SEC's Sankey Gives Himself Lot of Wiggle Room on Expansion Talk

Opening SEC Media Days, commissioner didn't say anything beyond they are at 16 teams ... at least for now

SEC commissioner Greg Sankey speaks to the media at the 2024 SEC Football Kickoff on Monday at the Omni Dallas Hotel in Dallas. / James D. Smith / SEC

DALLAS — As usual, SEC commissioner Greg Sankey gave his annual State of the League address to kick off 2024 Football Kickoff in downtown Dallas Monday morning. Like the freeways, he had a lot of traffic to get through and ended up back where he started.

"Sixteen is our today and 16 is our tomorrow," Sankey said before taking any questions.

That's trying to get a jump on all the expansion talk that, naturally, is going to include the SEC as they appear to be with the Big 10 in a super-power takeover of college athletics. It got interesting a little later, when he started getting questions.

A record number of media are squeezed into the event, which he announced is heading back to Atlanta next year at the College Football Hall of Fame there. For those interested, that's 781 miles east of this year's current location, or as the Big Ten and ACC call it, right next door.

Don't think he doesn't know the ACC is dealing with lawsuits that could launch a full-scale breakaway in that league. Because of geography, there is naturally going to be talk about schools like Clemson and Florida State headed to the SEC.

Add in however many from the state of North Carolina if there is such a breakaway. Sankey, though, took the politically-correct approach to handling all that, which gave him about six lanes of traffic to work with.

"I pay attention," Sankey said. "We're focused on our 16. I'm not a recruiter. My job is to make sure we meet the standard of excellence that we have for ourselves on a daily basis. That attracts interest. It's done that with the two universities that we have added this year. They're not the only phone calls I've ever had, but I'm not involved in recruitment."

A lot of that is to avoid getting dragged into any lawsuits. The ACC is fighting those in multiple states and it doesn't appear to be clearing out any time soon.

"Our presidents have been clear that I am not going to entangle us in litigation around expansion," Sankey said, indicating his marching orders to avoid saying anything specific. "So I pay attention, but I'm not engaged in those conversations."

As usual, he expounded on that. Very, very carefully.

"As I understand, the issue is agreements have been signed, the decisions have been made among a conference," Sankey said "The question is are those going to be honored as they were established? And apparently that's for a court to decide now."

After that he hit the big curve and began the push to get the whole idea back where it started. That's not a criticism, just an observation.

"The broader implications, obviously if things change, then there's a new level of uncertainty," Sankey said. "It already creates speculation that I think is counterproductive, but I don't spend an enormous amount of my time thinking about it. I certainly don't spend any time engaged in that recruiting activity because we're focused on our 16, and I want to be respectful of the difficulty that's currently faced with that issue — that set of issues within the ACC and my colleague Jim Phillips."

Finally, he brought it home before moving on to other topics, mostly about bringing Texas and Oklahoma into the league.

"I'm not going to guess about what happens next," Sankey said.

He probably could have just said at the start. All of that means he's aware of what's going on, but they've already left themselves a path to do without causing decades of scheduling uproar.

Sankey may suspect what's going to happen. Like athletics directors, they work the possibilities over in their minds constantly.

He's not going to say, though. These days, everybody is more worried about the lawyers being the only ones getting a whole lot out of all the talking.

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