Projecting the final 12-team College Football Playoff bracket ahead of the official reveal

The first 12-team College Football Playoff field will be officially unveiled on Sunday afternoon. But we’ll give you an educated guess as to what to expect when the bracket is announced.

NBC Sports national college football insider Nicole Auerbach has covered the College Football Playoff for more than a decade. She has participated in mock selection committee exercises multiple times, which means she understands the selection, ranking and seeding processes and principles that the actual committee will use this weekend. Plus, she is fluent in selection committee speak, which is a language all of its own.

With the regular season in the rear-view mirror and conference championship weekend finished, she has projected the 12-team Playoff field. Her explanations are available below the bracket.

Final College Football Playoff Projection (by seed):

1. Oregon (Big Ten champion)
2. Georgia (SEC champion)
3. Boise State (Mountain West champion)
4. Arizona State (Big 12 champion)
5. Penn State
6. Notre Dame
7. Texas
8. Ohio State
9. Tennessee
10. Indiana
11. Clemson (ACC champion)
12. SMU

Note: The five conference champions ranked highest by the selection committee receive automatic berths to the College Football Playoff The final seven spots go to the highest-ranked at-large teams. Seeds 1-4 are required to be conference champions, and all four teams will receive a first-round bye. Notre Dame, an FBS independent, is ineligible for a top-four seed.

Here’s the projected field in bracket form:

Here’s everything you need to know heading into Selection Sunday.

No. 2 seed: Georgia (11-2, SEC champion)

Somehow, some way, the ‘Dawgs have ended up here — SEC champions and the recipient of a first-round CFP bye. I’m not sure anyone necessarily saw this coming after the September loss to Alabama or the lopsided defeat at Ole Miss late in the year … or back in the middle of the season when starting quarterback Carson Beck threw nine (!) interceptions over a four-game span. But here we are, four top-25 wins later against one of the most challenging schedules of anyone in the nation. And it’s a good thing that Georgia earned that bye, because Beck was injured in Saturday’s SEC championship game (and only returned for the eventual game-winning handoff because his backup, Gunner Stockton, took a big hit). I don’t think the selection committee will handle this particular quarterback injury the way it did last year with Florida State’s Jordan Travis, but it’s certainly a storyline to follow.

No. 3 seed: Boise State (12-1, Mountain West champion)

Star running back Ashton Jeanty chose to remain a Bronco last offseason because he wanted to help Boise State do something special. And that’s exactly what this team did, going unbeaten in conference play en route to a Mountain West championship and dropping just one game (a three-point loss at Oregon) all year. That close loss came to a team the selection committee has ranked above the rest in each of its rankings this fall; Boise State played the unbeaten Ducks as well as anybody all season. That’s a feather in the Broncos’ cap, and it helps offset the significantly weaker schedule that they played compared to their Power 4 peers in the bracket. Their SOS is outside of the top 80 and is worst of the top CFP contenders. But the committee has given Boise State a great deal of respect in recent weeks, and it ranked the Broncos five spots ahead of Arizona State — the highest-ranked Big 12 team — in its penultimate rankings. Both teams then played (and beat) top-20 opponents this weekend, which leads me to believe that Boise State will still be ranked ahead of Arizona State on Sunday. If that holds, it’s a remarkable achievement for Boise State, a Group of 5 school, to end up ranked ahead of two Power 4 champions.

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No. 4 seed: Arizona State (11-2, Big 12 champion)

The Sun Devils may be college football’s hottest team, and they’re certainly one of the best stories in the sport this year. It’s great that Cam Skattebo and Sam Leavitt get to be part of the College Football Playoff and that the nation gets to spend more time getting to know Kenny Dillingham. After Arizona State beat Iowa State by 26 points in the Big 12 championship game on Saturday, it was fair to wonder whether the Sun Devils could jump Boise State. They’ve played a tougher schedule than the Broncos, and they can explain away a loss to Cincinnati as one without Leavitt. They also have three top-20 wins while Boise State has two wins over UNLV (a team currently ranked No. 20 that could easily fall out of the Top 25 after Friday night’s loss at Boise). But it’s also hard to imagine that the committee would take a team that was five spots behind the other and leapfrog ‘em off of a more dominant win (at a neutral site). I am just not sure I see it, even if I think Arizona State was under-ranked last week and Boise State was over-ranked. But because SMU got upset by Clemson in the ACC title game, Boise State and Arizona State can both land in the top four and earn first-round CFP byes.

No. 5 seed: Penn State (11-2)

The Nittany Lions might not drop at all after losing a thrilling Big Ten championship game to Oregon. They showed tremendous fight (and offensive ability) before losing by eight points to the No. 1 team in the country. The selection committee has kept Penn State ahead of Notre Dame for weeks now, and I don’t think the group will suddenly flip that order after seeing how closely the Nittany Lions played the Ducks (while the Fighting Irish were idle). Penn State has just one win against the committee’s current top 25, but it has two close losses to two of the best teams in the country, and I don’t expect the committee to penalize it much for that.

