It's time to put on your tin foil hats because there's still one way the Miami Hurricanes could qualify for the College Football Playoff, but it would require one heck of a logic gymnastics routine by the selection committee.
The justification may have been handed to the committee by none other than the Alabama Crimson Tide, who got rocked by the Georgia Bulldogs 28-7 in the SEC Championship Game.
Despite that kind of third loss being incurred, the Crimson Tide could still find themselves inside the 12-team playoff field by virtue of their four ranked wins during the regular season. That leaves the door open for chaos to deny the next team up on the bubble a spot in the bracket. That team? The Notre Dame Fighting Irish.
Wild ACC conspiracy would sneak Miami into CFP over Notre Dame
So, what would need to happen to see Miami inserted into the CFP over Notre Dame? Just one thing actually. A Duke upset over Virginia in the ACC Championship Game, which they achieved on Saturday night in overtime, 27-20.
The Blue Devils have five losses and despite being crowned ACC champions, the committee cannot justify leaving out a one-loss Sun Belt-champion like James Madison for the former. American Athletic champs Tulane already qualified and the Dukes would round out the five conference champion auto-bids.
That takes us to the at-large bids. We already know this is contingent on Alabama being left in, so then Notre Dame's resume would get compared to the next closest team which is Miami. And we all know how that debate has been heating up in recent days.
“We’re waiting for that final ranking so that they can make it a clean sweep and put Miami over Notre Dame.”
— ACC Network (@accnetwork) December 6, 2025
Dan Radakovich’s message is simple: @CanesFootball should be in the College Football Playoff 🙌 pic.twitter.com/2MMA8YDSC9
The Hurricanes have the head-to-head tiebreaker against the Irish but the eye test favors the latter. If the committee wants to avoid a PR nightmare leaving out a Power Four conference for the first time in history, it might admit Miami as an ACC representative. That would come at the cost of leaving out Notre Dame.
The torches and pitchforks would definitely come out in South Bend if that were to happen but there's been a clamoring for the committee to honor head-to-head matchups in their rankings, especially when a playoff spot is on the line between two teams. Someone is going to be left out and in the end it'll be a business decision.
Both fan bases will draw eyeballs to the playoff but which one will draw the most? Perhaps snubbing Notre Dame would encourage more people to watch whichever first-round game Miami plays in because of the controversy.