The Joel Klatt Show: A College Football Podcast - College Football Playoff First Round Picks & CFP Prediction

Episode Date: December 18, 2024

FOX Sports’ lead College Football analyst Joel Klatt makes his picks for the First Round Games of the College Football Playoff before making his full CFP bracket picks - including who he thinks will win the National Championship. He begins with the game between Indiana and Notre Dame and considers whether Curt Cignetti’s Cinderella squad can pull off the upset in South Bend. He then looks at SMU’s chances to knock off Penn State in State College and whether James Franklin will get a signature win of his tenure. Klatt breaks down the matchup between Clemson and Texas and discusses whether there should be concerns about Quinn Ewers in this matchup. He then analyzes the Tennessee-Ohio State game as the Buckeyes look to bounce back from their loss to Michigan. He discusses whether Ohio State will be able to correct their mistakes from that game against a team that is built similarly to the Wolverines with a strong Defensive Line and Run Game. Following his picks, he fills out his full bracket for the College Football Playoff and announces who he is picking to win the National Championship. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

I firmly believe that they're going to play a much better game against Notre Dame than what they did against Ohio State. Because all of those things that they struggled with against Ohio State, remember, those are fixable problems. College football has never been better. Interest has never been higher. I believe that we are at the dawn of the golden age of college football. It was an epic day of college football. It was one of those days where you fall in love with the sport all over again. Hey, what's up everybody?

Welcome into the Joel Clatt Show. I am Joel glad. This show is brought to you by Hampton by Hilton, and we have got a picks and previews episode ready for today for the college football playoff. It's finally here. The 12-team playoff is finally here. I cannot wait for this. I got to tell you, I'm very excited about these games, and I think that we're going to actually get some great games. So I've got my picks right here. We're going to give you a little preview of each of these games and my thoughts on each of these games. But first, remember, wherever you're listening to this show, wherever you get your podcast.

If you would do us a huge favor, just rate and review the show. That would be great. If you could also just invite a friend in or send it to a friend on this holiday season, just be like, hey, you know what? Where do I get my college football info? Well, Joel Clat show. So share it with a friend. If you're not on YouTube, get over there and subscribe to the show on YouTube.

We've got a lot of stuff over there on the YouTube channel. You're going to love the YouTube channel. the football series, the schematic series, we have started that, and we will be rolling that out here shortly. I don't know the exact date, but we'll be rolling that out during the course of kind of the holiday season and then into the spring. Make sure to hit that notifications button and then leave a comment down below the video. And then wherever you like to social media, we're there.

So it doesn't matter. You can be old school on Facebook. You can be new school on TikTok. you can find us at Joel Clatt Show. All of our content is out there, and you can find us on social media. As far as this show is concerned, we have been excellent in terms of our picks. We were 4 and 1 in Conference Championship Game Week, which pushed our overall record for the season to 49 and 30 against the spread.

That is picking against the spread here. We're only picking winners, and we're only doing it with the like 5 to 6 to 7 best games of the weekend. not cherry picking lines here. We're just taking the best games in college football and giving you our thoughts. We preview them and then we make a pick against the spread. We have been 49 and 30 on the year. That's 62%. By the way, we also gave you that 60 to one Heisman pick in the preseason for Travis Hunter. So that was a nice little payout. So now we've got these four games, and I can't wait for them. We've got Indiana, Notre Dame. We've got SMU Penn State, Clemson at Texas. And then the big one, I think everyone is kind of waiting for is that Tennessee at Ohio.

Ohio State game. Let's get to all of these and let's break these games down. The most important games that we have had in our sport and we're going to start this one out on a Friday night in South Bend as we've got the in-state showdown. Marcus Freeman and the Notre Dame Fighting Irish welcome in the Indiana Hoosiers and Kurt Signetti to the college football playoff, which in and of itself kind of blows your mind, right? These two teams, by the way, don't play often. I believe the last time they played was 1991. So this is not like they have a lot of familiarity with each other. And it's not even as if these guys were all recruited from the same areas.

