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ESPN’s most-likely Playoff scenarios include same three teams

Dustin Schutte

By Dustin Schutte

Published:

The College Football Playoff scenarios that are most likely to occur don’t involve Michigan, Ohio State or the B1G, according to ESPN.

Thursday morning, ESPN’s Heather Dinich tweeted out that the four most-likely scenarios for this year’s playoff involve Alabama, Clemson and Notre Dame. According to the Playoff Predictor, there’s a 61 percent chance that those three teams are playing in semi-final matchups at the end of the year.

Alabama and Clemson will each have three games remaining — two regular season and a conference championship — while Notre Dame has just two contests left.

Alabama, Clemson and Notre Dame are all 10-0 on the season. The other contenders for the playoff — including Michigan and Ohio State — have one loss this year.

If Michigan or Ohio State wins out, denying either a spot in the College Football Playoff would be hard to do. That would mean the Wolverines or Buckeyes would finish the year 12-1 with a B1G title to their name.

There’s still a few weeks of football to be played, but it’s hard to imagine a scenario, at least right now, in which Alabama, Clemson and Notre Dame aren’t included in the Final Four.

That means there are seven teams battling for that final spot.

Dustin Schutte

Dustin grew up in the heart of Big Ten country and has been in sports media since 2010. He has been covering Big Ten football since 2014. You can follow him on Twitter: @SchutteCFB