What's the Latest Discourse on CFP Expansion?

The eyes of the college football world will descend on Hard Rock Stadium in Miami, Florida, tonight for the CFP National Championship between Miami and Indiana. While 20 million people (or more) will watch Fernando Mendoza and Carson Beck duel for the national title, many will forget that just two seasons ago, the Hurricanes would have never sniffed a playoff appearance with their 10-2 regular season record. The 2024 national champion, Ohio State, would not have seen a playoff appearance either had it not been for playoff expansion, which has yet again become a hot-button topic in college football.

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As Curt Cignetti and Mario Cristobal lead Indiana and Miami, respectively, tonight on the gridiron, down the street in a hotel ballroom, decision makers have yet again broached the topic of playoff expansion, just two seasons after expanding from the four-team playoff (which stood for 10 years) to the 12-team playoff (which will wrap its second iteration on Monday night). The discourse is not "will it expand", however. The sticking point is, "What will we expand to?"

According to Ross Dellenger of Yahoo Sports, the major divide in the room is between the two largest players: the SEC and the Big Ten. The SEC, led by commissioner Greg Sankey, wants to keep the CFP at 12 teams, but is targeting a 16-team field if expansion is inevitable. Meanwhile, the Big Ten, led by commissioner Tony Pettiti, intends to expand to 24 teams. As of now, the college football calendar would not support expansion, with the Army-Navy game taking place the Saturday after conference championships, and the first round of the playoffs starting the following week (the weekend before Christmas).

The first iteration of playoff expansion began a process that has quickly created a slippery slope: devaluing the most valuable regular season in sports. College football was built on tradition, and a 24-team playoff, at least at the FBS level, is anything but traditional. If a team loses a quarter (or more) of its regular-season games, then is that team truly worthy of competing for a national title? It works in smaller divisions of football because the talent level is equal, and while NIL and the transfer portal have brought more parity to the FBS level, the talent still pools at the top. According to the 247 Sports team recruiting rankings, you have to go all the way to number 10 to find a non-SEC/Big Ten/Notre Dame team. Miami sits at number 10, and the Hurricanes still suffered two losses before playing for a national title on Monday night. The first Big 12 team that appears is Texas Tech at No. 18. The highest non-Power Four team is Boise State at No. 51.

12 teams is a perfectly acceptable model. It prevents one slip-up from derailing an entire season, as is the case with the 2025 Alabama Crimson Tide (who had three losses going into the playoffs). Expansion doesn't feel like the answer, but rather, an adjustment to the current model combined with a calendar adjustment.

The Adjustments

12 teams is perfectly acceptable, but the timing isn't. The four teams with byes for the 2025 College Football Playoff (Indiana, Ohio State, Georgia, Texas Tech) spent a month off in between their final games during conference championship weekend and their first playoff game. Teams that played in the first round (Oregon, Texas A&M, Ole Miss, Oklahoma, Alabama, Miami, Tulane, and James Madison) also got a bye week due to the calendar of the Army-Navy game. The solution is simple: move the Army-Navy game.

President Trump signed an executive order giving the Army-Navy game an exclusive four-hour window for their contest, which is fine. Move it to week one and play it on either Sunday or Monday (Labor Day) in an exclusive window. We do it already with games during week one, and Army-Navy to introduce the new season would still give the game the proper pageantry that it deserves. This would open the playoffs to move up a week and start after conference championships (or the conclusion of the season, mirroring the NFL calendar). This still rewards teams who get the first-round bye while shortening the college football calendar to be more in line with the academic calendar.

Playoff discourse will continue until the adults in the room wise up and understand that the current model is perfectly acceptable, but with minor tweaks, we can continue to grow the game and thereby drive more revenue, which is the root of all these discussions, without devaluing the greatest regular season in sports.

Wyatt Fulton is the Tide 100.9 DME and Brand Manager, primarily covering Alabama Crimson Tide football and men's basketball. For more Crimson Tide coverage, follow Wyatt on X (Formerly known as Twitter) at @FultonW_.