After the best semifinal day in the nine-year history of the college football playoffs, the title game will compare the defending champion to what the sport has come closest to a Cinderella team in years.
It will be No. 1 Georgia (14-0) looking for their second consecutive championship against Upstart and No. 3 TCU on Jan. 9 at Sofi Stadium in Inglewood, Calif.
The four-team playoffs were littered with one-sided semifinals, but Saturday – and into early Sunday and into the New Year – delivered two thrillers and 179 points overall.
The Bulldogs came from 14 points behind in the second half to beat No. 4 Ohio State 42-41 in the Peach Bowl and advance to the CFP championship game for the third time under coach Kirby Smart.
“If we want to have a chance to win a national championship, we have to play much better football than we did tonight, but we have to take the resilience and composure with us,” said Smart.
The Bulldogs and Buckeyes played a classic that resulted in Ohio State missing a field goal with three seconds remaining. Amazingly, it was even better than the wild start to the semi-final doubleheader between No. 3 TCU and No. 2 Michigan.
The Horned Frogs (13-1) upset the Wolverines 51-45 in the Fiesta Bowlthe second highest scoring CFP game of all time.
“We’re going to celebrate that,” said TCU quarterback Max Duggan. “Of course we’re excited, but we know we have a big one ahead of us.”
TCU, the first Big 12 to win a playoff game, will be aiming for its first national title since 1938. Under coach Dutch Meyer, the Horned Frogs defeated Carnegie Tech 15-7 in the Sugar Bowl to cap a 10-0 season.
Southeastern Conference champion Bulldogs opened as a 13 1/2 point favorite. according to FanDuel Sportsbookwhat will be the fifth meeting between the schools.
Georgia has won them all, including the last one in the 2016 Liberty Bowl.
The Horned Frogs, who were coming off a 5-7 season in 2021 and settled for seventh place in their conference ahead of the season, have embraced the underdog role and thrived on being challenged.
“We know we will hear it again. It’s not going to stop now,” said first-year coach Sonny Dykes. “We have to do what we did in that game (against Michigan). We have to respond to that criticism and show up and do what we’re supposed to do.
“If we think that’s going to go away, I think you all know it’s not. That’s the way it is.”
TCU would become the first team to win a national championship in the year after a losing season since Michigan State in 1965.
Georgia, No. 1 for most of the season, is looking for its third national title and is trying to become the first consecutive champion of the CFP era and the first since Alabama won the BCS in 2011-12.
It will be a duel between the Heisman Trophy finalists and Duggan and Stetson Bennett of Georgia.
Neither is a future first-rounder, and both had ups and downs in the semifinals but came through in the top spots.
Duggan ran for two points and threw two TD passes as the Frogs held off a heaving Michigan in the second half.
Bennett threw for 398 yards and two touchdowns in the fourth quarter, including the game-winner by 54 seconds.
These Bulldogs rely more on Bennett and their offense than last year’s championship team, which fielded one of college football’s best defenses in recent history. Georgia ranked fifth in the nation in yards per game (6.97) and made the playoffs.
The Frogs also have strong offense with Duggan and star receiver Quentin Johnston having 163 yards on six catches against the Wolverines.
This is the penultimate season of the four-team playoff version before expanding to 12 teams in the 2024 season.
Prior to Saturday, just three of 16 semifinals had been decided by single digits and all of those failures helped fuel a desire to widen the field in hopes of creating some more interesting postseason games.
That New Year’s Eve, the four-team playoff turned out to be an eight-hour college football party.
Following the loss to TCU, Michigan coach Jim Harbaugh summarized his team’s game and, as it turned out, the day.
“The winner,” he said, “was football.”
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