LAS VEGAS — About 30 days prior, as he was observing a gathering concerning university football’s postseason through Zoom, Big Ten representative Tony Petitti underwent a rush of abrupt understanding.
As he noticed personnel from the postseason sharing conceivable alterations to the standards and information employed by the choice board, as he saw mathematicians conveying thoughts on revisions, Petitti pulled away from the Zoom and had a contemplation.
What precisely are we undertaking?
“I discovered myself sitting there thinking that preliminary matches appear to be exceptionally judicious as we take a gander at people discussing focuses and subtracting numbers and including numbers. I’m thinking, ‘This is the judicious framework and the one where we play diversions is radical?’
“I respect the work they’re putting into it and all the stuff they’re talking about and including and subtracting and listening to mathematicians and planning specialists. But all of that is more valuable than two groups playing on the field? OK.”
In a discourse on Monday with Yahoo Sports from the location of this week’s Big Ten football media days, Petitti underscored that his league’s position on a future postseason arrangement remains unaltered — a position, he clarifies, that’s improbable to alter until the power gatherings concur to play the same sum of conference games (nine) and until the choice handle is rectified.
The conference proceeds to back a postseason structure with more programmed get to spots as contradicted to the so-called “5+11” arrangement that highlights more at-large selections. The Big Ten’s long-discussed postseason arrangement — a “4-4-2-2-1” model — would allow four programmed qualifiers to the SEC and Big Ten, two each to the ACC and Big 12, one to the highest-ranked Group of Six champion and three at-large selections. The model, vehemently contradicted by the ACC and Big 12, would diminish the subjectivity of the choice committee, incentivize more perennial non-conference matchups and, Petitti clarifies, give an road for inner-conference play-in fashion recreations pitting, for illustration, the third-place Big Ten group against the sixth-place finisher for a spot within the postseason.
Big Ten commissioner Tony Petitti remains a proponent of a system that would give his conference four automatic bids. (Michael Hickey/Getty Images)
(Michael Hickey via Getty Images)
Any arrangement with a bigger at-large pool such as the 5+11 — it grants qualifiers to the best five conference champions and 11 at-large spots — depends as well intensely on a subjective choice committee, he explains.
Petitti accepts proposed modifications to the information utilized by choice committee individuals to seed groups and decide at-large selections remains “incredibly incomplete” and, he recommended, may never reach the point of fulfilling his membership.
“I’ve listened my colleagues around other alliances say that a part of work has to be done to the choice committee and that’s where I have a difficult time on what that truly implies,” Petitti said. “In talking to a few of the people in our room, our ADs that have been on that (selection) committee, I’ve however to listen somebody say they require more information or stuff to look at. You’ll be able come up and make measurements, but eventually it’s fair individuals assessing what’s put in front of them.”
Whereas recognizing that his alliance must concur with the SEC on a postseason arrangement in arrange for it to progress forward — the two gatherings control the matter — Petitti says he’s OK with the postseason remaining at 12 groups next season instep of the proposed 16-team extended model.
“Earlier on, we felt expansion would be a great thing, but we’re not planning to extend unless we truly feel like the arrangement and get to makes sense,” Petitti said. “It has to make the normal season better. On the off chance that it doesn’t do that, why are we doing it?”
Such a plausibility — remaining as a 12-team postseason in 2026 — is developing more likely by the day as the two gatherings remain at an impasse, both with one another over the number of conference diversions they play (SEC eight and the Big Ten nine) and with the CFP’s choice process.
The SEC is however to decide on whether it is moving from eight conference diversions to nine in 2026, in spite of the fact that signs point to the conference remaining at eight diversions at slightest for next year, particularly in case the choice committee handle is unsatisfactory. Indeed SEC representative Greg Sankey said final week amid his media days there’s “not a part of warmth” from the football coaches in including an additional conference diversion.
The SEC’s head coaches hold influence within the conference. In reality, their pushback to the Big Ten’s 4-4-2-2-1 model in May moved the league’s thought of that format.
In the interim, neither alliance appears fundamentally agreeable to proposed modifications to information within the choice process.
The CFP staff proposed to commissioners an alteration to the committee’s strength-of-schedule ranking that gives more weight to diversions played, for illustration, against the best 30-40 programs within the nation. Furthermore, a modern information point, “strength of record,” has been made that grants more weight to great wins and doesn’t penalize as much a program for misfortunes against positioned or best teams.
Petitti is unmoved. He is against widening the at-large pool from seven to 11 groups as it gives the 12-member choice committee — a rotation of mostly athletic executives and previous coaches — more authority.
“It’s not that we think the choice committee does a poor job. I’m fair not beyond any doubt how you make it better. The more groups you include, the more troublesome choices you create,” he said. “We’re planning to allow the committee more to do? What’s the reason to do that? Giving them more work to do and more discretion?”
In spite of the contradiction with the SEC, both commissioners say that they proceed to talk frequently and the two alliances remain near. Petitti trusts the conferences can hold a third joint athletic executive meeting soon.
“Anybody who is composing that the fact we might not be on the same page nowadays on arrangement changes implies we don’t have an awesome working relationship is within the off-base place,” Petitti said Monday.
Said Sankey final week: “There is no crack between the SEC and Big Ten commissioners. We have diverse sees. That’s OK.”
They disagree on something else too: the timing of the exchange portal.
A committee of power conference football directors and athletic executives is anticipated to form a formal suggestion on the portal soon. The desire is for a single portal in January. The Big Ten remains the as it were FBS conference that’s against such a move. Big Ten coaches and directors are pushing for an April portal.
“That’s not where the other three (power) alliances are,” Petitti said. “At the conclusion of the day, when you govern with others, there are planning to be issues where you know you’re planning to have to concur that your position wasn’t the one adopted. But having player development happen amid the postseason appears something that’s not perfect. It puts players in troublesome spots. It’s not great for the game.”
In a discourse with Yahoo Sports final week, Sankey said he was looking for a portal date that’s “the correct thing for the instructive enterprise,” and both pioneers accept there ought to be a single portal as contradicted to the two presently existing.
“We have to induce back as a collegiate venture to say we have a duty and desire that you seek after your instruction in a steady way,” Sankey said. “Transferring each semester or five schools in five a long time isn’t steady with those objectives.”
