Swarbrick said the new ACC Network is critically important to the future of the conferenceGETTY IMAGES
Notre Dame AD Jack Swarbrick said he "doesn't sense a lot of momentum" regarding potential alterations to the CFP format prior to the end of the initial 12-year contract with ESPN in '25, according to Eric Hansen of the SOUTH BEND TRIBUNE. Swarbrick said, "We have health and safety issues. We have consumer-demand issues. The playoff is just part of that discussion. And we have to be focused on the health of college football." He also touched on the short- and long-term impact of the new ACC Network on Notre Dame, saying it is "critically important to the future of the conference and the future of our program." Swarbrick said the "distribution out of the Big Ten and the SEC right now is very different than the rest of college athletics," and the ACC Network is "going to help close that gap" (SOUTH BEND TRIBUNE, 8/24). Swarbrick discussed one change he would make to college football, which would be to "normalize the scheduling." He also said there is a "need to create some better way to evaluate teams" in regard to CFP rankings. Swarbrick: "The selection committee of the College Football Playoff has done a phenomenal job, but they only have 12 data points." Asked if he thought it would be viable to hold a Shamrock Series outside of the U.S., Swarbrick said, "I'm less optimistic that we can figure out how to do that than I was many years ago. The complexities of it are significant. It's just very complicated. I'm excluding Canada here" (SOUTH BEND TRIBUNE, 8/25).
