Big Ten also disagrees with SEC (and rest of college football) on transfer portal window

The future of the College Football Playoff when the 2026 season begins is unknown. However, the future of the transfer portal when the 2025 regular season ends is also unknown. Some administrators need to make some final decisions quickly. Talking season gives us a chance to find out where the decision-makers are leaning.

Out in Las Vegas on Tuesday, Big Ten commissioner Tony Petitti broke his silence and explained some of his reasoning for his conference wanting a play-in game playoff model. This means a 4-4-2-2-1 format that would give out eight total bids to SEC and Big Ten members. Petitti believes that a 6-3 record in the Big Ten should get a team into the postseason dance.

Big Ten commish Tony Petitti on playoff format: "We want to better connect the regular season & postseason. We want more conference games to matter in November." Wants to "keep as many teams alive as deep (in season) as possible"

— Brett McMurphy (@Brett_McMurphy) July 22, 2025

Petitti also opened up on the fact that any model that asks for more picks from the playoff selection committee “will have a difficult time getting support from the Big Ten” moving forward. That is trouble because the ACC and Big 12 have both publicly supported the 5+11 model that will hand out double-digit at-large bids. The SEC seems to be leaning towards the 5+11 model.

A fight is breaking out on what to do with the future of the playoff. This could cause the current 12-team format to extend into 2026 when the big ESPN contract for the postseason tournament begins. This seems to be the format that SEC commissioner Greg Sankey prefers if a change to the selection process is made.

But this is not the only big talking point that the Big Ten is on an island with.

Back at SEC Spring Meetings two months ago, Georgia head coach Kirby Smart said that the biggest big picture decision that college football needed to make post-settlement was where to put the single transfer portal window that coaches have been pushing hard for.

“So, the biggest decision that has to be made across football right now to me, by far, is when is the portal window and is there one or two,” Smart told reporters in Destin.

There are currently two transfer portal windows for college football. The first occurs for 20 days in December and the other is open for 10 days in April. The former has become the most popular one but the latter has given players and their representation an extra negotiation window. We have also seen some double-dip transfers in a single offseason across the landscape because of the two transfer portal windows in a single offseason. The SEC and Big 12 have both gone on record about what they want — a 10-day transfer portal window in January after College Football Playoff quarterfinal games are played on New Year’s Eve/New Year’s Day. At this point, almost all of the bowl games will be over, and everyone in college football except the four teams still playing for a national title will have shifted into offseason mode. Programs can spend all of December focused on closing at their high school class and getting ready for a bowl game instead hosting portal visitors throughout the month.

Well, the Big Ten has other ideas.

Petitti’s conference is still supporting not opening the transfer portal until April when the major roster moves can be made at essentially the end of the fiscal year in college athletics. Spring semesters typically end in late April/early May and the school’s new rev-share cap will restart every June. In theory, universities and their programs will have a good feel for how much money is available to spend on what will be the most expensive team-building market.

This goes against the traditional college football calendar.

Teams will go months without knowing what their team will look like. How will this alter spring practice? We’ve already seen some changes made to the traditional spring construct and their are discussions ongoing to tag OTAs with the 15 allotted spring practices that would allow programs to split up time on the calendar on when to use these workouts. You could have them in March/April like normal or wait until May when rosters are locked in. There is also the offseason training plan to consider. Many schools will want projected starters on campus for these important months. That would not happen with the Big Ten’s proposal.

Yahoo Sports’ Ross Dellenger reports that the Big Ten is holding its ground on this request.

“A committee of power conference football administrators and athletic directors is expected to make a formal recommendation on the portal soon,” writes Dellenger. “The expectation is for a single portal in January. The Big Ten remains the only FBS conference that is against such a move.”

Smart mentioned that tampering will be out of control if you have a four-month build after the season before opening the free agency market. The big two conferences started a joint advisory group 17 months ago to “address the significant challenges facing college athletics” moving forward. This came after Sankey and Petitti secured a memorandum of understanding that gave these two conferences authority power to determine the future of the playoff. Unfortunately, these leagues can’t seem to agree on anything. A playoff decision must be made by Dec. 1 or the 12-team format will be locked in for 2026. The portal decision will come much sooner than that.

Welcome to the new age where the most powerful entities in college athletics keep having standoffs on major decisions.