2026 College Football Playoff Projected Bracket: Week 4 Edition

Three weeks into the season, the playoff picture is taking shape. Texas holds No. 1 in the AP poll, Ohio State and LSU already have a loss, and a big Week 4 slate will reshuffle the board by Sunday.

Here’s our projected 12-team bracket for December. It includes each contender’s RallyFuel Football NIL Index, a 0–100 rating of a program’s NIL momentum, and the NIL Index for every team in the AP Top 25.

How the 2026 playoff works

• 12 teams. The CFP stays at 12 teams in 2026. The Big Ten, SEC, ACC and Big 12 champions get automatic bids, along with one Group of Six team.
• The Group of Six bid. It goes to the highest-ranked team from the American, CUSA, MAC, Mountain West, Pac-12 or Sun Belt, whether or not it won its conference.
• Notre Dame’s path. The Irish get an automatic bid if they finish in the top 12 of the final rankings.
• Seeding. Every team is seeded straight from the committee’s final ranking. Only the top four get first-round byes.
• Dates. The first round is December 18–19, and the national championship is January 25, 2027, in Las Vegas.

Projected bracket

First round (Dec. 18–19, campus sites)

• No. 12 Tulsa at No. 5 Notre Dame. A matchup of two top-10 scoring defenses: Tulsa allows 9.0 points per game and Notre Dame allows 7.7. The difference is offense. Notre Dame scores 40.0 points per game to Tulsa’s 29.7. Our vote: Notre Dame.
• No. 11 Iowa at No. 6 Ohio State. Iowa has the nation’s best defense, allowing 4.3 points and 176.7 yards per game. Ohio State’s offense, at 523 yards per game, is the toughest test that defense could face. Our vote: Ohio State.
• No. 10 Penn State at No. 7 Ole Miss. Penn State’s defense allows 7.3 points per game. Ole Miss is 3-0 and already 1-0 in SEC play. Our vote: Ole Miss.
• No. 9 Alabama at No. 8 Texas Tech. This is the best game of the round and the biggest NIL gap: Texas Tech is RallyFuel’s No. 5 program at 25.5, while Alabama sits at 21.7 (#35). On the field, Alabama scores 47.7 points per game and Tech allows 20. Our vote: Alabama.

Quarterfinals

• No. 1 Georgia vs. No. 9 Alabama. Georgia leads the country in scoring at 59.3 points per game and allows just 13.3. Our vote: Georgia.
• No. 2 Indiana vs. No. 7 Ole Miss. Indiana scores 48.3 and allows 5.3 per game, the best margin among Power 4 teams. Our vote: Indiana.
• No. 3 Miami vs. No. 6 Ohio State. This is the closest NIL matchup in the bracket, 26.2 vs. 26.0. Miami has the nation’s No. 1 offense at 594.3 yards per game. Our vote: Miami.
• No. 4 Texas vs. No. 5 Notre Dame. Two elite defenses meet: Texas allows 12.0 points per game and the Irish allow 7.7. Our vote: Texas.

Semifinals

• Georgia vs. Texas. Georgia’s offense is the difference, and the Bulldogs also edge Texas in NIL Index, 25.4 to 24.6. Our vote: Georgia.
• Indiana vs. Miami. Miami scores 51.7 points per game, and Indiana allows 5.3. It’s the best strength-on-strength matchup in the bracket, and it pairs RallyFuel’s No. 1 and No. 3 NIL programs. Our vote: Miami.

National championship (Jan. 25, Las Vegas)

Georgia over Miami. The Bulldogs are the only team in the top five nationally in both yards per game (539.0) and scoring (59.3), and their defense ranks inside the top 25. Balance wins in January.

NIL Index vs. playoff seed

What stands out:

• Indiana is the NIL leader. The No. 2 seed is RallyFuel’s top program nationally, and it leads this field in Performance (31) and Fan Demand (8).
• The top of the field is loaded. Five of the country’s top six NIL programs are in this bracket: Indiana, Miami, Ohio State, Texas Tech and Georgia.
• Texas ranks lower than its poll spot. The AP’s No. 1 team is sixth in this field for NIL, at #13 nationally.
• Alabama has little fan pull. The Crimson Tide rank #35 nationally with a Fan Demand score of zero.
• Iowa’s defense hasn’t translated to NIL. The nation’s No. 1 defense has the lowest NIL Index in the field (17.8), with zero Fan Demand.
• Fans can move these numbers. Fan Demand is the weakest category for every team in the field.

AP Top 25 vs. RallyFuel NIL Index

The biggest gaps between poll rank and NIL rank:

• Ranked lower than their NIL. Oregon (No. 20 in the AP poll) has the seventh-highest NIL Index in the Top 25 and the top Social Power score (52). Texas A&M (No. 23), SMU (No. 22) and Florida (No. 21) all rank in the Top 25’s top 12 for NIL.
• Ranked higher than their NIL. Notre Dame (No. 3) is 15th among Top 25 teams in NIL. Ole Miss (No. 4), Utah (No. 15) and Texas (No. 1) also sit well below their poll spots.
• The top 10 still leads. AP top-10 teams average a 24.6 NIL Index, compared with 22.0 for teams ranked 11–25.
• Not every NIL power is ranked. RallyFuel’s No. 2, 9, 10 and 12 NIL programs aren’t in the AP Top 25 at all. Unranked Oklahoma State, which upset Oregon in Week 2, carries a 22.2 NIL Index (#28), higher than eight ranked teams.

