A 12-team College Football Playoff will be here by 2026 — at the latest — and is sure to affect many aspects of the sport’s landscape. But how will it impact recruiting? What role will the expanded Playoff have in where the top prospects end up?

Grace Raynor, Ari Wasserman and Max Olson share their thoughts.

Do you like the move to a 12-team field? 

Raynor: I do. I’m all for more games and the excitement that comes with eight additional teams having the opportunity to compete for a national championship. Even if the same two or three teams win it each year — which very well could be the case — the product isn’t going to suddenly get worse. What’s the harm in spicing things up?

Wasserman: I’m kind of torn. Though the extra Playoff games will lead to exciting matchups down the line that everyone will enjoy watching, I am a little concerned about what this means for the regular season. College football’s regular season is the most exciting because the stakes for each game are always through the roof. The thing we crave most — big-time upsets — will be watered down without the consequences. Results of big-time rivalry matchups like last year’s Ohio State-Michigan game will be irrelevant to the Playoff field. That stuff matters.

All that said, though, I think this is a necessity because we have to keep fan bases from every conference engaged. Having a 12-team Playoff with inclusion across the sport stops what was otherwise my biggest fear: fan bases from teams not in the Big Ten or SEC becoming disenchanted with the sport. I like the conferences and the system as it stands now, but that’s the way of the world. Adapt or die.

Olson: I do. I’ve talked with head coaches who prefer an eight-team model, fearing we might be changing too much too quickly — and I can appreciate that viewpoint — but I’ve been a fan of this 12-team proposal ever since it was unveiled last summer. There’s no such thing as a Playoff that 100 percent of people will love. There aren’t going to be 12 excellent teams every season. But I like where we ended up, with a model that puts value in conference championships and ensures more G5 access.

Best of all, we’re injecting a lot more hope into this sport. It’s exciting to me that more teams and more conference races will matter. Very, very few programs have the resources and ability to build (and sustain) a top-four program. We’re moving to a model that rewards more great teams, and not just the ones loaded with future NFL players. I fully understand those loaded programs will keep winning the national titles, and that’s OK. Expanding the Playoff was a must for the health and growth of this sport.

Do you think this will lead to more parity in recruiting over the next five to 10 years?

Raynor: While I still believe the best recruiters will always rise to the top, expanding the field should at least help with parity, yes. Take Cincinnati, for example. The Bearcats signed the nation’s No. 42 class in 2022 with an average player rating of 86.74. Nine months removed from their first Playoff appearance, they have the nation’s No. 22 class with an average player rating of 87.61 — almost a full point increase. (And yes, the impending move to the Big 12 no doubt has helped Cincinnati’s recruiting pitch.) After Washington made the Playoff in 2016, the Huskies’ average player rating went from 87.42 and 88.45 in the Classes of 2016 and 2017 to 90.21 and 90.1 in the Classes of 2018 and 2019.

Competing in the Playoff isn’t the No. 1 priority for recruits, but if a prospect is deciding between two schools and both are Playoff contenders, maybe he picks what would have initially been his runner-up in the four-team model. Also: Imagine what kind of recruiting atmospheres the on-campus Playoff games will create.