College baseball’s regular season is over and conference tournaments are underway. Soon, it will be time for the NCAA Tournament to begin with eight teams hoping to make the College World Series.

By EDDIE PELLS, AP National Writer

The College Football Playoff will go to a more straightforward way of filling the bracket next season, announcing Thursday that it will place teams strictly on where they are ranked instead of moving pieces around to reward conference champions.

Ten conference commissioners and Notre Dame’s athletic director came to the unanimous agreement they needed to shift the model that drew complaints last season.

The new format will no longer guarantee an opening bye week for the four highest-ranked league champions, reserving that benefit for the four top-ranked teams in general. The change was widely expected after last season’s jumbled bracket gave byes to Big 12 champion Arizona State and Mountain West champion Boise State, even though they were ranked 12th and ninth, respectively, by the playoff selection committee.

That system made the rankings and the seedings in the tournament two different things and resulted in some matchups — for instance, the quarterfinal between top-ranked Oregon and eventual national champion Ohio State — that came earlier than they otherwise might have.

“After evaluating the first year of the 12-team Playoff, the CFP Management Committee felt it was in the best interest of the game to make this adjustment,” said Rich Clark, executive director of the CFP.

The five highest-ranked conference champions will still be guaranteed spots in the playoff, meaning it’s possible there could be a repeat of a different sort of shuffling seen last season when CFP No. 16 Clemson was seeded 12th in the bracket after winning the Atlantic Coast Conference. That ended up costing 11th-ranked Alabama a spot in the playoff.

Under the new arrangement, the four top-ranked conference champions will still receive $8 million for their leagues — representing the $4 million they earn for making the playoff and $4 million for advancing to the quarterfinals.

“That was the commissioners’ way of — at least for this year — holding to the commitment that they have made financially to those teams, those conference champions in particular, that would have been paid those amounts under the former system that we used last year,” Clark told ESPN .

Southeastern Conference commissioner Greg Sankey was among those who pushed for the change in the upcoming second year of the 12-team playoff, though he remained cautious about it being approved because of the unanimous vote needed.

Smaller conferences had a chance to use the seeding issue as leverage for the next set of negotiations, which will come after this season and could include an expansion to 14 teams and more guaranteed bids for certain leagues. The SEC and Big Ten will have the biggest say in those decisions.

As it stands, this will be the third different playoff system for college football in the span of three years. For the 10 years leading into last season’s inaugural 12-team playoff, the CFP was a four-team affair. The seeding change was first reported by ESPN, which last year signed a six-year, $7.8 billion deal to televise the expanded playoff.

The playoff for the upcoming season begins Dec. 19 on the campuses of the teams ranked 5-8. All games beginning with the quarterfinals will be at neutral sites, ending with the title game on Jan. 19 at Hard Rock Stadium outside Miami.

A look at possible first-round matchups had straight seeding been in play last season. (with result of actual matchup in parenthesis):

— No. 12 Clemson at No. 5 Notre Dame. The Tigers still would have gotten in despite being ranked 16th. Notre Dame, a team without a conference, could benefit from this new arrangement because it is now eligible for a bye. (No. 5 Texas 38, No. 12 Clemson 24).

— No. 11 Arizona State at No. 6 Ohio State. The Sun Devils face a juggernaut instead of receiving a first-round bye. (No. 6 Penn State 38, No. 11 SMU 10).

— No. 10 SMU at No. 7 Tennessee. Yes, Alabama, 11th in CFP’s final ranking, still would’ve been the odd man out because of Clemson. (No. 7 Notre Dame 27, No. 10 Indiana 17).

— No. 9 Boise State at No. 8 Indiana. It could’ve been Ashton Jeanty vs. the Hoosiers in a matchup of two of the season’s best stories. (No. 8 Ohio State 42, No. 9 Tennessee 17).

Byes: No. 1 Oregon, No. 2 Georgia, No. 3 Texas, No. 4 Penn State. Could Texas or Penn State have gone further without having to play that extra game?

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The planned presidential commission on college athletics has reportedly been put on pause.

The move comes just a week after former Alabama football coach Nick Saban, who was reportedly selected to be the commission co-chair with Texas Tech billionaire booster Cody Campbell, downplayed the need for such a commission.

“To be honest with you, I don’t really know much about this commission. I don’t really know what this commission would do,” Saban told reporters. “You know, I think we know what needs to be done, I just think we’ve got to figure out who’s got the will to do it.”

According to On3, President Donald Trump will eventually form the commission to reform name, image and likeness (NIL), but the president wants to wait until after U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) pushes through his federal legislation. Cruz has pushed for change in the NIL world, likening it to the “Wild, Wild West.

