Anthony Wilson
The new team of 12 College football The playoff format will make its debut this season, bringing sweeping changes to the way we talk about, analyze, and ultimately decide the sport’s champion.
Proponents of the format routinely point to the benefit that increased access will have for all of college football: More teams in contention to make the playoffs later in the season will generate greater interest in November; the presence of seven at-large bids allows teams to remain in contention even if they are outside of their respective conference title races.
The logic makes sense, but the increased opportunity to stay in the playoff race will also be accompanied by increased expectations of making the playoffs. Any reasonable fan could look at the playoff monopoly held by just a half-dozen power programs — Alabama, Georgia, Clemson, Ohio State, Michigan and Oklahoma combined to account for 72.5% of CFP bids — and adjust their expectations for your favorite team’s chances of making the playoff.
Over the 10 years of the four-team format, we’ve seen teams (and coaches) put together strong campaigns that didn’t make the playoffs but ended in the New Year’s Six Bowl. This season may have had some disappointing moments along the way, but ultimately, they were seen as a success. With the expansion, the free seats for the New Year’s Six are now free seats for the PCP, so it is hoped that programs that fell short in previous years will move the field forward.
And it is with this premise that we analyze seven coaches who lead programs that came close, but failed to reach the CFP in their first 10 years of existence. These are coaches leading programs that may have considered the New Year’s Six a success in the past, but are now looking for a chance to win it all in the 12-team bracket.
No program has more New Year’s Six bowl appearances without a CFP bid than Penn State. The Nittany Lions have played in the New Year’s Six Bowl five times in the last eight years (with a 3-2 record in those games) and even won the Big Ten championship in 2016, but were not selected for the playoff. The hiccup for Franklin often comes at the hands of Ohio State, Michigan or both. In fact, the Buckeyes and Wolverines represent Penn State’s only regular-season losses over the past two seasons.
But now two things have happened that significantly benefit Penn State’s postseason prospects. Not only are the Big Ten shaking off divisions, which increases the Nittany Lions’ chances of competing for the conference title, but the playoff is expanding in a way that would have made many of these six New Year’s seasons a potential playoff year. Franklin did an excellent job of setting a standard at Penn State, and routinely delivering 10-win seasons kept the actual job pressure (outwardly, at least) somewhat low. But now that there is an achievable goal of taking Penn State where it hasn’t yet been, the pressure is mounting. The Nittany Lions have a team and a schedule to be in the thick of the Big Ten title and CFP races. So unlike previous years when Penn State could have played out after falling to Ohio State and/or Michigan, the late-season games for the Nittany Lions will be filled with playoff pressure for the team and its coach. .
There is one reading of Kiffin’s tenure at Ole Miss that identifies this current run as one of the most successful in modern program history. The Rebels were among the best teams in the country in the late 1950s and early 1960s under Johnny Vaught, but from 1971 to 2011, Ole Miss won 10 or more games just twice (1971, 2003) and never finished above 13th place in the ranking. final AP Top 25. The program peaked again under Hugh Freeze before stumbling in the wake of the scandal, but Kiffin has brought Ole Miss back to the forefront of the sport by posting 29 wins with a pair of top-11 finishes over the past three years. . With four appearances split evenly between Kiffin and Freeze over the past 10 seasons, Ole Miss is second only to Penn State in the six New Year’s Day bids.
If you’ve been paying attention to the Rebels’ offseason, then you know very well that they’ve built a roster to make a CFP run, counting on big additions to the transfer portal to prepare for a season that’s scheduled to win 10 games once again. So while Kiffin surpassed the program’s historical standard, the expanded playoff changed expectations for Ole Miss later in the year. The Rebels invested like a playoff team because increased access opened a door to making the playoffs. If Ole Miss can’t take the next step, then New Year’s Six Bowl appearances and high poll rankings won’t be enough to stop the pressure from mounting on Oxford.
Lincoln Riley, USC
This one is interesting because Riley, unlike many other coaches on this list, has been to the CFP, even though the program he currently leads has not. The combination of USC’s playoff deficiencies, including Riley’s 11-3 debut in 2022, along with Riley’s own inability to advance from the semifinals at Oklahoma (he was 0-4 in CFP appearances), will bring heightened scrutiny when it comes to how USC fits into the playoff picture.
While coaching instability has been the theme of USC football since 2010, the power of the Trojans’ program has helped produce two different peaks in the playoff era, resulting in three New Year’s Six Bowl appearances. A Rose Bowl victory in 2016 and a Pac-12 title in 2017 under former coach Clay Helton seemed to promise a return to glory, but the ensuing slump kept USC off the national stage and actually hurt expectations of a proud program with several national titles on its showcase.
