College Football Playoff odds, schedule: Miami vs. Texas A&M, Alabama vs. Oklahoma headline first-round games

The College Football Playoff field has finally been set, and as expected the committee's at-large selections produced ample controversy as Miami finally jumped Notre Dame in the final rankings of the season to nab the last at-large spot. 

Alabama's 28-7 loss to Georgia in the SEC Championship Game didn't impact its ranking, as it stayed at No. 9, and American champ Tulane and Sun Belt champ James Madison earned the final two automatic qualifiers as the two highest-ranked conference champions after Duke became a five-loss ACC champ. 

The next two weeks will feature plenty of debate over the committee's decisions, but here we want to set that aside and go ahead and look at the matchups we will see on the football field in the first round of the playoff. We'll see a pair of rematches from the regular season, with Oklahoma beating Alabama and Ole Miss beating Tulane once already this year, and rematches are often tougher for the winning team the second time around. 

Another fascinating subplot is there being three teams going through coaching changes playing in the first round. James Madison and Tulane will still have Bob Chesney and Jon Sumrall, respectively, for their playoff games before they depart for UCLA and Florida, but Ole Miss will not have Lane Kiffin on the sidelines after he departed for LSU, with Pete Golding taking over in Oxford. 

All of that will play out in two weeks, and here is how the oddsmakers view the first-round matchups. 

All times Eastern; Odds via FanDuel Sportsbook

No. 9 Alabama (-1.5, 40.5) at No. 8 Oklahoma -- Friday, Dec. 19, (8 p.m.): The first of two rematches will send Alabama to Norman as the only road favorite in the first round. The Sooners effectively punched their ticket to the playoff with a stunning win in Tuscaloosa three weeks ago and then held on for dear life against Mizzou and LSU to stay at No. 8 despite some woeful offensive performances. 

There is a reason this total opened at 40.5, as neither of these offenses have been in stride of late. The Sooners haven't scored more than 23 points in their last three wins, but they are playing defense as well as anyone in the country. Brent Venables is happy to rely on that group to not just get stops, but to create turnovers and score points themselves. 

That's how they beat Alabama the first time, and after another sloppy performance against Georgia in the SEC Championship Game, the Tide will have to clean up their offensive operation if they're going to avoid a second loss to the Sooners. Ty Simpson and the Alabama offense have been struggling, but they'll hope two weeks off can get them a bit healthier on that side of the ball and allow them to find the spark they'll need to advance to the quarterfinals. 

No. 10 Miami (+4.5, 51.5) at No. 7 Texas A&M -- Saturday, Dec. 20 (12 p.m.): These two teams met in the 2022 and 2023 season-openers, with the home team winning both times -- a trend A&M hopes to continue and Miami wants to break in the playoff. The Aggies enter the game as 4.5-point home favorites with a total of 51.5, as this game pits two top-20 scoring offenses against each other. Miami also boasts the nation's No. 6-ranked scoring defense, allowing just 13.8 points per game, but the question on everyone's mind is how they'll fare against this caliber of competition. 

Motivation should never be a question in the playoff, but the 'Canes ought to have plenty they want to prove about their ability to beat a top SEC team. The Aggies, meanwhile, may feel like the committee was overly penal in dropping them behind Ole Miss and to the No. 7 seed, giving them a matchup with the 'Canes instead of Tulane. 

In terms of recent form, Miami is the team that's seemed to find its best over the last few weeks, while on the other side, Mike Elko will need to rally his Aggies after their season-ending loss to Texas where their offense seemed to run out of gas -- two weeks after needing a miraculous comeback to avoid a dreadful loss to South Carolina. We'll find out whether a few weeks off can get the Aggies refreshed and back to the form that had them as a top-3 team in the country for much of the season.

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No. 11 Tulane (+17.5, 56.5) at No. 6 Ole Miss -- Saturday, Dec. 20 (3:30 p.m.): We saw this game once in September, where the Rebels torched the Wave to the tune of a 45-10 victory. We'll find out if Tulane can fare better in a December trip to Oxford, but the oddsmakers are expecting another lopsided victory for Ole Miss, even with all of the turmoil of Lane Kiffin's departure. 

Both teams are in the midst of a coaching change, but Jon Sumrall will stick with Tulane through the playoff before leaving for Florida. Ole Miss, on the other hand, understandably refused to let Kiffin stay and this game will be the first of the Pete Golding era. The expectation is not just to win but to win comfortably, and anything less than that will lead to some alarm bells going off for the Ole Miss faithful. 

We know what Ole Miss is capable of against this opponent, but we still are waiting to find out exactly how focused they are on the task at hand after a wild couple of weeks. Rematches are often tougher when you're the team that won -- as we saw with Alabama in the SEC title game -- and Tulane will hope that the game tape from their lopsided loss reveals some opportunities to make dramatic improvements. 

No. 12 James Madison (+21.5, 50.5) at No. 5 Oregon -- Saturday, Dec. 20 (7:30 p.m.): The Dukes are the biggest underdog of the first round, as expected, but Bob Chesney's bunch will be trying to shock the world at Autzen. Oregon has had its ups and downs this season, but it has been rounding into strong form of late and appear to have figured out how to get its offense rolling again after a midseason swoon. 

The defense is among the nation's most dominant, allowing just 14.8 points per game, and they are going to look to overwhelm the Dukes on the line of scrimmage on both sides of the football. Chesney is going to have to scheme up a masterpiece to give the Dukes any kind of chance here, because we saw against Louisville early this year that it's just hard for them to sustain drives given the difference in size they have on the offensive line. 

If the Dukes aren't just happy to be there and aren't worried about simply keeping it respectable, they should go into this game going for broke. I'd expect some trickery and aggression from James Madison, which could end in disaster but is also the best chance they have at a stunning upset. 

On the other side, Dan Lanning's bunch should be looking to put the Dukes away early. I would expect an early commitment to the running game and allowing that to open up some downfield shots for Dante Moore to try and take the drama out of this matchup quickly.