The entire talk of the offseason in College Football has been around potentially expanding the College Football Playoff. After just one season in the 12 Team College Football Playoff format, the Conference Commissioners have met constantly about expanding the Playoff potentially to 16 teams. The only true progress that has been made has been moving to a straight seeding format meaning the 12 best teams will be seeded 1-12.
As the Conference Commissioners have met to discuss a potential new format several options have come up. Some of the top proposals have been just adding 4 at-large teams to the current format, expanding with 4 guaranteed bids for the SEC and Big 10 with 2 guaranteed bids for the ACC and Big 12, and a format with 5 bids to Conference Champions and 11 at-large bids.
While several different formats have been proposed, none of them have been agreed upon to this point. The Big 12 and ACC rightfully took issue with the SEC and Big 10 pushing for more guaranteed bids which makes sense as a down year in either Conference would keep the Playoff from having the best teams. The SEC moved away from that model opting for a model that favors strength of schedule.
After a ton of debate between the commissioners, they'll be restarting the conversations as they were never able to get anywhere.
Conference commissioners have decided to “start over” on determining 2026 College Football Playoff format, sources said. Big Ten & SEC initially wanted 4 AQs each w/2 each to ACC & Big 12. However, ACC & Big 12 pushed back. SEC coaches later publicly did not support 4 AQ model…
— Brett McMurphy (@Brett_McMurphy) June 18, 2025
In the end, the stubbornness of the Big 10 and SEC is going to rob College Football fans of finally getting a solution to the College Football Playoff. The push by both conferences to get formats that best suit themselves are self serving and will never allow for a solution to be reached.
If the Big 10 and the SEC are that much better than every other league, they should simply be okay with any format that expands the Playoff. The sport gives each team a great chance to earn it on the field as they can schedule the top programs and if they win on the field there's a clear path to making it into the Playoff.
Instead, College Football fans will be left hearing about the commissioners meeting for Months with no solution as further changes continue to be held over the heads of the fans.