The Southeastern Conference is staying with an eight-game football conference schedule—at least for one year.
Thursday at the SEC spring meetings in Destin, the conference announced it has established a scheduling format for the 2024 football season as it continues to finalize a long-term strategy as a 16-team conference.
In the one-year schedule, SEC teams will play eight conference games plus one required opponent from the ACC, Big Ten, Big 12, Pac-12, or major independent during the 2024 season when Oklahoma and Texas join the league.
As previously announced, the SEC will eliminate divisional standings beginning in 2024. The SEC Championship Game will feature the two top teams in the Conference standings at the end of the regular season. The format will allow every school to play every other school a minimum of two times in a four-year period, regardless of whether the SEC utilizes an 8-game or 9-game format for future conference competitions.
“We have been engaged in planning for the entry of Oklahoma and Texas into the SEC since the summer of 2021,” SEC commissioner Greg Sankey said. “But the change of the membership date from 2025 to 2024 creates scheduling complexities that can better be managed with a one-year schedule.”
Each school’s opponents for the 2024 season will be announced on June 14 on a special prime time show on the SEC Network, and dates of games will be announced at a later date.
“Creating a one-year schedule will provide a longer on-ramp to manage football scheduling around existing non-conference commitments of our members,” Sankey said. “It will also provide additional time to understand the impact of an expanded College Football Playoff and engage with our media partners as we determine the appropriate long-term plan for SEC football schedule.
"During this time of change, our fans will continue to enjoy traditional rivalries and begin to see new matchups presented by adding two historically successful football programs to the SEC.”
At least for one more year.
Under the eight-game schedule, it’s no longer guaranteed that long-standing rivalries like the Georgia-Auburn game would take place in 2024. Under a nine-game schedule, it’s believed that Auburn would be one of the Bulldogs’ three permanent rivals – should the conference morph into a nine-game conference schedule in 2025.
During the SEC spring meetings, both Hugh Freeze of Auburn and Georgia’s Kirby Smart said they hoped the game could be kept in place, although Georgia’s coach said he realized the game might have to be sacrificed for the conference’s greater good.
“It’s going to be tough because there are so many people that want that historic rivalry including me. I was part of that rivalry. I grew up as part of that rivalry. I think it’s one of the best there is, but I think it’s one of the costs of progress bringing two more teams in,” Smart said. “One of the costs of scheduling, getting more balanced in terms of you’re going to play everybody. It’s not just going to be Georgia-Auburn. It’s going to be somebody else for somebody else. Sometimes you call that progress. Sometimes you upset the fans. Traditionalists want those rivalries and others want to see you play the teams they never get to see you play and you can’t have both.”
Coaches asked about the eight- or nine-game schedule were obviously split on the issue, with Arkansas head coach Sam Pittman joining Alabama’s Nick Saban in flipping his opinion, now thinking an eight-game slate should be the way to go.
“I think one of the more difficult things with the nine games is we tried to schedule two out-of-conference Power 5 games to try to improve our strength of schedule over the next seven, eight or nine years,” Saban said. “If you go to nine games, we’ll have to unwind that. So, my deal is, was always play more SEC games because we couldn’t get more people to schedule. So, now, I think there are more people in-tune to schedule, so having to balance that is probably the most important thing.”
Smart, meanwhile, brushed off the entire topic completely when asked to give his take.
“That’s the most overrated conversation there ever was. For four years you’ll play everybody home and away. I get it: the traditional rivalries, you have three, two, and one. You guys need something to write about bad when you start writing about this,” Smart said. “It’s not that big of a deal to me. You have to win your games to advance. You need to be in the SEC championship. That’s a lot better topic for me, is somebody going to get an advantage by not going to the SEC Championship Game but making the expanded playoff."
