Well, better almost late than never, right?

About the Ratings

Each offseason, my brother and I rate every Power 5 team on the basis of how excited you’d be to see that team on your non-conference schedule. The possible ratings are “no rating”, 0, 0.25, 0.5, 0.75, and 1. “1” is the best, as evidenced by the list of 20 teams that earned a 1 this year: Alabama, Auburn, Clemson, Florida, Florida State, Georgia, LSU, Miami, Michigan, Notre Dame, Ohio State, Oklahoma, Oregon, Penn State, Tennessee, Texas, Texas A&M, Utah, Washington, and Wisconsin.

How does each conference fare in terms of the ratings? Well, let’s see:

1. SEC (0.61)
2. Big Ten (0.43)
3. ACC (0.41)
4. Big 12 (0.375)

That’s mostly what you’d expect, except for maybe the ACC there. At any rate, let’s dive right into the teams.

Atlantic Coast

1. Florida State (2 legit, 1 FCS): Memphis, @Notre Dame, Charleston Southern, Florida. FSU leads the way, though it’s through a traditional rival, a mandatory game against the Irish, and then… well, an intriguing game with Memphis. This team has gone through a lot this offseason, and that’s not even getting into any of the off-the-field stuff, so it’ll be an interesting trek for the ACC favorites.
2. Georgia Tech (2, 1): Georgia State, Virginia Military, N-Notre Dame, @Georgia. Well, we’re competent again. But can we win more than two games against this schedule? We’ll see.
3. Louisville (1.5, 1): Austin Peay, Jacksonville State, @Notre Dame, @Kentucky. Once again, mostly buoyed by some traditional and mandatory rivals.
4. Clemson (1.25, 1): N-Georgia, Appalachian State, Citadel, South Carolina. Clemson-Georgia is, of course, one of the games of the year in September. A lot will ride on it, but we’ll talk about that more in our Week 1 write-up.
5. California (1.25, 1): California-Davis, @Auburn, San Diego State, Oregon State. They’re playing at Auburn, of course this is an east coast team!
6. North Carolina State (1, 1): Western Carolina, N-Tennessee, Louisiana Tech, Northern Illinois. NC State-Tennessee isn’t really anywhere interesting, it’s just at the NFL stadium in Charlotte.
7. Pittsburgh (1, 1): Kent State, @Cincinnati, West Virginia, Youngstown State. The Brawl is back once again, and I also like getting Cincy in for some Ohio Valley spice. This is a solid regional schedule.
8. Miami (1, 1): @Florida, Florida A&M, Ball State, @South Florida. The Canes get the Gators back on the schedule, which we love to see. The game at USF is a bit of an odd duck, but we suppose the Canes don’t mind going to Tampa.
9. Virginia (1, 1): Richmond, Maryland, @Coastal Carolina, @Notre Dame. While ACC teams don’t have a lot of control with regards to playing Notre Dame, we find the game at Coastal to be a bit odd. Luckily for the Hoos, that’s not nearly as daunting of a prospect with most of the Coastal braintrust on to greener (though less teal) pastures. Also funny that Maryland is counted as an out-of-conference game, but then again NC State and UNC played a couple of years ago for the same reason, so it’s not unprecedented.
10. Stanford (1, 1): Texas Christian, California Polytechnic, @Notre Dame, @San Jose State. It’s sort of funny that the shortest road trip in the conference is all the way out here. Also sort of funny that Stanford is going down to San Jose while that stadium is still a construction zone.
11. Boston College (0.75, 1): Duquense, @Missouri, Michigan State, Western Kentucky. While not highly rated, this BC slate does have multiple other Big 4 teams on. Unfortunately for the Eagles, we figure that WKU may be more of a contest than the games against the Tigers and Spartans.
12. Wake Forest (0.75, 1): North Carolina A&T, Mississippi, Louisiana, @Connecticut. Wake gets Ole Miss to head to Winston-Salem, though they also have a trip up north as well. A lot of ACC teams deciding to take the road game for their 2-for-1s this year, we guess.
13. Southern Methodist (0.75, 1): @Nevada, Houston Christian, Brigham Young, Texas Christian. A perfectly functional OOC schedule for… oh, right. Well, at least the TCU-SMU cross-town rivalry is still on the docket, for now.
14. North Carolina (0.25, 1): @Minnesota, Charlotte, North Carolina Central, James Madison. So this is a super-regional schedule… outside of the trip to Minneapolis. I mean, we always encourage inter-sectional matchups here, and Carolina has one on the schedule, so we’re not hating, per se. Besides, Carolina has bigger problems, like figuring out how to beat us.
15. Virginia Tech (0, 0): @Vanderbilt, Marshall, @Old Dominion, Rutgers. This is how to get both a Big Ten and SEC teams on our schedule in the most technical way possible. And again, a G5 away game!
16. Duke (0, 1): Elon, @Northwestern, Connecticut, @Middle Tennessee State. Obligatory note about how Duke-UConn would probably be a better basketball game.
17. Syracuse (0, 1): Ohio, Holy Cross, @Nevada-Las Vegas, Connecticut. Okay, with the Orange’s trip out to Vegas, let’s count up how many G5 away games the ACC has as a conference. Yeah, that’s 8 different games! I guess now there won’t be a lot in the next few years? Either way, there’s some interesting scheduling here for sure.

