Michigan football HC Kyle Whittingham predicts NCAA breakaway super conference is on the horizon

Jan 13, 2026 - 22:00

College sports, including college football, have been volatile over the last few seasons. The introduction of NIL and the expansion of player transfers have upended the college sports environment. Newly hired Michigan football head coach Kyle Whittingham recently said what has been speculated for a while, that he thinks there will be a super conference of schools that break away from the NCAA over these issues.

On the latest episode of “The Triple Option,” Kyle Whittingham spoke with Urban Meyer about what he sees as the future of college sports, and Whittingham said he thinks bigger conferences will eventually break away from the NCAA and form a super conference on their own.

Whittingham said, “I think when you talk about the overhaul that I mentioned, I think you’re going to see a super conference develop where they probably just play each other. They don’t play anybody but the people at that level, and they’ll break away from the NCAA, and they’ll have their own commissioner. And so I think that’s going to be a thing of the past.”

Urban Meyer was talking with him about the type of out-of-conference schedule Michigan can expect. Whittingham says in the long run, he thinks there won’t be any conferences anymore, and it’ll just be a big super conference. The big conferences will remove themselves from the NCAA anyway.

However, for now, Whittingham said to expect, “A game that you know is a very competitive game, and then a game that you definitely should win, and then a middle-of-the-road game. And so, I think that is still probably the best approach right now.”

Whittingham is 66 years old and has seen all of the changes come and go in college football as the head coach of the University of Utah over the past 21 years. It is worth listening to him when he makes that prediction. However, for now, he is trying to ensure the Michigan Wolverines maintain their spot near the top of the Big Ten and college football after he helped bring Bryce Underwood back.

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