BYU Misses College Football Playoff, Accepts Invite to Pop Tarts Bowl

Dec 6, 2025; Arlington, TX, USA; BYU Cougars wide receiver Parker Kingston (11) runs with the ball during the first half against the Texas Tech Red Raiders at AT&T Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Jerome Miron-Imagn Images | Jerome Miron-Imagn Images

On Sunday, the College Football Playoff committee selected the 12 teams for the College Football Playoff and BYU missed the cut.

On the same day, BYU was selected for the Pop Tarts Bowl bowl against Georgia Tech, according to a report from Brett McMurphy. The Pop Tarts Bowl will kickoff at 3:30 PM ET on Saturday, December 27th. BYU was one of the first two teams left out of the College Football Playoff.

The headline of this game is not who BYU is going to play. Rather, it's who they are not going to play. Reports surfaced that BYU was going to face Notre Dame if the Fighting Irish weren't selected for the College Football Playoff. When Notre Dame found out they were not selected for the playoff, they opted not to play in a bowl game. The Pop Tarts Bowl was forced to pick a different matchup, and that's how they landed on BYU-Georgia Tech.

While the Pop Tarts bowl is one of the better bowl destinations in college football, it's a disappointing conclusion to what probably should have been a college football playoff berth. The Cougars were the first P4 team to finish 11-1 and be ranked outside the top 10.

Like BYU, Georgia Tech started out 8-0. Then the Yellow Jackets stumbled in November, going 1-3 and falling to 9-3.

Despite having a strength of record and a resume worthy of the playoff, the committee couldn't look past BYU's blowout losses to a top four team in Texas Tech. BYU had a better strength of record than both Miami and Alabama, yet those two teams received at-large bids over BYU.

Regardless, BYU made incremental improvements in 2025. They made the conference championship game after narrowly missing the game last year. They also did it with a true freshman quarterback in Bear Bachmeier that didn't the join the program until June. The problem is they had to play a national championship contender in Texas Tech twice. BYU, frankly, is not ready to compete at that level quite yet.

The most important storyline of the offseason for BYU will be to improve the roster. Part of Kalani Sitake's contract extension included more money for NIL. With those additional funds, BYU should have the opportunity to improve at key positions.

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