ANN ARBOR, Mich. — Michigan, which believed it had a legitimate shot at the No. 1 ranking after a rout of Iowa in the Big Ten title game, is the No. 2 seed in the College Football Playoff and will face Georgia in the national championship semifinals.
The teams will meet Dec. 31 in the Orange Bowl, the winner advancing to the national championship game on Jan. 10 at Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis. Kickoff for the semifinal is 7:30 p.m. at Hard Rock Stadium in Miami Gardens, Florida, on ESPN.
Top seed Alabama, which defeated previous No. 1 Georgia in the Southeastern Conference championship on Saturday, and No. 4 seed Cincinnati will meet in the Cotton Bowl in the other semifinal. The pairings were announced Sunday during the CFP selection show.
"I thought we shoulda been No. 1," Michigan edge rusher and two-time captain Aidan Hutchinson said Sunday. "I mean, we just beat the No. 2 team (Ohio State) in the country, and then we beat the No. 13 (Iowa), but it is what is. We're in it. We're all so excited to play in Miami."
Michigan is 12-1 after a 42-3 rout of Iowa in the Big Ten Championship Game on Saturday night before a record crowd at Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis. This is the Wolverines' first Big Ten title since 2004.
The Wolverines, unranked in the preseason, said after winning the Big Ten title they believed Michigan should be the No. 1 seed. But it's all about being in this position, two wins from a national championship.
"I knew it was going to be either one or two," Michigan quarterback Cade McNamara said Sunday,, "but I figured either way we're in the playoff, we got a chance."
There had been some debate by college football analysts after the SEC and Big Ten conference championship games whether Michigan or Alabama should be No. 1.
Gary Barta, the CFP selection chair, made clear during his interview on ESPN that Alabama's 41-24 victory over Georgia, which had been the CFP No. 1, was enough to launch the Crimson Tide to the top spot ahead of Michigan.
"This was not only Alabama beat Georgia, but they controlled the game pretty much from the start to finish," Barta said. "So there's that, and you add that to their body of work. At the end of the day, now, Michigan, obviously a big win two weeks in a row now, looking great against Ohio State (last week) and against Iowa, but at the end of the end day it was a complete victory over Georgia.
"The committee came out of there with a strong consensus that Alabama was 1 and Michigan 2."
Coming off its 42-27 victory over Ohio State on Nov. 27, Michigan rose to No. 2 in the CFP rankings. This has been a remarkable season for the Wolverines, coming off last year's 2-4 record and picked in an informal media poll in July to finish fourth in the Big Ten East.
This will be the third meeting between Michigan and Georgia. The teams played in 1957 and 1965 and split those games.
McNamara said he already has reviewed the Iowa game film and will turn his attention to studying Georgia later today. For now, he said it's about the team enjoying the success of winning the Big Ten title and relaxing a bit.
"We're gonna have a little time off here. It will be good for the team to get healthy, let our minds settle for a second," McNamara said. "I think we're gonna come back with just as much juice as we came in the first day. That's a testament to the amount of effort and how much these guys care about winning. We have great leadership on this team and what needs to be said will be said, but I think we're in a good place right now."
That place is a national semifinal.
