 2 weeks to support Notre Dame sliding from #9 to #11. Nothing has happened to support Alabama even remaining in the top 15, much less not even falling a spot!

Notre Dame was left out because they were a legitimate threat to win it all and blow up the conference caste system. This was a political hit job ordered by the power brokers in the conferences and President Trump should order an immediate investigation. A crime was committed here.