There are currently no plans to change the format of the four-team College Football Playoff or adjust the selection committee’s protocol for choosing the top four teams, CFP executive director Bill Hancock told ESPN on Tuesday after two days of virtual CFP spring meetings.
The annual meetings, which typically take place in Irving, Texas, over a span of three or four days and include ESPN and bowl executives, along with all 10 FBS commissioners and Notre Dame athletic director Jack Swarbrick, were condensed into three, 90-minute Zoom meetings Monday and Tuesday because of the coronavirus pandemic.
“My bosses are happy with the CFP,” Hancock said of the commissioners and Swarbrick, “but they’re talking and they will continue to talk.”
The playoff is entering its seventh season, and Hancock said recently that the CFP staff continues to prepare for the Jan. 11 national championship game in Miami in spite of the uncertainty that has engulfed the sport’s future. There currently isn’t any timetable for the return of college athletics, which came to a halt in March.
Part of the spring meetings, though, included typical conversations about the 2020-21 national title game, along with a review of last year’s game in New Orleans.
“It was productive,” Hancock said. “We just talked about all the standard topics that we would have if we would have met in person.”
Former selection committee chair Rob Mullens, whose term expired in February, and new chair Gary Barta, Iowa’s athletic director, joined the videoconference to talk about their experiences on the committee. Hancock said neither recommended any changes.
The committee members are required to select the four best teams, but if they are deemed “comparable,” then they must consider conference championships, strength of schedule, head-to-head results, common opponents, and any other relevant factors like injuries.
Hancock said the national championship sites for the final two seasons of the current contract will be chosen a year from now. Current future sites include Indianapolis (Jan. 10, 2022), Los Angeles, (Jan. 9, 2023) and Houston (Jan. 8, 2024).