Steve Sarkisian Floats Radical Alternative to College Football Playoff Expansion

Texas head coach Steve Sarkisian questioned the direction of CFP expansion and proposed a surprising alternative to the current playoff model.

Texas Longhorns head coach Steve Sarkisian looks on prior to a game against the Georgia Bulldogs at Sanford Stadium. | Brett Davis-Imagn Images

Any college football fan is well aware of the sport’s seemingly endless pursuit of playoff expansion.

The College Football Playoff officially expanded from four teams to 12 beginning with the 2024 season, and while that format is set for the immediate future, discussions surrounding a 16- or even 24-team playoff continue to gain traction.

Whether that would ultimately help or hurt the sport remains a major topic of debate. But there have certainly already been beneficiaries so far.

That includes the Texas Longhorns, who likely would have missed the playoff field in 2024 under the old four-team format before earning the No. 5 seed in the CFP.

Even so, Texas head coach Steve Sarkisian is not convinced expansion is actually fixing college football’s biggest issues.

In fact, he believes it may be making some of them worse.

Sarkisian Questions Current CFP Direction

Texas Longhorns head coach Steve Sarkisian gestures after a game against the Georgia Bulldogs. | Dale Zanine-Imagn Images

Speaking with USA TODAY, Sarkisian challenged the current trajectory of the playoff system and even proposed a dramatically different alternative: shrinking the field back down while implementing conference-based postseason systems to determine the four playoff participants.

“I’d go back to a four-team playoff,” Sarkisian said. “And have your own conference playoff to get the four teams if you want more inventory for your television partners.”

The idea itself is not entirely new. Many fans have argued that expansion has watered down the regular season. But fans are fans, and griping is a natural response to a flawed system. 

But hearing that criticism come from possibly one of the most influential coaches in college football — especially one coaching a program that directly benefited from expansion — is significantly telling.

But Sarkisian’s concern goes beyond simply adding teams. His larger issue centers around the CFP selection committee and whether it can realistically evaluate an increasingly large pool of contenders.

According to Sarkisian, the current system already stretches the committee thin. Expanding to 16 or 24 teams would only make rankings, polls and public perception even more influential in the process.

“You’ve got a 12-team playoff, and that means there are at least 30 teams that impact it,” Sarkisian said. “Now all of a sudden, you want to go to 24? Now the polls become an even greater factor.”

Sarkisian explained that even as someone obsessed with college football who spends full Saturdays watching games across multiple screens, it is nearly impossible to keep up with every meaningful matchup nationally. In his view, that reality raises legitimate concerns about how consistently teams are actually being evaluated.

And while Sarkisian acknowledged Texas has benefited from many aspects of the current system, he made it clear he believes college football has become increasingly reactionary in how it handles these kinds of decisions.

The chances that this proposed model will ever gain serious traction are relatively slim. But the fact that one of the sport’s most powerful coaches — at one of its richest programs — is openly questioning the future direction of the CFP says plenty about where college football currently stands.

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