Category Archives: OOC schedules

Rating the 2010 Non-Conference Slate, Part 1: ACC

The ACC actually has a lot of make-or-break out-of-conference games this year, a big deal for a conference hoping to live up to their new TV deal. As an ACC fan, let me tell you a lot of folks in this conference (especially from the “southern wing”) suffer from what I call “SEC-envy”. Unlike many of these folks, I don’t think the media is actively biased against the conference. That said, sometimes the conference doesn’t really help itself. But with the nation’s 2nd toughest OOC schedule as a group (with a “legit average” of 0.3177) the ACC will have its chances to show its mettle. Let’s get started.

Oh, I should note that in some cases, schools were tied with the same rating, in which case the tie is broken first by the number of DI-AA teams on the schedule and then completely arbitarily.

  1. Florida State (2.5 legit, 1 DI-AA): Samford, @Oklahoma, Brigham Young, Florida. Hope of getting back to the ACC forefront abounds in Tallahassee this year, and this schedule can help with 3 pretty legit teams on the slate. Florida is of course a rivalry game, but Seminole fans have to be hoping Christian Ponder can show Sooner fans what they’re missing this year. If FSU can win two of the big three of these they will finish the season ranked, provided their defense doesn’t catch fire within the conference again.
  2. Miami (1.75, 1): Florida A&M, @Ohio State, @Pittsburgh, South Florida. Okay, this isn’t, your, um, older brother’s Miami team, but a rematch of a national title game is always fun. 
  3. Clemson (1.75, 1): North Texas, Presbyterian, @Auburn, South Carolina. Well, it’s not Clemson-Georgia but Tigers vs. Tigers is always fun. 
  4. North Carolina (1.5, 1): N-Louisiana State, @Rutgers, East Carolina, William & Mary. Well, the biggest thing here is the season kick-off neutral site against LSU. Most ACC partisans feel LSU is ripe for the pickin’ in this game, but then they turn around say that UNC themselves is extremely beatable. So we’ll see. I will say that if there’s year that LSU seems vulnerable, to me, this is it.
  5. Georgia Tech (1.5, 1): South Carolina State, @Kansas, Middle Tennessee State, @Georgia. Well, we get post-Mangino Kansas in Lawrence. Um, outside of that, there’s not really much to say about this slate, other than that the MTSU series is a 2-for-1 and I think the trip to Murfeesboro is next year.
  6. Boston College (1.25, 1): Weber State, Kent State, Notre Dame, @Syracuse. I have no idea what to say about this schedule. They’ll be favored to win all of these except ND, and even then they should have a pretty good chance. Oh, and it just gets worse from here.
  7. Duke (1, 1): Elon, Alabama, Army, @Navy. Let’s be clear here: two of three are on the schedule because this is Duke, which is also the reason they’re on Alabama’s joke of a schedule. 
  8. Maryland (1, 1): N-Navy, Morgan State, @West Virginia, Florida International. The Navy game is in Baltimore, which should be fun except that I think Navy is probably going to win. I wish Maryland could play Colorado in the “battle of coaches who probably should have been fired a year ago” bowl.
  9. Virginia (1, 2): Richmond, @Southern California, Virginia Military, Eastern Michigan. The only ACC team playing two DI-AA teams, they probably need it the most. At least their new coach probably shouldn’t lose to Richmond.
  10. Virginia Tech (0.75, 1): N-Boise State, James Madison, East Carolina, Central Michigan. I don’t know if the VPI-Boise State game is THE MOST IMPORTANT GAME IN ACC HISTORY, but it is a big deal for the conference. Once again, VPI can use their opening game as the kick off to a darkhorse national title run, while this is the most important game on Boise’s schedule. So that is one to watch. The rest of this schedule? Not so much.
  11. Wake Forest (0.75, 1): Presbyterian, @Stanford, Navy, @Vanderbilt. Let’s see… anything clever to say about this? Well, um, both Vandy and Wake have gold and black as their primary colors. Um. Yeah, I got nothin’. Oh, well, yes, Stanford is still only worth 0.5 points, one year does not grant you legitimacy. 
  12. North Carolina State (0.5, 1): Western Carolina, @Central Florida, Cincinnati, @East Carolina. Who is the AD at NCSU? How did you end up scheduling two mid-majors away in the same year? There are a lot of schedules worse than this one. But there are also a lot of better ones. But then again, NCSU has been pretty solidly “mediocre-to-bad” since 2003, so if the same AD has been there the entire time (I’m too lazy to look) they should have been fired a long time ago anyway.

