The college football house is on fire — and we’re arguing about floor plans
· Yahoo Sports
MIRAMAR BEACH, FL – Greg Sankey stepped to the podium, and began the most consequential spring meetings in SEC history Monday by declaring there will be no news on the College Football Playoff.
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Well, whoop-de-freaking-do.
The college football house, everyone, is burning down. But buddy, that new billion-dollar house on the block — the ever-expanding CFP — needs to be saved.
Not the once thriving neighborhood it lives in.
Sankey tried to steer the lookahead conversation this week toward the critically mundane, and away from the sexy 24-team pipe dream the Big Ten is selling. Tried to talk about the guts of the college football system, and the infection that’s quickly rotting the bones.
Free player movement. Private NIL chaos. Judge shopping. A dysfunctional calendar. Gambling and college sports. And a little thing called academic integrity.
You know, the whole higher education thing.
Sankey wanted to talk inside baseball, but a media group of about 20 wanted to talk Morganna the Kissing Big Ten Bandit, sauntering by in her 24-team t-shirt. (Google it, kids).
Late in the 45-minute conversation, Sankey released the quote of the offseason while talking about rules enforcement — a declaration so impactful, it should’ve been a bombshell takeaway to begin what could be a line in the sand drawn by the SEC.
“You have to be willing to be governed,” he said.
And just to be clear: He’s talking about everyone. The SEC. The Big Ten. And the other hangers-on in college football (that means you, ACC and Big 12 — the Big Ten’s new and next Alliance victims).
We’ve reached the laughable point of college football enforcement when the No.1 player in the transfer portal (quarterback Brendan Sorsby) has admitted he bet on his Indiana team in 2022, yet still thinks he should be allowed to play ― and has hired NCAA-killer attorney Jeffrey Kessler to defend him.
Sorsby’s defense (I swear I’m not making this up): gambling on Indiana football made him, “feel more connected to the game and my teammates” and gave him, “more of a reason to root for my teammates.”
As a result of gambling on Indiana that season — again, I swear I’m not making this up — Sorsby’s affidavit in an injunction filed against the NCAA in Lubbock County, Texas, states, “In retrospect, by the end of my freshman year at Indiana, I was truly addicted to gambling.”
Frankly, watching Indiana football prior to the arrival of the Great Cignetti would make anyone gamble. But that’s another story for another time.
The original judge in the Sorsby NCAA case would’ve ruled on this odd injunction that states gambling is a mental health issue (I swear, I’m not … you get the picture), but he recused himself last week without explanation.
I’m no mindreader, but it may have something to do with his undergrad and law degrees from Texas Tech, or that internet sleuths found a photo of him holding guns up with the Texas Tech mascot.
Here’s Judge Phillip Hays. He will decide if Texas Tech QB Brendan Sorsby gets to play this fall. pic.twitter.com/qtZqkvURc5
— Ryan Autullo (@RyanAutullo) May 18, 2026
But yes, everyone, let’s talk about the Big Tens’ shell game of a 24-team playoff. You know, the one where they originally wanted 16 teams, and wanted the Big Ten and SEC to have four automatic qualifiers.
When everyone else balked, the Big Ten upped the ante and went to 24, and then the ACC, Big 12 and Notre Dame lost the red fuzzy ball among the shells when the Big Ten said it was all-in on 24 at-large selections. No automatic qualifiers.
Uh, fellas. The Big Ten and SEC will more than likely secure 75% or more of those teams in the 24-team field. They’re getting exactly what they wanted at 16 (exclusive access) — and watering down the product at the same time.
My god, I can’t be the only person who sees this Alliance redo, can I?
The problem is, enforcement and rules and regulations are boring. Until it impacts your school.
Until you’ve recruited a player from the transfer portal, and he enrolls in school and he’s sitting in class — and a coach from another program starts recruiting him and offering him a million bucks.
We have to be willing to be governed, everyone. Or we’ll just keep looking for the next kiss from the next distraction to actually fixing the problem.
While watching the entire college football neighborhood burn to the ground.
Matt Hayes is the senior national college football writer for USA TODAY Sports. Follow him on X at @MattHayesCFB.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: CFP expansion dominates SEC spring meetings, not more pressing problems