College Football Playoff Odds: A Little More Faith in the Hoosiers

Douglas Farmer breaks down the fallout from Tuesday's college football playoff rankings, including how the Hoosiers' odds shortened in the College Football Playoff odds.

Douglas Farmer - Betting Analyst at Covers
Douglas Farmer • Betting Analyst
Dec 2, 2025 • 20:36 ET • 4 min read
Indiana Hoosiers quarterback Fernando Mendoza (15) throws a pass.
Photo By - Imagn Images. Indiana Hoosiers quarterback Fernando Mendoza (15) throws a pass.

The Miami Hurricanes can bellyache all they want, as can the Texas Longhorns, but the College Football Playoff selection committee has erased their hopes of making the Playoff, something rather clear to anyone willing to think logically over the last four days.

The latest committee rankings slotted Texas at No. 13, up three spots, and Miami at No. 12, both on the outside of the Playoff field and with no genuine path into the bracket.

Their College Football National Championship odds already reflected that misery. Again, this was always the most likely scenario for Tuesday night and should not surprise anyone.

College Football Playoff odds

Biggest Riser

No, this is not Notre Dame. The Irish odds stayed steady at +1000 at FanDuel both before and after the rankings were released Tuesday night, another point of data that this would always be the case. Miami was never jumping Notre Dame in the rankings this weekend. Whether the Hurricanes should have been ranked behind the Irish at all is an entirely different argument; the only pertinent argument was whether they would jump them, and that never made any sense.

Instead, Indiana’s odds shortened to +370 after the rankings release, from +400 beforehand, while Georgia’s shortened to +750, from +800 beforehand.

The best guess to explain those quick changes is the likelihood that one of them ends up in the No. 3 slot, possibly facing the winner of No. 6 Mississippi vs. No. 11, either Virginia or the American champion. But even that may be a misguided guess, because if Alabama upsets Georgia in the SEC title game, the entire middle section of the bracket will be a bit uncertain.

Biggest Drop

The biggest drop in national championship odds was not even Miami’s, despite the Hurricanes’ dreams of reaching the Playoff being dashed. Miami was always such a long shot; the +17500 odds remained unchanged.

Instead, Ohio State’s odds fell to +185 from +170 before the rankings reveal.

The best guess to explain that may be Alabama sliding in front of Notre Dame. With both the Tide and the Irish now likely for the Playoff — a two-touchdown upset in the Big 12 game is the only thing that would actually endanger either of them — this field should have all the teams that actually have genuine title aspirations.

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Douglas Farmer
Betting Analyst

Douglas Farmer spends his days thinking about college football and his nights thinking about the NBA. His betting habits and coverage follow that same pattern. He covered Notre Dame football for various outlets from 2008 to 2024, most notably spending eight seasons as NBC Sports’ beat writer on the Irish. That was also when his gambling focus took off. Knowing there were veteran beat writers with three decades more experience than he had, Douglas found his niche by best recognizing Notre Dame’s standing in each year’s national landscape, a complex tapestry most easily understood and remembered via betting odds.

In 2021, that interest created a freelance opportunity with Covers, a role that eventually led to Douglas joining the company full-time in 2023. In the fall, Douglas will place five or six dozen bets each week, a disproportionate amount via BetRivers because the operator tends to have lines slightly different than the rest of the market. The same can be said of Circa Sports’ futures markets.

While Douglas is an avid NBA fan and covers the league throughout the year, the vast majority of his bets are on college football, because that is the biggest key to sports betting: Know what you do not know.

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