The Rose Bowl has signed an settlement with the Faculty Soccer Playoff that paves the best way for the occasion to broaden to 12 groups beginning in 2024, sources affirm to CBS Sports activities. The CFP had given the Rose Bowl till the top of the week — on the newest — to conform to phrases the bowl had up to now been unwilling to just accept.
With the Rose Bowl now within the fold, a proper announcement of a 12-team playoff being held in 2024 and 2025 is anticipated imminently. The brand new format was initially agreed upon by the CFP Board of Managers in September.
Though the terms of the settlement signed by the Rose Bowl aren’t but recognized, the bowl had been demanding to play its recreation in its conventional time slot at 5 p.m. ET on Jan. 1 regardless of playoff enlargement probably affecting the bowl schedule. That point slot is taken into account probably the most priceless in sports activities tv. The settlement signed by the Rose Bowl doubtless creates considerably extra flexibility in that scheduling course of.
In an expanded playoff, the video games themselves are extra necessary than the bowls that host the contests. The Rose Bowl refusing to acquiesce to a extra uniform scheduling coverage would have delayed enlargement till 2026 after the CFP’s present contract with ESPN ends. That will have price concerned events an estimated $450 million in added income, and it could have saved the Rose Bowl out of the choice course of as soon as a brand new contract was signed.
The Rose Bowl had proposed internet hosting CFP quarterfinals in 2024 and 2025 — probably with out their conventional Large Ten and Pac-12 companions — in change for holding its time slot as a part of the CFP’s new media rights contract starting in 2026, a supply near the scenario informed CBS Sports activities. That supply was refused.
Requested what leverage the Rose Bowl had within the course of, an individual concerned within the CFP course of merely replied, “They’ve none.” One CFP bowl official mentioned early enlargement would have been not possible after this weekend’s convention championship video games amid the push of bowl and playoff season.
The CFP is within the ninth yr of a 12-year take care of ESPN that expires after the 2025 season. All mandatory events aside from the Rose Bowl had already agreed to broaden to 12 groups for the 2024 and 2025 seasons. The ten FBS conferences, Notre Dame and the taking part New 12 months’s Six bowls agreed on such points as enjoying at campus websites, dates of video games and income distribution for early enlargement. Nevertheless, the settlement to broaden early wanted to be unanimous.
Through the years, each BCS/CFP scheduling choice — till now — has accommodated the Rose Bowl having the ability to broadcast its recreation at its most popular time slot 5 p.m. time slot on or round New 12 months’s Day. The sport has historically been scheduled to comply with the Match of Roses of Parade. The timing was such that the solar would at all times set within the West over the San Gabriel Mountains in the course of the recreation, thus creating probably the most iconic settings in American sports activities.
With the CFP able to broaden, its handlers grew to become much less tolerant of assembly the Rose Bowl’s calls for. That 5 p.m. time slot might be too priceless sooner or later when — for the primary time — the sensation is that the video games are extra necessary than the bowl websites.
“It is the equal of Tremendous Bowl Sunday,” mentioned one business supply of the 5 p.m. time slot. “New 12 months’s Day is form of like a Sunday, even when it is not on a Sunday. Everyone is hung over from New 12 months’s Eve. They’re sitting again, it is 5 o’clock. Everyone is completed with what they should do. It’s the finest window that there’s.”
The first causes to broaden early are to offer extra playoff entry to groups and rating an additional $450 million per yr from rightsholder ESPN so it might air the extra CFP video games in 2024 and 2025. A brand new media rights contract will have to be signed for 2026 and past.
It was not clear what leverage the Rose Bowl believed it held within the negotiations. That broadcast window is effective, and CFP stakeholders had been fed up with accommodating the Rose Bowl in an association that goes again nearly 1 / 4 century.
The Rose Bowl started to surrender its exclusivity in 1998, the primary yr of the BCS. Again then, it agreed to finish a steady run of that includes the Large Ten and Pac-12 champions that dated again to 1947. Within the BCS settlement, the Rose Bowl surrendered its two spots as soon as each 4 years in a rotation to host the BCS Championship Sport. That first occurred after the 2001 season when Miami defeated Nebraska for its final nationwide title. Each faculties on the time talked about how they had been meant to really feel like outsiders after 55 consecutive years of Large Ten vs. Pac-8/10 matchups.
When the CFP started in 2014, it was assured the Rose Bowl would by no means host a nationwide championship. Los Angeles was constructing the brand new SoFi Stadium, and town of Pasadena did not have the means to outbid town of L.A. SoFi will host the 2023 CFP Nationwide Championship. In the meantime, since 2014, the Rose Bowl has hosted CFP semifinals in 2015, 2018 and 2021.
“The luster of that recreation goes away [if the Rose doesn’t agree],” mentioned one bowl government exterior the CFP system. Possibly the Rose Bowl simply has to provide in, suck it up. It is simply who blinks first.”