Because remember, this Indiana roster changed over so quickly once Kurt Signetti actually got that job last year. In his first year, being the national coach of the year, Signetti is bringing this team in. And I do think that they're going to be playing with a lot of confidence and this error of like nothing to lose. nothing to lose. Neither team has played a particularly strong schedule, and everybody likes to talk about that with Indiana through the course of the back half of the season as we were getting ready for the playoff. But when you actually look at the strength of schedule metric that the committee used, Indiana and Notre Dame were only six apart. I believe Indiana was 67th in the country of strength of schedule. Notre Dame was 60th in the country in terms of strength of

schedule. So neither team faced a particularly tough road to get here. Now, Notre Dame lost a game that was kind of inexplicable at the time, Northern Illinois at home. Meanwhile, the one game that Indiana lost, you kind of, you looked at the schedule and you're like, yeah, they're probably going to lose at Ohio State in the shoe, and that's exactly what happened. Now, both of these teams have done what they've needed to do against those weak schedules. These two are number one and number two in terms of point differential this season. That's obviously important because you know that they have been taking care of business regardless of their opponent, which is not the case for everybody, and we'll get to that in a little bit. Indiana got that tough road environment in

Columbus, and they've failed that. Let's be honest, a game that Gus and Jenny and I called, and Indiana was not ready for it, in particular on the special teams, they gave up those, basically those two touchdowns, one in a return, one on a block punt and a short field. with their punt team. They made a lot of mistakes in the special teams. They struggled to deal with Ohio State's defensive pressure, and their protection plan was not very good. And what did I say at the time? And I will stand by what I said at the time is they will be better

the next chance that they get at this because none of these guys, and really none of these coaches, together at least, had faced anything close to going up and facing Ohio State on the road. And as we've seen during the course of the season, even when Ohio State went to Oregon in their first top five matchup of the season on the road, even when Georgia went on the road to Alabama in a top five matchup early in the season, nobody plays well in their first opportunity in that environment. These are still just young men that are trying to get their feet wet in what can be very intimidating places.

So that's what happened to Indiana. And I said at the time, they will be better if they get another opportunity at this. And here's their opportunity. I firmly believe that they're going to play a much better game against Notre Dame than what they did against Ohio State. Because all of those things that they struggled with against Ohio State, remember, those are fixable problems. They didn't just get taken out behind the woodshed and battered around from a roster standpoint.

Now, listen, Ohio State did some great things, but you're talking about getting a punt off. Like, you can do that and you can fix that. Punt coverage, you can fix that. The protection plan, which was mainly mystic. in protection, you can fix that. It's not like a guy was just getting beat in one-on-one rush time after time after time. So I didn't think it was really a personnel thing as much as it was a mistakes and stage thing for Indiana at Ohio State. I'm speaking of that game earlier in the year,

which means they should be better in this environment. I fully believe that Indiana is going to play a really solid game against Notre Dame. Notre Dame comes into this one with one of the best rushing attacks in the country, really dynamic running the football, and one of the best defenses in the country. I think Howard Cross is likely going to play. It looks like, sounds like he's going to play. He missed the last three. And now you get this matchup, and I love these types of matchups where you really have strength against strength. What you have is this really potent dynamic run game from Notre Dame, which they lean on. You know, they don't throw the ball very well. it's not a dynamic passing game, but they run it incredibly well.

And you've got that going up against Indiana, which, oh, by the way, is the number one rush defense in the country. No one realizes that, but that's the case. So Jeremiah Love and company are going to be going up against a defense that does a really good job against the run. If you're building a team to go into and face Notre Dame, you would build a team like Indiana. Now, would you like maybe a little bit more star power? Yeah, sure.

But in the middle of the season, they played just average football against Northwestern in a win on the road. The next week, they kind of shuffled around their secondary, and it actually coincided with the week that we went to Indiana, and Gus and Jenny and I went and called their game against Nebraska. And I was talking with Brian Haynes, their defensive coordinator, and he shuffled the lineup around a little bit in the secondary, and since then, they have been incredible defensively.

in particular stopping the run, and now they get their biggest test. Can Indiana's defense with that creative way that they play up front with guys like C.J. West and Mikhail Kamara up front and their defense front with those linebackers that have played so well and so much football going back to JMU with Kurt Signetti, like can they handle the rushing attack for Notre Dame? That's the entire, the entire matchup in this game. That's where this will be won or lost. Then you go to the other side and you start thinking about,

Notre Dame has got a very solid defense. Will Indiana be able to protect the passer? Curtis Rourke. If Curtis Rourke is upright and they can protect Curtis Rourke, I think that they're going to be able to move the football. Now, this team, this defense is very stout. There's no doubt. So I don't think Indiana is going to go out there and just go gangbusters.

