The landscape of college sports — especially college football — is changing dramatically, and this year has brought a number of high-profile announcements. The most recent of these has to do with an expanded college football playoff, which would encompass a total of 12 teams. At a time when some observers of the sport are noting college football’s evolution into something like the NFL, this seems like another step in that direction.
At the time that the expanded playoffs were announced, the timeframe provided wasn’t definitive, and looked to be happening somewhere between 2024 and 2026. Turns out that the later side of that is more likely, based on recent comments made by the SEC’s commissioner, Greg Sankey.
According an ESPN report, Sankey addressed reports of the expanded playoffs before this weekend’s Georgia/Oregon matchup. He advised some measure of caution when it comes to the playoff schedule. “There’s a bunch of moving parts,” Sankey said. “That’s where I wish we could have used the last nine months to work.”
Sankey went on to address conferences’ decisions to expand and the television rights that are interwoven with that. “Ours is slated for 2025, and we made that decision knowing it could be a four-team playoff then,” he told members of the press. All of which is to say that — based on Sankey’s comments — 2026 might be the first season for an expanded college playoff. Though at this point, it seems entirely possible that more could change between now and then.
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