Jan. 1, 2026, 1:58 p.m. ET

The Miami Hurricanes beat the Ohio State Buckeyes in the first College Football Playoff quarterfinal of the 2025-2026 college football season. The Canes’ 24-14 win was convincing and clear-cut. Miami was the better team, controlling most of the game and getting better quarterback play. The result is significant for a whole host of reasons. One is that it likely pushes college football closer to a 16-team CFP in the near future.

Teams with first-round byes

The biggest reason Miami over Ohio State is likely to lead to a 16-team CFP is that teams with first-round byes are now 0-5 entering January 1’s three quarterfinals. College football power brokers will see this and conclude (probably) that having byes disadvantages higher-seeded teams. That’s the starting point for this conversation.

16-team playoff would not have byes

Some think that a 16-team CFP would have a first round with byes, likely involving the bottom eight teams in the field would play (9 versus 16, 10 versus 15, etc.). However, the more probable outcome of a 16-team playoff would be that it’s like a full NCAA Tournament region: 1 versus 16, 2 versus 15, and on to the 8-9 game in the middle of the bracket. No byes, every team plays, and it’s really easy for fans to understand.

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The 16-team format would create bracket picks and bracket pools, NCAA Tournament-style. More centrally and urgently, ESPN gets four more first-round games to televise or sublicense. The property becomes more lucrative. It’s really hard to watch Miami, a 10 seed, play its way into the semifinals and not think that a No. 13 seed in a 16-team playoff could make a run. Miami’s success will make the drumbeat for expansion louder, not softer.

Notre Dame

The Fighting Irish did not deserve to be in over Miami, but the argument could still be made that Notre Dame deserved to be in the playoff alongside Miami, with Alabama being left out. Notre Dame players, coaches and fans are looking at Miami and saying, “That could have been us.”

Rather than having to choose between Notre Dame and Miami as the last at-large team in the field, a 16-team playoff would have made it so that both the Irish and Canes got in, putting another brand-name team in the field.

BYU

BYU and also Vanderbilt would have had much more realistic chances of making a 16-team playoff. BYU, as the team which won its high-profile bowl game (the Pop-Tarts Bowl), can very convincingly say it deserved to be in a 12-team field. That applies even more to a 16-team field.

Let’s affirm one simple point about BYU: It was 12-2. That’s a team which deserves a chance to prove itself in the playoff.

24-team playoff is ridiculous and a joke

If the CFP expanded to 24 teams, that would be a case of jumping the shark. A 24-team field means three-loss teams are certain to be invited, and four-loss teams have a chance. That’s awful. A 16-team field is just large enough to make sure various two-loss teams — Utah also fits here — don’t get excluded. It’s just right. Beyond 16 would be horrible, and this is why expansion skeptics don’t even want to move to 16. They think the number will simply keep going up. That’s understandable, but 16 really is the right number.

Miami winning reinforces the point that lower-ranked/seeded teams deserve their shot.

Four-team playoff failure

Miami would not have gotten this opportunity under the four-team playoff. Isn’t it good for the sport that the Hurricanes had this chance?

James Madison

The lingering frustration about the 2025-2026 CFP is that James Madison got in. One more time, that was because the ACC’s schedule and tiebreakers created a vacuum and a loophole which allowed Duke to play for the conference title. The conferences have to close their loopholes in various ways. As long as that happens, we won’t see another James Madison, giving Notre Dame or BYU a spot in a 16-team playoff and creating good matchups involving the lower-seeded teams.

Significance of 16 teams

If ESPN/TNT had to broadcast eight first-round CFP games instead of only four, that would likely mean multiple games on Friday and Saturday, and possibly one game on either a Thursday or a Monday. This, in turn, would likely mean college football would try to play these games on the second weekend of December to avoid direct competition with the NFL. The NFL, by law, cannot play on the second weekend of December. A move to 16 would likely create momentum for an adjusted CFP and regular-season schedule which would bring college football into the modern era.

Big picture

An 8 seed — Ohio State — beat No. 1 seed Oregon last season. Now a 10 seed, Miami, beat a 2 seed. If you were to make an argument for 16 teams rather than 12, you would want to see these kinds of results. Going deeper — lower — on the seed list has not hurt college football in the quarterfinals. Getting James Madison out, and Notre Dame or BYU in, would make an eight-game first round a highly watchable product … and that’s now more likely to emerge in the next few years.

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