Grace Hollars-USA TODAY Network via Imagn Images
By Chris Marler
Parity has come back to college football.
That’s been a pretty popular phrase uttered by many around the sport. It’s Latin for “the SEC isn’t the only conference winning national titles anymore.”
NIL and the transfer portal definitely have evened the playing field. Indiana went from being arguably the worst program in the history of the sport to one of the greatest seasons in college football history. The Big Ten winning the last three national championships has done a lot for the sport and those that were exhausted from the vice grip the SEC had it in for nearly two decades.
The last three national champions had something else in common besides coming from the same conference. They all played a non-conference schedule without a Power Four opponent.
The last 3 National Champions didn’t play a Power-4 team out of conference during their regular season.
Thank the BIG10 for showing everyone else the way https://t.co/fr9k7AKYHd
— Cruz Oxenreider (@TheRealCruzOx) February 12, 2026
Complaints about the inequities in college football scheduling have been common. Most of that had to do with the Big Ten and Big 12 playing nine conference games while the SEC and ACC played eight. That has since been alleviated with the SEC moving to nine games and most of the ACC doing the same. T
hat didn’t automatically fix any issues or level the playing field between the Big Ten and SEC which is what they mostly wanted.
What it did was create even more issues in the SEC.
Playing a nine game conference schedule is a great idea if it’s a parallel move across all conferences. That’s not entirely possible because the ACC has an odd number of teams and can’t figure out how to make nine games for all 17 possible. It also creates yet another issue among teams with built in non-conference rivalry games at the end of the year. That’s the case for four teams in the SEC: Georgia, Florida, South Carolina, and Kentucky.
🏈🤓 SEC Schedule Deep Dive 🏈🤓
Here’s a look at which SEC teams are scheduled to play the MOST non-con games vs Power 4️⃣ opponents over the next 🔟 years
And which P4️⃣ teams are playing the most SEC opponents over that same span. pic.twitter.com/Toak7fX3u7
— Chris Marler (@Vern_Funquist) July 24, 2025
To add to the issue a lot of teams in the SEC previously scheduled Power Four non-conference games over the next decade. As of last July, SEC teams scheduled 156 games against Power 4 opponents from 2025-2034. Georgia, Florida, and South Carolina had 18 or more apiece. Alabama scheduled two every year until 2034 for a total of 20. Seven teams in the league scheduled at least nine of those games over the next decade.
That’s why it was kind of shocking to hear Ari Wasserman scold Alabama for potentially cancelling their home-and-home with Ohio State saying “blue bloods shouldn’t back out” of big games because the sport suffers. That sentiment was nowhere to be found when Indiana cancelled multiple games against Power Four opponents and replaced them with FCS and group of five schools. I don’t have the energy to argue the hypocrisy of that anymore. I’m sure I will at some point again this offseason, but in the meantime how does a solution sound instead of just complaining?
NEW: College football loses if Alabama cancels its home-and-home (2027-2028) series with Ohio State👎
(via @AriWasserman)
Story: https://t.co/EG6gHQFQPz pic.twitter.com/S4QjULj7gm
— On3 (@On3) February 12, 2026
SEC schools currently must play at least one game against a P4 opponent to even the playing field for Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, and Kentucky. If we want equity in college football scheduling others should follow suit and that should be the norm. Play nine conference games. The other three out of conference games should include one Power Four opponent, so that every team at the Power Four level plays a total of ten. With the final two games, schedule one Group of Six team and one FCS team.
Simple.
It won’t stop all future arguments. There will surely be teams that are furious if they schedule Ohio State, Texas or Oregon while others play Boston College or Purdue, but it’s a step in the right direction.
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