If you think Miami’s head-to-head win over Notre Dame put the Hurricanes in and the Irish out of the College Football Playoff, you’re half right. The real turning point came two months later with a 3-yard catch by Duke’s No. 3 receiver against a team headed to the Pinstripe Bowl.
That’s the way the butterfly effect played out during this bonkers season. With that in mind (and the caveat that no game is ever decided by one play alone), here are the 10 moments with the most meaningful consequences across the country:
How Duke doomed Notre Dame
After scoring a touchdown in the final minute to cut Clemson’s lead to 45-44, Duke went for the go-ahead 2-point conversion. Receiver Sahmir Hagans slipped easily into the flat, and Darian Mensah found him for the winning points in Duke’s first victory at Clemson in 45 years.
What if the play had failed? A Duke loss would have knocked the Blue Devils out of what became a five-way tie for second in the ACC’s standings. They would not have made the ACC championship game, let alone won it. Instead, the ACC’s Pitt/SMU/Miami/Georgia Tech jumble would have gone to the next tiebreaker, the highest team rating score in an advanced metric. Unless that metric was an outlier, the Hurricanes would have held the edge and faced Virginia for the ACC title.
Either ACC champion (Miami or Virginia) would have outranked James Madison, keeping the Dukes out of the CFP. A Hurricanes win would have put Miami into the bracket as a conference champion and opened up a spot for the next at-large team.
Notre Dame.
Notre Dame had plenty to celebrate this year. But Duke kept it out of the Playoff. (Justin Casterline / Getty Images)
A $300 million blade of grass
No. 3 Penn State and No. 6 Oregon were tied at 3 in the third quarter when Ducks running back Noah Whittington tried to spin out of a tackle on a first-and-goal run. Penn State appeared to force a fumble and returned it to midfield … but a replay review overturned it because Whittington’s right knee grazed the grass. Oregon scored on the next play, and the Ducks left Penn State’s White Out game with a 30-24 double-overtime win.
The Nittany Lions snowballed after another big-game defeat by James Franklin. When one close loss became three in a row (see below), Franklin was fired. Before Penn State’s 54-day coaching search ended with the Nittany Lions hiring Matt Campbell from Iowa State, speculation around the opening led to new contracts for Indiana’s Curt Cignetti, Nebraska’s Matt Rhule and BYU’s Kalani Sitake, among others. Add them all up, and it’s not a stretch to connect Franklin’s firing to $300 million in new deals/extensions elsewhere. And the first domino in the chain reaction was the grass that brushed Whittington’s knee.
A tipped ball helps start the coaching carousel
Down 30-23 in the final minute at UNLV, UCLA’s last-gasp drive ended when Nico Iamaleava threw a pass over the middle that was knocked into the air by a linebacker and corralled by defensive back Aamaris Brown for the game-sealing interception. The Bruins fell to 0-2 and fired coach DeShaun Foster the next week after a home loss to New Mexico.
Perhaps Foster’s dismissal was inevitable, but this defeat helped spur his early exit. That early exit kick-started a wild coaching carousel, generally and specifically in a way that goes back to Franklin. The turnover at UCLA eventually led to a promotion for assistant Jerry Neuheisel, whose offensive play calling keyed an upset of Penn State. That Nittany Lions loss made the possibility of Franklin’s firing start to seem real.
What if Brian Kelly beat Lane Kiffin?
Although No. 13 Ole Miss statistically dominated No. 4 LSU, the Tigers only trailed by five late. All they needed was a fourth-and-3 stop with 1:47 left to get the ball back with a chance to win.
It didn’t happen. No LSU defender was within 5 yards of Ole Miss tight end Dae’Quan Wright, so Trinidad Chambliss converted the easy pass to seal a 24-19 Rebels victory.
Suppose LSU snuffed it out and drove 65 yards for a touchdown to stay undefeated. Would the Tigers have cratered the way they did against Texas A&M a few weeks later? Even if LSU still lost to Vanderbilt and the Aggies, would LSU have fired Brian Kelly after only two losses? Would they have clamored to hire Lane Kiffin after he lost at home to the guy they just fired? And where would Kiffin’s 10-2 Rebels have fallen on the CFP bubble?
OU topples the Tide
Alabama, Miami and Notre Dame all could have made the field if not for an unlikely touchdown by Oklahoma — a pick-six by defensive back Eli Bowen against the Tide. It was one of only five interceptions Alabama quarterback Ty Simpson threw all season, and it was a pivotal moment in Oklahoma’s 23-21 victory over the Tide because of how rough the Sooners looked on the other side of the ball. Bowen’s touchdown covered 87 yards; Oklahoma’s offense totaled 212 yards all game.
