The Big Ten might have the most outlandish idea ever for College Football. The conference is reportedly talking about the idea of a College Football Playoff expansion to 24 or even 28 teams. They want to mirror the NCAA Basketball March Madness with Winter Madness I suppose. Let me be clear: this is ridiculous. College football doesn’t need a bloated, watered-down tournament. The bowl games have already lost value and meaning. It now seems like a chance for a company to slap their name on something else. The College Football Playoffs should be a meaningful time and have only eight teams.
Photo Cred: Spectrum News
The proposed Big Ten model would eliminate conference title games. That should be the first deal breaker. It would hand out auto bids like candy and sour already frustrated fans. It would put double digit playoff games on campus. Sure, that might sound exciting but it completely misses the heart of the sport. College football’s magic has always been the sense that every single Saturday matters. Expanding to nearly all of the rank teams by seasons end makes the regular season into nothing more than a jockeying contest for seeds rather than a fight to get in.
We are watching the traditions of college football erode, one “expansion” at a time, and all of it is being driven by money. We lost the original Pac-12 and Cal and Stanford plays in the ACC, and Mountain West is no longer what it was. Conferences are chasing TV deals and playoff shares. Every year a new building goes up on campus but the sports suffer. Rivalries lose their bite when three losses still get you into the postseason. November Saturdays take you out, not put you in. Conference championship games should be a do-or-die spectacles. It would vanish entirely, erased for the sake of a few extra playoff matchups with 3 and 4 lost teams.
And let’s be honest: a 28-team playoff isn’t about access or fairness. It’s about greed. TV money and content demand is ruining everything. More games mean more TV contracts, more ad revenue, more tickets sold. But does the product get over saturated. College football doesn’t need to mimic professional leagues or the NCAA basketball tournament. Its charm is that the season is the playoff, and every week carries national implications. Strip that away, and you strip away the very soul of the sport.
Photo Cred: Patriot Press
Here’s what actually makes sense:
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Eight teams, not 28. Each Power Four champion (or Power Five, if the Pac-12 can climb back to relevance) gets an automatic spot. Scrap the divisions and let the two best teams play for the conference crown on Championship Saturday. Winner gets in. Simple, fair, and still meaningful.
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Home-field championships. Put those title games back where they belong: on campus. Imagine an SEC championship in Death Valley or a Big Ten title game under the lights in Ann Arbor. The electricity, the pageantry, the student sections—it would be unmatched. That’s the atmosphere college football should be doubling down on, not neutral-site stadiums designed for TV.
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A chance for outsiders. The top-ranked Group of Five (or “non-Power Four”) champion gets the 8-seed vs the 1 seed. That keeps the playoff accessible without pretending the 20th-best team in the country deserves a shot at the title. Also the 1 seed would play the “weakest” team as an award.
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Reward the best of the rest. The heartbreak of the Championship Saturday doesn’t mean the end of the road. The highest-rated losers from the title games should fill out the remaining playoff spots, ensuring we don’t leave out elite teams that just came up short in one game. Let’s be real it would be the SEC and Big Ten because those conferences think they are the greatest thing since sliced bread was created.
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Preserve the bowls. Rotate the Big Six bowls through the quarterfinals and semifinals, then finish with the National Championship on a neutral field. That protects tradition while still delivering the biggest possible stages for the best games.
Photo Cred: SRA
This approach keeps the playoff exclusive, keeps the stakes high, and keeps college football true to itself. Every Saturday still matters. Every rivalry still matters. Conference championships still matter. And the postseason feels earned, not handed out to half the country. A 28-team playoff might line the pockets of the power brokers, but it robs the sport of its character. College football doesn’t need greed disguised as progress. It needs clarity, balance, and meaning.Keep it simple. Keep it special. Keep it at eight.
