Greg Sankey reacts to comments about eliminating SEC Championship: ‘We have contracts’

Amid some calls from inside the SEC about potentially eliminating the conference championship game, Greg Sankey responded Wednesday. Speaking after the College Football Playoff meetings, he noted the contract the SEC currently has in place for the title game.

The SEC’s deal with the city of Atlanta and Mercedes-Benz Stadium was due to expire in 2026. However, in 2023, Sankey announced an extension of the deal through at least 2031. That means the game will be at the home of the Atlanta Falcons for at least the next six seasons, including the upcoming 2026 campaign.

That’s why, while Sankey said school officials can share their opinions, the contracts are in place. As a result, the SEC Championship will remain for now.

“We have contracts,” Sankey said, via Yahoo! Sports’ Ross Dellenger. “Opinions are expressed, but we have [a] contract, so we have a championship game.”

The role of conference championship games has already come into question during the expanded College Football Playoff era. In fact, the Big Ten previously floated a proposal that would call for those games to be eliminated and effectively replaced with CFP play-in games.

But in the SEC, chatter about potentially eliminating the championship game ramped up earlier this month. Alabama athletics director Greg Byrne told USA Today the game has “run its course” in the current landscape. While he acknowledged how special the game is, he sees it going away if the College Football Playoff expands.

“It’s a great event,” Byrne said. “I don’t like the idea of it going away, but I think it’s reality, with an expanded playoff.”

When asked by On3’s Chris Low about doing away with the game, Georgia coach Kirby Smart said he’d be fine with it if the College Football Playoff was to expand. However, he would want to know more details before the conference finalized any decision.

“But I’d want to know the parameters of it before we did anything,” Smart said. “Where we are right now with 12 teams (in the playoff), I don’t necessarily agree that it needs to quit being played. But if it gets to 16 or 24 and we’ve got to move the end of the season up and we’ve got to get everything done by the second week of January, then I’d say it probably has to go.

“The important thing is we need to gain something, meaning we’re playing that weekend in the first round of the playoff when the SEC championship game is normally being played and playing the season out like an NFL playoff system. But if we’re going to leave it where it is now, with 12 teams in the playoff, I’m not for removing the SEC championship game.”