The expansion of College football The playoff field has been a hot topic of conversation heading into the 2022 season.
After more than 14 months of haggling over details and questioning motives, a plan to expand the College Football Playoff to 12 teams was finally approved Friday, paving the way for a multibillion-dollar tournament as early as the 2024 season.
What remains to be determined is how quickly the current four-team model can be converted and implemented, but that will happen no later than 2026. When it does, the major college football championship will triple in size.
“It was a very historic day for college football,” said Mississippi State President Mark Keenum, Chairman of the CFP Board of Directors, continued a process that began in June 2021 with an ambitious project has been derailed for months by provincialism and distrust.
In a unanimous vote needed to continue rapid expansion, the 11 university leaders who make up the board of trustees approved the initial 12-team proposal. It calls the six highest-ranked conference champions and six at-large picks — determined by a selection committee — to the playoffs.
The top four seeds would be conference champions and would receive a bye into the second round. The first round matches would be played on campuses and the rest on pétanque sites.
A 12-team, 11-game playoff system to crown a champion could be worth as much as $2 billion in conference media rights who play major college football, starting in 2026.
“So our plans are to begin the 12-team format starting with the 2026 football season,” Keenum said. “However, we have asked our (conference) commissioners on the steering committee to explore the possibility of us beginning the 12-team playoff format before the 2026 seasons, either in 2024 or 2025. We, as board members, recognize that there are some pretty significant issues that need to be addressed.”
If the new format can be implemented before the current 12-year contract with ESPN expires, the conferences could bring in an additional $450 million over the final two years. The current deal brings in about $470 million a year.
CFP Executive Director Bill Hancock said ESPN, as part of its contract, would get first bid on any new playoff inventory added in 2024 and 2025.
Beyond 2025, there is no TV contract for a playoff. The plan is to release the new format on the open market and possibly involve multiple television partners instead of just ESPN.
The conference commissioners and Notre Dame The sports directors who make up the CFP steering committee are scheduled to meet Thursday in Dallas. Among the logistical hurdles they must overcome are match dates, hosting venues, Available television windows and impact on regular season schedule.
The committee must also determine how all of this new revenue will be shared and then have it approved by the chairs.
Hancock announced in February that expansion for the 2024 and 2025 seasons was off the table and that attention would turn to what the playoffs would look like for 2026 and beyond. Last month, the CFP has locked venues and dates for championship matches to play after the 2024 and 2025 seasons. In a 12-team playoff, these dates are expected to be pushed back.
But it’s the presidents who ultimately decide what happens in the playoffs, and they took matters into their own hands to advance expansion.
“It was time for us to make a decision,” Keenum said.
Even after the February announcement, there were signs that the initial expansion was not dead. At a June commissioners meeting in Utah, differences in optimism could be resolved.
“Actually, it wouldn’t surprise me once we agree on the format, if it happens before the end of the current legislature,” Pac-12 said Commissioner George Kliavkoff in July.
Kliavkoff was one of three relatively new Power Five commissioners, along with Kevin Warren (Big ten) and Jim Phillips (ACC), whose various objections to the 12 teams’ proposal stalled negotiations last year.
This 12-team plan had been developed over more than two years by a subgroup of the management committee that included Greg Sankey of Southeastern Conference. Skepticism has increased between the new commissioners, who had not been part of a process that began in 2019, and the others after it was revealed that the SEC would add Texas And Oklahoma at the power plant conference no later than 2025.
Now everyone is on board with the plan.
“The Pac-12 strongly supports the expansion of the CFP and welcomes the decision of the CFP Board of Directors,” Kliavkoff said in a statement. “The CFP expansion will provide increased access and excitement and is the right thing for our student-athletes and fans. We look forward to working with our fellow conferences to finalize the important elements of an expanded CFP to launch it as soon as possible.”
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
