College Football Playoff expansion: SEC’s Greg Sankey, other commissioners vent over delay of 12-team format

College Football Playoff expansion became a scorching hot topic last June when the CFP working group proposed a 12-team format that included six automatic bids for the highest-ranked conference champions and six at-large bids. That discussion came to a screeching halt on Friday when the CFP Board of Managers revealed that the current four-team model will remain in place through the end of the current 12-year contract following the 2025 season.

That set off a fury of comments by various conference commissioners, most notably from the SEC’s Greg Sankey.

“I don’t think [developing a new format] becomes any easier,” Sankey told the Associated Press. “In fact, I think it becomes more complicated. From our perspective, we’re going to have to go and rethink our position based on how others have approached the conversation that, really, they initiated. And I don’t expect that to get any easier.”

Sankey pointed out to Sports Illustrated’s Ross Dellenger that those who voted against expansion were clamoring for it as recently as three days ago. “If that isn’t the definition of mixed signals, I don’t know what the definition might be,” said Sankey. 

“If we can’t make the decision now around a format that was widely acclaimed as innovative and creative and met a wide variety of needs, we’re all going to have to go back and rethink that,” he continued. “The outcome hasn’t been a healthy representation of decision making.”

It is possible, Sankey admitted, that the SEC will reconsider its own stance on the 12-team proposal that he helped create and, instead, back the current or a tweaked four-game format.

Other conference commissioners also sounded off on the delay in expansion.

“I share the disappointment felt by many college football fans today,”…

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