Join us next time, for the Big East!

Rating the 2010 Non-Conference Slate: Prologue

It’s that time once again, boys and girls. The rules from 2008 still apply, so let’s get right down to business.

First, let’s do the list of “1”, that is, the teams we judge to be the most desirable to play. We fully acknowledge the inclusion of Georgia Tech in this group is very biased: Clemson, Florida State, Georgia Tech, Miami (FL), Virginia Tech, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Texas, West Virginia, Michigan, Ohio State, Penn State, Notre Dame, Oregon, Southern Cal, Alabama, Auburn, Florida, Georgia, LSU, and Tennessee. For those of you keeping score at home, that’s 5 “1”s for the ACC, 1 for the Big East, 3 for the Big 12, 3 for the Big Ten, 2 for the Pac-10, and 6 for the SEC. So the breakdown below by conference probably won’t be that surprising:

  1. SEC (0.75 average)
  2. Big Ten (0.659)
  3. ACC (0.604)
  4. Pac-10 (0.6)
  5. Big 12 (0.5625)
  6. Big East (0.5625)

That’s a pretty sharp one-year decline for the Big 12, which went from tied for 2nd to tied for last. The main explanation for the Big 12 is probably the decline of the former glimmers of hope in the Big 12 North (Kansas and Missouri) and Colorado has been so bad for so long now that their desirability rating finally took a hit. The Pac-10 is ready to break out, I think, especially if Stanford and Washington (especially Washington) can continue rising up. Meanwhile, our bias for the ACC continues, as we may be the only people on the planet still excited to play Miami and FSU (or, for that matter, Clemson). But hey, we all have our vices.

Coming soon, the conference-by-conference breakdowns, starting with, as usual, the Atlantic Coast Conference. See you then.

Rating the 2009 Non-Conference Slate: Epilogue

Before we can properly dive back in to college football, let’s examine our treatment of the best, and worst, of college football scheduling this year. Unlike the previous editions, this has a bit of subjectiveness to it, after all, no one really cares what kind of schedule Duke plays – the point here is to reward or shame programs that should, well, know better.

First, the shaming.
11. Rutgers (0.1 legit average, 2 DI-AA): Howard, FIU, @Maryland, @Army, Texas Southern. My arbitrary cut-off for consideration was a 0.1 “legit average”, which is simply the number of legit points divided by the number of OOC games a team plays. This completely uninspiring slate sees two DI-AA teams stop in and only one BCS opponent. But it gets worse. It gets much worse.
10. Arizona (0.833, 1): Central Michigan, Northern Arizona, @Iowa. Iowa doesn’t rate very highly on the “legit” scale, which is perhaps unfair, but this is still a pretty bad schedule. It’s an improvement over last year’s effort, though. Perhaps it’s a sign of change for a gradually rising program?
9. Louisiana State (0.0625, 0): @Washington, UL-Lafayette, Tulane, Louisiana Tech. Yeah, yeah, it sucks that Washington is terrible now, but completing the rest of the Louisiana Circuit (minus the other half of the UL-UM pick ’em) doesn’t make for an inspiration schedule. However, the get the nod over the following teams, because at least they aren’t playing any true DI-AA teams. The tie was broken in a completely arbitrary and subjective fashion.
T-8. Northwestern (0.0625, 1): Towson, Eastern Michigan, @Syracuse, Miami (Ohio). I considered leaving NU off the list entirely, but hey, you win 9 games and want to be among the big boys of the Big Ten, then you need to schedule better.
T-8. Virginia (0.0625, 1): William & Mary, Texas Christian, @Southern Mississippi, Indiana. As for this, well, I said earlier they might lose a game (or three) against this schedule. The continued employment of Al Groh confuses me. That said, UVA should be better and schedule better, so I guess that’s why they’re on the list.
T-6. Kansas (0.0625, 1): Northern Colorado, @Texas-El Paso, Duke, Southern Mississippi. Though I expect their counterparts in Manhattan to catch up (or is it down?) next year with the return of Bill Synder, for now this sad excuse for a schedule will have to do for one of the Big 12 North’s main contenders.
T-6. Wisconsin (0.0625, 1): Northern Illinois, Fresno State, Wofford, @Hawaii. Really? Of course, they needed overtime to beat Cal Poly last year, so…. and hey, it’s not as bad as Penn State’s.
4. Pennsylvania State (0.0625, 1): Akron, Syracuse, Temple, Eastern Illinois. Seriously. I mean, they will go 4-0 but there is just absolutely no room for error in a schedule like this. Penn State really has to hope everyone else in the conference does their part to help out, including Ohio State beating USC and subsequently losing to them, because without that the Big Ten’s overall strength of schedule will be shot.
3. Texas (0, 0): Louisiana-Monroe, @Wyoming, Texas-El Paso, Central Florida. This. I just. Wow. I will laugh if Texas pulls an Auburn (circa 2004) and winds up undefeated and 3rd in the BCS behind, say, USC and Florida because of this schedule. And how did they end up in Wyoming? Is that a 10-for-1?
2. Texas Tech (0, 1): North Dakota, Rice, @Houston, New Mexico. Of course, this schedule is worse. I’d say TTU needs to put up 230 points combined on these four in order to keep up.
1. Mississippi (0, 2): @Memphis, Southeast Louisiana, Alabama-Birmingham, Northern Arizona. Yeah, maybe Ole Miss scheduled bad in the recent past due to being terrible themselves, but still. There’s no reason to import a DI-AA team from Arizona to fill out your already terrible schedule .

