The College Football Playoff National Championship is set. Alex and Richard react to a mixed pair of semifinal games, with Miami outlasting Ole Miss and Indiana feeding Oregon into a wood chipper. In the rare Hurry-Up recorded from a live studio (or at least living room), we discuss:

* 18:37: Miami 31, Ole Miss 27

* 01:03: Indiana 56 (!), Oregon 22

Producer: Anthony Vito

Become a paid subscriber

We are grateful for the several thousand people who pay $10 a month or $110 for the year to support Split Zone Duo. One thing you get is the knowledge that you are making this independent college football podcast possible. Another thing you get is a lot of bonus episodes, including weekly dispatches all offseason long. The football season is our busiest time, but we like to think the offseason is our most creative time, and there’s still a lot of news to talk about.

Thanks to our partners and subscribers

* 20% off Dad Water: https://drinkdadwater.com/discount/SZD

* https://www.nokiantyres.com/szd

* Shop Homefield at https://www.homefieldapparel.com/

* Modelo: Drink responsibly. Beer imported by Crown Imports, Chicago, IL

SUBSCRIBER EPISODE: Once upon a time, Ole Miss picked segregation and the Stars and Bars over being good at football. Indiana picked basketball over being good at football. Miami never really chose not to be good at football, but made a series of mistakes and ran up against difficult modern realities that caused a long drought. Meanwhile, the story of Phil Knight rescuing Oregon is now so old-fashioned it’s basically quaint. In this subscriber episode, Richard and Alex talk about how the four 2025 Playoff semifinalists got out of their own way.

The second half of this audio file (starting at 39:43) is a resurfacing of our “Dead Letters” episode about the history of Ole Miss football, featuring Alex and Steven Godfrey. We’ve gotten a lot of new listeners since the episode came out in 2023 and wanted to make sure those folks had a chance to hear it.

Find all Dead Letters shows here.

Producer: Anthony Vito.

This is a subscriber episode of SZD

We are grateful for the several thousand people who pay $10 a month or $110 for the year to support Split Zone Duo. One thing you get is the knowledge that you are making this independent college football podcast possible. Another thing you get is a lot of bonus episodes, including weekly dispatches all offseason long. The football season is our busiest time, but we like to think the offseason is our most creative time, and there’s still a lot of news to talk about.

We’ll do a lot of that exclusively for subscribers. Thanks to everyone who’s already joined us, and if you haven’t yet, we think you’ll enjoy it if you check it out. Good for the soul but also good for the podcast queue.

Richard and Alex talk about the absurd FCS Championship that ended with Montana State claiming the national title over Illinois State. Then it’s time to preview the College Football Playoff semifinals in a lot of detail.

* 2:30 FCS Championship

* 15:42 Ole Miss vs. Miami

* 33:52 Oregon vs. Indiana

* 52:15 NFL playoff takes

Producer: Anthony Vito.

Become a paid subscriber in 2026!

We are grateful for the several thousand people who pay $10 a month or $110 for the year to support Split Zone Duo. One thing you get is the knowledge that you are making this independent college football podcast possible. Another thing you get is a lot of bonus episodes, including weekly dispatches all offseason long. The football season is our busiest time, but we like to think the offseason is our most creative time, and there’s still a lot of news to talk about.

We’ll do a lot of that exclusive for subscribers. Thanks to everyone who’s already joined us, and if you haven’t yet, we think you’ll enjoy it if you check it out. Good for the soul but also good for the podcast queue.

Thank you to Split Zone Duo’s sponsors

* 20% off Dad Water: https://drinkdadwater.com/discount/SZD

* https://www.nokiantyres.com/szd

* Shop Homefield at https://www.homefieldapparel.com/

* Modelo: Drink responsibly. Beer imported by Crown Imports, Chicago, IL

Richard (from the Sugar Bowl) and Alex (from the Rose Bowl) break down the College Football quarterfinal bowl games in this order:

* Ole Miss 39, Georgia 34

* Indiana 38, Alabama 3

* Oregon 23, Texas Tech 0

* Miami 24, Ohio State 14

Want much more? Become a paid subscriber

Subscribers get weekly bonus episodes, usually more than one during the season and postseason, as well as the chance to ask questions and engage more deeply with the hosts. We’d love to have you.

