Do you think it was personal for Ole Miss during Saturday night's public shaming of Lane Kiffin? The Rebels' impressive Trinidad Chambliss-led win over LSU in a showdown of unbeaten top-10 teams has pushed Pete Golding's squad into our updated College Football Playoff bracket this week to lead our Week 4 bowl projections update. Ole Miss is one of three new teams to join the CFP lookahead after a narrative-setting victory in the SEC opener for both teams.
The Rebels have four more games this season against opponents currently ranked inside the top 25, the same number as Kiffin's Tigers. After USC's near slip-up at Rutgers, Penn State joins the group of CFP hopefuls from the Big Ten. If the SEC intends to put four (or more) teams in the bracket, Alabama is one of those with an opportunity in the coming weeks after handling Florida State, 50-36, behind four total touchdowns from Keelon Russell.
Reports of bowl season's potential demise earlier in the week had me in my feelings, with writing on the wall largely dependent on college football's future playoff format and Power Four programs no longer being interested in playing high-end Group of Six teams after moving to nine-game conference schedules. CBS Sports reached out to several bowl directors this week, but those who responded offered no comment on the future of college football's postseason. The root issue is signing multi-year sponsorships for games involving the Big Ten and SEC, since a possible 24-team CFP expansion would likely remove many featured programs from those matchups.
Pushing games like the Citrus, ReliaQuest, Music City and Gator Bowl to before the season is a possibility if playoff growth comes to fruition. For 2026, we'll have 35 traditional bowl games, along with 11 in the CFP. And we're updating our projections for every matchup weekly until we get there.
Projection: South Carolina State vs. Alabama State Charles Huff's Tigers are in the Group of Six CFP conversation despite their Week 2 loss at Boise State, since they're the clear favorite in the American entering league play in October. Unfortunately for Memphis, the margin for error is zero since the Broncos will be favored to win out in the Pac-12 and their only loss — at Oregon — may hold water at season's end if the Ducks rebound.
Projection: Eastern Michigan vs. North Texas A newcomer to our bowl projections this week, the Commodores pulled a stunning win over NC State to move to 3-0 improbably with a fumble recovery in the end zone with one second to play. Clark Lea's program has already handed the keys over to five-star freshman quarterback Jared Curtis, who overcame a couple giveaways in his first career start to beat the Wolfpack.
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