SEC eyeing nine-game conference football schedule in 2026

The SEC is set to officially add the Oklahoma Sooners and Texas Longhorns to the conference roster this summer and has already released the 2024 football schedule.

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That schedule, which will include 16 teams for the first time, features each team playing eight conference games and four-non-conference contests. That’s been the standard format for the SEC for some time.

Back in June 2023, SEC commissioner Greg Sankey indicated that the 2024 slate would be a “one-year schedule” and would not be based on any previous scheduling pattern.

“Creating a one-year schedule will provide a longer on-ramp to manage football scheduling around existing non-conference commitments of our members,” Sankey said. “It will also provide additional time to understand the impact of an expanded College Football Playoff and engage with our media partners as we determine the appropriate long-term plan for SEC football scheduling.”

On Tuesday, Texas athletics director Chris Del Conte spoke with the media at an annual town hall-style meeting, where he revealed details of the SEC’s future football scheduling format.

“We have eight games scheduled right now,” Del Conte told Inside Texas. “We’re working on going to a nine-game schedule, but we have a ways to go with that. I would say this year (2024) we have an eight-game schedule. The following year (2025), we have another eight-game schedule. Then we’ll look at going into a nine-game conference schedule.”

Based on Del Conte’s comments, it appears that the SEC will again use a “one-year schedule” in 2025 consisting of eight conference games before the league finally moves to a nine-game format for the 2026 season.

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While a nine-game football schedule does have its advantages, such as conference members facing each other more often, it does create an imbalance of home and away games. Most power teams prefer to play seven home games each season, which means that they would need three non-conference home games in years when they play four SEC games at home and five on the road.

That could squelch some longstanding non-conference rivalry games and could also lessen the number of big time home-and-home series in future seasons.

When asked about Texas possibly playing home-and-homes with some of its former Big 12 foes, Del Conte wasn’t sure.

“If they want to come play here at Texas, I’m all in,” Del Conte said. “I’m not sure yet how we can do a home-and-home until I know how all that balances out.”

Texas extends first two offers to QBs in the 2026 class

With KJ Lacey in the fold in 2025, Steve Sarkisian now has his first two targets in the following cycle.

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No decisions in a recruiting class are more important than which quarterbacks receive offers, especially coming from a noted developer of the position like Texas Longhorns head coach Steve Sarkisian.

With Alabama product KJ Lacey committed in the 2025 recruiting class, Sarkisian and his staff extended more to 60 offers in the 2026 cycle before the first two offers went out at quarterback on Wednesday — to Nashville (Tenn.) Nashville Christian School’s Jared Curtis and San Marcos (Calif.) Mission Hills’ Troy Huhn.

Sarkisian extended both offers personally.

Ranked as the No. 1 quarterback in the 247Sports Composite rankings and the No. 1 overall recruit by 247Sports, the recruitment of Curtis is already relatively mature as he enters the spring of his sophomore year, not an uncommon development for quarterback recruits of his stature.

A 6’4, 225-pounder, Curtis holds more than 30 offers from top programs nationally with Alabama, Florida State, Georgia, Ohio State, Tennessee, and Texas A&M currently among his top choices with Oregon recently hosting Curtis for an unofficial visit.

Curtis went 180-of-321 passing (56.1 percent) for 2,522 yards with 25 touchdowns and nine interceptions as a sophomore, adding 543 rushing yards and 13 touchdowns.

Offering Huhn from Sarkisian’s home state represents a different type of evaluation by Sarkisian — the 6’4, 195-pounder is unranked by all four services and doesn’t yet have a nationally elite offer list. Arizona, Arizona State, Cal, Nebraska, Oregon, Penn State, San Diego State, Texas A&M, and UCF have all extended offers so far. Expect that list to grow during the spring evaluation period.

Texas is already familiar with Huhn, who visited for a camp last summer and was in attendance for the overtime win over Kansas State in early November.

Sarkisian’s ties to California and Huhn’s willingness to make multiple trips to the Forty Acres already make him a quarterback to watch in the 2026 class as Texas takes a shot at Curtis, though the process is still early for the Longhorns with Sarkisian and position coach AJ Milwee selective with their offers at this stage and several other unoffered quarterbacks among the nation’s top-100 prospects showing interest in Texas with Junior Day visits last month.