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Then, Riley had the Trojans competing for the Pac-12 title on the first Friday night of December 2022, positioned in the top four of the CFP Rankings and needing just one win to make history for the program. If it weren’t for Caleb Williams’ hamstring injury and a late Utah offensive outburst, we might not be here discussing playoff pressure. As it stands, the Trojans are entering the Big Ten hungry to hit the ground running when it comes to a conference title and playoff run.
The problem for 2024 is that USC is not projected to be in the playoff mix. The Trojans have odds that line up with a 7-5 season of 8-4 and are the favorites to no reach the playoff (-590). So while general expectations are that Riley will lead USC to the playoffs now that the field has expanded, the immediate outlook suggests that may not happen in 2024, and that will only increase the pressure in 2025.
Hugh Freeze, Auburn
We’re looking at an overall push here because I don’t think anyone expects Auburn to make the College Football Playoffs in 2024, but if things aren’t heading in that direction for the 2025 season, we’ll see the tone change around Freeze’s program. Freeze himself reached Six Year’s Six twice as a coach; Auburn has also made two appearances, getting there under Gus Malzahn in 2016 and 2017. The Tigers will always be motivated by the success of their two biggest rivals, Alabama and Georgia, and while in the past those programs may have been a hindrance to success Within the SEC and therefore in the playoff race, there is now an open door for Auburn to suffer some losses and remain in contention to make a 12-team field.
The key in 2024 will be for Freeze to show that big wins on the recruiting trail are paying off on the field, with young stars from his early classes evolving into high-impact players over the next 12 months. Combine player development with some work in the transfer portal next offseason — where I expect Auburn is shaping up to be one of the big players on the market — and there will be real expectations of a 12-team playoff run in 2025.
While Fickell made the playoffs in historic fashion, leading Cincinnati to an undefeated regular season and the first CFP appearance for a Group of Five program, Wisconsin has yet to make the playoffs despite several successful seasons over the past decade. The Badgers have had a string of strong divisional games in several Big Ten title games and three New Year’s Six appearances (2016, 2017, 2019). The decision to move on from Paul Chryst, responsible for those three NY6 runs, and hire Fickell indicated the Badgers’ desire to take the next step.
The fact that Fickell’s rookie season ended with a 7-6 record, including losses to Indiana and Northwestern, will only increase the pressure for a rebound in 2024. Wisconsin, historically, won’t be in the same conversation as Ohio State, Michigan and Penn State, but Fickell’s coaching ability and pedigree, combined with the program’s success from 2010-2019 (three Big Ten titles, six top-13 finishes in the AP Top 25), set expectations that the Badgers may be among the top 15 programs. Being in the top 15 in the 12-team era means you’re in the hunt for a playoff spot and therefore carry playoff expectations, so while 2024 may not be the year, it won’t be long before Fickell feels that playoff pressure .
Kyle Whittingham, Utah
Franklin and Kiffin have teams that are actually the favorites to make the CFP in 2024, so you could argue there’s more pressure there, but Whittingham arguably has a clearer path to the playoffs now that Utah is in the Big 12. -favorites to win the Big 12 (+350, along with Kansas State), and that would likely guarantee one of the four automatic bids that produce a first-round bye.
Whittingham led Utah to the New Year’s Six twice, reaching the Rose Bowl both years after back-to-back Pac-12 titles in 2021 and 2022. Injuries ravaged the 2023 team, but with QB Cam rising back for another year and a good amount of production returning on defense, this is a group that can absolutely beat the Big 12 in its first season for the program’s first appearance in the CFP. Now, if things get worse and the first year of Big 12 play doesn’t produce a season up to expectations, we’ll see the pressure start to mount for Utah to take the next step.
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Tennessee is the only program on this list without multiple New Year’s Six appearances, but the 2022 Orange Bowl victory against Clemson came under Heupel’s guidance. That season represented a true breakthrough moment that changed the Volunteers’ expectations. Heupel faces the same challenges as the rest of his SEC peers in navigating a schedule that includes several national title contenders, but Tennessee is also recruiting and developing in a way that suggests the pattern is to keep pace.
If we were entering another eight years of the four-team playoff era, Heupel could potentially have 10-win seasons every two years, making numerous New Year’s Six bowl appearances and avoiding any real pressure given the prospects and odds involved with a four-key team. In a 12-team format that will potentially have three or four bids available to SEC teams, however, Tennessee is expected to compete for an at-large berth if it is not playing in the SEC championship.