Big Ten

1. Southern California (2, 0): N-Louisiana State, Utah State, Notre Dame. As usual, USC plays one of the more interesting OOC schedules in the country. Given that Notre Dame is a yearly rival for them, they don’t really need to play another power-conference team, and yet, here they are.
2. Purdue (1.25, 1): Indiana State, Notre Dame, @Oregon State. Purdue and Notre Dame don’t play a lot, so that’s cool to see. We also appreciate the trip out west for the Boilermakers.
3. Michigan (1, 0): Fresno State, Texas, Arkansas State. Michigan also usually does a good job with OOC schedules, and this one has what should be a banger against Texas. I don’t think Fresno will have much of a chance in the Big House, but it’s certainly a more interesting pick than a MAC or FCS team.
4. California-Los Angeles (1, 0): @Hawaii, @Louisiana State, Fresno State. It seems like in the future UCLA’s schedule will become more Big Ten-like, which is to say they’ll play all their out-of-conference games in September before conference play starts. For now, though, they’ll play LSU after playing Indiana and Fresno at the end of the season before being fully absorbed into the Borg Collective that is now the Big Ten.
5. Wisconsin (1, 1): Western Michigan, South Dakota, Alabama. I hope Alabama goes up to Madison, has a nice time in what should be a perfectly comfortable Midwestern summer, and then forgets why they’re there.
6. Nebraska (0.5, 1): Texas-El Paso, Colorado, Northern Iowa. Unfortunately, this is it for the Nebraska-Colorado revival, and the next time the Huskers have an interesting OOC slate will be when they play a home-and-home with Oklahoma in 2029 and 2030.
7. Oregon (0.5, 1): Idaho, Boise State, @Oregon State. There’s some exceptions in the future, but I think it’s going to be a fairly Pacific Northwest focused OOC schedule for the Ducks going forward. Hopefully they figure how to keep the Civil War going. Right now it’s only planned for the next two seasons.
8. Minnesota (0.5, 1): North Carolina, Rhode Island, Nevada. This is a perfectly functional OOC schedule. We disagree somewhat on UNC’s rating, but I do view them as one of the premier ACC teams. And it’s three home games! A win all around for the Gophers.
9. Pennsylvania State (0.25, 0): @West Virginia, Bowling Green, Kent State. Love to see the regional action against the ‘Neers, other wise, er, not much to see here.
10. Maryland (0.25, 1): Connecticut, @Virginia, Villanova. Yes, I know Maryland is not in the ACC, but on a lot of days that’s harder to remember than the other moves that just took effect this season.
11. Rutgers (0.25, 1): Howard, Akron, @Virginia Tech. In future editions, VPI might notch a higher rating, but for now that puts Rutgers in the back half of this field.
12. Iowa (0.25, 1): Illinois State, Iowa State, Troy. Iowa is one of the more… interesting teams this season. Last season, of course, was marked by the Drive for 25, Brian Ferentz’s quixotic venture to keep his job as Iowa’s offensive coordinator. Naturally, the funniest outcome will be if they score less than 75 points against these three.
13. Washington (0, 1): Weber State, Eastern Michigan, N-Washington State. The prospects for the Apple Cup continuing seem better, at least.
14. Michigan State (0, 1): Florida Atlantic, Prairie View A&M, @Boston College. I tried to imagine how to say “Sparty” in a Southie accent and decided that I maybe didn’t want to know.
15. Illinois (0, 1): Eastern Illinois, Kansas, Central Michigan. Oh man Illinois could definitely lose to this Kansas team at home.
16. Ohio State (0, 0): Akron, Western Michigan, Marshall. This is very much a schedule by the Buckeyes that says “yeah, if we go anywhere from 12-0 to 10-2 we’re in the college football playoff, our schedule doesn’t matter.” In fairness, I’ll note that they have Texas, Alabama, and Georgia on future schedules.
17. Northwestern (0, 1): Miami, Duke, Eastern Illinois. The main to try to find these games at all on TV is to see the Wildcats’ temporary lake-side stadium.
18. Indiana (0, 1): Florida International, Western Illinois, Charlotte. Well, if nothing else, this OOC schedule will probably get the Hoosiers a third of the way to 9Windiana(tm).