With that over with, let’s take a look at teams who decided to entertain all of us and perhaps helps themselves a little in the process. This is a little more stringent than the above, as I wanted to focus on teams that played more than 1 BCS school and interesting inter-regional matchups.
6. Illinois (0.5, 1): N-Missouri, Illinois State, Fresno State, @Cincinnati. Just barely making the cut, the Illini’s neutral site game with Mizzou and games against the likes of Cincy and Fresno are definitely gambles in the OOC scheduling world. Kudos to them.
5. UCLA (0.5, 0): San Diego State, @Tennessee, Kansas State. I’ve always liked Tennessee’s willingness to travel, though in this case the beneficiary is UCLA. Tacking on Kansas State was also a good move on UCLA’s part, though you can bet K-State won’t be scheduling games like that again anytime soon.
4. Oregon (0.6667, 0): @Boise State, Purdue, Utah. Oregon is considered, generally, to be the second best team in the Pac-10. For them to go out and play at Boise is a pretty big deal. Honestly, the weakest team on this schedule might be Purdue, but we’ll see if Utah can re-live the magic from last year. About as challenging as a slate featuring Purdue as the only BCS representative can get, at any rate.
3. Southern Cal (0.6667, 0): San Jose State, @Ohio State, @Notre Dame. Southern Cal-Ohio State is pretty much the game of the year already, though I’ve already elaborated on why OSU needs it more. If Notre Dame were better, that would be enough to vault this schedule to the top, but as-is it’s just not good enough.
2. Virginia Tech (0.4375, 0): N-Alabama, Marshall, Nebraska, @East Carolina. A “neutral” site game with a major SEC and national power? Check. A home game with a historically good Big 12 team on the rise? Check. A road game at a non-BCS opponent that beat you last year? Check. Though our average doesn’t like them, this is a pretty darn good schedule. I honestly think VPI has a shot in all of these games, too. Honestly, this should challenge for #1.
1. Georgia (0.625, 1): @Oklahoma State, Arizona State, Tennessee Tech, @Georgia Tech. It hurts for me to say this, but this is a darn good schedule. I don’t think anyone expects Oklahoma State to be as good as it was last year, but I applaud at least the decision to go out there. Arizona State makes its return trip and should still be decent, and I would like to think my own alma mater isn’t exactly chopped liver. I could go either way with this or VPI’s schedule, as this 3 good to very good teams, as opposed to VPI’s great team and very good team. Nonetheless, for me to conceded anything to UGA should tell you that this is darn good.

Well folks, that’s a wrap. We’ll begin regular programming soon. I even already have the Week 1 TV Guide setup, that’s how much I’m looking forward to it! See you then.

Rating the 2009 Non-Conference Slate, Part 6: SEC

And finally, we wrap up our look at the college football’s non-conference scheduling with the Southeastern Conference.

