SEC's Greg Sankey confirms 'cupcake weekend' is finally dead after move to nine-game schedule

MIRAMAR BEACH, FL - After years of eating "cupcakes" late in the college football season, the SEC has finally decided that its sweet tooth in November needed to go.

If you are a fan of football, you know exactly what I'm talking about in terms of games played on the second-to-last weekend of the regular season in the Southeastern Conference.

These matchups have generally consisted of schools within the SEC playing lower-level FBS, or even FCS opponents, like Alabama versus UT-Chattanooga on November 21, 2026.

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In reality, these matchups are usually treated like an 'off-weekend' or even a Saturday where fans know that the starters will be out of the game by halftime.

Fans are the ones who take a hit, knowing that these dreadful games will be played before 'rivalry weekend', and having to still pay a ridiculous amount of money to attend these scheduled outings that most would think should be a less-expensive trip to see their favorite team play.

"That's the end of cupcake weekend. We never got that one sponsored, though," SEC Commissioner Greg Sankey jokingly noted on Tuesday evening.

Now that the league is moving from an eight-game to nine-game conference schedule, the SEC is hoping to capitalize on its new format.

Getting away from these types of games being played late in the season is also a way for the conference to show their fans a little extra love, though media rights holder ESPN assuredly appreciates the SEC finally pulling the trigger.

"It's nine conference games and a recognition that you're populating more weekends," Greg Sankey said on Tuesday evening. "And so you really cannot have odd numbers of open or non-conference dates later in the season because then that has a backward domino effect in where you place games early. We ran into some of that in the '26 season."

Also known as "buy games," schools have used this weekend late in the season to either snag an extra win for bowl eligibility or add a few extra million to the athletic department budget, after their payouts to the schools who travel into town for a beating.

It's a move that also keeps up with the Big Ten, who have not watered down this weekend in November with a type of matchup that makes season ticket holders question why they are paying so much for their overall package.

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Unfortunately with a move to a nine-game conference schedule, some teams in the SEC have decided to 'mutually' part ways with upcoming power-four opponents, most recently with South Carolina and North Carolina canceling their home-and-home series.

There have been plenty others who have also decided that the additional conference game would be a catalyst to rearranging schedules, though there is still hope that schools will continue scheduling these marquee games in the future.

Next season, we will see Ohio State versus Texas, Oklahoma versus Michigan and Alabama versus Florida State, just to name a few.

But, as for the cupcakes that took up the back portion of the month of November, those days are history following the upcoming season.

It's about time.