But this is an offense that I think learned their lesson against Ohio State. It's a passing game that I really like. It's an RPO structure that really fits Curtis Rourke and what he does. Kurt Signetti is going to be bold. There's no doubt. Now, they did lose their quarterback coach, Tino Sun Siri, to a coordinator job at UCLA. And they all talked about how instrumental he had been

in developing this RPO system. But I'm just telling you, like, this offense will be able to move the football. I fully believe that. And certainly the lessons that they were able to learn against Ohio State are going to pay dividends. The biggest question I have in this game is the Notre Dame passing attack. That's the biggest question I have, because I do think that Indiana will be able to at least limit Notre Dame's ability to run the football. Now, I don't know if they're just going

to stifle them. I don't think that they will actually, but they could limit that, which means that Riley Leonard could be in some obvious passing situations. If that's the case, I like Indiana, because this passing game for Notre Dame just has not developed during the course of the year. You look up, by the way, and Riley Leonard has not thrown it for over 230 yards all season. Maybe he could have if they would have leaned into the passing game, but that's not really who he is. He's not a great passer. He helps in the run game. He's basically just a running quarterback, and there's only been four games all year where they've reached 200 yards throwing the football. I believe that these games, all of them, are going to come

down to quarterback play. And in this game, I trust Curtis Rourke more than Riley Leonard. The defense that has stepped up time and time again has been Indiana. I feel like Indiana's defense has been very good. Notre Dame's defense has been really good all year until their last outing. And USC all of a sudden threw up 35 points and over 500 yards against them. And they are a little bit more dynamic than some of the other teams that Notre Dame has faced. So the best offense that Notre Dame has faced, they gave up 35 points and 500 yards. Even Indiana's defense, they didn't give that up to Ohio State. They kind of limited Ohio State outside of what Michigan did to Ohio State. It was Ohio State's

fewest number of yards this year. Even less yards than they gained against Oregon on the road. Meanwhile, Notre Dame's defense struggled against USC. Listen, call me crazy, but the more I looked at this, I wanted to just take the points and have Notre Dame win the game. But trusting Curtis Rourke and thinking about C.J. West defending the run and those linebackers and the idea of Riley Leonard having to throw the football when they have to

rather than when they want to. I'm leaning Indiana here. I think Indiana is definitely a take the points at seven and a half. I think that's a big number. And I'm actually going to call for the outright win. I think the Hoosiers go into South Bend and they get the win. 34-31. I think Indiana moves on in a great season.

I think it could be a great game. Granted, this could go either way. And I do love both of these teams. This is not a knock against Notre Dame. This is more a tip of the cap to the run defense of Indiana and to their quarterback Curtis Rourke. I'm going to take the seven and a half with Indiana, and I'm going to say 34, 31,

Hoosiers win the game on Friday night. Then we move into the triple header on Saturday. Here we go. All right, SMU at Penn State. Penn State's favored by eight and a half. Should be a great environment in state college. Hey, by the way, shocking, you can do a whiteout at noon. Whiteout playoff game.

I've been calling for this all season long. I've wanted this since the preseason. I believe that Happy Valley is one of the great environments in college football. games that I've called there, games that I've watched, all of them. This is a great environment. It is an incredibly loud stadium. They do a remarkable job on their defensive side of jumping the snap count and taking advantage of the crowd noise.

And that will absolutely be the case in this game. Penn State is a very good football team, very good football team. By the way, it's going to be cold there. It's going to be probably in the 20s, possibly snow the night before. Penn State has the advantage in that, not just because, because they've played in it before, but more so, I'm just telling you as a player, it's not about having past experience playing in cold weather. It's the fact that Penn State, if they want to, has the opportunity to go practice outside for any number of periods during

the week. So that way, like, you're accustomed to it. It's like hitting a golf ball on the driving range is much easier than hitting it on a golf course. Why? Repetition. Because you do it repeatedly time and time again. I can hit five, six, seven, eight, seven irons in a row. And I get the feel for it and I get the whole rhythm to the way that I'm feeling. Well, that's the same way, like from a quarterback standpoint, we didn't have an indoor Colorado. So when it came to cold weather, I didn't mind practicing outside because I knew that like, okay, this is exactly how it's going to feel Saturday when I'm trying to grip the football or this is how I feel, my body feels, how it feels to get hit. Meanwhile, when other teams go to that cold weather, whether they've

