Miami's 2026 College Football Playoff Championship Berth Marks Key Win for ACC

The CFP selection committee nearly excluded the ACC from the College Football Playoff. Now, the one ACC program that advanced to the CFP is in the National Championship.

Jan 8, 2026; Glendale, AZ, USA; Miami Hurricanes quarterback Carson Beck (11) reacts after winning the 2026 Fiesta Bowl and semifinal game of the College Football Playoff at State Farm Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Joe Camporeale-Imagn Images | Joe Camporeale-Imagn Images

There was a moment when it seemed quite possible that the Atlantic Coast Conference would not have a team in the 2026 College Football Playoff. It was certainly trending that way, but the CFP Selection Committee had other plans.

Miami, Alabama, or Notre Dame. Only two could make it, realistically, and the Hurricanes weren’t even in their conference’s championship because of conference record and head-to-head tiebreakers.

Those tiebreakers allowed the 8-5 Duke Blue Devils — who at least went on to beat 11-2 Virginia, 27-20, and be crowned kings of the ACC — to slip into the conference title game over 10-2 Miami, which is a question for ACC commissioner Jim Phillips to deal with later down the road.

But thanks to the fact that the ‘Canes ousted the Fighting Irish, 27-24, in Week One of the 2025 season — and belong to a conference, which is what the CFP favors apparently, for that matter — the selection committee decided to roll with the U for the 12-team playoff as the No. 10 seed, leaving out Notre Dame.

It is fair to say they made the right decision.

After unexpectedly upsetting No. 2 Ohio State in the quarterfinals following a 10-3 victory against No. 7 Texas A&M in the first round, the Hurricanes continued their Cinderella run to the ultimate stage of the Playoff — the 2026 College Football National Championship — with a 31-27 defeat of No. 6 Ole Miss on Thursday.

IT WAS ALWAYS ALL ABOUT THE U 🙌 pic.twitter.com/87p2xauXzZ

— ACC Football (@ACCFootball) January 9, 2026

The sweetest part of that victory? The title game will be at Hard Rock Stadium in Miami, Fla., the home of the Dolphins — and also, by extension, the U.

This is the first time in the CFP era that Miami has advanced to the national title game, let alone made a semifinal appearance, and 2001 was the last time the five-time national champions were in a position to capture victory at the highest stage.

The impact of this run by the Hurricanes extends far beyond the program, however. This is a big step for the ACC as a whole, and it will impact the future of the CFP in a dramatic way now that the committee is seeing what an ACC program an accomplish on the bigger stage.

Most of all, it gives the ACC more leverage in the future direction of the CFP — more say in the proposed expansion, and a greater chance for more ACC teams to be incorprated in the selection committee’s final rankings. Afterall, this is the best run an ACC team has made since Clemson’s reign of dominance from 2015-18 with Deshaun Watson and Trevor Lawrence, which has fizzled out by now.

Unlike the Southeastern Conference (SEC) and the Big Ten, which had five and three teams reach the 12-team playoff this year, respectively, Miami was the ACC’s sole hope to make a statement to the rest of the FBS, and it has done so in convincing fashion.

With the possibility of the CFP expanding to 16 teams for the 2026 season, the ACC could ride out the Hurricanes’ success to propel additional ACC teams over SEC and Big Ten programs in future Playoff rankings, which would inevitably even out the field and be less SEC/Big Ten heavy.

The Hurricanes only two losses in 2025 were against ACC opponents — to Louisville on Oct. 17 and SMU on Nov. 1 — and there were several teams from the conference apart from Miami, notably Pittsburgh, the Mustangs, and Georgia Tech, that could have probably contended with any team in the CFP and only suffered three losses in the regular season, just like Alabama and Notre Dame did.

Yet the committee had zero intention of allowing two or more teams from the ACC in the CFP this year, and the one that has reached further heights than any team in the country so far barely met the criteria for selection as well.

When Miami head coach Mario Cristobal said that “people” — likely meaning the committee — are unaware of how good teams in the ACC are, he did not fully have backing for that statement at the time. But now, he has every right in the world to claim that he was right.

Under Miami’s wing, the ACC has bounced back in national relevancy among college football’s Power-Four field. It is only a matter of time before that translates to tangible alterations in the committee’s selection process, unless the bias toward the SEC and Big Ten is just too omnipotent to overcome.