The 24-team College Football Playoff is official. It will theoretically take away the stakes and tension of the 12-game regular season in the FBS. It will absolutely shutter championship weekend, depriving the sport of a decades-long lineup of conference title games.
ESPN and the CFP agreed on a deal that sells broadcast rights of an expanded playoff field at a price of nearly $1.7 billion over five years, according to ESPN reporter Heather Dinich. The change, beginning in 2027, means doubling the current size of the bracket. It means an influx of 8-4 teams keeping national title hopes alive and the further devaluing of field stormings across the country.
It means the end of the Big Ten, SEC and Big 12 Conference Championship Games.
The CFP and
ESPN have agreed on a five-year, nearly $1.7 billion deal that will expand the field to 24 teams in 2027 with ESPN as its continued broadcast partner, sources told ESPN, a seismic move that also eliminates the lucrative Power 4 conference championship games.
— Heather Dinich (@CFBHeather) November 9, 2026
Conference championship games aren't as rooted in the sports foundation as other traditions, but they've been a staple of the first Saturday in December since 1992. That's when the Southeastern Conference boosted its membership to a dozen programs, split off into two divisions and made the league's East and West champions face off to claim SEC supremacy. Other conferences followed suit, providing a compact, high stakes schedule that led college football into bowl season on a high note.
Now, those are gone, bulldozed to clear space for the first round of playoff games that will whittle a field of 24 teams down to 16.
This was done in service for one purpose, and it wasn't to honor tradition or fans. It's a massive financial windfall that stands to trade immediate cash for a steady devaluation of the regular season.
The nation's blue blood programs will rumble through drama-free autumns en route to their place in the bracket. Upsets over top 10 teams will lose their luster. An ecosystem of fandom built on equal parts pride and shame will say goodbye to the schadenfreude of a top five program losing two games before November and shambling on through a zombie season as message boards and social media melt down.
This was a largely unpopular move. The Athletic's Stewart Mandel's informal polling put football fans at roughly 70 percent opposed to an expanded bracket. It's going through anyway, because our experience can be traded for profit and we have no control over that. Regular season wins and losses will be greeted with a shrug. The comfort of sinking into a couch and watching 12 hours of high stakes conference championship games is finished.
College football fandom has been commodified. Monday, it was sold for a little less than $350 million per year.
This article originally appeared on For The Win: The 24-team College Football Playoff has officially killed conference championship games