Some advanced metrics (like ESPN’s Football Power Index) rank OU below the Tide, Hurricanes and Irish, and its offense is one of the worst units in the Playoff. Take away Bowen’s touchdown, and a 9-3 Sooners team wouldn’t have boxed out Alabama and made the field.
If it wasn’t for a rare pick six from Alabama’s Ty Simpson, the Sooners could’ve found themselves outside of the CFP. (Kevin C. Cox / Getty Images)
Bull spit
With two minutes left and the Gators leading South Florida by a point, Florida defensive lineman Brendan Bett earned an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty for spitting on a Bulls lineman. The 15 free yards helped set up Nico Gramatica’s walk-off 20-yard field goal.
Losing at home to an in-state Group of 5 program was the beginning of the end of Billy Napier’s Florida tenure; he was fired a month and a half later. It was also a marquee moment for USF head coach Alex Golesh, who started his third year with back-to-back wins over ranked teams (his Bulls beat Boise State in Week 1). Auburn hired Golesh the day after the regular season ended.
Florida DL Brendan Bett was ejected after appearing to spit on another player. pic.twitter.com/VNfvjw15dF
— SportsCenter (@SportsCenter) September 7, 2025
The coaching ripples got even bigger when Florida replaced Napier by poaching Tulane’s Jon Sumrall, and USF landed Ohio State offensive coordinator Brian Hartline. That means the spit affected two CFP participants and might have colored the preparation of the Buckeyes’ offense in their Big Ten championship loss to Indiana. Speaking of which…
Mendoza’s Heisman moment
This one’s easy. Indiana faced third-and-6 as it clutched a 13-10 lead over Ohio State in the final three minutes of the Big Ten championship. That’s when Fernando Mendoza uncorked a gorgeous 33-yard pass to Charlie Becker for a first down.
The conversion helped the Hoosiers drain all but the final 18 seconds. They held on to win their first outright Big Ten title in 80 years, earn the top seed in the Playoff and rise to No. 1 in the AP poll for the first time ever. The throw itself probably clinched the Heisman Trophy for Mendoza.
What a throw, and what a catch 😲
No. 2 @IndianaFootball is starting to feel it.
📺: FOX pic.twitter.com/zzSr8yQn1h
— Big Ten Network (@BigTenNetwork) December 7, 2025
Arch Manning vs. Florida
Even though Texas tried to blame its CFP omission on a close Week 1 defeat at Ohio State, committee chairman Hunter Yurachek said the Longhorns’ 29-21 loss at Florida was what was “holding them back.” One play that could have changed it: Arch Manning’s third-and-long heave to a wide-open Emmett Mosley V late in the first half.
The incompletion led to a fourth down and a punt the Gators blocked for a safety and a 19-7 lead. Because Manning was hit as he threw the ball, it’s hard to blame him too much. But a completion would have meant a touchdown that cut Florida’s lead to 17-14 and, for all we know, sparked a win. The deep touchdown pass under those circumstances might have also buoyed Manning’s confidence and could have been a strong, early October counterpoint to the criticism surrounding his play.
Georgia gets stuffed
Facing third-and-3 at the Alabama 10 in the fourth quarter, the Bulldogs were not settling for a game-tying field goal. They were going for a touchdown and the lead. To try to make it happen, they chose to sequence a pair of plays without substituting. The final one, a fourth-and-inches rush by former walk-on Cash Jones, was stuffed thanks to a missed block. Alabama held on for a 24-21 victory.
The end of a 33-game home winning streak didn’t matter much in the big picture for Georgia, which avenged the loss in last week’s SEC championship and looks like a national title contender. But it mattered a lot for Alabama. Yurachek repeatedly called the Crimson Tide’s win “arguably the best win” for any team this season, making it a deciding factor for Alabama staying ahead of Miami and Notre Dame in the final rankings.
Alabama stopping Georgia’s fourth down run gave it a crucial win en route to the CFP. (Kevin C. Cox / Getty Images)
Irish botched extra point
Notre Dame’s loss to Miami was the biggest focus in the CFP debate, but this moment against Texas A&M was just as large. Jeremiyah Love’s touchdown rush put the Irish ahead 40-34 with 2:53 left, but the botched extra point left holder (and former starting quarterback) Tyler Buchner scrambling. His pass flew incomplete, which meant the Aggies could win the game with a touchdown and extra point. They did on a Marcel Reed’s fourth-and-goal touchdown that could also be on this list.
Reverse the extra-point outcomes, and the Playoff situation is reversed, too. The 11-1 Irish would have easily been in, and the 10-2 Aggies might have landed below the cut line thanks to a resume without a single win over a team that finished ranked by the CFP.
A similar special-teams what-if: If Illinois hadn’t hit a walk-off field goal to beat USC, the 10-2 Trojans would have been in the CFP mix … and boosted Notre Dame’s resume by giving the Irish a top-15 opponent.