Officiating assignments announced for College Football Playoff semifinals, championship

We’ve known the pairings for the College Football Playoff semifinals - at one point in ancient history known as the Rose Bowl and Sugar Bowl - for more than a week now, but on Monday we learned the third team on the field for both the semifinals and the championship.

Officials for #CFBPlayoff semis: Rose: SEC, Sugar: Pac12. Champ Game: BigXII crew.

— Chris Fowler (@cbfowler) December 15, 2014

Bowl games require neutral officiating outfits, which allows SEC refs to oversee the ACC-Pac-12 Rose Bowl and Pac-12 refs to work the SEC-Big Ten Sugar Bowl. And with zero teams in the four-team playoff, the Big 12 was a natural choice to work the championship game since it is the only Power Five conference guaranteed not to have a conflict of interest.

That sound of a sad trombone you hear is coming from Bob Bowlsby‘s office.

As a reminder, the CFP semifinal pairings:

- Rose Bowl: No. 2 Oregon vs. No. 3 Florida State (5:30 p.m. ET)
- Sugar Bowl: No. 1 Alabama vs. No. 4 Ohio State (8 p.m. ET)

The College Football Playoff championship will take place Jan. 12 at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas. All games will be televised by ESPN.