Vanderbilt head coach Clark Lea was pretty blunt when it came to CFP expansion coming around the corner. The expectation is that the College Football Playoff will go from 12 to 24 teams, especially now with ACC and Big 12 support for a bigger playoff.
This comes on the heels of the American Football Coaches Association voicing its support for the 24-team playoff. But as On3’s Brett McMurphy pointed out, Big Ten commissioner Tony Petitti and SEC commissioner Greg Sankey seemingly have the ultimate say on a format.
Lea seems to be bracing for the change, which would cause a seismic shift in traditional college football, especially at the end of the year. But it seems like Lea and other coaches are a little surprised this didn’t happen earlier.
“Expansion is coming, we all expected it for this year, and it hit a hiccup,” Lea said, via OutKick’s Trey Wallace. “We’re gonna have to let go of some traditional end of the year elements in college football (conference title games) or somehow the playoff is incorporated (play-in games).”
Lea was critical of the 12-team CFP bracket due to the byes and the breaks in play from rivalry weekend, to the conference title games and then to the first round games. The first round games last season took place, beginning anyway. December 19th as Alabama and Oklahoma kicked it off. That would’ve been a week where Vanderbilt would’ve played, had they snuck in.
If that was the case, Vanderbilt, without playing in the SEC Championship, would’ve played one game on November 29th and the next 20 days later. So perhaps he has a point.
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“I think what we saw last year with these ridiculous breaks in play, I think it ruins the competitive product on the field,” Lea said. “To say 24 or 16 is really just to say as many teams as we can, while also not giving away the ability to negotiate what those games can bring.”
The AFCA Board recommended a College Football Playoff that included “the maximum number of participants,” as Yahoo! Sports’ Ross Dellenger first reported. The recommendation also included a discontinuation of conference title games and preservation of the Army–Navy Game’s exclusive window, with “flexibility” for other games to happen on that day.
In addition, the board recommended the College Football Playoff end by the second week of January. Last season’s national championship game took place Jan. 19, 2026, and next year’s is scheduled for Jan. 25, 2027. The AFCA also proposed reducing the minimum number of days between games to no fewer than six.
“The American Football Coaches Association (AFCA) has identified the length of the college football season as a critical issue that needs to be addressed,” the AFCA said in a statement. “As we modernize our game to better serve student-athletes, we have fallen short in structuring a season that concludes in a timely and sustainable way.”
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