There has been a lot of debate over whether Notre Dame should have made the College Football Playoff over Miami, but Dan Orlovsky believes there was room for both in the 12-team field. Alabama fans will not be pleased with the ESPN analyst’s explanation as to why.
Miami and Notre Dame both finished the regular season 10-2. Notre Dame was ranked ahead of Miami in the final regular-season rankings that were released last Tuesday, but the two teams flipped places in the final standings and the Hurricanes made the playoff. Most people agree with that outcome since Miami beat Notre Dame during the regular season, but the College Football Playoff committee offered a completely bogus explanation for why the two teams flipped places despite neither playing a game last week.
During Monday morning’s edition of “Get Up,” Orlovsky argued that both Miami and Notre Dame should have made the playoff. He thinks Alabama, which finished the season 10-3, should have been left out. While the argument for including Alabama is that the Crimson Tide should not have been penalized for playing in the SEC Championship Game and losing to a team they already beat this season, Orlovsky feels they simply are not playing championship football.
“Alabama hasn’t played good football in a month. I was on Friday’s show and I said if Alabama gets boat-raced (in the SEC Championship Game), I would leave them out. They got boat-raced,” Orlovsky said. “They were down 21, it’s the third quarter with like 3 minutes to go, it’s 4th-and-1 on their own 40 and they punt it. Why do you think they punted, America? So they don’t get smoked by more. They didn’t look good in that game. They didn’t look good against Auburn. They didn’t look good against (Oklahoma). Shoot, they didn’t look good against LSU like five weeks ago.
“I think Notre Dame, unequivocally, is a team that people can sit there and say, yes, they can win a national title. The way Alabama has played, at least in the last four or five weeks, they are not a team that can win a national championship.”
"Notre Dame should've been in over Alabama." 👀
— Get Up (@GetUpESPN) December 8, 2025
—@danorlovsky7 on the CFP pic.twitter.com/b8AZzducBd
Alabama was ranked No. 9 in the final regular-season CFP rankings, and they remained there after the SEC Championship Game despite their 28-7 loss to Georgia. One of the biggest issues with the CFP is that the committee needs to figure out how to handle conference championship games. In this instance, the decision was made that Alabama should not be penalized for playing an additional game and losing to a top-three team.
Notre Dame’s athletic director unloaded on the CFP selection committee over the decision to put Miami in the playoff over the Fighting Irish. Orlovsky feels the real argument is whether Notre Dame should have been given a spot over Alabama.
