Week 1 of the 2025 college football season features a loaded slate, including LSU at Clemson, Notre Dame at Miami and Alabama at Florida State, among others. LSU-Clemson could be a top-five matchup, as could the biggest headliner: Manning and Texas visiting Ohio State in a matchup of the 2024 national champion and our early 2025 favorite.

Ohio State reigned supreme in the first year of the 12-team College Football Playoff, defeating Tennessee, Oregon, Texas and Notre Dame on its road to glory. Like most things in college sports right now,

It's never too early to look ahead to next season's College Football Playoff despite the Ohio State Buckeyes capturing the National Championship just weeks ago.

Now that it’s all over and the Ohio State Buckeyes are the college football national champions, it can be definitively said: Expanding the College Football Playoff worked.

ESPN has college football's national title staying in the Big Ten next season. Michigan and Ohio State have given the conference back-to-back national champions. ESPN's Bill Connelly predicted a new winner emerging from the Big Ten.

Ohio State took down Notre Dame to win the inaugural 12-team College Football Playoff and claim the school’s first national championship since 2014, but now it’s time to get an early look ahead to the 2025 college football season and what teams are in contention right now.