Ohio State is celebrating and preparing for all the changes coming to college football in 2025

ATLANTA — The early favorite to win next year’s national championship: Ohio State.

The question no one can really answer at this point: What kind of sport will the Buckeyes, or anyone else, be back when they start it up again in seven months.

A program that won the title by spending lavishly ($20 million reported) and using the transfer portal judiciously (QB Will Howard and RB Quinshon Judkins were the main ones) joins everyone else in not knowing exactly what the rules will be in this game that it changes quickly when the next fall happens.

A landmark legislative solution that allows schools to pay players directly while reducing the number of players (but increasing the number of available scholarships) is set to take effect next school year.

Before that, schools need to see how Title IX regulations fit together. There will be haggling over a transfer portal that almost everyone agrees is out of control. They will find out if the 12-team playoff that debuted this season will remain as it is or get a tweak or two.

“There are so many unknowns,” said Gloria Nevarez, commissioner of the Mountain West Conference. “We try to follow all this as best as we can and offer solutions. But we need to see what ‘it’ is so we can determine how it affects us.”

The playoff expansion benefited a well-built Ohio State team

The Buckeyes, listed as 9-2 favorites by BetMGM Sportsbook to win all of next season, have adjusted as well as anyone to the 2024 environment.

Yet their luckiest twist of fortune had nothing to do with planning or roster building, but simply expanding the college postseason from four to 12 teams. An ugly loss to Michigan in November knocked them out of the Big Ten Conference title race and would have been their last game of the season in years past.

This time, they got a second chance after being ranked sixth by the College Football Playoff selection committee and the eighth seed thanks to a system that allowed the conference champions (Boise State of the MWC and Arizona State of the Big 12) to leapfrog them and earn byes.

It would take a unanimous vote of the conference’s 10 commissioners and Notre Dame athletic director Pete Bevacqua to change a seeding system that many agree is worth tweaking.

“I think there’s going to be a good, honest conversation about whether we need to make some changes from this year to next year to make something that worked really well work even better,” Bevacqua said over the weekend. “Will there be changes? I don’t know. I’m just one person.”

There is still uncertainty about schools paying players

It is understood, however, that there will be changes to the way Name, Image and Likeness (NIL) payouts are awarded to players. Under the terms of the House settlement, schools are allowed to pay players directly by sharing up to $20.5 million in revenue.

It is generally thought that the lion’s share of those funds would go to the players whose sports bring in the most money — football and basketball (men’s and women’s). A government memo released last week, however, called some of that into question by suggesting that paying men an outsized portion could run afoul of Title IX rules.

A new administration sworn in could change that, but the clock is ticking. The settlement is expected to be approved on April 7, and the rules are expected to take effect at the start of the next school year.

“It’s been five years of every day being different than the day before, adapting and adapting and being a man,” said Grant House, the Arizona State swimmer who is the lead plaintiff in the lawsuit that triggered all of these changes. “Right now, nobody has all the answers, but we’re looking for solutions.”

Would a commissioner solve many of college football’s problems?

Maybe what college football could really use is a commissioner to solve all these problems.

Whether it’s former Alabama coach Nick Saban or someone else, it’s a suggestion that keeps coming up when the subject turns to anything from the playoffs to scheduling to paying players on the transfer portal that has become a flood of players looking for better deals on different places.

“It would help the fans enjoy the game,” said Chris Fowler, who called Ohio State’s win over Notre Dame. “You need a centralized layout, you need a more level playing field. You need better enforcement. You need an entity that can enforce what’s going to happen when you go to revenue sharing, because that opens up a whole new potential for rule-breaking.”

2025 top teams projected like a who’s who of powerhouse colleges

Even with the portal and all the new money-changing stuff — see, an $8 million quarterback at Duke and NFL coaching great Bill Belichick at North Carolina — next season’s list of favorites looks like the usual lineup of college football’s best programs.

—LSU pulled what is considered the best out of the transfer portal.

— Texas will begin the season with Arch Manning, grandson of Archie, at quarterback.

—At Georgia, Gunner Stockton is expected to replace Carson Beck, who has committed to Miami.

—The Hurricanes also took Xavier Lucas, a defensive back from Wisconsin who never officially entered the portal, which opened up a whole new set of questions about tampering and how this system works.

Meanwhile, the champs will look to Julian Sayin, a five-star recruit who transferred to the Buckeyes out of Alabama before playing college ball, to replace the NFL-bound Howard.

Coach Ryan Day — his job in jeopardy after the loss to Michigan — will celebrate briefly. Asked if the pressure is off now that he has a national title, Day was already thinking about next year’s opener, Aug. 30 against Texas at The Horseshoe.

“Try to lose the first game and see how it goes at Ohio State,” Day said. “We’ll see about that.”