Georgia Leads Top 5 Playoff Teams: 2026 CFB Playoff Insights

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00:00Let's take a look at the teams that made the playoff from the conference, top-ranked Georgia

00:05winners of the SEC championship over Alabama, 28-7. They finished the season with a 12-1

00:13overall record, followed by Ole Miss, Texas A&M, Oklahoma, and Alabama. Give me your thoughts

00:20about the conference as a whole and the top five teams that made the playoff.

00:25Well, I think the thing about the strength of the conference is all five of those teams

00:29are capable of getting hot and having a run right through the conference to the championship,

00:34but I think they're aligned just right. Georgia's at the top. I would have A&M above Ole Miss as the

00:40next strongest team in my mind, but everybody there is playing well enough. They've got enough

00:45talent that on a given Saturday, they can win their football games and have the ability. It does go to

00:52show you how strong the conference is and how much they've looked at not just the record, but who they

00:58played, the strength of schedule, and how well they were playing toward the end of the schedule.

01:03And if you look at that schedule, I think you and I will agree, Georgia is playing the best at the

01:09end of the season. They've been trending toward their best football. They've probably got the best

01:15postseason coach in the business. And so you'd have to say, Georgia is the one you got to look out for

01:20the most. When you look at Georgia's offense at the start of the year, they were hitting

01:25on all cylinders and wins over Tennessee and Ole Miss. But in the second half of the season,

01:32basically in the second half against the Ole Miss Rebels, when they trailed 21 to 16 at halftime,

01:38that defense took over. Never really stopped from that point on. They dominated teams down the stretch,

01:44such as Texas and Georgia Tech, shut down Ty Simpson in Atlanta in the SEC championship game.

01:51This defense is really coming into form. The other team I would highlight, Coach, has been Oklahoma.

01:57They were on the outside looking in in the middle part of the year, had to win very close games

02:01in road environments against Tennessee and Alabama. They've been basically playing

02:07playoff caliber football for the last month and a half of the regular season. That's got to be a

02:14benefit for Brett Venables in their first round matchup against Alabama.

02:20Yeah, it really has. Their defense is that good that you have to say they are a candidate to go all

02:26the way. Their offense has not been quite productive enough. When they play a team that can score points,

02:33I think their quarterback is very good, not great. Their offense is very good, not great.

02:38Defense is unbelievable. So I think, again, you can't be a one-dimensional football team. But

02:44Oklahoma does play well enough on offense. If they go out there and play great defense,

02:50and Venables does a good job of that because he runs the defense as the defensive coordinator,

02:54head coach, you could very well see Oklahoma running the table as well, getting to that championship

03:00game, much like Texas A&M and what they can do. Although Texas A&M, again, is a team that shows a little

03:05more on offense with Marcel Reed. We're going to break down all of those top quarterback battles

03:11in next segment. But I do want to highlight Texas A&M. They were undefeated for much of the regular

03:17season. An 11-0 start, had a very close scare late in the season at home against South Carolina,

03:24trailed that matchup 30-3. They prevailed 31-30 in that ballgame at home, a monumental

03:31second-half comeback, but the loss at the end of the regular season to their arch-rival Texas.

03:38Does that hurt the team or potentially reset the team with a main focus on a national championship?

03:46You know, I've always said that when you win a close ballgame or you don't play your best

03:50and you pull a victory, you pull a win, that that helps you more than it hurts you. It makes you pull

03:56together, come together, see what you've got to do, see what you are capable of doing when you don't

04:01play well. And so I think that was huge when they came back to win that game against South Carolina.

04:07But again, when they showed against Texas, it also shows what they can do when their quarterback's

04:12not hot and he's not playing great football. We saw that against, again, Texas and hurt them at the

04:18very end. So again, it'll be a game where they have the talent. They have shown they can win big

04:24with high-scoring offense. They have shown they can win tight with a great defense. They just got to

04:29now be ready to play.

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