Kirk Herbstreit reveals how doomsday Alabama scenario could get Miami, Notre Dame in College Football Playoff

As the final College Football Playoff rankings show approaches, all eyes are on Atlanta. No. 9 Alabama is squarely on the bubble, meaning Notre Dame and Miami fans are watching closely to see if one of their teams can sneak into the 12-team field.

But as the Crimson Tide struggled in the first half against No. 3 Georgia in the SEC Championship, ESPN’s Kirk Herbstreit discussed a potential doomsday scenario for Alabama. Depending on what the committee thinks, it could get both Notre Dame and Miami in the bracket.

Herbstreit wondered if a Georgia blowout victory would allow the Fighting Irish and Hurricanes to jump past the Crimson Tide. While he noted the SEC Championship marks one more game than either team would play – and that he wasn’t predicting a blowout – Herbstreit said both fan bases should be hoping Georgia wins big.

“This is all about the SEC Championship, but if I’m a Notre Dame or Miami fan, I’m sitting here pulling for Georgia to just keep rolling along,” Herbstreit said during the ABC broadcast. “Make this as big and as bad as you can for Alabama because that could potentially open the door for Miami and Notre Dame if Bama were to get blown out here by Georgia. … I’m not suggesting they are going to get blown out, but I just know there’s so much.

“With Bama getting punished – in my opinion, Bama went to Athens and beat them there. So it would have to get really ugly for them to be punished for losing a game. They have to play a bonus-round game.”

As Kirk Herbstreit noted, Alabama defeated Georgia at Sanford Stadium during the regular season. But the Crimson Tide also had a stretch of four wins over teams ranked at the time of the matchups. That helps bolster the resume, and if Alabama could rally in the second half, it could avoid potential disaster and punch a ticket to the College Football Playoff.

“Bama, the one thing that doesn’t show [on the graphic], they beat four ranked teams in a row,” Herbstreit said. “Not just the best win at Georgia, but I think it’s the amount of good wins that they have is the probably best thing on their resume. Better than anybody else at this point. So they just need to show a pulse here, start to get back into this game.”

Miami, Notre Dame and Alabama all entered Saturday with 10-2 records. Of course, the Hurricanes notably have a victory over the Fighting Irish in Week 1, which further adds to the intrigue around what the College Football Playoff committee will do with the two teams. Notre Dame ranked ahead of Miami every week since the rankings started to come out.