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By Rowan Fisher-Shotton
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The College Football Playoff committee released its first rankings of the 2026 season on Tuesday night, and Miami is No. 1 for the first time in program history.
The top five are: Miami (8-0), Georgia (7-1), Utah (8-0), Indiana (8-1), and Alabama (6-2), followed by Kentucky (7-1), Texas (6-2), UCLA (8-0), BYU (7-1), and Ole Miss (6-2) to round out the top 10. Notre Dame (7-1), meanwhile, sits at No. 11 and Ohio State (6-2) is No. 12.
It's just the first of six rankings, but it's an important marker nonetheless. It shows how the committee values schedule, record, and head-to-head results, and it gives the first look at who would get a first-round bye and who would play on the road. Teams also outside the top 12 now know how much ground they have to make up.
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On Wednesday's episode of "Get Up," ESPN's Paul Finebaum said he couldn't make sense of the rankings, calling them "about as discombobulated" as any he's seen.
"I don't really know if I could make much sense out of it, because it is about as discombobulated a ranking as I've ever seen," Finebaum said. "Trying to make sense out of this would literally drive me crazy, because there isn't really a lot of sense. And even though I'm sitting in Alabama today, Alabama has no business being where they are.
"That is truly absurd to have Alabama that far ahead of Tennessee, a team that just disemboweled them a couple of weeks ago at Neyland Stadium," Finebaum added. "And for the committee to value Alabama's win about five or six weeks ago at Mississippi State, when the quarterback, Kamario Taylor, was in the game at the beginning and then became injured, makes no sense. But then again, I'm used to the committee not making a lot of sense. I'm hoping that this was some late Halloween trick on America."
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Alabama at No. 5 overall is the main target of criticism. The Tide already have two losses, and yet they're ranked ahead of Texas, which has the same record but more wins over ranked opponents, and Tennessee, which already beat them 26-10 on Oct. 17 in Knoxville. The Vols, meanwhile, are all the way down at No. 13, outside of the playoff picture.
UCLA at No. 8 is another interesting one, as an unbeaten team that's sitting behind two teams with two losses, while Notre Dame is the last team in the field despite having just a single loss on its season. The SEC also has six teams in the top 13, which has the field even more debate about whether the committee is valuing strength of schedule too much.
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With more rankings to come, much of this will look very different in the weeks ahead, especially with some of the matchups on the schedule for Week 10. BYU and Utah will face off in Salt Lake City, while Texas will travel to Missouri, Alabama will go to LSU, Ohio State will host Oregon, Tennessee will host Kentucky, Georgia will head to Ole Miss, and Notre Dame will take on the top-ranked Hurricanes in South Bend. The results from all of those games could have massive implications.
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