College Football Playoff to Continue Four-Team Format Through 2025
The inevitable has officially been announced as the talks of expanding the College Football Playoff have been taken off the table for a while.
ESPN’s Pete Thamel broke the news that the announcement was expected sometime today and shortly thereafter it was confirmed in a statement from Bill Hancock, the Executive Director of the College Football Playoff.
“The CFP Board of Managers met via video conference yesterday, as a follow-up to a video meeting earlier this week conducted by the CFP Management Committee.
“The Board of Managers has accepted a recommendation from the Management Committee to continue the current four-team playoff for the next four years, as called for in the CFP’s original 12-year plan. At the same time, the Board expects the Management Committee to continue its discussions of a new format that would go into effect for the 2026-27 season.
“Even though the outcome did not lead to a recommendation for an early expansion before the end of the current 12-year contract, the discussions have been helpful and informative. I am sure they will serve as a useful guide for the Board of Managers and for the Management Committee as we determine what the Playoff will look like beginning in the 2026-2027 season.
“I thank the working group for its hard work that resulted in the 12-team proposal, and the Management Committee for its thorough and diligent job reviewing it and other possible expansion ideas. This has been a long, careful, and detailed process that involved many people considering a complex matter. I am grateful to everyone for their dedication to college football and the detailed and deliberative effort everyone put into the consideration of a different format. I know the four-team event will continue to be successful.”
Now that the current playoff model will be used through 2025, there are some very interesting questions that arise.
Will Oklahoma and Texas stick around for the length of their contract with the Big 12 instead of jumping ship early, as was the expectation from nearly everyone close to the situation?
Will there be a review process after the 2025 season delaying the expansion even further, or will the talking heads of college football reach an agreement before that time?
Only time will tell us the answers, but with everything concerning the playoff at a standstill, we have plenty of that to go around.
