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Newsstand: What are Notre Dame football's chances to make the College Football Playoff?

Kyle Kellyby: Kyle Kelly12/01/25ByKyleKelly

Notre Dame football’s chances to return to the College Football Playoff are more likely than not, according to oddsmakers.

In BetMGM’s latest college football futures Sunday night, it listed the Fighting Irish at -375 to make the College Football Playoff, an implied probability of 78.9%. Those odds are better than BYU (+400), Miami (+800) and Vanderbilt (+5000), but worse than Oklahoma (–5000).

After the regular season, eight schools are widely viewed as strong bets to make the 2025 CFP: Ohio State, Indiana, Texas A&M, Georgia, Texas Tech, Oregon, Ole Miss and Oklahoma. The ACC champion and the highest-ranked Group of Five champion are guaranteed two additional spots.

The final two at-large spots are expected to come from a group that includes Notre Dame, Alabama, BYU, Miami, Vanderbilt and Texas. BetMGM did not list odds for Alabama or Texas to make the CFP.

The committee will reveal the latest rankings Tuesday at 7 p.m. ET. The final rankings will be released five days later, on Sunday at noon ET, after conference championship games.

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Notre Dame Quote of the Weekend

“They’re a good football team. I think we’ve faced, someone told me, four top ten teams. It’s hard to rank them. They’ve all been good in their own way. Certainly, Miami was tough, playing them down there. Their defensive front is outrageous, you know what I mean? So this is a good team. They’re very well-coached. I have a lot of respect for Coach [Marcus] Freeman.”

— Stanford coach Frank Reich on Notre Dame after Saturday’s game.

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