[Husker] 2005 Schedule Comments & Fearless Fead's Prediction for 2005

[Gary Fead]

Good Morning All:

Well the 2005 schedule seems to have pushed list traffic up a little bit, which is a good thing as long as it's a civil discourse. 

1. I do not recall NU and Houston ever having a series lined up that was cancelled. I do recall NU/TCU as well as an NU/Arkansas series being cancelled.

2. As was mentioned regarding the Maine game on September 3rd, look for that game to be at night and quite possibly a candidate for PPV. Whoever said it in this forum last night is correct about a PPV possibility. 

3. "Follow the Money".......If you follow the money you can usually figure out the reason for many decisions. If NU had played Houston in Houston in September the game most likely would have been on ESPN which of course would have resulted in some TV money for Houston as well as NU (probably around $150,000). OK, so why not play at home (every home game is worth over a million dollars) and try to stage the game for PPV (we'll make more on a PPV with Maine than we would going to Houston and having the game on ESPN). 

We made a killing (dollarwise) on PPV games in 2004. Now whether we can do that again in 2005 I don't know, a 5-6 season will bite you in many ways. But as I noted a few months ago it only takes about 3,000 subscribers (@ $29.95) to have a PPV break even. The past season in Omaha alone Cox Cable had 11,000 subs for the Western Illinois game and around 6,000 or so for the Kansas game. Furthermore NU doesn't have to share the PPV revenue with the opponent.

4. As far as the season ticket holders complaining about a game against Maine they better not complain too much as the Maine game may be one of only two games at home that are winnable (the other being Iowa State) for NU. The remainder of the home schedule isn't going to be a pushover. Wake Forest, Pittsburgh, Iowa State, Texas Tech, Oklahoma and Kansas State are all good to excellent opponents with four of these teams beating NU in 2004. 

5. What does next season hold for NU? In my opinion I think it's going to be a long year in Lincoln I would not be surprised if we end the season next year with a 3-8 or 4-7 record. Looking further down the road 2006 won't be much better as we add USC, Texas, Oklahoma State and Texas A&M to the schedule (though we loose Oklahoma and Texas Tech off the schedule). 

6. Regarding Wake Forest we return the home game to WF in 2007 traveling to Winston-Salem, NC on September 8th, 2007.


Gary Fead
Omaha