CFP Executive Director: More On-Campus Games Are a Possibility

ATLANTA—On Sunday, in a College Football Playoff Board of Managers meeting in Atlanta, FBS commissioners are set to hold their first official debrief since the 12-team playoff began.  

Speaking to a small group of reporters Saturday, CFP executive director Rich Clark indicated that, among several issues on the docket, commissioners will discuss whether to move more CFP games to campus sites in the future.

“We’ll talk about it for sure,” Clark said. “The campus games were amazing. That atmosphere, and what went on there, and certainly a lot of people are very interested. But the quarterfinals and the semifinals were amazing, too.” 

As for how the conversations would go, he said: “I don’t know what the appetite is amongst the commissioners, necessarily.”

The inaugural 12-team CFP began with four on-campus matchups in late December, all of which were considered wildly successful from an atmosphere standpoint. The CFP encouraged home teams to incorporate all the pageantry of a regular-season home game into their events, and fans, media members, and even coaches raved about them. But then, the New Year’s Six bowl sites took over, hosting the quarterfinals and semifinals: The Rose, Sugar, Peach, and Fiesta Bowls hosted quarterfinals, and the Orange and Cotton Bowls hosted the semis.

The New Year’s Six bowls have been a major part of the college football postseason for a century, and the CFP has worked hard to ensure they’d maintain relevance in a multi-game Playoff era. Ten years ago, the bowls inked a contract with the CFP to include them in the four-team era. That contract translated into the bowls hosting in the early 12-team era, too.

But Clark confirmed that the contract expires at the end of the 2025-26 season—so there’s no contractual obligation to include bowls in a future CFP format at all. It’s unlikely that campus sites will host quarterfinals next year, but that could all change come 2026. 

“I hate to frame it that way,” Clark said in reaction to a description of the CFP-New Year’s Six bowl contract “ending.” But technically, the bowls have no guarantee that they’ll be part of the CFP starting in 2026. And Clark didn’t exactly make any promises that future contracts were on their way to being finalized.

He told reporters that all options were on the table.