Big 12

1. West Virginia (1.25, 1): Pennsylvania State, Albany, @Pittsburgh. As usual, we wholly endorse the return of the Backyard Brawl, and the general regional nature of this schedule for a school that’s increasingly an outlier in the new Big 12.
2. Houston (1, 0): Nevada-Las Vegas, @Oklahoma, Rice. UNLV is a non-factor, and there would definitely be more interesting years for Houston to roll into Norman, but this could still be fun.
3. Baylor (1, 1): Tarlteton State, @Utah, Air Force. This won’t be the first time we’ll see a Big 12 team’s OOC game against a Pac-12 team still show up as an OOC game.
4. Central Florida (1, 1): New Hampshire, Sam Houston State, @Florida. I don’t think UCF will give Florida much of a game, but, well, you never know…
5. Iowa State (0.75, 1): North Dakota, @Iowa, Arkansas State. Outside of the usual “why would you play one of the Big Sky powers on purpose?!?” not much going on here outside of the rivalry game.
6. Utah (0.5, 1): Southern Utah, Baylor, @Utah State. And, to wit, here’s the other side of two sudden conference-mates thrown together.
7. Arizona (0.5, 1): New Mexico, Northern Arizona, @Kansas State. And again!
8. Colorado (0.25, 1): North Dakota State, @Nebraska, @Colorado State. Honestly, Colorado heading back to the Big 12 feels sort of spiritually correct, unfortunately, I don’t think Oklahoma, Missouri, and Nebraska are going to get the memo. Also unfortunately the Colorado State rivalry is going to take a break after this season until 2028, and the Buffs won’t get any of their wayward Big 8 rivals back on the schedule until when Mizzou rolls into Boulder in 2030.
9. Kansas State (0.25, 1): Tennessee-Martin, @Tulane, Arizona. And again again!
10. Cincinnati (0.25, 1): Towson, Pittsburgh, @Miami (OH). Why is Cincy heading to a MAC school? Well, that’s a rivalry that dates to a 0-0 tie in Miami back in 1888. They’ve played every year since 1909 (except 2020). Suffice it to say, the Bearcats have dominated in recent decades, but Miami did tie the series at 60-60-7 with an upset last season. This will be the first time since 2017 the Bearcats will travel to Miami. Can the Redhawks make it it two in a row? I will I just copy and paste this in a few weeks? We’ll see!
11. Oklahoma State (0.25, 1): South Dakota State, Arkansas, @Tulsa. Again, what makes you think scheduling a Big Sky school is a good idea? We assume that going to Tulsa is a 3-for-1 thing.
12. Texas Christian (0.25, 1): @Stanford, Long Island, @Southern Methodist. Huh, TCU is really loading up on ACC teams for some reason.
13. Arizona State (0, 0): Wyoming, Mississippi State, @Texas State. This is about as difficult of a schedule as you can have and get 0 OOC points for it. The Cowboys are always plucky and Miss State might be the most random number generator team you can get out of the SEC. And then you go on the road to the closest thing they’ve had to a buzzy team in San Marcos since they moved to FBS? Best of luck, Sun Devils.
14. Kansas (0, 1): Lindenwood, @Illinois, Nevada-Las Vegas. The folks in Urbana-Champaign are going to be blown away by this offense.
15. Texas Tech (0, 1): Abilene Christian, @Washington State, North Texas. Texas Tech going to Pullman feels like a commitment by the two schools often referred to by outside commentators as being “on the moon” to play an OOC series.
16. Brigham Young (0, 1): Southern Illinois, @Southern Methodist, @Wyoming. Perhaps the best thing about BYU’s schedule is a game that doesn’t appear here: the Holy War is finally a permanent conference rivalry game again. That’s a downright rare win for conference realignment. Otherwise, this one’s kinda weird, perhaps it’s still some artifacts of BYU’s time as an independent washing out of the schedule.

