Stop Stressing - 10-2 Notre Dame Will Make the College Football Playoff

Notre Dame, if it wins out and goes 10-2 - and it's still a massive if ... (cough ... Northern Illinois ... cough) - will be in your College Football Playoff for the 2025 season, and it might even host a first round game.

So stop stressing about this. Here's why ...

Notre Dame is getting enough love from the AP and Coaches polls

No, the AP and Coaches Polls don't matter one lick in this equation, but yeah, the College Football Playoff committee members look at this stuff.

The other polls and ranking systems are strictly forbidden in the discussion of the rankings, but ... yeah, of course they have some role when it comes to setting the expectations.

The Irish are 16th in both polls, and if you know anything about the polls, that's good enough at this point.

Team wins, team goes up. Team loses, team goes down.

Trust me, if Notre Dame goes 10-2, it'll finish the regular season in the top eight.

Don't worry about the rest of the Notre Dame schedule

At least, don't worry about it when it comes to schedule strength and how the CFP committee will analyze it.

Over the final seven games are six ACC teams and a Navy squad that will at least finish with at least nine wins and could win the American Conference.

Don't get caught up in the weeds of how good those power programs actually are.

The College Football Playoff committee sincerely wants the best tournament possible. There are no ulterior motives here - and no, there wasn't any sort of conspiracy against Florida State two years ago when the perfect storm hit to keep it out.

That, and this bunch really doesn't want any smoke.

What's the easiest way to justify your final rankings? When going spot by spot - the committee meticulously argues and debates each of the 25 slots - in the end, if you're in a power conference, and you won ten games, you're good.

Notre Dame plays just two Group of Five teams, and Navy and Boise State could each win their respective conferences.

The Irish could absolutely lose to USC. Going to Pitt is sneaky-dangerous, and yeah, NC State has a right-day-right-time shot at this on Saturday. But again, just win, just keep winning, and as long as there's no blip ...

Seriously, 10-2 gets it done for Notre Dame

In the history of the College Football Playoff going back to 2014, no at-large team without ten wins would've been in a 12-team playoff ahead of a power conference team with ten victories.

If the committee really did it right last season, 9-3 Alabama should've been in over SMU, who lost to Clemson in the ACC Championship, who lost to South Carolina, who lost to ... Alabama. But in the end, 11-win SMU - who beat no one - got the call because of the record. It was a mistake, but it was a consistent call.

Realistically, there won't be too many ten-win teams from power conferences to worry about.

The champions from the ACC, Big Ten, Big 12, and SEC will get in, along with the everyone-gets-a-trophy gift thrown to the top Group of Five champion. That leaves seven spots.

The Big Ten and SEC Championship losers are almost certainly in, and both conferences will each have one other team win ten wins.

That means there will be three spots available. Looking ahead, there will likely be a fourth team with ten wins from the SEC or the Big Ten, there might be another ACC or Big 12 team, and ... Notre Dame.

Even if there are a group of ten win teams to choose from - which there almost certainly won't be - Notre Dame on a ten-game winning streak will get the nod over most of the other options because ...

The Notre Dame losses to Texas A&M and Miami were more than acceptable

Yup, it's true - better to lose right away than late.

Miami appears to be a powerhouse, so dropping the opening weekend date in Miami Gardens in a great 27-24 thriller will be totally fine, and so will the 41-40 overtime loss to Texas A&M.

Again, the ten-game winning streak will matter, especially if it's perceived that the defense has improved.

So worry about NC State. Worry about figuring out your Peacock subscription.

Worry about injuries - especially to CJ Carr, but that's for another day - and a bad performance against USC, or Boston College, or Navy.

But don't get freaked about what anyone else is saying. As long as Notre Dame keeps on rolling, everything will be okay.