Washington State leaves no stone unturned for Pac-12 as prez Schulz breaks silence on "hold up" rumors around 5+7 college football format

The Pac-12 has been one of the most newsworthy conferences lately, and the College Football Playoff format has been another thing to add to the discussion. After Tuesday's unanimous vote, the 12-team format will now see five highest-ranked conference champions and seven best teams.

There were beliefs that the Pac-12 tried to "hold up" the format change for the College Football Playoff in 2024 and 2025, and one person has spoken about it.

Washington State president Kirk Schulz, who voted in favor of the 12-team format, discussed potential Big Ten and SEC proposals. Some allegedly included multiple automatic bids into the College Football Playoff. Schulz is a member of the CFP board of managers and gave a brief statement on Tuesday about the situation while talking to Ross Dellenger of Yahoo Sports.

"I worry about any league getting a certain number of automatic berths beyond their champion. I wouldn't be alone in that," Schulz said.

With the way the College Football Playoff is slated for 2024 and 2025, there are some issues for specific situations. If the Notre Dame Fighting Irish are the No. 1 ranked team at the end of the regular season, they would not receive a first-round bye as the Power Five conference champions would receive it instead.

Schulz said this could be some commissioners acting in their conference's best interests.

"My commissioner tells me that there was an idea floated of a single league getting four [automatic qualifiers] into the playoff," Schulz said. "You go, 'Boy, that doesn't seem like it's going to be well embraced by football fans across the country.' The commissioners are fantastic, but they are paid to look out for the betterment of their conference."

It will be interesting, as the rumor is that there will potentially be a 14-team playoff format in 2026.

What proposal could the Pac-12 want for the College Football Playoff?

The Pac-12 is still in a weird situation as it figures out what its future will look like. The conference has a new commissioner, Teresa Gould, starting next week and needs to add teams. However, regarding the College Football Playoff, it seems to be content with how things are right now.

With the format for 2024 and 2025, the conference gets an automatic entry for the conference champion. Even if the field expands, maybe Pac-12 will hope for a 6+6 model to include a Group of Five conference and not have the SEC or Big Ten dominate the field.