MAC Commissioner Jon Steinbrecher gives 2025 State of the Conference address

The commissioner hit on a number of topics in Detroit, with special focus centered on changes in “non-Autonomous” synergy and movement.

MAC Commissioner Dr. Jon Steinbrecher addressed assembled media at Ford Field in Detroit, Michigan on Thursday, July 24, discussing a variety of topics relating to college sports and the conference over a 15-minute session.

Steinbrecher, who first took over commissioner duties in 2009, is one of the NCAA’s longest-standing commissioners at the Division I level, and as such, had plenty to say as far as the issues which currently face the league.

Steinbrecher started the address by highlighting the sheer amount of change in the conference, welcoming in six new head football coaches and two new athletic directors (Akron’s Andrew Goodrich and UMass’ Ryan Bamford).

Steinbrecher also welcomed two new partnerships into the conference’s fold, with Apple announced as the MAC’s official sideline equipment partner and an agreement with national college athlete honor society Chi Alpha Sigma to enroll all MAC student-athletes as members.

Steinbrecher praised the addition of UMass, noting the Amherst-based flagship school’s reputation as an academic institution and showing optimism for the Minutemen program to catch up quickly with the other MAC athletic departments. UMass was recently ranked as the 26th best public school by U.S. News and World Report, and has recently made investments in their athletic facilities and NIL infrastructure.

Steinbrecher also thanked NIU for their contributions to the MAC in the program’s second tenure, noting the program’s big game capabilities (especially highlighting the 2012 Orange Bowl, 2024 vs. Notre Dame) and championship pedigree while also noting their prowess in graduating talent— such as current North Carolina State head coach Dave Doeren, current Vanderbilt assistant coach Jerry Kill and the late Jim Mallory, as well as current ACC Commissioner Jim Phillips, who started his AD career with NIU.

Steinbrecher emphasized in post-address comments to Michael Reghi and Dustin Fox that the MAC would take its time to celebrate NIU and their student-athletes and then wish them well, expressing the impending move is “bittersweet.”

Steinbrecher also made a nod to the selections of MAC alumni Nick Saban and Urban Meyer for the 2025 College Football Hall of Fame in Atlanta, Georgia and former Kent State basketball forward Antonio Gates to the 2025 Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio.

Notably, Steinbrecher had a lot to say regarding the House vs. NCAA settlement, which became official in the spring.

“The response that comes to mind is from the lyrics from Pink Floyd Song and is quote. I am comfortably numb.,” Steinbrecher quipped. “… The settlement is neither good nor bad. It is. It is simply a framework for providing an evolving set of guidelines.”

On Wednesday morning, the various college administrators at the Division I level met with College Sports Commission CEO Brian Seeley to discuss progress on constructing systems to enforce NIL and eligibility rules.

“The history of college sports is replete with examples of programs that search for loopholes or simply circumvent or ignore the rules,” Steinbrecher said regarding the meeting. “For this settlement to persist, the membership must behave in a manner that was approved by the federal appeals court. Additionally, the House settlement is not the end of the road. It is Step 1 of what are likely to be many, many, many more steps.”

Steinbrecher, much like he did last year, expressed his reservation about a solution to the NIL problem that does not involve legislation from Congress, noting he has directly lobbied Congress four times over the last year and has kept an eye on the recent SCORE Act, which is expected to hit the congressional floor for adoption in September.

(Relatedly, President Donald Trump signed an executive order to limit “pay for play” via NIL in college athletics late Wednesday afternoon, threatening to use the government’s power of the purse to block Title IX and other types of federal funding if colleges do not comply— though there are questions surrounding the legality of the order.)

“The goal [of college athletics] is to get a college degree, and we need to have eligibility and transfer rules that we can enforce,” Steinbrecher said. “I recently heard a couple of media talking heads say that college athletes should not have to go to class and that the athletes should just focus on playing and they could come and get a degree another time. I can think of several colorful adjectives, I’ll just say wrong.”

“Absent a direct link between intercollegiate athletics and the Academy,” Steinbrecher continued, “it would call into question why we would have intercollegiate athletics on our campuses. Regardless of the economic issues, we must be attentive to, and primacy must be given to facilitating the successful educational journeys of our student-athletes.”

