The recent news that the College Football Playoff will not be expanding in the immediate future has drawn reaction from some of the leaders who had a say in whether or not it happened, including SEC Commissioner Greg Sankey.
The vote by the CFP management committee to expand the four-team playoff by 2024 — two years before the CFP’s contract with ESPN expires — was eight in favor of it and three opposed. The management committee is comprised of the 10 Football Bowl Subdivision conference commissioners and Notre Dame athletic director Jack Swarbrick.
The three dissenting votes came from the ACC, Pac-12 and Big Ten, according to Sports Illustrated’s Ross Dellenger. While the majority were in favor of expansion, the vote had to be unanimous in order for it to happen before the ESPN contract runs out at the end of the 2025.
The opposing votes came as no surprise. ACC Commissioner Jim Phillips has been the most vocal opponent to playoff expansion before the 2026 season, opining that there are more pressing issues that first need addressing in college athletics. The Big Ten and Pac-12 teamed up with the ACC last year to form an alliance to try to take back some power in the sport, so the three conferences were unified in their stance against expansion for now.
Among the concerns voiced by Phillips is the physical toll that playing more games could take on the student-athletes. Sankey, who was also part of a four-person subcommittee that helped come up with the 12-team proposal last summer, told The Associated Press that the group looked at more than 60 playoff models and have come up with solutions to some of the concerns voiced by Phillips and others.
Sankey suggested there’s more at play there.
“What strikes me as unfortunate is people haven’t wanted to act on those (solutions) as they protect their own interests,” Sankey said, according to the AP.
Now that expansion won’t be happening until at least 2026, Sankey said he could have some reluctancy to support expansion in the future. Sankey’s conference has been represented in the playoff every season since its inception in 2014. Georgia and Alabama played in the national title game this past season, the second time two SEC teams have met in the final.
But, according to the AP, Sankey has liked the idea of an expanded playoff helping grow interest in college football nationally. Whether it’s something the SEC supports in the future remains to be seen.
“We’re going to have to go and rethink our position based on how others have approached the conversation that, really, they initiated,” Sankey said. “And I don’t expect that to get any easier.”
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