The first-ever 12-team College Football Playoff is down to just four schools, and only three games remain before a national champion is crowned. Though the season is winding down, there is plenty of drama left to unfold,

Notre Dame is a slim favorite over the Nittany Lions, but the teams enter the Orange Bowl evenly and uniquely matched.

It's been a long time since either Notre Dame or Penn State reached college football's mountaintop as national champions. It was 1988 for the Fighting Irish, 1986 for the Nittany Lions. There's been good seasons and bad seasons in the three-plus decades that have followed,