With college football’s klieg lights trained on playoff expansion, NIL sanity, revenue sharing and the fast-approaching season — kickoff is just two weeks away — a small group of administrators is planning to overhaul the way the sport goes about its business.
“It’s everything,†a source with knowledge of the undertaking said recently. “It’s the transfer window. It’s recruiting. It’s spring practice. And it’s everything tied to those issues.â€
University of Arizona defensive back Ayden Garnes, left, works on his coverage technique with defensive back Michael Dansby during preseason workouts, Aug. 1, 2025.
The 15-member working group of athletic directors, compliance officers and chief football administrators from the power conferences is quietly creating an entirely new calendar for the sport. The group has met formally a few times this summer, but its members exchange ideas on a daily basis with the goal of producing a revolutionary proposal by the end of August.
In theory, the sport could have a single transfer window in place this winter.
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Spring practice could be pared down or eliminated altogether.
NFL-style OTAs (organized team activities) could be implemented.
Signing day for high school recruits could be moved to the summer.
“We felt there was a huge opportunity, coinciding with the House lawsuit decision†— and the implementation of revenue sharing with athletes — “to get a bunch of things rectified,†a second source said. “But everything is interwoven.â€
The working group is part of a broader change to the way college sports is governed. That transformation gained steam Tuesday when the Division I Board of Directors approved a proposal to grant the ACC, Big 12, Big Ten and SEC increased voting power on the NCAA’s key oversight and governance committees.
Effectively, the power conferences are untethering themselves from the skull-crushing bureaucracy that, for decades, has connected them to Division I schools with smaller budgets and conflicting aims.
Ultimately, the second source said, the working group won’t make an official recommendation on the sport’s new calendar. Instead, it will emerge from the weeds and present at least one, and potentially several models to power conference executives, who can then implement the changes.
The multi-layered approach seemingly reflects exactly the Byzantine structure the ACC, Big 12, Big Ten and SEC hope to eliminate. Except in this case, it’s necessary. Overhauling the football calendar is immensely complex, akin to a game of seven-dimensional chess played inside a wormhole. The process would paralyze any committee that had other issues to solve.
“I thought it was interconnected,†a source said, “and then I rolled my sleeves up. It’s hard to comprehend the level of minutiae.â€
Adding to the complexity of the calendar overhaul: The working group has been tasked with presenting models for approval without knowing whether the College Football Playoff will expand to 16 teams starting with the 2026 season — a change that would require opening-round games on the second Saturday of December, a week after conference championships. (The day is currently reserved for the Army-Navy game and the Heisman Trophy presentation.)
That additional round of CFP competition has the working group pondering whether the regular season should start earlier, on the Saturday prior to Labor Day weekend? (This year, the date is Aug. 23.)
“If you move the whole thing up, what does that do to the bowl system?†a source said. “A lot of time has been spent on that one.â€
No calendar issue generates more frustration, or is more difficult to solve, than the transfer portal.
Should it be limited to a single window or multiple windows? Should it open in the winter or spring? And how does the timing impact roster construction in the revenue-sharing era, when coaches are constantly contemplating their budget for the next year?
(The desire to set payrolls as soon as possible could result in National Signing Day for high school recruits being moved to the summer.)
Last season, the transfer portal opened Dec. 9, the day after the playoff field and bowl matchups were unveiled. The calendar flaw was exposed a week later when Penn State’s backup quarterback, Beau Pribula, entered the portal as the Nittany Lions prepared to host an opening-round game.
“We got problems in college football, and I can give you my word Beau Pribula did not want to leave our program, and he did not want to leave our program until the end of the season,†Penn State coach James Franklin said at the time.
“But the way the portal is and the timing of it and the way our team is playing … he felt like he was put in a no-win situation.â€
The working group aims to rectify that, but how?
Many coaches and administrators favor a single transfer window in early January, but that timing would create an awkward overlap with the CFP quarterfinals and semifinals. No professional sports league allows free agency to unfold during its championship season.
The Big Ten, seemingly alone among the power conferences, views April or May as the best time for the portal.
“It’s crazy that the portal window is not in the spring — it makes zero sense to me,†Washington coach Jedd Fisch told the Hotline recently. “People talk about (the time needed for) putting a team together. The NFL has no problem putting a team together, and the NFL Draft happens in April.
“We probably would lose 50% less players to the portal if the portal was later. If you ask teams why players leave, a lot would say well, position-coach changes, coordinator changes, scheme changes, the emotion after the season. You take all those things out if you have your portal†in the spring.
The process would be vastly easier to manage if not for that pesky academic calendar.
A single transfer window in the first half of January could prove problematic for some schools and beneficial to others, depending on the date students are required to enroll.
But placing the portal in the spring would force players to remain on campus for months while knowing they are headed for the exit and create an opportunity for tampering the likes of which the sport has never seen.
Also, how would a single transfer window impact spring practice? The workouts would become obsolete if players can’t transfer until April or May, given that the team on the field would bear zero resemblance to the post-portal roster.
That’s one reason the working group is considering the elimination of spring practice and implementing a version of OTAs (organized team activities) used by the NFL.
“It’s hard to even identify the entry point with all the issues,†the second source said. “Do you start with the portal or the season? Do you work backward or forward? Do you make one change at a time or a few things in conjunction with each other?â€
A morsel of clarity could emerge by the end of the month.
