Hey, you. Yeah! I’m talking to you! The college football fan who’s been watching the NBA over the last three months – pay attention!
The landscape of college football has evolved. Maybe you’ve kept up with everything week-to-week since the season ended. Maybe you clocked out after Michigan won the title game on January 8th.
Either way, this is your alarm clock. Most FBS colleges are already hosting their spring games this month. This spring primer will catch you up on everything you need to know by the time next season rolls around. That way, you can impress your cousins by saying something like, “Y’know, I think Dante Moore should be Lanning’s QB1.”
Remind me, the Pac-12 is dead, right? Why did that happen?
Correct. The Pac-12 couldn’t keep up financially with the other Power Five and will only feature two teams next season: Oregon State and Washington State. In order to play a full season, the Beavers and Cougars made a deal with the Mountain West to fill out their schedule.
The Pac-12’s former members are scattered across the nation. California and Stanford will be in the ACC, the Big 12 now has Arizona, Arizona State, Colorado and Utah, while the Big 10 took in UCLA, Oregon, USC and Washington.
Why are all these teams moving conferences?
Two reasons: media rights and money.
In 2020, the New York Times broke a story that ESPN made a deal worth $3 billion with the SEC for the rights to broadcast their games. According to an IndyStar report from 2023, the Big 10 made a broadcasting deal with CBS, NBC and Fox for seven years worth up to $8 billion.
Both of those deals begin this season.
ESPN tried to make a deal with the Pac-12 to broadcast their games, but the conference held out to try and get more money. ESPN called their bluff, got the rights to the SEC and the Pac-12 is dead because of it.
The Pac-12 isn’t the first conference to experience the loss of big schools though. Texas and Oklahoma were the first powerhouses to leave their conference in 2020 when the rivals accepted deals to leave the Big 12 for the SEC – another deal that will start this season.
So that’s all that I need to know for conference realignment?
Not quite. There’s the whole Florida State vs. ACC debacle.
ACC schools are currently locked into a deal with ESPN that started in 2016 where each school would receive about $40 million per year for broadcasting rights until 2036.
That’s a 20-year deal with no room to negotiate.
Florida State isn’t happy with that $40 million. Why? Because SEC and Big 10 schools are set to make $75 million a year.
FSU wants to leave the ACC (inevitably to join a conference that will give them more cash), but to do that, they are required to pay an exit fee.
Texas and Oklahoma had to do the same thing to leave the Big 12 early, but their exit fee was a combined $100 million. Because the ACC’s deal lasts so long, FSU’s exit will cost somewhere in the hundreds of millions of dollars.
The Seminoles filed a lawsuit against the ACC in December, and Clemson followed their example by filing their own lawsuit in March. If the two schools win and leave the ACC without paying their exit fee, there’s no telling how many other schools may try to play conference hopscotch.
To summarize, there is no more Power Five. The Pac-12 is dead. The Big 10 and the SEC are set to make more money than any other conference and don’t expect conference realignment to stop anytime soon.
That all makes sense. Which teams are projected as the favorites right now?
First off, there’s the Georgia Bulldogs and Texas Longhorns. While the Bulldogs may have failed to three-peat last season, they will start next year as the heavy favorites to return to the title game behind senior quarterback Carson Beck. Texas is in a similar boat with starter Quinn Ewers returning one year removed from losing in the semi-finals to Washington last season.
Right behind the two of them will be Oregon. Head coach Dan Lanning lost his starter Bo Nix to the NFL draft and will have to replace him with…one of two starting-caliber quarterbacks who transferred to Eugene this season (Dillon Gabriel from Oklahoma and Dante Moore from UCLA). Talk about a good problem to have.
Michigan will have a tough time repeating as champions after losing over half of their starters to the NFL Draft. Ohio State isn’t going anywhere but has some questions to answer after losing to the Wolverines for the third straight year.
Finally, we have the enigma that all of college football is hoping to solve. No one knows what will happen this season to the perennial contenders in Tuscaloosa as the Alabama Crimson Tide will have their first season without Nick Saban since 2007.
Right, Nick Saban finally retired. What does that mean for Alabama?
Not even three days after Saban announced his retirement, Alabama announced Kalen DeBoer to be the heir apparent to Saban’s throne. After taking Washington to the National Championship last season, he’ll now be competing in the SEC – the conference that produced 40% of playoff teams in the CFP era.