  1. Georgia (2.5 legit, 1 DI-AA): @Oklahoma State, Arizona State, Tennessee Tech, @Georgia Tech. It pains me once again to say something good about UGA, but they have recently started to make an effort to schedule some decent teams. Many SEC schools would be content to go with their OOC rival (see: Florida, Kentucky, usually USC) and call it a day, but UGA has not one but two legit OOC opponents outside of GT. Good for them. While it gets a little easier next year I’m surprised they allowed this year to happen at all.
  2. South Carolina (1.5, 1): @NC State, Florida Atlantic, The Citadel, Clemson. And it immediately starts to go downhill. While the SEC wasn’t the lowest rated conference this year, UGA’s score does have a strong effect on the average. At any rate, this follows the formulate for the SEC: rivalry game (if applicable), OOC game with school from neighboring or same state, and two patsies, one of which should be DI-AA.
  3. Alabama (1, 1): N-Virginia Tech, Florida International, North Texas, Tennessee-Chattanooga. I may write an article later on the return of the “kickoff classic” type of game that we all thought died 9-10 years ago, but for now suffice to say I like these types of games, even if this particular series does take place in Tech’s backyard. Bama-VPI in particular is a huge deal for both teams. VPI can get on the map and start their darkhorse run for the title with a win, while Alabama can show they haven’t lost a step since last year by starting with another whipping over an ACC team. The rest of the schedule, of course, sucks very thoroughly (I may also write an article on Bama paying San Jose State a million bucks to get shallacked next year, we’ll see).
  4. Mississippi State (1, 1): Jacksonville State, Georgia Tech, Houston, @Middle Tennessee. Miss State makes the return trip to Atlanta, outside of that there’s not much to get excited about here unless Houston is decent again.
  5. Vanderbilt (1, 1): Western Carolina, @Rice, @Army, Georgia Tech. This is the 5th-ranked schedule in the SEC, and there’s only one legit team on here. It only gets a one (along with Miss State) because of our bias towards Tech, otherwise these would probably be ranked much lower. That said, they do get a trip to Rice’s historic stadium, which has to be the most diproportionally sized stadium in the country. (The stadium seats 70,000 while the university has a total enrollment of 6,392 which also makes it (along with Vandy and Wake Forest) one of the smallest schools in DI-A, period.)
  6. Tennessee (0.75, 0): Western Kentucky, UCLA, Ohio, Memphis. Tennessee avoids a DI-AA team thanks to Western Kentucky’s newfound status this year as a full DI-A member, and also gets a return trip from our favorite football trust busters. Outside of that, well, they play Memphis which I guess is sort of interesting.
  7. Auburn (0.75, 1): Louisiana Tech, West Virginia, Ball State, Furman. Well, good thing WVU is on this schedule. I think the main trend for both teams “What the hell is going on with our program” as I’m pretty sure there are segments of the Auburn fanbase that still think the Gene Chizik hire was some sort of practical joke.
  8. Florida (0.75, 1): Charleston Southern, Troy, Florida International, Florida State. Two Sun Belt teams, a DI-AA team and a mandatory rivalry game. Your defending national champions, folks! I wonder if in reference to the FIU game Florida people say, “Well, we played a team from Miami this year!”
  9. Arkansas (0.5, 1): Missouri State, N-Texas A&M, Eastern Michigan, Troy. Arkansas and TAMU are looking at making the their neutral-site get-together in the Cowboy’s new intergalactic space palace (which I saw from the air a couple weekends ago, and I’d say it’s a pretty accurate description) a regular thing, which I’m totally a fan of. The rest of this schedule, not so much.
  10. Kentucky (0.5, 1): N-Miami (OH), Louisville, UL-Monroe, Eastern Kentucky. Yes, that is an “N” next to the Miami game, as the game is being played in Cincinatti. My guess it was probably supposed to be the Redhawk’s home game in the contract and it was moved there so they could get 50,000+ folks in blue and white there to watch the ceremonial beatdown.
  11. Louisiana State (0.25, 0): @Washington, UL-Lafayette, Tulane, Louisiana Tech. In fairness, LSU didn’t know that Washington would be so terrible when this game was probably scheduled. That said, was UL-Monroe not available? Seriously, this schedule is patently ridiculous for a team with national title aspirations.
  12. Mississippi (0, 2): @Memphis, Southeast Louisiana, Alabama-Birmingham, Northern Arizona. This schedule is also patently ridiculous, mainly because it happens to have both SE Louisiani and NAU on it. Ole Miss was also supposed to play a home-and-home with GT starting next year, but backed out and replaced us with either UL-Lafayette or Jacksonville State. (GT replaced them with Kansas.) Just pathetic, but I imagine it will help accomplish Ole Miss’s goal of getting some mentions this year (as the pre-season hype train seems to love them).