No. 6 seed: Notre Dame (11-1)

The Fighting Irish suffered the worst loss of any CFP contender all the way back in Week 2, a home loss to Northern Illinois of the Mid-American Conference. But then they went out and won 10 games in a row, many of those victories coming in dominating fashion (including a 49-14 win over currently ranked Army, which went on to win the AAC championship game). Notre Dame outscored opponents this season 478-163, and the Irish rank third in the nation in ESPN’s game-control metric. Notre Dame’s elite defense and electric rushing attack have impressed the selection committee to the point that the NIU loss was essentially a non-factor in the group’s late-season evaluation of this team. The Irish will host a first-round game in South Bend. And I think they’ll be ahead of the SEC runner-up without any marquee wins on its resume. The committee values dominance and consistency, and Notre Dame has proven it can be both.

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No. 7 seed: Texas (11-2)

The Longhorns have no wins against the committee’s top 25. They also have two losses to the same team — which will likely be the No. 2 overall seed. So, this is a resume with a good loss (suffered twice) but no marquee wins. I’d say that the committee would likely penalize Texas for its lack of quality wins, but it hasn’t to date. And Penn State and Indiana remain comfortably in the bracket, too. So the question becomes how far the Longhorns drop after a second loss to the same team in an additional game (that most of its at-large competitors didn’t have to play) this weekend. I don’t think it will be that dramatic; the Buckeyes didn’t drop very far a week ago after losing to a not-great Michigan team. But I also don’t think the committee would let the Longhorns skate entirely after losing to Georgia’s backup quarterback.

No. 8 seed: Ohio State (10-2)

The Buckeyes did not beat rival Michigan and therefore did not play for a Big Ten championship this weekend, but there was also no real doubt about whether they’d be in the final 12-team field. Ohio State dropped just four spots after the shocking loss to a Michigan team that was barely above .500 on the season. That kept the Buckeyes in position to host a first-round game, in large part because of the team (Tennessee) that they’re being compared to. The data is quite similar for both teams when it comes to strength of schedule and strength of record. Both Ohio State and Tennessee have bad losses to unranked teams (Michigan and Arkansas, respectively) which essentially cancel each other out. But the Vols have one win over a team that is currently ranked (No. 11 Alabama) while the Buckeyes have two wins over teams that are currently ranked in the committee’s top 10 (No. 3 Penn State and No. 9 Indiana), so that gives Ohio State the edge over Tennessee.

No. 9 seed: Tennessee (10-2)

The Vols’ resume is anchored by the win over Alabama, a team that the selection committee has shown great respect for and deference toward. The group had the Crimson Tide as its last at-large team into the field in the penultimate rankings released on Tuesday, which means that the committee considers Alabama’s best quite impressive and enough to make up for its bad losses. And that means that Tennessee gains quite a bit of respect from the committee because it beat that Alabama team. The committee has also largely adhered to head-to-head results, so this has given the Vols a nice buffer to keep ‘em above the Tide down the stretch of the season (even after a mid-November lopsided loss to Georgia that knocked Tennessee out of hosting range). While I’m projecting SMU to get into the final bracket as the last at-large team, it’s possible that the committee opts to put Alabama in over the Mustangs. Either way, Tennessee’s win over the Tide is big enough to keep the Vols in the field comfortably, though I’m not projecting them to host a first-round game.

It’s time to go bowling for college football teams across the nation.

No. 10 seed: Indiana (11-1)

The Hoosiers don’t have any wins against teams currently in the committee’s top 25, but they have been one of the nation’s most dominant teams against their schedule — even if it’s one of weakest schedules of the at-large contenders. The way they’ve beaten opponents matters, because as selection committee chair Warde Manuel said a few weeks ago, “Teams can only play the schedule they have in front of them against the teams that have been, from a conference standpoint, assigned.” Perhaps different selection committees would treat Indiana differently, but this committee really likes the Hoosiers. They remained comfortably in the field after their loss at Ohio State, and they have enough wiggle room even now to spend Selection Sunday relatively stress-free. And that feels right. An 11-1 team in either the Big Ten or SEC should not be on the outside looking in.

No. 11 seed: Clemson (10-3, ACC champion)

It feels like a lifetime ago, but Georgia beat Clemson, 34-3, all the way back in Week 1. At the time, it seemed like the beginning of the end of the Tigers’ run atop (or near the top of) the sport. Like everyone else, Clemson had its ups and downs over the course of the regular season. A loss to in-state rival South Carolina a week ago dashed the Tigers’ hopes of landing an at-large bid. They’d have to win the ACC championship to earn the league’s automatic bid to the CFP — and then they went out and did just that, winning on a walk-off 56-yard field goal. It no longer matters that Clemson lost three games this year. The Tigers are into the field, and that’s what matters. Forget the first-round bye. It would have been nice, sure. But for a team that didn’t think it’d have a shot to be part of the bracket a week ago, all Clemson wanted was a chance. And that’s what the Tigers have now, even if it means a first-round road game.

No. 12 seed: SMU (11-2)

Selection committee chairman Warde Manuel was asked on Tuesday whether or not SMU could drop below Alabama if it lost in the ACC championship game. “Potentially, yes,” Manuel said. But, of course, it would depend on how the ACC championship game went. After falling behind early, SMU fought and clawed its way all the way back, tying Clemson in the final minute before allowing a long kickoff return that set up the game-winning field goal. If you watched that game, you know you saw a team that deserved a spot in the College Football Playoff. And if the committee opts to give this final at-large spot to Alabama instead, it will completely devalue conference championship games. No one will want to ever play in one if a three-point loss knocks you out of the Playoff field entirely.