Nick Saban explains changing opinion on College Football Playoff expansion

When he was still roaming the Alabama sidelines, Nick Saban was an ardent defender of college football bowl games, and as such, openly rejected the further expansion of the College Football Playoff.

But as the CFP committee weighs further proposals to expand the Playoff from 12 to 16 teams beginning in 2026, the former Crimson Tide head coach appears to have changed his tune.

“Back in the (day), I was never for expanding the Playoff, because I thought bowl games were really important to the history and tradition of college football,” Saban said Tuesday morning ahead of his annual Nick’s Kids charity golf tournament in Birmingham. “But now that we have expanded the Playoff and bowl games have taken a less significant role. So I think expanding the Playoff and having as many teams involved as we can without playing too many games for the players, that’s a little bit of concern, is probably a good thing.”

For Saban, expanding the College Football Playoff is ultimately about providing more teams the opportunity to participate in meaningful postseason games, especially as non-Playoff bowl games lose more and more significance.

Report: Power Conference commissioners meet again to discuss College Football Playoff future

Power conference commissioners met this weekend to once again weigh the future of the Playoff, according to Yahoo! Sports insider Ross Dellenger, with discussion reportedly centering around a potential “compromise” for the Big 12 and ACC regarding a new 16-team model.

Saturday’s meeting is the second time the commissioners gathered to talk about potential CFP expansion in the last 10 days. ESPN’s Pete Thamel noted Big Ten commissioner Tony Petitti appeared virtually since he’s in California for the conference’s upcoming spring meetings.

The proposed 16-team bracket would include four automatic bids for each of the SEC and Big Ten, according to Dellenger. The ACC and Big 12 would get two spots each, while the Group of 6 would get one. There would also be three at-large spots.

In addition, as Dellenger previously reported, “inner-league play-in games” could also be in the cards at the end of the year. That would put the third-place team in a conference against the sixth-place team, as well as the fourth-place team against fifth-place.

ACC coaches emphatic that SEC, Big Ten automatic qualifier proposal makes ‘zero sense’

These renewed discussions have come after those within the ACC and Big 12 rejected the “4-4-2-2-1” format proposal from the Big Ten and SEC which gives those leagues favored status with more AQ bids.

“No one likes it,” an anonymous non-Big Ten and SEC athletic director told Dellenger.

Miami head football coach Mario Cristobal was among several ACC coaches to sound off on the Big Ten-SEC proposal. Cristobal called out the entire idea that Power Four conferences are effectively gifted multiple automatic bids to the Playoff.

“Granting spots, that makes zero sense,” Cristobal told Dellenger. “Football has never been about gifting. It’s about earning.”