The window to reach an agreement to expand the Playoff before 2026 is shrinking.
College Football Playoff leaders could not reach unanimity during Monday's meeting, so no decision on expansion was reached.
The setback now puts expansion before the current CFP contract expires in jeopardy.
Bob Bowlsby, the Big 12 commissioner, said the vote "didn't even get close." He added that the timeframe to expand the Playoff before 2026, the same year the current CFP contract expires, is shrinking. Both eight-team and 12-team expansion models have been considered.
“There's some possibility [of expanding the CFP] but it gets to be a smaller and smaller possibility with each passing day,” Bowlsby said, per The Athletic.
“We're going into overtime,” executive director Bill Hancock said.
Bowlsby said the remaining topics that commissioners are split on are automatic qualifiers, bowl games and the timing of it all. All those topics, including revenue distribution, will be discussed going forward. There will be another meeting in the future but it's unclear exactly when.
Mississippi State president Mark Keenum, the chair of the CFP's board of managers, was optimistic despite Monday's announcement.
“I think we're gonna get there," Keenum said, per ESPN. “I think that there's a commitment on the part of our commissioners that we're going to move forward to come up with an expansion for college football. And you know, time is something that we recognize that we need to move as quickly as we can. ... We still have four years remaining, but we obviously want to make a decision well before that. And I know that everyone had arrived here in hopes that we could come to a decision here at this meeting, but we still have some more work to do.”
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