NEW ORLEANS — Once again, SEC football is moving closer to a nine-game conference schedule. And once again, even with momentum building, it’s not a done deal.
The conference has seemed close to this move for years, only for enough opposition within the league to stop it, either for financial or competitive reasons. This time, another factor might finally push it over the finish line: an alliance with the Big Ten.
The two conference commissioners and their athletic directors wrapped up a second round of meetings here Wednesday. A possible scheduling agreement was not discussed, several people said. But the conferences did discuss the possibility of four guaranteed spots for each conference in an expanded College Football Playoff, and if that happens, there’s a good chance the SEC will finally go to nine games.
But no decisions were made at the meetings, and one could take several months, according to Florida athletic director Scott Stricklin.
“It’s all connected,” Stricklin said, citing the need to know what the CFP format will be.
SEC commissioner Greg Sankey said Wednesday “there’s a lot of interest” in going to nine games and indicated that some who were reluctant to make the move have changed their minds.
“I think people change. Positions change,” Sankey said. “There’s been a lot of phone calls in advance of the meeting: ‘What are you thinking? What do we need to look at? Are there different ways to form this?’”
SEC commissioner Greg Sankey’s conference members continue to debate an eight- or nine-game conference football schedule. (Denny Simmons / The Tennessean)
SEC presidents have said for several years that they need more money from ESPN to add a ninth conference game. When Oklahoma and Texas joined the league, the contract called for a pro-rata increase in what ESPN paid the SEC, so it went to about $811 million per year. ESPN has resisted pleas to increase that amount, citing cost-cutting at Disney, among other factors.
There are a few reasons ESPN might be ready to play ball. The situation with the ACC appears to be stabilizing, so there’s some certainty there. Then there’s the CFP contract, which ESPN agreed to in March 2024, going through the 2031 season.
Perhaps more importantly, there are the ratings from the 2024 season, the first under the SEC’s non-division format. The SEC had six of the 10 highest-rated non-Playoff games, and 15 of the 21 highest-rated games involved at least one SEC team, per Sports Media Watch.
If the SEC goes to a nine-game schedule, certain rivalries will continue to be played every year: Alabama-Tennessee (sixth-highest-rated non-Playoff game), Texas-Texas A&M (10th-most-watched non-Playoff game) and Georgia-Auburn. If the SEC stays with eight games, its format would result in those rivalry games being only twice every four years. The SEC made sure to include those games and a few other marquee matchups in the 2024-25 temporary format, almost as a way of showing ESPN what it would be missing.
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But the new format caused some newfound reluctance to go to nine games: Texas was the only team to go 7-1 in conference play, two others suffered two losses, and five had three losses. Alabama, Ole Miss and South Carolina just missed the Playoff.
That’s why four guaranteed bids for the CFP could be the final push toward nine games, alleviating concerns about hurting teams’ bids.
Sankey has never publicly confirmed that he favors going to nine games, instead presenting himself as guiding the conversation. That conversation has taken years and was the main story at SEC spring meetings for several years; each time the conference held off on the decision, not going to nine games but doing only temporary eight-game formats.
The saga might finally be nearing an end. Then again, that has been assumed before.
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“We’ve not made a decision, and we’re coming up on four years,” Sankey said. “And the reality, and I’ve said this to you, that that conversation began in 2018; it was tied to the move from divisions. Can you rotate people through? So it was a pre-expansion conversation, but the three or four years really is a post-expansion dialog. And we made decisions for ’24 and ’25, (while) ’26 and beyond remains an agenda item for us.”
Asked when they need to make a decision, Sankey smiled.
“Right before we send out the press release,” he said.
(Top photo: Bryan Lynn / Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)
