Changing of the guard in college football … For the first time since the 4-team college football playoff was introduced in 2014 at least one of Alabama, Georgia and Ohio State will not be in the field. Mississippi delivered the coup de grace last night when they rallied from a 9-point half time deficit to eliminate Georgia 39-34 in the Sugar Bowl in New Orleans. That sends the Rebels to the Fiesta Bowl on January 8th where they’ll face Miami in one semi-final, while it will be an all-Big10 affair in the other when Oregon meets upstart Indiana in the Peach Bowl in Atlanta the next evening. The two winners of those games will then meet for the national championship on January 19th in Miami. A couple of notes to note. It will be a 1 versus 2 situation in the Peach Bowl as the respective QBs – Fernando Mendoza of Indiana and Oregon’s Dante Moore – are generally considered to be the top two prospects at the position for 2026, although neither has officially declared. And likely no player is happier to be in the Final 4 than Miami QB Carson Beck, who rather unceremoniously left Georgia last winter and transferred to the Hurricanes who are in while the Bulldogs are not!
