Danny Kanell might have found a solution to the constant griping about scheduling among the Power 4 teams in college football.
One of the big topics of conversation on the first day of SEC Media Days was how scheduling isn't equal. Shane Beamer described Clemson as basically "a ninth conference game", while Brian Kelly tried to justify playing SE Louisiana and Louisiana Tech as some sort of an in-state humanitarian effort.
But Kanell suggests forget about wrangling between eight and nine conference games, just play 10 games against Power 4 competition and make that the qualifier for the college football playoff.
Instead of constantly trying to get the SEC to go to 9 game conference schedule why don't we push for all P4 conferences to play 8 game conf schedule with more non-conf matchups??? Just make it a requirement to play a min 10 regular season games vs P4 opponents
— Danny Kanell (@dannykanell) July 14, 2025
That would work for Beamer and South Carolina, who has Clemson and Virginia Tech on the non-conference schedule this year. It works for the programs that have in-state rivals in difference conferences (i.e. Georgia-Georgia Tech, Florida-FSU, Kentucky-Louisville, etc.), but scheduling would be more difficult for LSU, who only has nine games against P4 competition this season.
Eight is still great in the SEC, for now
The easiest solution would still seem to be just add a ninth conference game, but it's not that simple if the SEC simply won't budge.
"All 16 members of the Southeastern Conference played at least nine games against what you would label power opponents," SEC Commissioner Greg Sankey said. "We had several that played 10 of their 12 games against power opponents. Some conferences have that. Some don’t."
The Big Ten plays nine conference games. It works for them and it's probably the reason the conference got a little more TV money than the SEC. If ESPN/ABC were willing to fork up some extra dollars for another SEC conference game, I'm positive Sankey wouldn't be so stubborn.
A 10-game P4 scheduling requirement would probably work for the Big XII too, which also plays nine conference games. The ACC plays just eight conference games for...some odd reason, but that conference is walking dead anyway.