played in it before or not, which SMU has not, they don't have the ability to feel that all week long so they don't have the repetition. So it's more of a shock to their system. That's why the whole weather thing is what it is. And obviously the Miami Dolphins talked about that after they went up to Lambo earlier this year. Penn State's got the advantage. They can practice in it all week. Now, SMU, I like their quarterback. Kevin Jennings has been really good since coming in as a starter after that BYU loss. He's nine and one. He's a threat with his arm and his legs. Like SMU can do it, man. I'm telling you, they can move the football. We saw that. The

problem with Jennings is that he has turned it over a bit of late 10 times in his last six games, and you can't do that against Penn State because remember now, they're going to put pressure on him. That's an active pass rush. It's a secondary that has some length and aggressiveness, and it's a defense that can fly around. Now, Breschard Smith, he was a 1500-yard guy from scrimmage for SMU out of the backfield. They've got some pieces. I think SMU is a good team, but they have not dealt with anybody close to Penn State defensively. Penn State's defense, I know they didn't play great against Oregon, but let's face it, no one's really played great against Oregon and Oregon's offense in particular in the middle or back half of the year.

This is still a defense, though, that can get after it. Think about their pass rush, right? Abdul Carter, Deni Dennis Sutton, like these guys can roll, and you get a little bit of a crowd noise factor in there, and now Abdul Carter is off the ball and you start trying to use a silent cadence. You better be able to line up and smash a little bit as a run game in order to slow them down. The games that they've lost in that building, those teams that won those games have the ability to get big and just overpower them. I'm thinking of Michigan last year, which is exactly what they did with Sharon Moore as the acting head coach.

They ran at 30 plus straight times. Ohio State, after the fourth down stop, what did they do? they ended the game on the field this year in Happy Valley running the football. You've got to be able to do that because if you just get into a game where you're going to be out there and you're going to try to out athlete Penn State on the defensive side, it's not going to work out very well for you. It's really not. And then think of it this way. Penn State is not a team that loses to teams that are below them.

And I know that might sound like elitist to say like below or above. I'm saying like favored. Penn State does not lose games that they should. shouldn't lose. Say everything that you want about James Franklin and his record in big games, but one thing that they have done is that they have taken care of business. And games that they're supposed to win, they win those games. The games that they lose are Michigan, Ohio State, Oregon. And I would make an argument that this year they've been closer in those games than they have been over the last couple. You go back two years and they weren't really

that close against Michigan and Ohio State a little closer last year in each of those games. And then this year they've got a fourth down in order to go in and tie the game in the fourth quarter against Ohio State. They end up losing the game. And they played Oregon as well as anybody. Like that was a great game in the Big Ten championship. So I do think that Penn State is getting to a point where they're going to win one of those games as the underdog. This is not that case, though, and this is not where they struggle. They don't lose games that they should win. And this is a game that they should win. Meanwhile, SMU is a team that had a great season, but has overachieved a little bit. They actually didn't beat anybody that they shouldn't

have. It's like the exact opposite of Penn State. The two teams that you would say, oh, yeah, they're probably better than SMU. SMU lost those games, BYU and Clemson. In the other games, it's not like they were dominant. Again, fantastic year, but I do think that this team has overachieved to get to this point. They had the benefit of incredibly favorable schedule in the ACC. Only what, six of their eight league games were against teams that were at, or excuse me, six of their eight league games were against teams that were at or below 500 in ACC play. Like, that's going to come back to haunt them a little bit because their schedule was not very difficult.

They lost to the two best teams that they faced, BYU and Clemson. And they squeaked by a couple of others. Love that they're here. Love that they're here. Good for them. Ret Lashley has done an incredible job. They beat Duke with six turnovers. And they're about to see a Penn State team that's playing their best football since they won a Big Ten championship. Andy Coddle-Nicki's offense has played really well, really well.

And look at what they did even against Oregon. They scored 37 on the Ducks. They ran it for 292 yards in that game. Singleton and Allen both had 100 yards in that game. They got Singleton involved in the past game. Alar made some great throws. He ran for 50 yards in that game. So even though they lose their backup quarterback Bo Probula,

that will only affect them if heaven forbid and God forbid, Drew Aller were to go down or have to miss any amount of time during the game. Like, yeah, SMU can rush the passer a little bit, but they don't have enough in this game. I like Penn State to cover the eight and a half. I think that they're going to win this game handily. All of the factors point to Penn State winning this game. I like them covering the eight and a half.

