Oregon earned the top seed in the College Football Playoff, while Alabama did not make it into the 12-team field.
Georgia, the SEC champion, was seeded second; Boise State, the Mountain West champion, earned the third seed; and Big 12 titlist Arizona State got the fourth seed and the fourth and final first-round bye.
In an in-state quarterfinal matchup, Canadian Kurtis Rourke and Indiana will take on No. 7 Notre Dame.
The Indiana and Notre Dame campuses are separated by 200 miles in the Hoosier State, but the teams haven’t met since 1991 and before that 1958. The temperature will be quite a bit cooler when the teams meet at Notre Dame Stadium Dec. 20 or 21.
The winner plays Georgia. The Bulldogs have played Notre Dame three times, all high-stakes games, and have never faced Indiana.
SMU captured the last open spot in the 12-team College Football Playoff on Sunday, bumping Alabama out of the first 12-team bracket that placed undefeated Oregon at No. 1.
The selection committee preferred the Mustangs (11-2), losers of a heartbreaker in the Atlantic Coast Conference title game, who had a far less difficult schedule than Alabama (9-3) of the SEC but, ultimately, still one fewer loss.
The expanded bracket marks a new era for college football, though the Alabama-SMU debate made clear that there is no perfect formula for identifying a champion.
The tournament starts Dec. 20-21 with four first-round games involving teams seeded 5-12. It concludes Jan. 20 with the national title game in Atlanta.
All will play in quarterfinals at bowl games on Dec. 31-Jan. 1.
Clemson stole a bid and the 12th seed with its crazy win over SMU — the result that ultimately cost Alabama a spot in the field. The Tigers moved to No. 16 in the rankings, but got in as the fifth-best conference winner.
Texas, Penn St, Notre Dame and Ohio St get home field in the first round
There was some tension around how the rest of the teams were seeded because that determined who gets home-field advantage in the first round. The games, with exact dates and times still pending, are No. 12 Clemson at No. 5 Texas; No. 11 SMU at No. 6 Penn State; No. 10 Indiana at No. 7 Notre Dame; and No. 9 Tennessee at No. 8 Ohio State.