The renewed Texas and Texas A&M rivalry headlines Week 14 in college football

It is now time to feast on turkey — and meaningful college football games. There’s always a lot at stake in the final weekend of the regular season, but this particular lineup of rivalry games seems extra appetizing.

Texas and Texas A&M will play one another for the first time in more than a decade with a spot in the SEC championship game (and, presumably, the College Football Playoff) on the line. Notre Dame is a win over USC away from securing a first-round home game in the first year of the 12-team CFP. Ohio State is trying to snap a three-game losing streak to its hated rival up north. Vanderbilt will attempt to play spoiler one last time this season as it tries to knock Tennessee out of the Playoff picture.

Plus, Arizona State and Iowa State will try to survive the weekend to secure spots in the Big 12 conference championship. And Miami will need to fend off Syracuse to do the same in the ACC, as SMU awaits. Some title-game tickets have been claimed already, but plenty more need to be earned this weekend.

Here’s what I’m watching for in Week 14:

Can Texas hold off Texas A&M to punch its Playoff ticket? The Longhorns and Aggies hate each other more than most rivals do, so the return of this rivalry game after 13 years would make this must-see TV on its own. But throw in what’s at stake — the winner goes to the SEC championship game and also likely secures up a spot in the 12-team bracket — and it’s clear that this is the most important game of a very important weekend. Texas has been highly regarded all season long but doesn’t have a marquee win on its resume. Texas A&M has had a rollercoaster of a year, with a new low coming a week ago in a four-overtime loss to Auburn, but still has a chance to win two games and earn the SEC’s auto-bid to the CFP. Or, at the very least, the Aggies can spoil a potentially special season for the Longhorns. Texas quarterback Quinn Ewers isn’t 100 percent healthy as he deals with an ankle injury, which could end up being a significant factor in this matchup (and a potential reason to bring in Arch Manning?) that I expect to come down to the wire at Kyle Field.

Will Ryan Day finally beat Michigan? The Ohio State coach has lost just nine games over six seasons. Three of those losses came to hated rival Michigan, otherwise known as That Team Up North. Day’s Buckeyes have lost to Michigan in each of the past three years, which is, frankly, unacceptable for the head coach at Ohio State. Day knows that. Earlier this week, he told 10TV’s GameTime that losing The Game to Michigan is “one of the worst things that’s happened to me in my life, quite honestly.” He continued, “Other than losing my father and a few other things, like it’s quite honestly, for my family, the worst thing that’s happened. So we can never have that happen again ever.” He can’t lose to this Michigan team, not this year. The Wolverines are 6-5 with one of the nation’s worst offenses. They are a shell of the national championship-winning team we saw back in January, and they are 21-point underdogs to the Buckeyes in Columbus. Day can’t lose this one, and he definitely shouldn’t.
Could USC spoil the season for Notre Dame? The answer is always, yes, it’s possible. But I don’t think the Trojans have what it takes this season, not after so many brutal losses and a quarterback change. The Irish have been the nation’s most dominant team over the past two months (and lead FBS in point differential over the course of the entire season), and I don’t expect them to let up with one game left and a CFP berth on the line. Notre Dame has an elite defense and an elite run game. The one thing we still don’t know is how the Irish would fare if they went down 10 or 14 points against a good team. Can Riley Leonard and the pass game be effective and efficient enough to get ’em back in the game? I’m not sure. But I also don’t think that USC is good enough on either side of the ball to pose that question to these Irish.
By the way, if Notre Dame crushes USC, it’ll likely be time for the Irish to jump Penn State in the CFP rankings. They’ll have a common opponent; the Nittany Lions eked out a win over the Trojans in overtime. Penn State fans are mad that this is even a possibility, but the selection committee has already excused Notre Dame’s bad loss to NIU. It’s also given the Nittany Lions credit for their good loss to Ohio State. This could be the kind of differentiator the committee will use as it sifts through its top teams over the final week-plus of the season.