35, 14. Penn State wins this one in a noon whiteout. Wait, what? I was told reliably that that couldn't happen. Lo and behold, here we are, here we are. And good for you. You got a great environment. Love going to Penn State. Love going to Penn State.

And I think that they win big. So the afternoon game on Saturday is going to be Clemson at Texas. Now, this is the biggest spread of the weekend. Clemson at Texas. Dabo in his seventh playoff appearance with Clemson, goes to face Steve Sarkesian and the Texas Longhorns. And Texas is 11.5 point favorites. That is a lot.

That is a lot for a team that, let's face it, has not played great offensively down the stretch. Now, let's get into this one. The most underrated unit, maybe in America, I think you can make the argument. It's the Texas defense. The Texas defense right now is number one in the country in yards per play defense

and number two in scoring defense. So I start this entire analysis. with this. I sit down, I look at this game, and I think to myself, can Clemson score over 20 points? The two best defenses, I would argue, that they saw all year, were Georgia, week one, they scored three, and South Carolina here late in the season, and they scored 14. So Texas, you could make an argument, has a better defense than either of those teams. and respectively, Clemson scored three and then 14. So this question of like, can Clemson score 20?

I believe that the answer is no. So if you start with that premise, you immediately have to go to the Texas offense and you have to wonder to yourself, what's Texas offense going to do in this game? Because as I said at the outset, it has not been a real fireworks show for the longhorns offensively in the back half of the year.

Think about some of these games that they've put up, and it's just like, you know, ewers hasn't looked all that healthy as he's been battling that ankle injury. His lack of mobility affects them. They've got to constantly scheme guys open, and sometimes that doesn't work. So you've seen low output games for the Texas offense. So now the question becomes like,

well, will Texas score 20 points? that's the bigger question. I love the quarterback matchup in this one, by the way. These two guys, Kate Klubnick and Quinn Uers, they played against each other in high school in the state championship game. Clubnick is going back to Austin. He played at Westlake High School, so he returns home. There's a lot of great backstories.

Clubnick now and this Clemson offense is going to go up against one of the better secondaries in the country. This is why I just don't believe Clemson is going to all the sudden turn on this offensive firepower that we haven't really seen all year, in particular in games against quality defense. Texas has the number one pass defense in America. They've done that with the Thorpe Award winner, Jadae Barron. They've got an All-American Safety, Michael Taff. By the way, he's Clubnick's high school teammate. They've got a former teammate from Clemson and the other safety, Andrew McCuba.

He played with Clubnik at Clemson last year and transferred over to Texas. So here he is facing his former team. This is a defense that probably plays really well in this game. They're at home. They have the benefit of crowd noise. This is not an offense that I think is going to threaten them. So low scoring from Clemson on the offensive side. And now we get to what is Quinn Ewers in Texas and

Steve Sarkesian give us on the offensive side. Ewers is not playing very well. The back half of the year, I have felt on a number of different occasions that I actually feel like Texas's offense would be better with Arch Manning. I know that that's hyperbolic. I candidly hate saying that, but I do think it's the case. And it's the case because when Ewers doesn't have mobility, and he hasn't had it with the lack of mobility in terms of that ankle injury, he can't scamper for first downs.

And when you can't move the chains with your legs as a quarterback, even just a couple of times, then the premium on your ability to be a great passer goes way up. You have to throw guys open. You've got to be dynamic as a passer because that's all you can lean on. You see, against Michigan early in the year, Quinn had his legs under him. So there was a couple of times early in that game on third downs that he ran for first downs, moved to the chains with his legs. And that totally changed the dynamic of how Michigan had to call their defense and who was open

and then what they could do from a schematic standpoint. Late in the year, he hasn't had that. So Georgia sacks him six times. And all the pressure in the world falls on Steve Sarkesian to scheme somebody open. Because one thing that I don't see from Quinn Ewers, and this is just like an honest evaluation, he doesn't throw guys open a lot. And the reason is that he doesn't change the pace on his throws. So normally when you hear me talk about quarterbacks,

you'll hear me say that you've got to be able to kind of change your pitch, change your pace. You've got to have the ability to drive the ball into tight windows, in particular and intermediate zones. You've got to have the ability to throw with touch both down the middle of the field and on the outside. And then you've got to have the ability to layer the football where you're throwing over defenders and in front of other defenders.

