CBS Sports took a look at the whole 2025 college football schedule and picked one game from each week that will play a role in the College Football Playoff race.
Clemson’s matchup against SMU at Death Valley on Saturday, Oct. 18, was pegged as Week 8’s most important game in shaping the 12-team playoff race.
Of course, it will be a rematch of the two teams’ thrilling 2024 ACC Championship Game. The Tigers and Mustangs met for the first time in series history last December, when Nolan Hauser’s 56-yard walk-off field goal gave Clemson its record 22nd ACC title and sent the Tigers to their seventh College Football Playoff.
Here’s what CBS Sports’ Chip Patterson had to say about that game and the playoff implications in Week 8:
“This is another difficult week to make one pick with conference title and CFP stakes across the country. Georgia (vs. Ole Miss) and Alabama (vs. Tennessee) have a chance to exact revenge from regular-season road losses in 2024, and Notre Dame will play host to a USC team that was extremely competitive when the two rivals squared off in last year’s regular-season finale.
“But our focus returns to the ACC, where the title race will be impacted first by a Louisville-Miami game on Friday night and then by the rematch of last year’s ACC Championship Game as SMU makes its first-ever trip to Death Valley to play Clemson.”
Coming off its eighth ACC Championship in the last 10 seasons, and its first CFP berth since 2020, Clemson (10-4, 8-1 ACC in 2024) was ranked No. 8 in CBS Sports’ way-too-early top 25 ahead of the 2025 season.
Clemson will open the 2025 season with a marquee matchup against the LSU Tigers at Memorial Stadium on Saturday, Aug. 30. You can see Clemson’s full 2025 schedule here.