ACC commissioner Jim Phillips dropped a major hint about the future of college football's postseason this week, revealing that ESPN has been making its preferred playoff size known directly to conference commissioners. According to Phillips, the network wants the College Football Playoff to stay capped at 16 teams—or even smaller.
"ESPN has been pretty clear with all of us that they'd like it to stay at 12, maybe 14, but no higher than 16," Phillips said, per Andy Staples. That's a significant stance from the network that holds exclusive broadcast rights to the CFP up to a 14-team format. Anything beyond that opens the door for competitors to bid on additional games.
Meanwhile, the ACC—whose games air exclusively on ESPN—is pushing for a much larger bracket. Phillips confirmed that the league's football coaches and athletic directors support expanding to a 24-team College Football Playoff. "When you leave worthy teams out, you need to tweak the format," he said, citing 2023 Florida State in the four-team era and 2025 Notre Dame in the current 12-team setup as examples of teams that deserved a shot but were left on the outside looking in.
No final decisions on expansion are expected anytime soon, but the battle lines are clearly drawn. Yahoo Sports reported last month that ESPN executives had privately dismissed the 24-team format, which makes perfect sense from a business perspective. The network has sublicensed a portion of its CFP rights to TNT, but beyond 14 teams, additional playoff games would hit the open market. That's a scenario ESPN wants to avoid at all costs.
On the flip side, Fox Sports CEO Eric Shanks publicly endorsed the 24-team format at a Sports Business Journal conference last month. That enthusiasm aligns perfectly with the Big Ten's long-standing push for 24 or even 28 teams. Fox owns a controlling stake in the Big Ten Network and holds the conference's lead broadcast package, but its college football season currently ends on Thanksgiving weekend. A 24-team bracket would give Fox access to December and January playoff inventory—a game-changer for the network's postseason lineup.
As the debate heats up, one thing is clear: the future of the College Football Playoff isn't just about what's fair for teams and fans—it's also about who gets to broadcast the biggest games of the year.