The SEC and Big Ten want you to know they’re superior. 

In fact, the two conferences floated codifying their authority in perpetuity by providing themselves with more auto-bids (4) than would be granted to fellow Power Four conferences, the ACC and the Big 12, which would only receive two. 

The latest case of self-indulgence comes in the form of a proposed 14-or 16-team playoff. The Big Ten and SEC would be guaranteed half of those 16 spots if they get their way. And usually, those two conferences claim more spots if representatives can also claim at-large spots in the model labeled as “4+4+2+2.” The last two spots in the 14-team version would go to the highest-ranked G5 conference champion and an at-large (read Notre Dame). The 16-team model would have three at-large spots. 

The rest of the college football world bristled when SEC commissioner Greg Sankey took to his bully pulpit at conference’s spring meetings to opine about how hard their schedules are and that losing to great teams is somehow better than beating ones he views as inferior. The SEC points to strength of schedule to prove its points, failing to admit that the metric is a positive feedback loop in which perceptions of teams carry more weight than on-field results. 

“It’s clear that not losing becomes in many ways more important than beating the University of Georgia, which two of our teams that were left out did,” Sankey said from on high with the beach behind him last week. Those two teams – Alabama and Ole Miss – were only in the discussion for a College Football Playoff spot because of that schedule and that win, however. How else could a team like Alabama, who lost to Vanderbilt and a .500 Oklahoma team be in the mix? Ole Miss lost to Kentucky at home and a Florida team that was 7-5 in the regular season. 

No one argues that the SEC is the best conference in college football from top to bottom. Or that the best five or six programs in the Big Ten can all win national championships. But why do those conferences need automatic bids? Both will have at least four teams each when this tournament gets moved to 16 games – which it will because everyone in the sport needs new money pots as revenue-sharing comes and the best place to find those pots is with added inventory. 

The answer is obvious: Guaranteeing more spots in the CFP than fellow P4 conferences eliminates the illusion that the SEC and Big Ten are peers with the ACC and the Big 12. They already, obviously, believe that they’re on a plane above, but four automatic bids to a 14- or 16-team playoff means that the Big 12 and ACC agree with the assertion. It leaves no room for upward mobility - for the Big 12 or ACC to play catch up. It would seal the fate of everyone outside the Obnoxious Two. It would make them the AFC and the NFC. 

College football is headed toward a split. Maybe it is a fool’s errand to pretend like the war isn’t over and we’re still fighting battles that matter not to the outcome. The G5 has never had a harder route to a championship despite entry into the CFP. The transfer portal, NIL, and upcoming revenue-sharing model further the divide between the haves and the have-nots. Colleges in the P4 conferences expect to spend $13-17 million dollars each on their roster. Coaches in the AAC believe their rosters will be closer to $3-5 million. In the Sun Belt and Conference USA, that’s likely closer to $1-2 million. 

Maybe UTSA was never going to win a national championship in a sport that includes Texas. But not even Texas Tech? Or TCU and Baylor? If only 40 teams count, what’s the point? Maybe the sooner the SEC and Big Ten take their ball and go start their own league with their own playoff like the Diet NFL they already view themselves as, the sooner the rest of us can go back to loving the sport we grew up with. The one that didn’t solely focus on winning national championships. Beating your rivals and winning a conference was enough for 100 years. 

Conference realignment is not done and there is a real possibility that power programs like Clemson and Florida State and Miami – and maybe some of the bigger brands from the Big 12 – join up with the existing SEC and Big Ten to form a super league in the 2030s. 

The best-case scenario is that the P4 stay together and add programs like Boise State from the G5 while collectively bargaining with the players so that portal restrictions and eligibility constraints can be enforced. The majority of the G5 being left behind seems like a when, not if, scenario.

It didn’t need to end like this. The lack of foresight and leadership within college athletics and college football specifically led to a power vacuum. The fact that Sankey performing his job description – making the SEC all-powerful – is a net negative for the other 80% of college football is one of the most fundamental things broken with college football. Tony Petitti, who lets Sankey and the SEC take all the fire for a plot the Big Ten is also conspiring with, is no different. 

Sankey said he doesn’t need any lectures about the good of the game and by the end of the spring meetings it felt like a 5+11 model was gaining steam in the coaching community at the spring meetings. That would mean the five highest ranked conference champions plus 11 at-large teams would make the CFP. And while that field likely includes more than four teams each from the SEC and the Big Ten, at least it would be earned on the field. 

You know, where the actual football is played. Parity is returning to college football. NIL and the transfer portal helped the Big Ten claim the last two national championships and programs like Texas Tech to build a roster the Red Raiders couldn’t have previously. That’s a good thing. In the 1980s and 1990s, programs such as BYU and SMU and Colorado and Georgia Tech laid claims to national championships. The sport didn’t belong to a handful of teams in one region of the country. 

Auto bids would end any hope of returning to anything remotely considered a level playing field. Maybe the Big 12 and the ACC can never close the gap. But the sport deserves the illusion.