Alabama athletic director Greg Byrne is ready to call it quits on the SEC Championship game.
With the ever-growing College Football Playoff adding games to the schedule left and right, Bryne indicated that he’s ready for the tradition to end.
“I think the ship has sailed,” Byrne said in an interview with USA Today. “(The SEC championship game) It’s run its course.”
The SEC became the first conference to introduce a championship game in 1992, and essentially every other conference followed suit in the years that followed.
But with the College Football Playoff going from just two teams in the BCS era to the current 12, the feasibility of conference championship games is waning, he said.
“It’s a great event,” Bryne said. “I don’t like the idea of it going away, but I think it’s reality, with an expanded playoff.
“… If you’re going to a 16-team playoff, you’re adding more games,” he continued. “I would imagine it would be pretty good content.”
Bryne is far from alone on the issue.
Earlier this year, Texas AD Chris Del Conte suggested scrapping the SEC Championship game.
In 2024, Lane Kiffin said coaches “don’t want to be in it.”
The CFP will remain at 12 teams next season, but there’s been recent talk of a possible 14- or 16-team field, leaving little room for conference championships unless big programs want to approach an NFL-like slate.
Last year, Big 12 commissioner Brett Yormark said he supported a 16-team playoff.
The Big Ten’s Tony Pettiti had his eyes set even higher, floating the idea of increasing the playoff to 24 or 28 teams.
