By Nunnie Robinson, WGS Sports Editor
The controversy surrounding Notre Dame ‘s exclusion from the 2025 College Football Playoffs has elevated concerns surrounding the equity of the process. If the objective is to select the 12 best teams in the country, then how is that achieved? Based on first round results of games played between Oregon and James Madison and Ole Miss and Tulane, the goal failed abysmally. Both losing teams made the playoffs by virtue of having won their conference championship, laudable but insufficient qualifiers as 2 of the country’s best 12. Two loss Notre Dame and three loss Texas were obviously better teams. Selecting teams based on winning a conference championship should not be grounds for automatic inclusion. The solution is expanding from 12-16 teams if at all feasible, a rhetorical thought based on having recently expanded from 4-12. The best teams usually produce exciting, close and competitive games. One team that has been benefited dramatically from the new financial system is Pat Mahomes’ Texas Tech Red Raiders which will face Oregon this weekend. The program went from mediocrity to championship contender overnight by overhauling a roster with star players from around the country using NIL and the new revenue sharing system.
Power 4 conferences include the SEC, ACC, BIG TEN, PAC 12, and BIG 12 while the Power 5 or mid-major conferences consist of the Mountain West, American, Sun Belt, Mid -American, Conference USA, and and FBS Independents. Estimates assume that all Power 4 schools will max out at the $ 20.5 million cap out of $133,625,014 and that all other NCAA I schools electing to participate in revenue sharing will make payments averaging 22% of annual operating revenue including FCS/HBCUS with MEAC and SWAC affiliations. Numerically, it looks like the following: Power 5 schools will share $22, 815,885 and FCS schools $4,224,695. Schools generating the most revenue receive the most.
Interesting matchups with home field advantage include Miami vs. Ohio State, Alabama vs. Indiana, Ole Miss vs. Georgia and Oregon vs. Texas Tech. Higher ranked teams receive home field advantage.
The expectations in HBCU circles to win is just as pressurized as in Power 4 and 5 schools, so it’s necessary, paramount for coaches like recently hired Quinn Gray (FAMU), Van Malone (Hampton) and Marshall Faulk (Southern) to recruit well with limited resources and inferior facilities while faced with similar fan expectations – WIN! We salute all coaches who assume this mantle, cognizant of the challenges that lie ahead. 2026 will prove really interesting. The question: who will meet the challenge?