Well, that’s a wrap! Well, not quite, as we’ve got a summary coming up pretty soon, so stay tuned!

Rating the 2009 Non-Conference Slate, Part 5: Pac-10

Oh yeah, I was doing this schedule preview thing. Let’s get this over with, starting with the Pacific 10, land of the 10-team round-robin schedule.

  1. Southern California (2 legit, 0 DI-AA): San Jose State, @Ohio State, @Notre Dame. This schedule doesn’t pull any punches, with two major road trips to the Midwest. USC-OSU will be essential to each team’s fate, with the loser probably lacking a good enough conference slate behind them to prop them up later in the year. (It would also serve USC well to stop getting upset in-conference, but that’s outside the scope of this article.)
  2. Oregon (2, 0): @Boise State, Purdue, Utah. Oregon ventures onto the blue turf in a crucial early matchup for both. (In fact, it’s one of the earliest games of the season, and frankly probably more appealing than the other big first Thursday matchup, South Carolina-NC State.) Oregon’s scheduling march doesn’t end there, with games against Purdue and Utah. These three matchups, combined, almost rivaled USC-OSU, but I still had to give the nod to USC. Maybe I’ve just been watching too much ESPN. (Oh snap!)
  3. Washington (2, 0): Louisiana State, Idaho, @Notre Dame. LSU-UDub would ordinarily be an interesting intersectional matchup, but let’s face it, Washington could well go 0-3 against this slate if they play like they did last year. (As Dr. Saturday pointed out, Washington had one of the toughest schedules in the country last year, mainly because they could not play themselves.) This is also the 2nd of 4 Pac-10 matchups with Notre Dame.
  4. Stanford (1.75, 0): @Wake Forest, San Jose State, Notre Dame. The Caltrain series returns this year, but will the Gridiron Gauruntee? Not that it seemed to help, based on their attendance numbers.
  5. California-Los Angeles (1.5, 0): San Diego State, @Tennessee, Kansas State. UCLA’s probably in for a bit of culture shock when they head to Knoxville, but their attempt to end the monopoly on LA Football isn’t really bolstered by a home slate of inept SD State and K-State.
  6. Washginton State (1, 0): Hawaii, Southern Methodist, N-Notre Dame. It’s Washington State! It’s Notre Dame! It’s in…. San Antonio? Apparently this is just the first in a series of Notre Dame’s take on a barnstorming tour, with upcoming games in the Meadowlands and Dublin, apparently. Anyway, as for Wazzou, well, unlike their cross-state partners in crime, it’s possible for them to go somewhere other than up, since they had a win and all.
  7. California (1, 1): Maryland, Eastern Washington, @Minnesota. This schedule is good in name only. I’m having a hard time getting excited about UMD and UMN, but at least they’re trying!
  8. Arizona State (1, 1): Idaho State, Louisiana-Monroe, @Georgia. Arizona makes the return trip to Athens, which in UGA’s conference would probably give them a high ranking schedule. Not so in the Pac-10! That said, in a perfect world this would be a pretty weak schedule, with Arizona’s other slots being taken up by a Sun Belt team and Idaho State (because apparently just regular Idaho wasn’t bad enough). Anyway, the drop-off after this is really noticable.
  9. Oregon State (0.75, 1): Portland State, @Nevada-Las Vegas, Cincinnati. Outside of the random roadtrip to Vegas, not much here. Well, at least Cincy is better than Iowa. Which leads us to…
  10. Arizona (0.25, 1): Central Michigan, Northern Arizona, @Iowa. Probably not as bad as last year’s debacle, but still, this schedule is weak by any standard, and especially so in the Pac-10.

Well, that concludes everyone’s favorite major conference west of the Rockies. Next, we wrap up with the SEC and perhaps a conclusion article. ETA: Sometime before the beginning of the season. Until then!