playoff

Tolly Predictions: The Playoffs

Who are the conference winners? Is the playoff dominated by the SEC and B1G? Bracketology has infected college football. 

These are my preseason picks for the playoff.

Yes, I know, Florida State already has a loss from week 0. I was never going to pick them to win the ACC (see the top ACC team in my preseason top 25 as evidence). I’m late, but this is better than never. 

Conference Championships:

SEC: Georgia over Ole Miss
Big Ten: Ohio State over Oregon
ACC: Miami over Virginia Tech
Big 12: Oklahoma State over Utah
American: Memphis over UTSA

Round 1:

9 Michigan at 8 Penn State 
10 Texas at 7 Ole Miss
11 Notre Dame at 6 Alabama
12 Memphis at 5 Oregon

Quarterfinals:

1 Georgia vs 8 Penn State
2 Ohio State vs 10 Texas
3 Miami vs 6 Alabama
4 Oklahoma State vs 5 Oregon

Semifinals:

1 Georgia vs 5 Oregon 
2 Ohio State vs 6 Alabama

Championship Game:

1 Georgia vs 2 Ohio State

National Champion:

The Ohio State Buckeyes

Want more Walk On Fan? 

Check out our B1G predictions that came out yesterday.

Follow us on Twitter (or X) @here.

This article was written by Cole

Tolly Predictions: The Playoffs Read More »

Tolly Predictions: The Big Ten

Who is winning the B1G? How many playoff caliber teams are there? These are our projections for the order of finish in the B1G this season. 

I have game by game predictions for every team, so these predictions are mathematically possible. I used the B1G tie breakers to get the order of finish… but there is a log jam at 3-6 in conference play that I struggled to figure out. We’ll just assume I got it right. 

Conference record shown in ().

Bottom Feeders

18th: Purdue 2-10 (1-8) 
17th: UCLA 3-9 (1-8)
16th: Northwestern 4-8 (2-7)
15th: Michigan State 5-7 (2-7)
14th: Illinois 5-7 (3-6) 

These are the bad teams. Will they all be bad? Doubtful. I’m probably underestimating at least one of these teams. That said, if your team plays one of these teams, you’d better win.  

Barely Bowl Teams

13th: Maryland 6-6 (3-6)
12th: Indiana 6-6 (3-6)
11th: Minnesota 6-6 (3-6)
10th: Washington 6-6 (3-6)

Bowl eligibility, that’s what we have here. That would be wildly over performing for Indiana, and a massive letdown for Washington.

Good But Not Great

9th: Rutgers 7-5 (5-4)
8th: USC 7-5 (5-4)
7th: Iowa 9-3 (6-3)
6th: Wisconsin 8-4 (6-3)
5th: Nebraska …

Tolly Predictions: The Big Ten Read More »

Who Can Win the Natty?

There are 134 FBS teams. But let’s be honest, not all of them are capable of winning a national title. Who are the select few that could do it in 2024?

The Blue Chip Ratio

There is a metric used to determine who is capable of winning the national championship that has never been wrong since its inception in 2011, and would presumably be accurate going back to the inception of that national championship game.

This metric is the Blue Chip Ratio.
It’s quite simple. Over the last 4 recruiting cycles, a team must have over 50% of high school recruits be “blue chip” players. A blue chip player is a 4 or 5 star recruit. The transfer portal doesn’t matter. If the player plays doesn’t matter. If you have a bunch of 3 stars that are projected 1st round NFL draft picks, that doesn’t matter. Just acquire as much high school talent as possible.

As of right now, there are 407 blue chip players in the 2025 high school class. Teams generally add 20-30 high school recruits per year. When you consider that there are 68 Power 4 schools, that’s not a lot of talent to go around. …

Who Can Win the Natty? Read More »

A Season of Change

A lot has changed in college football in the last year. Thankfully you’ve found this article that will catch you up to date with the biggest changes. 

The Big 10 (18)

  • The Big Ten has dropped divisions. At the end of the season, the 2 teams with the best conference records will play in the B1G Championship game. (This means Ohio State vs Michigan could happen in back-to-back weeks).
  • 4 new schools have been added to the B1G, bringing membership to 18 schools. The new teams are Oregon, Washington, UCLA, and USC.
  • B1G Friday Night is now a thing. There will be a Big Ten Friday night football game every week this season except week 3.
  • Channel flipping. The “top 3” B1G games each week have locked in TV times and networks. FOX at Noon, CBS at 3:30, and NBC at 7:30 (all times EST). Sometimes NBC will put their “best” game on Peacock. It is what it is. 

The ACC 

  • They have also done away with divisions like the B1G.
  • They have added 3 new schools to the conference bringing membership to 17 schools. SMU, Stanford, and Cal are in the ACC now.

A Season of Change Read More »

Welcome to Walk On Fan

Sign up to receive notifications when new articles go live!