The college football season is here. Which matchups are must-watch?
Here are six high-stakes matchups that you won't want to miss (using preseason AP Top 25 rankings):
No. 9 LSU at No. 8 Alabama (Nov. 8)
After falling short of the inaugural 12-team College Football Playoff, pressure is building for LSU's Brian Kelly and Alabama's Kalen DeBoer. Both historically successful programs are not far removed from recent title victories, with LSU in 2020 and Alabama the following year.
Both are coming off matching 9-4 seasons, each with a 5-3 conference record in the rugged SEC. Alabama should be favored in every game ahead of this one except for a late September visit to No. 5 Georgia. If LSU can knock off Clemson, the Tigers should be favored in all their games too ahead of this tilt.
Last fall, a two-interception game from Garrett Nussmeier hurt the Tigers, who struggled to stop Jalen Milroe and Co. Now Nussmeier is considered a Heisman contender and he will get a chance for a marquee conference road win over the Tide and DeBoer, who wants to distance himself from last year's 9-4 debut season,
No. 1 Texas at No. 5 Georgia (Nov. 15)
Texas and Georgia, the two highest-ranked SEC teams in the AP Top 25 preseason poll, square off in Athens less than a month before the league title game, which is where they last met (a 22-19 Bulldogs win in December).
Texas has a new quarterback in charge in Arch Manning; he briefly entered both games against Georgia in 2024, completing 3 of 6 passes for 19 yards after a slow start by Quinn Ewers and a 20-point deficit in Week 8.
Both teams have a lot of football to navigate before this one but it could be a dandy — and a precursor to another meeting or even two before the season ends?
No. 2 Penn State at No. 3 Ohio State (Nov. 1)
Penn State earned the No. 2 seed in the Top 25, surpassing the reigning national champions, Ohio State, who came in at No. 3. The Big Ten rivals meet on Nov. 1 in Columbus in a matchup likely to carry league title game and playoff implications.
Drew Allar, a two-headed rushing attack and a stout defense should have the Nittany Lions favored in every game before this one, with all due respect to No. 7 Oregon (Sept. 27). Same for the Buckeyes, who are a 2.5-point favorite over the higher-ranked Longhorns in the opener.
Ohio State is 24-8 against Penn State and has won eight in a row. Coach James Franklin's sole victory against the Buckeyes was in 2016 during his second year at the helm.
This year, the playoff format shifts to straight seeding, meaning the top four teams will be rewarded with a bye. A good showing here might impress the CFP committee before its first rankings of the season, too.
No. 16 SMU at No. 4 Clemson (Oct. 18)
Expectations are high for Clemson, which is loaded. After LSU, the Tigers could be on cruise control when SMU comes calling for a game that matches two CFP teams from a year ago (both lost in the first round).
Clemson quarterback Cade Klubnik, a Heisman favorite, had a standout outing against the Mustangs in 2024, throwing for 262 yards and four touchdowns. Receiver Bryant Wesco Jr. had a career-high eight receptions, 143 yards and two TDs. The two are expected to pick up where they left off.
SMU QB Kevin Jennings is back amid some question marks elsewhere, but the schedule isn't daunting ahead of the trip to Clemson.
No. 11 Arizona State at No. 22 Iowa State (Nov. 1)
The Sun Devils went 11-3 and grabbed an automatic bid to the College Football Playoff last season, thanks in part to a dominant 45-19 Big 12 championship game victory against ... Iowa State.
The Cyclones have some challenging games ahead of this one but wins there set this up nicely for a chance to impress the CFP committee.
Power Four conference champions still earn a spot in the 12-team bracket, but they won't have the luxury of a first-round bye unless they're ranked in the top four. The Sun Devils could be in the running either way, but every win counts for both teams in pursuit of a playoff berth.
USC at No. 6 Notre Dame (Oct. 18)
After consecutive underwhelming seasons, USC coach Lincoln Riley could use a major road win, and is there a bigger statement to make than against a storied rival?
Notre Dame has beaten the Trojans seven times in the last eight meetings, including the last two in which the Fighting Irish averaged 48.5 points. USC last won a game in Notre Dame Stadium in 2011.
The Irish have national title hopes. The Trojans have hopes that Riley is finding the right formula to turn things around in what could be one of the last games in this longstanding series. The contract for a rivalry that dates to 1926 expires after their game in 2026.