Thanks to our partners and subscribers

* 20% off Dad Water: https://drinkdadwater.com/discount/SZD

* https://www.nokiantyres.com/szd

* Shop Homefield at https://www.homefieldapparel.com/

* Modelo: Drink responsibly. Beer imported by Crown Imports, Chicago, IL

Producer: Anthony Vito

The College Football Playoff quarterfinals are here. Alex, Richard, and guest host Rodger Sherman dive into all of these games:

* Miami-Ohio State at the Cotton Bowl

* Oregon-Texas Tech at the Orange Bowl

* Alabama-Indiana at the Rose Bowl

* Ole Miss-Georgia at the Sugar Bowl

* Illinois State-Montana State in the FCS title game

* UW-River Falls-North Central in the Stagg Bowl

Plus: Does the NFL need to reconsider its playoff format to exclude teams from the NFC South and AFC North? Producer: Anthony Vito

Want much more? Become a paid subscriber

Subscribers get weekly bonus episodes, usually more than one during the season and postseason, as well as the chance to ask questions and engage more deeply with the hosts. We’d love to have you.

Thanks to our partners and subscribers

* 20% off Dad Water: https://drinkdadwater.com/discount/SZD

* Nokian Tyres: https://www.nokiantyres.com/szd

* Shop Homefield at https://www.homefieldapparel.com/

* Modelo: Drink responsibly. Beer imported by Crown Imports, Chicago, IL

Alex and Richard spend 23 minutes talking about Michigan’s holiday hiring of former Utah coach Kyle Whittingham:

* In a time of intense national focus on the age of people in leadership positions (hmm, wonder where that came from), the 66-year-old Whittingham is unusually old to be taking this job. We wouldn’t worry.

* Whittingham’s recruiting at Utah became a pressure point that may have contributed to him leaving. How much does that matter as he moves to a job with a built-in financial advantage?

* Whittingham has been coaching Big Ten teams in the Pac-12 and Big 12 for years. What does he need to do differently in the ACTUAL Big Ten?

For your holiday listening, Alex and Richard take on dozens of questions from SplitZoneDuo.com’s paid subscribers. Let’s start with the juicy but sad breakup of Notre Dame and USC, move to the coaching carousel, and then have some fun. A rough listing of the questions featured in this episode, in order:

* What’s actually going on with Notre Dame and USC breaking up their football rivalry, and whose fault is it?

* What is Michigan’s realistic play in the coaching carousel, and who could they actually hire?

* Is Michigan likely to have a coach in place by the bowl game, or is that assumption wrong?

* Is a bridge coach (specifically Biff Poggi) a viable or sensible option for Michigan?

* Kyle Whittingham vs. Brian Kelly: Who is the better “CEO” head coach?

* With so many Power 4 openings, is the best path to a top job now being a successful P4 coordinator?

* What happened at Ohio, how should they move forward, and why did they handle it better than Michigan?

* Why does Warde Manuel still have a job (pending investigation)?

* Is Pat Fitzgerald possibly a worse pure football coach than Jonathan Smith but better positioned because of NIL and donor buy-in? Is “coach who can unlock donor money” now a core hiring archetype?

* Will Michigan State’s new $400 million donation allow them to immediately spend big on the roster?

* What are agency “speed-dating” events for coaches and athletic directors?

* Does the modern college football calendar make it harder for FCS programs to reset or fire coaches?

* Will the calendar lead to more long-tenured FCS coaches staying put at big programs?

* What are the chances Ed Orgeron resurfaces on LSU’s staff?

* Why didn’t Dan Mullen come up for any of the open head coaching jobs?

* What’s really wrong at Florida State beyond portal hits and misses?

* If an AD tried to reverse-engineer Curt Cignetti, what traits would they be looking for?

* What goes on your CFB trip bucket list?

* New York or LA: The better CFB city?

* Why do national college football narratives so often default to NY/LA logic when the sport itself doesn’t?

* What are our goals for this podcast in 2026?

Thank you so much for being part of what we do. We’ll see you around New Year’s Eve to get you set for the CFP quarterfinals and FCS title game.

Producer: Anthony Vito

These are difficult times for the college football bowl games that aren’t part of the Playoff system. Player opt-outs were already a thing, and now entire teams don’t want to take part. At best, the games are internet memes featuring some enjoyable football on the side. At worst, nobody cares. How many of these problems are truly new, and how many of them feel worse than they are because we have a distorted picture of being young in the 1990s and 2000s?

Alex and Rodger challenge their priors on how much bowl season has changed and how much of bowls’ decline comes down to nostalgia.

Want much more? Become a paid subscriber

Subscribers get weekly bonus episodes, usually more than one during the season and postseason, as well as the chance to ask questions and engage more deeply with the hosts. We’d love to have you.

Thanks to our partners and subscribers

* 20% off Dad Water: https://drinkdadwater.com/discount/SZD

* Nokian Tyres: https://www.nokiantyres.com/szd

* Shop Homefield at https://www.homefieldapparel.com/

* Modelo: Drink responsibly. Beer imported by Crown Imports, Chicago, IL

Producer: Anthony Vito.