That layered ball is not a touch. throw, but it's not a drive throw either. So if you can do that and you can change speeds, that makes you a great passer. It also allows you to throw guys open because you can attack areas of coverage that guys that can't change speed can't attack. Well, Ewers throws primarily with touch. He is a float thrower. He doesn't often drive the football unless it's a very short route, like a slant or something along those lines. When he's throwing the football down the field or outside of the numbers, generally speaking, because again, I'm sure you can show me a clip,

and I've seen a clip here and there of him driving the ball, but generally speaking, he throws with touch. He floats the ball. And because of that, because of that, there is an immense amount of pressure on Steve Sarkesian to scheme guys open. We've seen that against Georgia, both times that they've played them. And Georgia is fast enough and well-coached enough to take that away.

I think Sark's going to have to have his cape on. Now, what do we see from Sark, generally speaking, after a long layoff? Great game plans. And so I fully expect him to have something cooked up for this Clemson defense that is going to allow Kwinuers to succeed. So do I think Texas can get to 20 points? Yes, I do think that they can get to 20 points. Kelvin Banks, who won the Outland Trophy, his availability is up in the air. But again, to me, it's not necessarily about the way the odds.

offensive line plays as much as it is about the way that Quinn Ewers plays. And I know those two things are tied together, yes, but, but the ability of Sark to scheme guys open, I think, is paramount. Sark is having right now, you know, to do a lot. A lot is on his plate. They were held to 20 points or less for their last seven games. And again, I'll just say this. I do think Quinn's going to have a short leash. I think of Tua with Jalen Hertz. I think of like, this is it. You've got to win this game to move. on. There's no other game after this. So how quick is the leash if Quinn is not playing well? If he's not seeing it like that first outing against Georgia, will we see Arch Manning?

Possibly. And I actually think there are more dynamic offense. He changes pace on his throws better than Quinn does. And he's much more elusive and a threat with his legs than Quinn. And that's obvious because now they have even like short-yarded situations where they'll bring him in. I like Texas to win this game. Texas, I think, is going to get close to 30 points. I think they score 27. Clemson does not score 20 points. I think they score 17. Thus, I actually think covering the 11 and a half is the way I'm going to go with Clemson.

I think I'm going to take the points with Clemson just because of this offense and the lack of production from Texas down the back half of the year. But again, the Texas defense is going to win this game for them. 27-17, Texas wins this game. and I'm taking the points for Clemson. All right, last game, Saturday night, the monster. Tennessee at Ohio State. Ohio State is seven and a half point favorites.

That's a big number. I think all of us kind of wondering right now, what kind of response do we get from the Buckeyes, from Ryan Day and from Chip Kelly? Because what we saw the last time out against Michigan was just an unabridged failure. And even Chip has talked about that now in several different interviews since,

or namely like one specific interview that I saw since, when he said like, hey, that was on me. I didn't get the ball to my best players in a position for them to succeed. And that's the coach's job. And he knows that. He knows that. Ryan knows that. There's no doubt.

Having said that, overarching, my initial thought is, if you're going to build a team to go in and give Ohio State problems, you would build a team that looks very similar to Tennessee, a team that is built rugged and deep on the defensive lines. and a team that relies on running the football. That's exactly what Tennessee is. In fact, they're a top 10 rushing team, both defensively and offensively. That's what you want in this game.

That's what you want. And so the pressure now is going to be on Chip Kelly, the play caller for the Buckeyes, and Ryan Day, the head coach, to make sure that they're not playing Tennessee's game. Michigan baited them into a game in the interior. They said, come on in and play in this phone booth. Ohio State went down there and did it. And guess what?

It didn't work out for them. Michigan's two best players, Kenneth Grant, Mason Graham, were allowed by the game plan to totally wreck the game. You really think those two guys aren't going to learn that lesson in these three weeks off? You'd be crazy.

It'd be crazy. I've seen them learn lessons firsthand. They learned a lesson on the defensive side against Oregon this year and changed their defensive philosophy mid-season to do a couple of things. One, get more dynamic rushing the passer, which we've seen show up in spades for them, and to get Caleb Downs more involved in every single play, which has allowed him to be one of the best players in the country, Big Ten defensive back of the year.

