ATHENS — The college football world can feel the earth moving beneath its feet once more.
The SEC’s move to a nine-game league schedule in 2026, announced on Thursday, opens the door for more talk about College Football Playoff expansion as early as 2026.
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Greg Sankey, the SEC commissioner, announced the news of the schedule expansion on Thursday, referencing television ratings and fans and athletes benefitting from traveling to more SEC destinations.
The SEC schools would also receive additional money from ESPN by planning another league game, as much as $5 million each annually per a Yahoo report.
Teams will play three opponents annually and rotate the other six games among the remaining league members.
That will lead to teams playing twice against each SEC opponent, home and away, within a four-year cycle under the new league schedule model.
The SEC has yet to announce who the three annual rivals are for each school.
Jim Phillips, the commissioner of the ACC, said at his league’s media kickoff event in Charlotte, N.C., in July the ACC could move to a nine-game conference schedule if the SEC were to make that move.
“We discussed nine several times in my five years as commissioner,” Phillip said “…. if the SEC ends up going to nine and maybe we end up going to nine, I think there’s a few challenges.”
The ACC having 17 teams presents a challenge for the league members to play an odd number of conference games.
There has been some discussion of counting games against Notre Dame — a member of the ACC in all sports except football — in the conference standings.
However the ACC works things out, it’s likely an expanded version of the College Football Playoff is coming sooner than later.
The most popular model to emerge from the respective conference’s “media days” this summer was the “5-11.”
The 5-11 model involves the four power conference champions (SEC, Big Ten, Big 12 and ACC) receiving an automatic berth along with the highest-ranked Group of 6 champion, as determined by the College Football Playoff Selection committee, and then the next highest-ranked 11 teams receiving at-large bids.
Big Ten coaches, including Bret Bielema — who once coached in the SEC while at Arkansas — had indicated they would not want the 5-11 model unless all conferences played nine league games.
“I think until you get to nine for everybody,” Bielema said in an ESPN interview, “I don’t think it could work.”
The Big Ten also recently proposed a 24- or 28-team CFP field. The concept was not among the most popular with fans, but Georgia coach Kirby Smart said if “done the right way” he would support it.
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The SEC coaches’ reluctance to move from an eight- to nine-game scheduled centered around a general lack of confidence that the CFP Selection Committee would recognize — or reward — the league’s teams for playing a more difficult schedule when compiling their rankings.
This, after three-loss teams Alabama, Ole Miss and South Carolina were left out of last season’s 12-team playoff field at the expense of at-large teams Indiana and SMU.
The Hoosiers and Mustangs had fewer losses than those three SEC teams, but they lacked the impressive wins the SEC teams’ boasted.
Sankey indicated the addition of an enhanced scheduling metric to be used by the College Football Playoff Selection Committee — announced on Wednesday — was part of the SEC’s decision to go to nine games.
Per the CFP, “The current schedule strength metric has been adjusted to apply greater weight to games against strong opponents.”
Sankey is buying in.
“It’s not a destination, but the honoring of schedule strength that has been communicated is really important for the Southeastern Conference,” Sankey said on the Paul Finebaum Show on Wednesday.
“Not everyone agrees (with the expanded schedule), I’m certain that our coaches are concerned about the competitive aspect,” Sankey said. “We have to continue to improve the selection process for the postseason …. “
The SEC has 10 of its 16 teams (62.5 percent) of its teams ranked in the AP preseason Top 25, while the Big Ten has six teams in the Top 25 (24 percent), the Big 12 four teams (16 percent) and the ACC three teams (12 percent).
College football leadership has a Dec. 1 deadline to decide on a College Football Playoff format to apply for the 2026 season and beyond.
