'Eight is better for Kentucky': Mitch Barnhart is sticking to preferred SEC scheduling model ahead of 2026 decision

How many games will the SEC play in 2026? That’s a question we do not know the answer do despite that season being just 12 months away. We shouldn’t have to wait long to get the answer.

KSR asked Kentucky Director of Athletics Mitch Barnhart about where everything stood with the future conference format on Monday at Kroger Field. The soon to be dean of college athletic directors did not hold back is thoughts on the matter.

“There’s no mystery in where I standard on eight-nine. Eight is better for Kentucky. We’ll have the athletic directors in our league, obviously there’s financial components to it,” Barnhart said. “There’s competitive components to it. There’s components to it as it relates to our ability to have seven home games or eight home games.”

“We’ve been fortunate about every two-plus years we’ve been able to have eight home games because (deputy athletics director) Marc Hill does an unbelievable job of scheduling with our football staff of putting things together for us to be able to have eight home football games. If we have nine conference games, the chances of doing something like that get a little bit harder for us. So the eight-nine conversation is difficult, and it’s a good conversation in the room. There’s an economic component as it relates to television for sure.”

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Kentucky does not want to go away for the eight-game model. Mitch Barnhart points out the ability to have eight home games and how important that is to the university and the local economy. That goes away if Kentucky keeps Louisville on the schedule but there is the option to drop that series. If UK did that, the program would be able to have eight home games when the scheduled aligned to create five conference games at Kroger Field and three non-conference games. That is probably the biggest potential move if the SEC ever goes to nine games. But that might not happen soon.

All signs point to the SEC staying with an eight-game model in the near future as the College Football Playoff negotiations are at an impasse. The Big Ten wants play-in games with a 4-4-2-2-1 model. The rest of the college football world seems to be pushing a 5+11 model. The ultimate playoff decision does not need to be made until December. The conference schedule model must be locked in before that.

Mitch Barnhart thinks we all could get some clarity on what the SEC will do in 2026 very soon.

“So I think that decision is going to obviously come pretty quickly,” said Barnhart. “We have athletic directors meetings in August. There’s probably a pretty good chance that’s on the docket. Then some decision comes out of all that.”

“It’s a conversation that’s got to come to a head here fairly quickly.”

We know where Kentucky stands. The rest of the league seems ready to commit to an eight-game model in the short-term but this is again another fluid situation as college football tries to establish a new normal in the post-settlement era.