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SEC bowl projections after Week 5: Alabama is back from vacation

Published: Sep 30, 2025 · 9:00 AM EDT

What a gargantuan win for Kalen DeBoer and the Alabama Crimson Tide.

Just like that, Alabama is back in our Playoff projections after knocking off Georgia in Sanford Stadium thanks to some absolute domination on third down, from both units. The Crimson Tide were just taking a vacation in Week 1 — there are few similarities between the team that lost to Florida State and the team that knocked off the Bulldogs Saturday night — except maybe Ryan Williams’ lingering drop issue. Could we see a rematch in Atlanta?

Certainly, there’s a lot of football to be played. For now, 5 SEC teams appear in the Playoff field after Week 5: Alabama, Georgia, Texas A&M, Ole Miss and Oklahoma. With Notre Dame needing to be perfect and Florida State’s loss to Virginia in mind, the path is absolutely there for 5 SEC teams in the College Football Playoff.

Let’s talk about Ole Miss.

It’s hard not to love what Lane Kiffin and the Rebels are doing through 5 weeks. Trinidad Chambliss, who just led his team to a win against Blake Baker’s monster LSU defense, is a budding star. It feels like Ole Miss’s season will be determined by Weeks 8 and 9 against Georgia and Oklahoma — the Playoff seems likely if the Rebels can stay the path.

On the other hand…

Oh, LSU. I didn’t like the Tigers last week, and I don’t like them now. This team has no rushing attack to speak of, which in turn is making life difficult for Garrett Nussmeier. That defense is good, but not good enough to drag that hapless offense to a win against high-powered opponents like Ole Miss. The Tigers need a major reset with tough matchups still to come at Alabama, Oklahoma and Vanderbilt — plus a home bout against Texas A&M. Sorry to do this to you Tigers, but y’all and the Music City Bowl are on a collision course.

Vanderbilt is the most intriguing team in the SEC through 5 weeks. No longer are the Commodores hunting for 6 wins — they’re legitimate contenders for a spot in the Playoff. ESPN’s FPI gives Vanderbilt a 43.2% chance to crack the 12-team field as of September 30. Yes, 43.2%! College GameDay made the right choice — Vanderbilt at Alabama is going to be a war.

Saturday can’t come fast enough.

College Football Playoff

We’ll leave this here for anyone not familiar with the current CFP format for 2025-26:

The top 5 conference champions will be awarded auto-bids, as they were last year. However, unlike last year, the top 4 of those 5 conference champions will not be guaranteed a first-round bye. Seeds 1-4 are simply be determined by their CFP ranking at the end of the season.
This year’s quarterfinal matchups feature the Rose, Sugar, Cotton and Orange Bowls, with the Peach Bowl and Fiesta Bowl as semifinal hosts. As with last season, first-round matchups (Seeds 5-12) will be hosted by the higher-ranked team on campus.

Rose Bowl: Ohio State vs. 8/9 winner

Orange Bowl: Miami vs. 7/10 winner

Cotton Bowl: Oregon vs. 6/11 winner

Sugar Bowl: Alabama vs. 5/12 winner