“Donald Trump’s presidential commission on college sports has been paused,” On3’s Pete Nakos posted on X. “Expectation is commission will eventually be formed, but is being delayed as U.S. Senator Ted Cruz works to push through federal legislation.”

Nakos added that Cruz led the pause.

Saban left Alabama’s head coaching position in January 2024. He later cited the landscape of college football with NIL, the transfer portal and other aspects for retiring.

The legendary coach reportedly told Trump that he believed that the flood of money had damaged college sports.

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Bob DeChiara-Imagn Images

College football’s NIL Era has created plenty of headaches for teams, especially smaller programs that don’t have the means to compete with bigger schools. Based on what Richmond coach Russ Huseman had to say, that problem has reared its head yet again thanks to the series of events that led to his kicker unexpectedly transferring to Maryland.

The NCAA had years to prepare for the seemingly inevitable day its student-athletes would be allowed to profit off of their name, image, and likeness, but the approach it opted to take after essentially flipping the switch overnight in the wake of the landmark Supreme Court ruling that forced its hand has left a lot to be desired.

It’s no surprise that schools have done everything in their power to exploit the current NIL landscape that has essentially created a market where many players are constantly on the hunt for the highest bidder—a reality that obviously benefits the programs with the deepest pockets.

The football team at the University of Richmond is pretty far from that end of the spectrum thanks to its status as an FCS squad at a school with less than 4,000 students. It is able to take advantage of the NIL fund known as The Spiders’ Collective, but most of its players aren’t exactly swimming in cash.

However, based on what head coach Russ Huesman had to say earlier this week, former Richmond kicker Sean O’Haire has managed to secure a pretty sizeable payday courtesy of the Maryland Terrapins, who he accused of tampering after losing the redshirt freshman at the start of May.

O’Haire hails from Ireland and had never played football before arriving at Richmond on a scholarship last year but quickly proved he could hang as a kicker by making all 12 of the field goals he attempted in the five games he appeared in.

All signs pointed to the Irishman playing for Richmond in 2025, as he’d been partaking in practices and participated in the team’s spring game before announcing he was transferring to Maryland at the start of the month—a development Huseman is not thrilled with based on what he had to say via the Richmond Times-Dispatch:

“Maryland tampered with our kicker and gave him $50,000. They came in, they tampered. The kid had zero interest in transferring, they offered him money. It happens all over the country, and there’s nothing the NCAA’s going to do about it.

“So, Maryland just decided to come in. They liked our kicker and offered him money…It’s ridiculous, pretty frustrating… He’s got an unbelievable future.

This was not on him. This was on Maryland. This was on his handlers. It was on a lot of other people that I’m not real happy with.”

At the end of the day, this is par for the course when it comes to the current state of college athletics, but it’s pretty easy to understand why Huseman is frustrated.

Last Updated on May 22, 2025

The ACC drove in record revenue from the fiscal year 2023-24, as tax documents reported that the conference brought in  $711 million, up from last year’s $706 million. In turn, the conference was able to award a record-high average of $45 million to its 14 full-member schools. The two teams that received the highest payout were Florida State, which earned $46.3 million, and Louisville, which earned $46.4 million. Additionally, Notre Dame received $20.7 million as a football independent. 

It’s worth noting that the ACC’s record-breaking year did not include ACC newcomers SMU, California, and Stanford. Despite the milestones reached on revenue and school payouts, the ACC remains behind the SEC and Big Ten.

To close the gap, ACC Commissioner Jim Phillips implemented a “success initiative” that rewards schools with more revenue if they make the postseason. Starting next year, the ACC will enact its new TV revenue-sharing plan, allowing schools to receive bonuses for the games that draw the most viewership, particularly in football and men’s and women’s basketball. 

Another critical aspect of the shared ACC tax documents was that the conference reportedly spent $12.3 million on legal fees, starkly contrasting the $7.2 million spent the previous year. That spending largely stems from legal disputes involving Florida State and Clemson, where both schools filed lawsuits over financial disparities that threatened their membership in the conference. With a new ESPN media rights deal extension locked in until the 2035-36 season and the additions of SMU, Cal, and Stanford, the ACC looks to forge a new chapter. 

“I just think you’ve got to settle down,” Phillips said. “I think college athletics needs to settle down, not just the ACC. I think we’ve positioned ourselves for that. The chaos and constant wondering of what’s happening here or there, that distracts from the business at hand.”

Phillips emphasized that the ACC is in a good place despite some of the recent legal headlines.

“I feel good about where we’re at, and while I do take things one day at a time, I think there’s a period of time where let’s settle in and get things done,” Phillips said.