ESPN updates list of SEC teams who are on track to earn CFP berth after Week 4
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ESPN revealed its updated list of SEC powerhouses it believes are on track to be in the 12-team College Football Playoff following Week 4 of the 2025 season.
Naturally, Tuesday’s list is fluid, because the college football season is fluid, and the ultimate decisions of the 13-member Playoff selection committee are still far in the future. But right now, as we head into the last Saturday of September, ESPN believes that 5 SEC teams would be in the Playoff if the season somehow ended right now. That SEC list is headlined by LSU and Georgia, who happen to be the 2 highest-ranked SEC teams in the latest AP Poll at No. 4 and 5, respectively.
Also included in ESPN’s SEC “would be in” the Playoff section is Oklahoma, which stayed unbeaten in Week 4 with a dramatic home victory over Auburn.
The next one is the most interesting one, with Tennessee being on ESPN’s Playoff list despite already having 1 loss this season in that overtime heartbreaker against Georgia in Week 3. No matter, proclaimed ESPN on Tuesday, with the 3-1 Volunteers getting the “would be in” treatment following a big bounce-back victory over UAB in Week 4.
The fifth SEC team that ESPN believes would be in the Playoff right now is Texas A&M, which had a bye week after that dramatic victory at Notre Dame in Week 3 and will host Auburn this Saturday with a chance to stay unbeaten.
Obviously, we’re not even out of September yet, so this is what ESPN’s list looks like right now, with many more Saturdays and many more dramatic endings still to come before the actual Playoff field is selected in December.
Cory Nightingale, a former sportswriter and sports editor at the Miami Herald and Palm Beach Post, is a South Florida-based freelance writer who covers Alabama for SaturdayDownSouth.com.
