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Come Fan with UsSaturday, June 20, 2026

College Football Playoff is the name of college football’s new playoff

Wednesday, we’ll know where playoff games will be played, and Thursday we’ll learn more about the selection committee.

College football’s long-awaited playoff system will simply be called College Football Playoff, according to ESPN’s Brett McMurphy. The BCS conference commissioners have been meeting in Pasadena, where they hashed out this and several other issues.

Said one of the assembled branding minds, who recently ditched some names of his own:

The four-team playoff will begin in 2014, with four other bowls serving as the BCS 2.0. ESPN is paying $5.6 billion over 12 years to broadcast the whole thing, with that payout being divided among conferences.

Among the other issues that are being decided this week are the remaining three sites for playoff semifinal games. The Rose, Sugar, and Orange Bowls are already known to be part of the six-site rotation, but three other sites needed to be finalized. The overwhelming favorites for those three games are the Fiesta, Cotton, and Chick-fil-A bowls.

Also up for a decision is the site of the first playoff championship game. Speculation has strongly pointed towards Cowboy Stadium in Arlington, Texas as the favorite to host the game, as it was one of only two cities to submit a bid to host. Tampa, Fla. was the only other bidder after a long list of other cities gave up.

Sites will be announced Wednesday, while the last piece of planning still left for the conference commissioners to decide this week, how the playoff field will be selected, will be announced Thursday.

A committee will be used to pick the teams, but who and how many people will be on the committee are still issues that need to be finalized.

More from SB Nation:

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Ole Miss wins (?) recruiting wars

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National recruiting coverage

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