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College Football Playoff, bowl projections after Week 8

Indiana's Myles Price celebrates a touchdown as the Hoosiers remained unbeaten with a rout of Nebraska. Jacob Musselman/Imagn Images

Another week, another round of shakeups in our bowl projections.

With Texas suffering its first loss of the season -- at the hands of Georgia, another playoff contender -- there are changes at the top of the College Football Playoff outlook.

And how about surprising Indiana, which remained unbeaten by drubbing Nebraska? The Hoosiers have staked a surprising claim for a CFP spot out of the Big Ten.

In other key games this weekend, Tennessee handed Alabama its second loss of the season, while Oregon, Miami, BYU and Iowa State remained undefeated.

What does it all mean for the College Football Playoff and the overall bowl picture?

In the new, expanded 12-team playoff, the five highest-ranked conference champions will make the field along with the next seven highest-ranked teams. The four highest-ranked conference champions will be awarded first-round byes, with the other eight teams meeting at the campus sites of the Nos. 5-8 seeds.

From there, the quarterfinals and semifinals will be played in what had been the New Year's Six bowls, with this season's national championship game scheduled for Jan. 20 at Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta.

All of that is just the tip of the iceberg, though. Apart from the playoff is the 36-game slate of bowls, from the Cricket Celebration Bowl on Dec. 14 to the Bahamas Bowl on Jan. 4.

We're here for all of it.

ESPN bowl gurus Kyle Bonagura and Mark Schlabach are projecting every postseason matchup, including their breakdowns of how the CFP will play out, every week until the actual matchups are set Dec. 8 on Selection Day.

Jump to a section:
Playoff picks | Quarterfinals
Semis, title game | Bowl season

College Football Playoff

First-round games

Dec. 20-21 -- ABC/ESPN or TNT Sports*
Bonagura: No. 12 Notre Dame at No. 5 Penn State
Schlabach: No. 12 Boise State at No. 5 Ohio State