Winners and losers from the 12-team CFP field

The 12 teams are set and the expanded College Football Playoff will begin Dec. 20 when Notre Dame hosts Indiana in South Bend.

While there was plenty of late drama Saturday in the SEC, ACC, and Big Ten title games, the only question entering the final rankings was whether SMU or Alabama would get the final at-large place.

The committee opted for the ACC finalist, making the Mustangs clear winners and the Crimson Tide losers.

Here's the full list from Sunday's announcement show.

Winner: Texas

Texas is a winner even though the Longhorns haven't beaten a current top-25 opponent this season. Steve Sarkisian's outfit has clearly put some sort of trance on the committee - it was deemed the No. 5 seed despite being 0-2 against currently ranked teams this year, with both losses coming against Georgia. The Bulldogs won by 15 in Texas in October and claimed an overtime defeat despite playing the entire second half without Carson Beck.

Regardless, Texas is the highest seed playing in the opening round and hosts a Clemson team that lost both its games to SEC opponents this year by a combined 51-17 margin. Should the Longhorns win, they'll advance to face the Big 12 champion Arizona State, a team the committee didn't deem worthy of a top 10 ranking even though it won a power conference title.

Let's just say the Longhorns' path to the CFP semi is more than "alright, alright, alright."

Loser: Alabama

Forgive Alabama fans if they were clearing their Dec. 21 schedule for a road trip for a large portion of Saturday night. The Crimson Tide looked set to steal an at-large bid from SMU as Clemson raced out to a 17-point lead on the Mustangs in the ACC title game. However, SMU rallied in the second half and tied it in the final minute before losing on a dramatic walk-off 56-yard field goal. Even in defeat, the comeback was enough to make the committee deem the Mustangs worthy of a playoff spot over the three-loss Crimson Tide.

Alabama's schedule is significantly tougher than SMU's, and the Crimson Tide have that sparkling win over Georgia earlier in the campaign. The program's playoff bid was firmly in its own hands heading to Oklahoma in the second-last week of the season, but the Tide laid an all-time egg with a 21-point loss to one of the worst Sooner teams in the last 25 years.

Nick Saban took the Crimson Tide to eight of the 10 editions of the four-team playoff - remarkable consistency for the nation's best program of that era. Even though the field added eight more teams in Kalen DeBoer's first season in Tuscaloosa, the Tide will be on the outside looking in this time.

Winner: Penn State

Penn State fell to 1-14 under James Franklin against top-five opposition Saturday, but the loss to Oregon left us feeling significantly better about this version of the Nittany Lions. The offense piled up over 500 total yards and hung 37 points on the country's only undefeated team. That should prove their ability to compete for the national title with anybody in the 12-team field. Their chances improved when the bracket was revealed Sunday as Penn State faces a potential combo of SMU and Boise State to make the semifinal.

SMU holds an impressive 11-2 record, but that's largely been filled with empty calories from beating unranked teams. While the Nittany Lions boast just one top-25 victory on the campaign, two one-score losses to Oregon and Ohio State show they belong among the nation's top programs.

Nobody has been able to stop Ashton Jeanty, but Penn State's run defense will be the best the Boise State star has faced all season should they meet in the quarterfinal.

Loser: Oregon

Somehow the winner of the Big Ten title game Saturday is a loser Sunday, and the loser of that matchup is a winner. Oregon capped an undefeated campaign - the only one in the country - with a thrilling 45-37 win over Penn State in Indianapolis. The result secured the program the No. 1 seed for the College Football Playoff, but the bracket reveal poses the question: would the Ducks have been better off losing to the Nittany Lions?

Sure, Oregon gets a bye in the opening round thanks to the conference title, but a rematch with Ohio State or a blockbuster contest with Tennessee awaits in the quarterfinal. Meanwhile, Penn State hosts an SMU team with zero ranked wins on the season and a possible quarterfinal contest with No. 9 Boise State. While the Buckeyes and Volunteers are seeded behind the Broncos, both SMU and Boise are ranked behind either of the Ducks' quarterfinal opponents.

Dan Lanning, to his credit, downplayed the hard draw afterwards when interviewed on ESPN.

"What an opportunity, right," Lanning said, according to Matt Prehm of 247 Sports. "In our world, we always talk about red light, green light. Focus on the things you can control. That's where we're going to focus on. Winning a national championship isn't supposed to be easy. So if our path is a little bit tougher, kudos to us if we go through it and take care of business."

However, Oregon can't be thrilled with the difficult path that awaits.

Winner: ACC

The ACC went from having an undefeated conference champion left out of the four-team playoff in 2023 to an 11-2 conference finalist with zero wins over ranked opponents included in the postseason this time around. The move to expand the playoffs paid off immediately for the third-best conference in college football.

Things didn't always look good for the ACC the past week, with 10-2 Miami behind 9-3 Alabama in the rankings Tuesday. That meant the ACC would be a one-bid league should SMU win the conference title game Saturday. But Clemson had other ideas, pulling off the thrilling upset over the Mustangs to steal the auto-bid.

That left SMU's fate to the committee - a precarious place given the clear respect it's previously shown for the Crimson Tide. Thankfully, it made the right call putting the Mustangs in the field and giving the proper respect to the ACC in the process.

Loser: First-round bye protocol

Overall, the increase to a 12-team field has been incredible for college football, but there needs to be one significant change for the second year of the format: the elimination of first-round byes for conference champions. With three-loss Clemson stealing the ACC auto-bid, two teams in the bottom of the 12-team field - No. 9 Boise State and No. 12 Arizona State - grabbed first-round byes this year.

The Sun Devils' strength of schedule sits 62nd in the country while the Broncos' is even worse at No. 81. Meanwhile, No. 7 Tennessee has to travel to Ohio State in Round 1 despite a strength of schedule that ranks 30th in the nation.

The conference champions should absolutely get an auto-bid to the 12-team field. That provides extra incentive to go all-out in an attempt to win a title game. However, the field must be seeded by strength once the 12 teams are set, with the first-round byes going to the best four teams, regardless of conference affiliation.