Run a college football pick'em
Pick every Saturday's winners. Rivalry weeks, ranked upsets, pure chaos - and a leaderboard to prove you saw it coming.
Free for groups up to 10. No app, no spreadsheet.
A college football pick'em is a weekly pool where players pick the winners of each Saturday's games - the top matchups or the full slate - and score a point for every correct call. The highest total over the season takes the bragging rights.
How it works
Create the pool
Set up your college football pick'em - trim a 60-game Saturday to the matchups your group actually wants, set when picks lock, and launch in minutes.
Share the link
One link to the group chat or alumni thread. Players join with a display name - no accounts, nothing to install.
Pick and climb
Everyone picks the weekend's winners. We auto-grade Saturday's carnage and stack the points on a live leaderboard.
College football pick'em rules
A college football pick'em - also spelled pickem or pick em - is a pick'em pool built for the wildest schedule in sports. Every Saturday you pick winners across a massive NCAA football slate, points stack all season, and the leaderboard sorts the diehards from the bandwagon.
CFB is tailor-made for it: huge weekly slates, ranked teams getting stunned, and rivalry games that wreck everyone's bracket at once.
The core rules
- Pick the slate. Each week you choose winners for the games in your pool - trim it to ranked matchups or go full chaos with the whole board.
- Score the winners. Correct picks earn points; most points wins. Run it weekly, season-long, or both.
- It stacks all season. From Week 0 through conference championships and bowl season, the standings carry over.
- Survive rivalry week. Upset-heavy weekends are where pools are won and lost - everyone misses the same chalk, so the contrarian calls pay off.
Scoring variations
- Straight up. Just pick winners, one point each - simplest, best for big casual groups, and the format Trofeo.live scores for you.
- Against the spread. Pick after the points so loading up on top-five teams every week isn't an auto-win. A popular house format, but not one we score - you'd track the lines yourself.
- Confidence. Weight each pick by how sure you are. Also not live here yet; the format is explained on the confidence pool page.
Formats & tiebreakers
Run it for a friend group, a dorm, or the whole alumni network - and pair it with an NFL pick'em for a year-round football season. Players level on points share the leaderboard position, so if bowl season has to produce one winner, agree the decider before it starts.
First time running one? The step-by-step walkthrough is in how to run a college football pick'em pool - slate size, lock deadlines, scoring choices and the strategy that keeps a pool alive past September.
College football pick'em strategy
College football is the hardest pick'em in sports and the most winnable pool, for the same reason: the talent gaps are enormous and the variance is absurd. Play for that, not against it.
Take the mismatches without thinking about them
A quarter of any Saturday slate is a top-15 team hosting somebody who shouldn't be on the field. Those are free points. Take every one of them, every week, and don't talk yourself into a "trap game" narrative because a podcast said so - the blowout happens far more often than the upset.
Spend all your bravery on the toss-ups
Once the mismatches are banked, a slate has maybe four games that are genuinely close. That's where pools are decided, and where the field splits. If you're going to be contrarian, be contrarian there.
Fade the road favourite in a hostile stadium
Home field is worth more in college than in the NFL - a ranked team on the road at night in a full stadium loses games it wins at home. It's the single most reliable source of upsets on a college slate, and the pick that separates you from a field that just takes the higher ranking.
Rivalry week burns everyone equally
Late-November rivalry games break form completely, and the pool will mostly miss the same ones. That means two things: don't panic when your Saturday looks terrible, and don't try to be clever across the whole slate. Pick the two rivalry games you have an actual read on and take the chalk everywhere else.
Bowl season is a different game
Bowls are decided by who cares and who's available - opt-outs, transfers, a coach who's already left, a month of layoff. Recent form matters less than motivation. Check the roster news before every bowl pick, because a team that's fully bought in beats a better team that isn't, and the field will still be picking on September rankings.
Keep the slate small enough that people play
The most common way a college pool dies is asking casual fans for 50 picks. Trim it to the ranked and rivalry games - as commissioner you set which games count - and the group stays in it through December. A pool everyone finishes beats a thorough one half of them abandon in week three.
Setting one up for the first time? The full walkthrough - slate size, lock deadlines and scoring choices - is in how to run a college football pick'em pool.
Why run it on Trofeo.live
A 50-game college slate is a spreadsheet death sentence. Trofeo.live grades every Saturday for you so you can actually watch the games.
- Auto-grading. Every result scored as it finishes, straight up - one point per correct pick, no commissioner sheet.
- Live leaderboard. Standings update in real time across the whole season and into the bowls.
- Public proof. Called the upset of the week? Gassed up. Picked the team that got blown out? Roasted.
- No app for players. You set it up; they pick from a link with a name.
Set your slate, share the link, and let rivalry week do its worst.
Rivalry week has receipts
Saturdays are chaos and everyone's a genius on Sunday morning. Trofeo.live keeps every pick on record, so the upset you called - or the one you fumbled - is right there for the group to see.
FAQ
What is a college football pick'em pool?+
It's a group game where everyone picks the winners of college football games each week. Correct picks earn points that accumulate all season - through rivalry week, conference championships, and bowl season - and the highest total wins.
Is a college football pick'em the same as an NCAA or CFB pick'em?+
Yes - college football pick'em, NCAA football pick'em, CFB pick'em and plain college pickem all describe the same game: everyone picks the winners of that week's college football games and scores a point per correct call. Only the spelling changes, never the format.
Can I pick only ranked games instead of the whole slate?+
Yes. You choose which games go into your pool each week - keep it to the ranked or marquee matchups, or open it up to the full board for maximum chaos. It's your call as the organizer.
Does it cover bowl season and the playoff?+
Yes - run the pool right through the conference championships, bowls, and the College Football Playoff. Many groups make bowl season its own bonus round.
Can I run a college and an NFL pick'em together?+
Absolutely - plenty of groups run a college football pick'em on Saturdays and an NFL pick'em on Sundays for a full-weekend football season. Each is its own pool with its own leaderboard.
What's the best strategy for a college football pick'em pool?+
Bank every mismatch without overthinking it - a quarter of any Saturday slate is a ranked team against an overmatched opponent, and those are free points. Then spend your contrarian picks only on the handful of genuinely close games, and fade ranked road teams playing at night in hostile stadiums, which is where college upsets actually come from. In rivalry week, pick the two games you have a real read on and take the chalk everywhere else.
I'm running a college football pool for the first time - what do I need to decide?+
Four things: which games count each week (trim the 60-game Saturday to the ranked and rivalry matchups so casual players stay in), whether picks lock at each kickoff or all at the first one, whether you're crowning a weekly winner or a season champion or both, and what happens if two players tie. Agree the tie decider before Week 0 - that's the argument every pool has in December.
How is bowl pick'em different from the regular season?+
Bowls turn on availability and motivation rather than form: opt-outs, transfers, a departing coach, and a month off all matter more than a team's September ranking. Check roster news before each pick. Many groups run bowl season as its own bonus round with a separate leaderboard, so someone out of the season race still has something to play for.
Is it free?+
Yes - free for groups up to 10 players. Bigger pools and custom branding are available on paid plans.
Run a college football pick'em
Pick every Saturday's winners. Rivalry weeks, ranked upsets, pure chaos - and a leaderboard to prove you saw it coming.
Free for groups up to 10. No app, no spreadsheet.