Pac-12

1. Washington State (1, 1): Portland State, Texas Tech, N-Washington. So you might be wondering how we decided what to do with the remainder of the Pac-12. It’s a tad awkward. In essence, I counted the Mountain West teams and the games against each other as conference games. That said, there’s some difficultly here because I checked and Wazzu here originally had San Diego State and San Jose State in their non-conference schedule. Those games were moved around with the new arrangement, so I’m not sure if there’s a way to say if one of them is still “non-conference” or not. So Wazzu has three “non-conference” games and Oregon State has four. That’s just the only sane way I could do it. Also, because I actually rank the schedules by the average, which means that Wazzu’s .3333 average just beats out Oregon State’s 0.3125 average. Which is a tad unfair given Oregon State’s schedule is more difficult, but such is life.
2. Oregon State (1.25, 1): Idaho State, Oregon, Purdue, @California. The Beavers, as noted above, definitely have a more difficult schedule, at least in the OOC framework. The main question for these teams is if they can maintain the level of relevance that we even rate their schedule. It’s one of the most unfair things I can think of in sports, especially for the Beavers. Wazzu is a truly rural ag school in far eastern Washington. Corvallis is the all of 50 minute drive up I-5 from Eugene. The only real difference between Oregon State and their brothers down the road is that the guy who founded Nike went to college there. I don’t really know what the answer is, though. I doubt the Big 12 is calling (especially since they seem to have decided to reach out to UConn first). The ACC already took the two west coast schools it perceived as valuable. I’m half convinced that if the sport survives the next decades, the mega-conferences may go the way of the mega-conferences of the first century of the sports’ history, that is, they collapse under their own weight. After all, today’s SEC and ACC can trace their own roots to the Southern Conference.

