The College Football Playoff semifinals wrap up on Friday evening as top-seeded Indiana and fifth-seeded Oregon look to punch their ticket to the national championship with a victory in the Peach Bowl.
This marks the fifth all-time meeting between the two programs, with the Ducks winning both games of a home-and-home series in 1963-64 and the Hoosiers taking two games in Eugene, including victories in 2004 and earlier this season in their first matchup as Big Ten foes.
As the highest-seeded team in the College Football Playoff, Indiana will wear its standard home uniforms of crimson helmets, crimson jerseys and white pants in each game as it advances through the postseason. It’s the same look the Hoosiers wore in their 38-3 win over Alabama in the Rose Bowl, as well.
Oregon, meanwhile, will wear its third different combination in as many games, as they’ll wear green helmets, white jerseys and white pants after wearing green helmets, green jerseys and yellow pants in a 51-34 win over JMU in the first round and black helmets, white jerseys and gray pants in a 23-0 win over Texas Tech in the Capital One Orange Bowl.
The Ducks have never played in the Peach Bowl, while the Hoosiers are making their third trip to Atlanta, as they suffered a 27-22 loss to Tennessee in 1987-88 and 27-23 loss to Auburn in 1990-91, though those games were played at Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium instead of Mercedes-Benz Stadium, home of the NFL’s Atlanta Falcons.
As for Friday’s field design, it features the Peach Bowl logo at the 50-yard line, with an advertisement for Chick-fil-A and a College Football Playoff semifinal wordmark at the 25-yard lines, which is the standard practice for the quarterfinals and semifinals that rotate among the Cotton, Fiesta, Orange, Peach, Rose and Sugar bowls.
The Ducks’ end zone is apple green with a yellow “Oregon” wordmark, while the Hoosiers’ end zone is crimson with a white “Indiana” wordmark. Both end zones also have the College Football Playoff logo to the left of the wordmark, and they sit on opposite corners of the field.
The winner of Friday’s game will advance to the College Football Playoff National Championship, where they will take on Miami on Jan. 19. It will be a de facto home game for the Hurricanes, who have played at Hard Rock Stadium, home of the NFL’s Miami Dolphins, since 2008.
Interestingly, Miami has won three of its five national titles in its home stadium, including the 1983, 1987 and 1991 titles at the Orange Bowl. They’ve worn white jerseys in all five of their national championship victories, which – coincidentally – were over teams that wore (a shade of) red jerseys over white pants.
Is that a good sign for Indiana tonight? And will they then join the likes of Alabama, Nebraska and Oklahoma as teams with a red and white color palette to fall to Miami in the national championship? We’ll see…
Photo courtesy of @CFAPeachBowl on X/Twitter.
