Monday’s college football national championship game between the seventh-seeded Notre Dame Fighting Irish and eighth seeded Ohio State University Buckeyes served as a wrap on the inaugural 12-team College Football Playoff bracket. Fortune smiled on the Buckeyes with a 34-23 victory.
Both teams finished 14-2.
It was a history-making tournament that defied prediction with six higher-seeded teams eliminated along the way to the title game in Atlanta.
The No. 1-seeded Oregon Ducks lost, 41-21, to Ohio State in the Rose Bowl while No. 3 Boise State lost, 31- 14, to No. 6 Penn State in the Fiesta Bowl.
Ohio State wasn’t finished as the Buckeyes went on to eliminate the fifth-seeded Texas Longhorns in the Cotton Bowl by a score of 28-14. That came after Texas had dispensed with No. 4 Arizona State University, 39- 31 in two overtimes, in the Peach Bowl.
Notre Dame, which jump-started its run with a 27- 17 victory over No. 10 Indiana in the first round, upset No. 2 Georgia, 23-10, in the Sugar Bowl. The Fighting Irish then topped No. 6 Penn State, 27-24, in the Orange Bowl.
It was a numbing experience as all four top-seeded teams fell in their first games.
Odds-makers must have had a collective heart-attack.
The tournament kicked off Dec. 20-21 with on-campus games then advanced to the quarterfinals on Dec. 31 and Jan. 1 with bowl games.
The semifinals took place Jan. 9-10 with an additional round of bowl games.
This marks the 11th year of the CFP era but the first with 12 teams. In previous CFP events, four teams were seeded.
Does bigger mean better? TV ratings seem inconclusive. The first round of games attracted an average of 10.6 million viewers while the quarterfinals attracted an average of 16.9 million viewers. The semifinals averaged 19.2 million viewers.
Interest obviously built as the tournament progressed.
Early returns, however, showed a 17 percent decrease across ESPN’s multi-faceted platform. That has been ascribed to the tournament stretching into late January.
The Cotton Bowl game between Ohio State and Texas scored 20.6 million viewers while the Orange Bowl game between Notre Dame and Penn State drew 17.8 million viewers.
Traditionally, the Jan. 1 Rose Bowl tops the card. This year’s game between Ohio State and No. 1 Oregon attracted 21.1 million viewers.
Branding still carries weight with an announced crowd of 77,600 at Monday’s national championship game. It appears fans got their money’s worth.
Speaking of money, each of the 12 teams qualifying for the CFP received $4 million. An additional $4 million went to each team advancing to the quarterfinals (eight teams) and $6 million for each team advancing to the semifinals (four teams). Ohio State and Notre Dame each received $6 million for advancing to Monday’s championship game.
The Buckeyes and Fighting Irish each pocketed $20 million for their participation.
Boise State represented the Mountain West Conference in this year’s CFP. The Broncos defeated UNLV, 21-7, in the conference championship game on Dec. 6. Boise State was inactive until its first CFP game on Dec. 31.
The 10th-ranked Broncos carried a 11-1 record into the game while 20th-ranked UNLV was 10-2.
A total of five MW teams earned postseason bowl berths. Besides the Broncos, No. 24 UNLV met Cal Berkeley in the L.A. Bowl (24-13 win), Fresno State engaged Northern Illinois in the Famous Idaho Potato Bowl (28-20 loss), San Jose State met South Florida in the Hawaii Bowl (41-39 loss in five overtimes) and Colorado State paired up with Miami of Ohio in the Arizona Bowl (43-17 loss).
The MV went 1-4 in the five bowl games.
San Diego State University was shut out of the postseason bowl schedule for the second consecutive year after the bottom dropped out of the season with six consecutive season-ending losses.
Midway through the 2024 schedule, SDSU sat reasonably comfortable with a 3-3 record. The Aztecs needed three wins in their final six games to become bowl eligible. They lost all six with only two games decided by one score.
The 3-9 finish was the worst since the team’s abysmal 2-10 season in 2008. The Aztecs finished 2-5 in MW play.
The loss to Air Force on Senior Night was especially disappointing. But head coach Sean Lewis spoke about the resiliency of his group.
“I’m disappointed we couldn’t send the seniors out the right way,” Lewis said. “Proud of their efforts and everything that they’ve given to the program over this year that I’ve been with them. And for the guys who have been here for an extended period of time and all that they’ve given, and they’ll be Aztecs for life and extremely proud of their efforts, and wish that they had a joyous locker room with them to celebrate all their efforts. But we came up short, didn’t do enough in all three phases, and that starts with me as a leader. We’ll get that right, we’ll get that rectified and we’ll consistently be bringing championships here back home. There’s no doubt my mind about that.”