So we've seen them adjust and learn real time. We've also, in history, seen Ryan learn lessons as it relates to his offensive game plans. Now, let's put aside the Michigan thing, which seems to be just a mental block right now for this program. Let's put that aside. And let's try to learn from history a little bit. In 2019, in Ryan Day's first year as a head coach, he went out there and lost what was a gut-riching loss in a playoff game to Clemson. Ever since then, when he's had a chance at a playoff, they've gone for broke offensively.

Think about the aggressive game plans that he's put together since that Clemson loss in subsequent years when they were able to play in Rose Bulls and playoffs. In 2020, they played that same Clemson team and put 49 on them. Remember that? That was just like Justin Fields throwing, bomb after bomb after bomb.

That was an incredible offensive performance. In 2021, they went to the Rose Bowl and faced Utah. They put up 48 after that loss to Michigan. What did they do? Jackson Smith and Jigba, I think he had over 300 yards receiving in that game. Last year in 20, or excuse me, in 2022, what do they do after losing to Michigan and still making the playoff? They put 41 on Georgia.

So again, the history suggests that the way they play against Michigan is not the way that they will subsequently play in their playoff game or in their bowl game. I throw last year's Cotton Bowl out because nobody played in that game. Nobody played in that. They're down their third quarterback. In these other instances, you got a dynamic, open, an aggressive game plan from Ohio State. And I think that's exactly what you're going to get this week as they welcome Tennessee because it would be crazy to lean into the strengths that Tennessee is going to put on the table. Namely, their defensive line and their rush defense.

This game needs to be played for Ohio State at tempo and in space, which is exactly what Chip Kelly is. This is what was so alarming in that game against Michigan. Exactly what he is is tempo guy and space guy. So Chip just needs to be himself. I think that they're planning on rotating some of those guards. To me, it's not about the guards. You take the game out of the hands.

of the offensive line, you play it in space. You get all of those really dynamic playmakers, the ball in space, Jeremiah Smith, the Mecca, Abuka, Trevionn Henderson, Quinshon Junkins, Cornel Tate. And then you just kind of let the chips fall where they may. Now, this Tennessee team is really good. I love this Tennessee team, and I've loved them most of the season. As you know, Vol fans don't like this show or me very much, but that's fine. I don't really care.

What I do care about is the fact that their defensive line is really strong and they can run the rock. They can run the rock, man. Dylan Samson is a hell of a player. Now, one thing I've been critical of them about is that they don't really have this like secondary option offensively. They like to spread the field out and run the football. But when you take that away, they don't really have an ability to like get big with

personnel groups and change their game plan if needed. So if Ohio State takes away that spread run game, where are they going? Is Nico Iomaleava all of a sudden? weather at night in the shoe going to start lighting them up, throwing the football? I mean, I have my questions about that. Tennessee's offense against quality opponents this year has not been that dynamic. I know that overall, some of their numbers offensively look fine, but when you look a little bit deeper and you say like, well, what do they do against the SEC?

They average 25 points per game. What do they do against FBS teams with a winning record? Well, they average about 20 points per game. So when you take a deeper dive, the offense for Tennessee is not really all that dynamic. If you're a VOLF fan, you kind of know that that's the case. Nico has not really progressed, right? There's been some frustrations in terms of the passing game. What you saw early in the season against poor competition is not what you have seen come to fruition throughout the SEC season.

So Ohio State has to take away their run game. They have to do it. Even though the clear weakness of the Buckeye defense is the one-on-one coverage on the outside, and namely Igbenosin who struggles with penalties, which is a huge, huge aspect. to this. That's where you have to attack. Now, you would much rather attack quickly on the outside in the 101, then have to read down the field. And the unfortunate part for Tennessee's offense is, is that their passing game primarily is a downfield read off option offense passing game, which means like they're going to have option routes down the field from the wide receivers.

The quarterback and the wide receiver has to be on the same page, the old Art Bryles kind of Baylor system that Josh Hypo runs, which means that the quarterback needs time. When you need time against Ohio State, that's a problem. This is a huge advantage for the Buckeyes. Their pass rush should be able to get to NICO if, if, and this is the huge if, if they can stop the run. So to me, the Buckeye defense has got to go in there and just focus on Dillon Samson, stop the run, and put the game on Niko Iomaleava, and then hopefully your

pass rush shows up as they're trying to read things out down the field. That's the way I see this game playing out. Tennessee's offense, do I think that they're going to be able to all of a sudden become dynamic against Ohio State? No, no, I don't. In fact, when you look at what they have done against those teams, like I said, just 25 points per game in SEC play. That's ninth in the conference. They don't really have that secondary out pitch, if you will, the ability to change up, go big, do different things. Ohio State's the best defense in the country. They're the number one total defense and the number one scoring defense in America. So this will be the best defense that Tennessee has faced all year. Yes, it's a better defense than Georgia. Do you really think that Tennessee is all the sudden on the road going to light up Ohio State? I just have my doubts about that. I really have my doubts. And I believe that the game plan for the Buckeyes is going to be fairly dynamic on the offensive side. I think Ohio State actually covers the seven and a half. I think Ohio State wins this one somewhere like, you know, 31, 20, something along those lines, and they move on. So if you're following you.

