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College Football Playoff, national championship predictions unveiled by Phil Steele
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It’s that time of year. College football expert and dominator of preseason content Phil Steele has released his latest magazine, complete with plenty of predictions for the 2019 season.
Perhaps the most noteworthy predictions from Steele are his College Football Playoff and national championship projections. As someone who does extensive research on each and every team in the offseason, Steele seems to have some of the best insight of the upcoming year as anyone involved with the sport.
Recently, Steele joined “The Opening Kickoff” on WNSP-FM 105.5 and revealed what he believes the playoff picture will look like at the end of year.
Steele has Alabama, Clemson, Michigan and Georgia filling the four spots this season. He believes the Crimson Tide will bounce back after a 44-16 loss last year to the Tigers to claim another national championship, as well.
“I’m going with Alabama this year,” Steele said, according to Mark Heim of AL.com. “When I look at Alabama, I see their defense being stronger than last year with six starters back. They only lost five draft picks this year. That’s light for that side of the ball.
“You have to look at 44-16. That is going to be a highly motivating factor for Alabama.”
The major takeaways from Steele’s projections are that the SEC gets two teams in the College Football Playoff for the second time in three years. In 2017, Alabama and Georgia played for a national title.
Steele having Michigan in the final four basically assumes that Jim Harbaugh finally gets over the hump this year and beats Ohio State and wins a B1G Championship. That would certainly quiet most of the Wolverines’ critics from the past four seasons.
It’ll be interesting to revisit these picks at the end of the season and see just how accurate Steele was in mid-June.
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