SEC

1. Florida (2.5, 1): Miami, Samford, Central Florida, @Florida State. Somehow the Gators couldn’t find a Florida-based FCS team to play instead of Samford, but other than that, the continued commitment to the “never travels out of the state” bit is remarkable. That said, this schedule has some high sickos potential with both Miami and UCF on here. I can definitely dig it.
2. Louisiana State (2, 1): N-Southern California, Nicholls State, California-Los Angeles, South Alabama. LSU is really trying to put the “LA” in “Louisiana”, we suppose. You’ve got the requisite Louisiana based school: check. You’ve got two of the universities most closely associated with Los Angeles: check. And… this is a bit of a stretch for sure, but if you consider South Alabama being from “Lower Alabama”, that’s four LA schools!
3. Georgia (1.25, 1): N-Clemson, Tennessee Tech, Massachusetts, Georgia Tech. It’s incredible that when we finally don’t play Clemson for the first time since 1982 Georgia finally plays them again. Great, fantastic.
4. Texas (1, 0): Colorado State, @Michigan, Texas-San Antonio, Louisiana-Monroe. So, this could be wrong, but we’ve been doing this OOC review thing here for a long time. Since 2007! That’s really wild for me to think about, honestly, but that’s beside the point. I just checked the archives, and yeah, this is the first time since Vanderbilt’s 2010 season that an SEC team does not have a FCS/DI-AA team on the schedule. (A look further back to 2007 indicates that Tennessee also was late to the SEC-SoCon challenge party.) And, at least as of this writing, the Longhorns don’t have one on their schedule, though they still need to fill things out in 2026 and beyond. (Unless, of course, the SEC finally goes to nine conference games.)
5. Texas A&M (1, 1): Notre Dame, McNeese State, Bowling Green, New Mexico State. A&M welcomes the Irish to Kyle Field, but yeah, otherwise not much to see here.
6. Alabama (1, 1): Western Kentucky, South Florida, @Wisconsin, Mercer. It’s the start of a new era in Tuscaloosa, and with that, this is a pretty manageable schedule except for the trip to the Midwest. Hopefully it goes as I described it earlier.
7. South Carolina (1, 1): Old Dominion, Akron, Wofford, @Clemson. We’re rapidly ranging out of the “anything to see here?” portion of the SEC OOC schedule.
8. Arkansas (0.75, 1): Arkansas-Pine Bluff, @Oklahoma State, Alabama-Birmingham, Louisiana Tech. We like Arkansas playing opponents to their west, and that may be interesting, but otherwise not much here.
9. Oklahoma (0.75, 1): Temple, Houston, Tulane, Maine. Unlike their Red River rivals, the Sooners are sliding into a very SEC schedule (though it is funny they’ll still play Houston).
10. Tennessee (0.5, 1): Tennessee-Chattanooga, N-North Carolina State, Kent State, Texas-El Paso. The Vols have the NC State game I’ve already talked about, and then otherwise a bunch of teams they’ll probably put up a bunch on.
11. Vanderbilt (0.25, 1): Virginia Tech, Alcorn State, @Georgia State, Ball State. This is certainly a Vandy schedule, including the part where they’re going to Atlanta.
12. Mississippi (0.25, 1): Furman, Middle Tennessee State, @Wake Forest, Georgia Southern. I don’t think Ole Miss has a lot to worry about with this OOC slate, at any rate, this won’t be a hindrance to their playoff ambitions.
13. Mississippi State (0, 1): Eastern Kentucky, @Arizona State, Toledo, Massachusetts. I don’t think Miss State has any playoff ambitions, per se, but again, like their cousins this doesn’t present any obstacles.
14. Auburn (0, 1): Alabama A&M, California, New Mexico, Louisiana-Monroe. Auburn doesn’t play New Mexico State this year, but to Hugh Freeze’s chagrin, he’s not going to be able to dodge Diego Pavia this year, either.
15. Missouri (0, 1): Murray State, Buffalo, Boston College, @Massachusetts. See below.
16. Kentucky (0, 1): Southern Mississippi, Ohio, Murray State, Louisville. Er, not much to see here.

So, finally, here’s the breakdown of OOC awesomeness by conference:

1. Pac-12 (0.33)
2. ACC (0.228)
3. SEC (0.19)
4. Big Ten (0.162)
5. Big 12 (0.15)

I suspect the ACC is benefiting a bit from the ACC-SEC rivalries, and the Pac-12 is mostly benefiting from having 2 teams. Regardless, the new college football season is upon is, and without any further adieu, I’d really like to get to the Week 1 previews. Onward!