First-Round Bets For the 2025 College Football Playoff

The 2025 College Football Playoff bracket is the talk of the sports world right now, and the declarations are flowing.

Here at The Roar, we don’t take a lot of positions on whether the first-round playoff games are boring, superfluous, or conspicuously lacking a certain group of Fighting Irish. 

Instead, I’m focused on one thing: winners. 

Here’s a look at some early leans for the first-round playoff games. 

Oklahoma vs. Alabama Prediction

Alabama’s offense is trending down, starting with Ty Simpson. Brent Venables appears to have a schematic advantage over Kalen DeBoer, racking up a 2-0 record against Alabama over these last two seasons. 

Give me the Oklahoma defense to dominate this game and advance the Sooners to the quarterfinals. 

Prediction: Oklahoma -105

Texas A&M vs. Miami Prediction

I’ve yet to see an angle on this game I really like, so I’m struggling to get to a bet I feel confident in recommending. 

Miami is perennially talented but distracted. I do think the Hurricanes have the guys up front on defense to break the A&M pocket, but you could have said the same thing about games against Louisville and SMU. 

The Canes need a mistake-free outing from Carson Beck, and they need their NFL talent to match what Texas A&M has. Otherwise, why wouldn’t you just lay the short number with the SEC team that was undefeated until a couple of weeks ago?

Betting on that feels like true gambling. How could anyone have a good feel for that without direct knowledge of the future?

Maybe you have an angle you like. But from where I sit, with only four games on the board for this first round, my recommendation for now is to pass on this one.

Grade: Pass; Lean Texas A&M -3.5, Under 51.5

Ole Miss vs. Tulane Prediction

I’m a long-suffering West Virginia fan, and this game has a very distinct feel to it: the 2008 Fiesta Bowl. After Rich Rodriguez devastated West Virginia (both the team and the state) by leaving for Michigan at the end of the 2007 season, interim coach Bill Stewart rallied the troops and led an angry roster to battle against favored Oklahoma.

The result? West Virginia romped.

Ole Miss doesn’t even have to beat a “better” team here as the Mountaineers did 18 years ago. All they have to do is harness that Kiffin anger and direct it at Tulane – a team that generally hasn’t played well down the stretch and already lost once to this Ole Miss team by 35. 

It’s definitely square, but I’m not sweating 17 points and the hook with the Rebels in this game. 

Prediction: Ole Miss -17.5

Oregon vs. James Madison Prediction

I think this might be the game with the widest range of potential outcomes. JMU does a lot of things really well – particularly on defense – but the Dukes have played a very soft schedule this year. 

Between Liberty falling off a cliff and the Sun Belt East looking uncommonly mediocre, there just isn’t much to draw on for a high-stakes game against a top program, several thousand miles away from the Shenandoah Valley. 

If you want to pass on this game, I’d totally understand. And if you wanted to ladder every possible Oregon alt spread you can find, I think that’s a pretty sensible approach, too. 

Having watched a lot of JMU this season, I’m going to take a pretty specific approach here. I’m going to put some faith in JMU selling out on defense and holding Oregon in check, at least for a little while. Offensively, I think the Dukes will really struggle against Oregon at the line of scrimmage throughout the game. There will be a lot of all-or-nothing plays, and I suspect that the most common result will be nothing.

All that points toward a low-scoring first half. Give me a first-half under, with the idea that the Ducks might run away with this as the game gets deeper into the third and fourth quarters. 

Prediction: JMU/Oregon 1H Under 26.5

Best College Football Bets for College Football Playoff First Round

• Oklahoma -105
• Tulane -17.5
• JMU/Oregon 1H Under 26.5