MIRAMAR BEACH, Fla. — The Big Ten has won the past three national titles in football and is 4-0 against the SEC over the past three seasons in head-to-head College Football Playoff matchups, but SEC commissioner Greg Sankey said Wednesday those metrics are a “pretty narrow band” and his league still “stands alone.”
“If you look at the entirety of our league, we are by far the most competitive, the strongest football league by far,” Sankey told reporters following the second full day of SEC spring meetings. “But you’re going to lose games when it’s close and competitive like that. So why have they surpassed us? It’s an oddball, it’s bounced a couple times the wrong way.”
When a reporter asked why the Big Ten has moved past the SEC in football performance in the CFP, Sankey didn’t bristle at the question but was ready with a response. He pointed out that Michigan beat Alabama 27-20 in overtime in the 2024 CFP semifinal at the Rose Bowl and quickly broke down Ohio State’s 28-14 CFP semifinal win against Texas in the Cotton Bowl.
A group of U.S. senators introduced new and wide-sweeping legislation Wednesday that aims to address many current issues in college sports, including an effort to restore some rule-making power to the NCAA and open the possibility for conferences to sell their lucrative television rights as one large group.
The Protect College Sports Act, written after months of negotiation between Republican Ted Cruz and Democrat Maria Cantwell, would provide the NCAA with an antitrust exemption to enforce several rules that have been challenged in court in recent years. Those rules would include:
- Limiting athletes to transferring schools only one time without penalty
- Limiting athlete eligibility to a maximum of five years
- Prohibiting former professional athletes from playing in college
- Prohibiting schools from poaching a coach from another school during their sport’s season