Steinbrecher also expressed reservation about Autonomous conferences interfering with the structure of the College Football Playoff, coming out as a staunch opponent of automatic bids for conferences.

“Unlike the CFP revenue distribution, which draws heavily from past performance and brand, selection for the CFP should be forward-facing, honoring conference champions and non-champions that had exemplary years,” Steinbrecher said in his address.

Steinbrecher doubled down on his comment when talking with Reghi and Fox, saying flatly “I am not a big fan of pre-ordaining playoff slots for conferences” when asked about the potential for changes in the Playoff.

Steinbrecher did note the MAC is not opposed to playoff expansion, saying the conference supports the current 12-team construction and is open to both a 14-team and 16-team bracket as long as concerns about the selection process are addressed.

Steinbrecher referred to his time as a BCS Committee member when discussing the College Football Playoff selection process, saying the BCS committee shifted the computer formula every season and it led to “dissatisfaction in the selection process and a call to have a human element incorporated into that process”, the results of which has cascaded down into the issued facing the current Playoff committee today.

“We should focus on ways in which we can enhance existing metrics as well as the development of new data and metrics to assist the committee with the challenging job of populating the bracket,” Steinbrecher said. “… History informs us that if we tinker with the event too much, credibility in the event— which is the second-most popular sports championship in the country behind only the Super Bowl— is at risk.”

Another major topic broached by Steinbrecher was cooperation between the so-called “Group of Six” or “non-Autonomous conferences”.

Steinbrecher called for the conferences to work together to try and ensure success for all involved and keep themselves afloat by supporting one another economically.

“It is becoming more and more clear that the way for our path for success forward is less fragmentation, more collaboration among all of us, certainly among the 10 FBS [conferences] and certainly among the five or six non-Autonomous FBS [conferences],” Steinbrecher said. “NCAA governance is one area in which this makes perfect sense, but there are many, many others— especially economic-leaning areas. We’re all going to win if we compete on the field but collaborate in the boardroom.”

When asked about a potential recruiting pitch to prospective members in a question-and-answer session with media after the address, Steinbrecher re-iterated the need for unity amongst the Division I partners.

“Whether or not we grow or not, who knows?” Steinbrecher retorted. “What I’m seeking is business partnerships with other leagues. That is the path forward.”

Steinbrecher went into more detail about what a business partnership could look like during his post-address interview with Reghi and Fox.

“Long-term, we need to operate more as a single unit as opposed to 10 independent units or 32 independent units,” Steinbrecher said. “There’s way more value in that. Getting us there is going to be a heavy lift and take some time, but that would help everybody— including the people at the top of the economic food chain. [Those top programs] are gonna need help as much— if not more— than we will just because of the economics of where they’re at.”

The comments are similar in nature to American Conference commissioner Tim Pernetti’s, who stated Thursday morning the FBS conferences (including the Autonomous ones) need to unify their media deals to help maintain the sport’s health.

To conclude the speech, Steinbrecher addressed the reputation that the MAC is a “dying” league due to recent developments.

“There is a wonderful quote by author Robert Heinlein that I also look often look at and he wrote, quote, ‘always listen to experts; they will tell you what cannot be done and why. Then do it.’ That has always been the way in the Mid-American Conference,” Steinbrecher read. “We are continually told budgets are not big enough, players are not fast enough and we cannot compete. Yet year after year, with that chip on our shoulder and a deserved reputation for being efficient and effective with resources, we persevere and we succeed. It’s our pirate mentality and I look forward to getting the season underway.”

To emphasize the conference’s embrace of the pirate mentality, the media day staging area did indeed have a pirate motif, complete with a skull-and-crossbones helmet, a flag-posing stage and official signage with the “Jolly Roger” version of the MAC logo.

The 2025 MAC football season kicks off on Thursday, August 28th, with six teams in action throughout the evening.

Bowling Green hosts FCS Lafayette and Ohio visits Rutgers to officially start the season, with both games having a scheduled kickoff time of 6 p.m. Eastern.