ESPN staff writers have more faith in Alabama than Sooners in CFP rematch

The waiting is over. After six weeks of jockeying for position to earn one of the 12 coveted spots in the 2025 College Football Playoff, the CFP selection committee rendered its final decisions, and Oklahoma has earned its way into the prized playoff bracket.

The seeds and pairings have been set with No. 8 Oklahoma hosting No. 9 Alabama in the first-ever home playoff game to be held at Gaylord Family-Oklahoma Memorial Stadium. The opening round of the playoff will be held at four different campus sites in Oregon, Texas A&M, Ole Miss and OU on Dec. 19 and 20. The OU-Bama matchup will get things started, kicking off at 7 p.m. CT on Friday, Dec. 19, and televised on ABC.

Now that the CFP brackets are set, various media that cover and comment on college football are starting to weigh in on how the games will go and which team will ultimately survive the three or four rounds it will take to win the national championship, to be decided on Jan. 20 at Hard Rock Stadium in Miami Gardens, Florida.

ESPN staffers nearly split on who will win Oklahoma-Alabama playoff rematch

Eleven ESPN staffers made their predictions on who will win between Oklahoma and Alabama in this year's playoff pairing, as well as every other matchup. This will be the third time these two historic college football icons have played each other since the Sooners knocked the Crimson Tide out of last year's College Football Playoff with a 24-3 upset win in Norman on Nov. 23, 2024.

Seven of the ESPN writers had Alabama winning by an average score of 20-15. Four others predicted an Oklahoma victory by an average margin of 22-17. None of the writers who picked the Sooners to advance to the quarterfinals had OU defeating top-seeded Indiana in the next round.

As for which team will make it through undefeated and hoist the national championship trophy, the ESPN staffers were unanimous that it would not be any team outside of the top-4 seeds. No. 3 Georgia received the most votes with four. Ohio State and Indiana each totaled three votes and one other staffer sided with Texas Tech.