The Southeastern Conference will move to a nine-game conference schedule in football beginning next year, the league announced Thursday.

The SEC joins the Big Ten and Big 12 in upping their conference slates from eight games to nine. That leaves the Atlantic Coast Conference as the only Power Four league still at eight as of 2026.

Additionally, the SEC will direct its schools to use one of its three nonconference games to face a "high-quality" opponent from one of the other three power conferences or Notre Dame.

Some schools are locked into traditional, annual rivalries outside the SEC -- Florida against Florida State, South Carolina against Clemson, Georgia against Georgia Tech -- but several more are not.

"Adding a ninth SEC game underscores our universities' commitment to delivering

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