Honorable mention
No. 8 Alabama at No. 5 Georgia (Sept. 27), a chance for 'Bama to improve to 10-1 against the Bulldogs since 2008 or for Kirby Smart to cut into his 1-6 record as a head coach against the Crimson Tide ... No. 3 Ohio State at No. 14 Michigan (Nov. 29), a matchup of the last two national champions in a series that has seen the Wolverines win four straight ... No. 25 Boise State at No. 6 Notre Dame (Oct. 4), a rare shot for a top Group of Five team to put up a marquee midseason win on the road ... No. 3 Ohio State at No. 12 Illinois (Oct. 11), a chance for Bret Bielema's Illini to show if last year's 10-win season was a fluke.
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He renovated his bathroom. You know, adult stuff. The last performance bonus Garcia received from the UFC was in 2011, when he lost another decision in another Fight of the Night, this time against Nam Phan at UFC 136. This time the bonuses were all $75,000. In other words, the bonuses had more than doubled in the span of four years. Garcia and other fighters could be forgiven, then, if they assumed this trend would continue. After all, the UFC and its parent company at the time only made more and more money each year. The events went from being broadcast on a niche men's-interest cable network like Spike TV to a major network TV partner in Fox. Then from there the UFC moved on to an even more lucrative deal with ESPN. And in 2026, as we learned this week, it will essentially double its broadcast rights revenue in a deal with Paramount. But in 2025, UFC bonuses are stuck at $50,000. With the exception of special events like UFC 300, they've held steady at that level for over a decade now. When adjusted for inflation, the $75,000 that Garcia and others received in 2011 is worth approximately $110,000 in today's money. While some events around the same time handed out bonuses worth far less, even the $35,000 Garcia received in 2007 would have been worth around $56,000 in 2025 money. All that is about to change, according to UFC CEO Dana White. Speaking to reporters Tuesday night, White promised some unspecified revisions to UFC fighter pay in the wake of this blockbuster deal with Paramount. But he did make one concrete financial promise: 'Bonuses are obviously going up, so that will be big.' White did not say how much bonuses would increase by. But clearly, these bonuses are a big deal to fighters. It's why they regularly plead for them in post-fight interviews. UFC featherweight Dan '50K' Ige even incorporated it as his nickname. Conor McGregor, the biggest star in either MMA or UFC history, delivered an iconic and oft-imitated moment early on in his career, following an impressive TKO win with the exhortation: 'Dana, 60 G's, baby!' (Again, that was 2013, when $60,000 had the the purchasing power of about $88,000 today.) So how much would UFC performance bonuses actually have to increase in order for it to be a true improvement on those handed out in the past? One starting point is to perform the simplest math available. The UFC's new broadcast rights deal is bringing in double the money of the previous one? Fine, double the bonuses. That would get us to $100,000 per bonus. But even that would fall short of keeping pace with inflation when compared with those 2011 bonuses. The biggest performance bonuses the UFC ever handed out were at UFC 300 last year, when each one was worth $300,000. (Max Holloway pocketed two of the four bonuses available, for a total of $600,000 for his knockout win over Justin Gaethje.) If that became the standard, it would mean $1.2 million in bonuses for every UFC event. Multiplied by 43 events per year, that comes out to $51.6 million per year in performance bonuses, which, to a lot of people, probably sounds like a lot. But it's also about 5% of the UFC's average yearly take in this new broadcast rights deal with Paramount. And that doesn't even factor in any of the other revenue sources, like ticket sales or site fees or international broadcast rights. Would the UFC actually consider a bonus increase of that magnitude? Based on everything we know it seems … doubtful. That's likely not just because TKO would rather keep the money than pay it out to people who have no real leverage or recourse to force such a reckoning. It's also probably because a fighter who suddenly has $300,000 in the bank is a lot less compliant when it comes to things like stepping in on short notice to plug holes in upcoming fight cards. Then again, hasn't the UFC told us again and again that it's a meritocracy where you 'eat what you kill'? The whole idea behind the performance bonuses is to motivate fighters to fight hard and put on a show for the fans. Imagine how much harder a prelim fighter making $20,000 to show would fight if you gave him a crack at a $300,000 bonus. And imagine what a bunch of fights like that might do for Paramount+ subscriptions.