DeBoer was one of the best options to take Alabama into the future, but he’s not just stepping into any coach’s shoes. He’ll be trying to fill some of the biggest shoes in college football history.
Fortunately for him, he’s got two things going his way. First, starting quarterback Jalen Milroe will be under center for his senior year, so DeBoer won’t have to try to find a new face to helm the Alabama offense.
Second, with the 12-team playoff being implemented this year, putting together a great season will still give the Crimson Tide a shot at the National Title and satiate the reasonable Alabama fans, even if he doesn’t win the SEC.
So the 12-team playoff is official?
You got it.
There had been a push for playoff expansion for a few years, but fans and analysts were divided on whether or not an expanded playoff would be good for the game. But after undefeated ACC champion Florida State was left out of last year’s playoff, the straw broke the camel’s back and a 12-team playoff became inevitable.
All 10 conference commissioners, and Notre Dame, agreed to a 12-team format where the top five conference champions will automatically make the playoffs with the top four teams earning bye weeks.
The first round of the playoff will also be hosted at the higher-seeded team’s stadium, giving college campuses the chance to host playoff games.
This all sounds like fun and games, but don’t get comfortable with 12 teams. There’s a push among college commissioners to create a new-and-improved 14-team playoff that would start in 2026 because of…well, because of money.
Wait, 14 teams? I thought everyone was happy with 12, when did that happen?
After the agreement for a 12-team playoff became official, it didn’t take long for commissioners to start itching to make the playoff larger for one main reason: automatic qualification.
The current contract of the College Football Playoff only mentions that the 2026 playoff will have at least 12 teams, there could be more, which brings us to the current 14-team proposal.
In this proposal, that probably will almost definitely happen, the SEC and the Big 10 will get three – yes three – teams that automatically qualify for the playoff. The ACC and Big 12 will get two slots each and one Group of 5 school has a guaranteed slot which leaves three at-large spots. If Notre Dame is in the top 14, they automatically get one of those three slots.
If this goes through, three things would happen: First, the Power Four, and especially the SEC and Big 10, would gain a massive amount of power and control over the playoff.
Second, it leaves the Group of 5 teams with almost no power at all and only one small seat at a massive playoff table. Granted, their schools are smaller and not as competitive as the Power Four, and earning automatic qualification is great, but this deal would clearly benefit the larger conferences. One Group of 5 athletic director told ESPN that the 14-team deal was like having to accept an offer straight out of “The Godfather.”
Finally, there’s a high possibility that a 14-team playoff with 11 automatic qualifiers would cause the regular season to lose much of its excitement.
For example, hypothetically let's say that Georgia beats Alabama in the regular season on Sept. 28 this year. Let's say Alabama then wins the rest of their games, makes the SEC Championship and loses to the Bulldogs again. If the Tide’s only two losses are to one of the best schools in the country, they’ll still earn an automatic qualification to the playoffs…
…where they could play Georgia…for a third time.
Bingo.
That seems like it would make the regular season a bit pointless.
Therein lies the concern of fans across the nation. Part of the magic of college football is how tense each game is. One loss could upend a team’s entire season. Every game is a must-watch thrill ride. But if there are so many automatic qualifiers, that magic could go away and that sense of risk and those tense moments may evaporate.
Things can only go a couple of ways. Fans might love the extended playoff and the potential to see upsets and thrilling revenge games and want more. The extended playoff might be predictable, full of blowouts and make the regular season pointless, leaving fans despondent.
Most likely? In 2026 the 14-team playoff will become a reality and we’ll have to live with it.
We’ll just have to wait and see.
That’s…pretty bleak. Should I even be excited for next season?
Absolutely! Don’t let 2026’s worries get you down, this is still college football we’re talking about. The SEC and Big 10 are going to be amazing to watch, Texas has to play Georgia and Michigan in the same season, and there will always be exciting players, impossible storylines, massive upsets and games we’ll be talking about for years to come.
We should all be excited when college football comes back…just don’t get so caught up in the hype that you miss what’s looming on the horizon.
Now go enjoy April’s spring games, call a friend, and show off a little bit by saying something witty like “I think Kalen DeBoer is a proven winner who just needed to be at the right school to win an NCAA title. Alabama will be fine.”
Just don’t forget who taught you that in the first place.
