WALDRON GRAIN & FUEL

12/07 15:12 CST Notre Dame, left out of playoff while Alabama and Miami get in, opts out of bowl consideration Notre Dame, left out of playoff while Alabama and Miami get in, opts out of bowl consideration By MARK LONG AP Sports Writer Notre Dame announced Sunday that it would not play in a bowl game this season, hours after the ninth-ranked Fighting Irish were left out of the College Football Playoff. "As a team, we've decided to withdraw our name from consideration for a bowl game following the 2025 season," Notre Dame wrote in a statement posted to its official X account. "We appreciate all the support from our families and fans, and we're hoping to bring the 12th national title to South Bend in 2026." Despite winning every game for nearly three months, Notre Dame dropped a spot in the final College Football Playoff rankings Sunday and was left out of the 12-team bracket entirely. The Fighting Irish, which won its last 10 games by an average of nearly 30 points, watched championship weekend from afar, idle as an independent with no options to impress the selection commitee one last time in a league title game. Athletic director Pete Bevacqua and coach Marcus Freeman had taken the high road in recent weeks, avoiding too much lobbying and believing their winning streak would be enough to earn a berth over Alabama. Miami (10-2) ended up knocking the Irish (10-2) out. With BYU losing to Texas Tech in the Big 12 title game, the committee ranked Miami and Notre Dame next to each other and turned to the head-to-head metric to determine which one would get the No. 10 seed. It was Miami, which beat Notre Dame 27-24 in Week 1 of the regular season. The Hurricanes will play at Texas A&M in the opening round of the playoff. No. 12 BYU, No. 13 Vanderbilt and No. 14 Texas --- and, to a lesser extent, Atlantic Coast Conference champion Duke --- are sure to have issues with the final CFP standings, too. But no one has a bigger gripe than Notre Dame, which dropped one spot after beating Stanford 49-20 and then fell another while not playing. Fans online had demanded the Irish boycott their bowl game, cancel their scheduling agreement with the ACC and reassess future slates. Some called for Bevacqua to be fired. Notre Dame lost consecutive games to open the season against teams that made the playoff --- Miami and Texas A&M, by a combined four points --- and has been as good as anyone in the country since. Alabama, meanwhile, became the first three-loss team to make the CFP field. Selection committee chairman Hunter Yurachek explained the logic after the Crimson Tide lost 28-7 to Georgia in the SEC championship game. "Their strength of schedule was the highest in the top 11, and (it) felt like in spite of their performance yesterday in the conference championship, they deserve to stay within that nine spot," he said. ___ Get poll alerts and updates on the AP Top 25 throughout the season. Sign up here and here (AP News mobile app). AP college football: https://apnews.com/hub/ap-top-25-college-football-poll and https://apnews.com/hub/college-football