Greg McElroy believes TCU can make the College Football Playoff in 2025

Greg McElroy sees as many as nine teams from the Big 12 that could make a run at a spot this year in the College Football Playoff. The last of those nine was the TCU Horned Frogs, three years after the program’s lone appearance, which led to a runner-up finish nationally in the CFP.

McElroy put TCU in his second tier, which labeled it as a playoff contender, in the Big 12 earlier this week on ‘Always College Football.’ None of the programs in the league were title contenders to him in tier one, but the Horned Frogs were one of those nine teams in tier two, along with Texas Tech, Kansas State, Arizona State, Iowa State, Utah, Baylor, Kansas, and BYU.

“I think TCU can make the playoff this year,” McElroy said.

TCU got back to a really good season last year with a finish at 9-4 overall. The Horned Frogs now return much of the production, bringing in single-digit transfers this offseason, from that team that won six of their final seven to close, capping it off with a victory in the New Mexico Bowl.

That starts offensively for a team that averaged 33.5 points per game, which was 25th nationally, and put up 426.8 yards of offense on average. QB Josh Hoover, who threw for nearly 4,000 yards with 27 touchdowns and 11 interceptions on 66.5% completion, is among those back for a unit that McElroy thinks will need to find some more balance, as the pass game accounted for nearly three quarters of their production in yardage.

“Part of my reason for optimism is that you have Josh Hoover back at quarterback. He had a tremendous year last year statistically. You have great stability along the offensive line in certain spots,” said McElroy. “I think the run game will hopefully take a pretty significant step forward. That was a bit of a point of contention last year and, if that part can take some of the pressure off the passing attack, this is a group that just couldn’t really get a whole lot going last year. You bring in Kevorian Barnes from UTSA, should provide an instant boost to the running back room. I think that group has a chance to be really good. They did lose some quality pieces there along the wide receiver corps but you bring in a couple of really talented transfers like Jordan Dwyer from Idaho, who went for over 1,100 yards last year, nearly 1,200 yards. You bring in Joseph Manjack from Houston. That could be really helpful. You also have a couple of highly-touted freshmen that could be impactful within the receiving room as well.”

However, despite having their best scoring defense in four years after allowing only 24.6 points, McElroy knows the Horned Frogs will have to be better defensively, specifically in the secondary, if this were to potentially happen. He thinks they could do so, too, with it being the second season for that unit in the system.

“They’ve got to be better on the defense. They were struggling in the secondary last year. That should be helpful (as) they attacked it in the portal some,” said McElroy. “This will be the second year now for Andy Avalos as the defensive coordinator. That should provide a little bit of continuity.”

That all said, to be a playoff team, TCU is going to have to have the wins, whether enough to be an at-large or to be in the Big 12 Championship. That could be difficult, hence why they were listed ninth among the nine teams in their tier, based on their slate that includes a pair of last year’s playoff teams, five of the other eight tier two teams on this specific list, and an opener against none other than Bill Belichick.

“Looking at the schedule? At Arizona State, at Kansas State, at North Carolina – three very difficult games away from home. They do get SMU at home. And they have to go to BYU,” McElroy read. “I look at this schedule and I just think, man, there’s a lot of games on the road that will be tricky, but you also have some other contenders, teams that I really like this year, that come to you. Like, Iowa State – they come to you on November 8th. Baylor comes to you on October 18th.”

Technically speaking, just about any team in the Big 12 could think they have a reasonable chance to make it into the CFP. McElroy, nonetheless, sees pieces in Fort Worth that, assuming the record is there, really could make a playoff team again for Sonny Dykes.

“I think TCU, if they can get better from a balance standpoint offensively, if they can show some growth on the back end defensively? This team has kind of the makings of a team that could win some shootouts if the opportunity presents itself,” McElroy said. “I do think they are a legitimate College Football Playoff contender this year.”