along here, those four picks for you, my first round college football playoff picks. And again, we're 49 and 30, 62% against the spread this year, right here on the Joel Clashio. Here are my picks. I think Indiana wins outright. I'm taking those seven and a half. I think Penn State wins handily. I'm going to say they cover the eight and a half at home against SMU. I like Texas to win by 10, just because I don't think Clemson's going to be able to score a lot of points. But Clemson, I think, stays within that 11 and a half because I've got questions about Quinn yours and that Texas offense. and what they've done in the back half of the year.

And I like Ohio State, an aggressive offensive game plan and the number one defense in the country at home to cover their seven and a half. There's the picks, folks. There's the picks. So here's what I want to do. Let's go ahead and take those picks and let's make a bracket. First time we've ever gotten to do this in college football,

and let's take advantage. Now, I hope this change is moving forward because I hope they recede in the second round in order to give a team like Oregon the best possible chance and the most favorable road to a potential national championship for earning the number one seed. But that's not what we're going to do here because it's a straight bracket,

which means that we're going to have to pick a winner right now, Oregon and Ohio State. I've got Oregon over Ohio State in the quarterfinals. That game would be in the Rose Bowl. So Ohio State beats Tennessee and then Oregon beats Ohio State. Oregon has just looked better than anybody else. We've seen the flaws, flaws, excuse me, from the Buckeyes.

So I'm going to go with the ducks. Next game is going to be Texas and Arizona State. I like Texas over Arizona State. And Cam Scataboo is a great player. Arizona State has had a great year. I don't think they're going to be a match for Texas in that ballgame. I like Penn State over Boise State. So if Penn State gets by SMU,

they've got this really favorable path in this college football playoff where all of a sudden they would face Boise State. Boise State has Ashton Genty and I don't know. So Penn State, that's a really easy path to the semifinal, and I've got them there. Now, I had Indiana winning out right over Notre Dame. Again, that's a coin flip game. I think it could be either. But I do like Georgia against either Notre Dame or Indiana.

So I've got Georgia moving on to the semifinals, and we would have this Big Ten SEC kind of final four where Oregon and Texas play Penn State and Georgia play. I think Oregon beats Texas, their speed, their dynamic. I think Oregon goes to the national championship game, and they would face Georgia. I mean, you just can't quit Kirby Smart. When Kirby Smart gets into these situations, it's like they win the game. They win the game, you know? And do we think that James Franklin and Penn State will be able to beat Georgia on a neutral?

Oh, man, that's a tough one. I think it could be close. I think it could be close, but I've got Oregon and Georgia. As the national championship game, as Dan Lannin takes on his former team, remember the first game that Dan Lannin coached at Oregon was against Georgia, and they weren't close. And now I've got Oregon winning the national championship, beating Kirby Smart, beating Georgia in the Mercedes-Benz dome down there in Atlanta.

The same stadium, UGA beat Oregon 49 to 3 in that first game back in 2022. Oregon is going to be my pick to win the national championship. they've had a remarkable year. And by the way, they would be then the first team to go. Wait, let's see. That's 16. 16 and 0. What?

They would definitely earn it. That means they would play Ohio State, Texas, and Georgia and win the national championship after winning the Big Ten in the first year in that conference and going 16 and 0. That's my bracket right there.

And that's what I'm going to land on. Hey, remember to follow us on YouTube. Subscribe to the channel on YouTube. If you would, please follow us on social media wherever you like to social media. At Joel Clash Show, all of our content is out there. And let us know what you think about the picks. And let us know how you did this year with our picks. Again, 62%. It was pretty good.

Enjoy these games. I will enjoy these thoroughly. Again, folks, there's a lot of problems in college football. And it's still great. And it's still amazing. And we get playoff football this weekend. Enjoy.