Players to watch

• Trinidad Chambliss, QB, Ole Miss (player NIL Index 55.0). He became the Heisman front-runner after leading Ole Miss to a 32-24 win over No. 7 LSU, completing 33 of 48 passes for 363 yards and two touchdowns.
• Darian Mensah, QB, Miami (50.8). Through three games, he has 873 passing yards and 11 touchdowns with no interceptions, completing 89.9% of his passes.
• Malachi Toney, WR, Miami (53.4). He leads the Hurricanes with 444 receiving yards and has moved into the Heisman conversation.
• Arch Manning, QB, Texas (60.6). He led Texas back from a 20-point fourth-quarter deficit to beat Ohio State, the largest fourth-quarter comeback over an AP No. 1 team in college football history.
• Gunner Stockton, QB, Georgia (49.7). He threw only four incompletions across Georgia’s first two games.
• Jeremiah Smith, WR, Ohio State (60.9). He has 400 receiving yards, and in Week 3 he became Ohio State’s all-time leader in receiving yards. He has the highest player NIL Index in this bracket.
• Charlie Becker, WR, Indiana (53.6). He has 12 catches for 272 yards and six touchdowns.
• CJ Carr, QB, Notre Dame (41.7). He entered the season as a top Heisman candidate.

How we voted

• Georgia over Texas for the SEC. Texas is No. 1 in the polls, but Georgia’s numbers are stronger across the board, including 178 points scored to Texas’s 113. This Saturday’s game against Oklahoma, which has the No. 5 scoring defense in the country, is a real test.
• Indiana over Ohio State for the Big Ten. The Buckeyes are 2-1 and host Illinois this week. Indiana is unbeaten and has allowed just 16 points all season.
• Texas Tech for the Big 12. The Red Raiders are No. 11 in the AP poll, 3-0 and already 1-0 in league play after beating Houston. They’re also RallyFuel’s No. 5 NIL program nationally. BYU and Utah are the biggest threats, and Utah has the league’s best defense (8.0 points allowed per game).
• Tulsa for the Group of Six. The American‘s Golden Hurricane are 3-0 with the nation’s No. 7 scoring defense (9.0 points allowed per game). They trail Boise State (48 points) and Western Michigan (27) in AP voting with 18, but both of those teams already have a loss. Tulsa also has the stronger NIL profile: 20.7 (#54) to Boise State’s 18.8 (#78), with a Performance score of 25 that matches SMU for the best we’ve seen outside Indiana. Tulsa’s unbeaten challengers are James Madison (133 points scored, 29 allowed) and North Dakota State (4-0).

How our bracket differs from CBS Sports

CBS Sports’ John Talty released his own projected field after Week 3. We agree on nine teams. Here’s where we split:

Our biggest difference is the byes. We give them to Georgia and Indiana, two unbeaten teams that also rank #6 and #1 in the RallyFuel NIL Index. CBS has Georgia at No. 5 and Indiana at No. 7, both playing in the first round.

First four out

1. Tennessee (3-0, NIL #11). Saturday’s home game against Texas decides a lot, and the Vols carry a slightly higher NIL Index (24.8) than the Longhorns (24.6).
2. Utah (3-0, NIL #87). The Big 12’s best defense needs to beat Texas Tech head-to-head.
3. BYU (3-0, NIL #36). Caught in the same Big 12 logjam.
4. LSU (2-1, NIL #7). The strongest NIL program outside our field. Hosting Texas A&M on Saturday night is close to a must-win.

Also in the mix: USC (4-0), Oregon, Michigan and Missouri.

Week 4 games that will move this bracket

• No. 1 Texas at No. 14 Tennessee (Sat., noon, ABC) · NIL: 24.6 vs. 24.8
• Oklahoma at No. 2 Georgia (Sat., 3:30, ESPN)
• No. 4 Ole Miss at No. 21 Florida (Sat., 3:30, ABC) · NIL: 23.2 vs. 23.6
• No. 17 Iowa at No. 18 Michigan (Sat., 3:30, CBS) · NIL: 17.8 vs. 19.8
• No. 23 Texas A&M at No. 10 LSU (Sat., 7:30, ABC) · NIL: 24.5 vs. 25.1
• No. 20 Oregon at No. 12 USC (Sat., 7:30, NBC) · NIL: 25.1 vs. 23.1

FAQ

How many teams make the 2026 College Football Playoff? Twelve. The field is the four Power 4 conference champions, the top-ranked Group of Six team and seven at-large teams. Notre Dame gets in automatically with a top-12 finish.

Do conference champions get a first-round bye? Not automatically. Byes go to the four highest-ranked teams in the final committee rankings.

When is the 2026–27 national championship? January 25, 2027, in Las Vegas.

What is the RallyFuel Football NIL Index? It’s a 0–100 Team NIL Score that rates a program’s NIL momentum. It combines four factors: on-field performance, NIL visibility, social power and fan demand. Indiana currently ranks No. 1 nationally at 30.3.