The Georgia Bulldogs have made the 12-team College Football Playoff in back-to-back years and are on track to make it again this year. If that is the case, then Kirby Smart’s squad will earn perfect attendance for the 12-team model. The bracket pool will expand to 24 teams next season. 

If the 24-team playoff existed during the entirety of Smart’s tenure, then Georgia would have made the pool every single year except for his first season back in 2016. Things are very different than they were in 2016. They are different than they were in 2017 when Georgia made its first national championship under Kirby Smart. They are different than they were when Georgia went back-to-back in 2022. They will be different next year than they are this year. 

The schedule has gotten more difficult for Southeastern Conference (SEC) teams with the addition of Texas and Oklahoma and doing away with division. Now, there is an extra conference game. We just saw five of the top seven teams lose in one day. Every SEC team has a loss.

Smart said that the schedule is a gauntlet now, when asked about the 24-team playoff. 

“I think only time will tell. Who knows how this thing is going to turn out in our league, but I think that among the coaches, we all agree that it’s brutal, it’s a gauntlet,” Smart said. “It’s already the fastest it’s ever been, in terms of every SEC team having a loss. What does that trajectory look like in four to five weeks or six weeks? I don’t even know how many more weeks.”

Smart also started asking hypothetical questions. 

“But is it going to be the SEC champion with three (losses)? Is it going to be two? I don’t know,” Smart said. “I just know that on any given Saturday, somebody can get their butt beat in our league. The 24-team playoff is just going to extend it longer. You’d like to think that it gives more teams access and opportunity, but at the end of the day, there’ll be a lot of teams in really tight margins and there’ll be those arguments. They are every year. The argument is going to be from number 20 to 28 instead of number eight to 16. There’s going to be overlap there.”  

One of those questions doesn’ t matter  because Georgia won the SEC Championship with two losses in 2024. That has already been done. A three-loss champion will probably be crowned eventually if the teams continue to even out. 

If Smart keeps things rolling in Athens the way he has moving forward, then Georgia fans should never be concerned about missing out on the playoffs. A championship will always be attainable if things at Georgia itself don’t change much.