The Pulse Newsletter 📣 | This is The Athletic’s daily sports newsletter. Sign up here to receive The Pulse directly in your inbox.Good morning! Get a timely hit today. Inside:
Data: A numbers-based distractionThe worlds of the WNBA and college sports have never been more engulfed by off-court/field stories. Just look at yesterday’s Pulse to see what courts, temporary restraining orders and NIL have wrought on college sports, fair or not. And in the WNBA, this season has simply seen a parade of forced negativity that would make most leagues crumble. The solution, which we’ve mentioned in this space plenty of times, is to focus on the actual competition. I’ve got two tools for us to do that today, fresh off the presses. Let’s start with football: This week, The Athletic published its 2026 College Football Playoff projection bracket, which will be used all season, odds updating as the games happen. There are odds for making the Playoff, winning a conference (if applicable), hosting a Playoff game, getting a first-round bye and winning the whole thing.
Our teams most likely to make the Playoff as Week 0 arrives: Notre Dame (76 percent), Texas Tech (72 percent), Miami (71 percent) and Ohio State (also 71). See all the data here.
