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The future of the College Football Playoff has been a hot topic in the offseason, and the model for what the expanded model should look like is making all sorts of headlines. The two proposed models are a 4-4-2-2-1-3 model and a 5-plus-11 model.
The 5-plus-11 model is gaining much more traction recently, especially among college football coaches. The other model, centered around more auto-bids for the bigger conferences, has more support among athletic directors and administrators.
The divide between the two models is that coaches favor the more competitive model. At the same time, administrators care more about the business side and would love a guaranteed spot to earn more money from the College Football Playoff. However, one of the most prominent voices in college football, Ohio State head coach Ryan Day, has voiced his support for the guaranteed model fresh off winning the 2025 National Championship.
“We're in the Big Ten, and we have 18 teams and some of the best programs in the country,” Ryan Day told ESPN. “I feel like we deserve at least four automatic qualifiers.
“You would have had at least a team or two (in the CFP) from out there (the Pac-12), so it only makes sense when you have 18 teams, especially the quality of teams you would have in that many teams representing the Big Ten.”
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Day's reasoning for his support is that a CFP model with more automatic spots will benefit college football overall because it will incentivize stronger non-conference scheduling, especially given how different non-conference schedules can be.
Day is trying his best to be a cheerleader for his conference after winning the national championship. It also benefits Ohio State football to keep drumming up the hype about how good the Big Ten is. That seems to be the underlying reasoning, despite Day constantly referencing “the good of the sport.”
It is worth noting that the Big 12 and ACC want to go to the 5-plus-11 model no matter what. The Big Ten and SEC are at odds over their respective schedules because the SEC would determine where the format goes. The Big Ten will only go to the 5-plus-11 model if the SEC goes to nine conference games.
The conferences have a long way to go in deciding what happens with the College Football Playoff. Still, the issue is that a conference “deserves” a certain number of bids, which is why the 5-plus-11 model is gaining popularity and Day's comments have already been taken to task.
