[Husker] Big 10 to increase number of league games.
Rod Wellman
gobigred66 at mac.com
Tue Feb 12 10:23:51 CST 2013
I think 9 games is a risky proposition and 10 is flat-out dumb.
NUs "strategy" with their non conference games now is: 1 "marquee" game against an opponent most would recognize as being a strong team. 1 game against a solid team, maybe a lower tier bowl participant from last year. Both of those games in theory could give the Huskers a good fight. Then, 2 games that in theory and on paper we should be heavily favored to win. Early season is the time to get some guys some experience and we'd rather do that against Western Kentucky than Ohio State.
So, in a 9-game scenario, one of those teams will be a Big 10 team. Big 10 gets to decide who, not us. Could be anybody. Might be Indiana. Or it might be Ohio State. Who knows? Point is, NU is not going to schedule very tough competition AT ALL in those three games when we know that the Big 10 gets to decide which Big 10 opponent we play the 4th game of the season . Why would we take a chance that we will play TWO top 10 teams in the first 4 weeks of the schedule? We don't do that now! Instead I could see NU scheduling 2 "decent" teams, ala Arkansas State, and one "gimme". If we did that, our strength of schedule in maneuvering the Big 10 land mine still plenty high. In other words, pull a Kansas State: make sure you win the non-conference games no matter what, and then hope to make a good run through the conference schedule. With 9 Big 10 games on the schedule, a few of those will be high caliber teams. Beat them, and you're in the national title picture.
Then there's the issue of retaining as many home games as possible. That would mean 2 of those 3 teams will almost assuredly be a home and home, meaning there's a good chance that 2 of the 3 will be "gimme". I don't see how this is a better non-conference schedule, or makes for more desirable match ups and games to watch, especially in the years when that first Big 10 game is one of the lower tier Big 10 schools, like Indiana. Then, it's 4 full games of "iffy" competition.
I fear the match ups against the likes of Tennessee, USC, Oklahoma will be a thing of the past. We'll be stuck with 2 Arkansas State type teams and a South Dakota State team every year.
And if we go to 10 games, well, then, it's even more likely we'll never see a Nebraska/(Insert top 15 program here) matchup in non conference. We'll get very familiar with the Big10 foes and it'll seem like we don't even play anyone else. Welcome to the NFL.
I'm talking myself into being a non-fan of conference expansion :) Damn you Delaney.
Ohio State can talk big now, and they have inked some deals with some "big names" (as have we). But once this whole thing gets put into place in 4 or 5 years, then we'll watch what their future scheduling starts to look like. Like us, they won't have much incentive to put a Texas on their schedule then.
One other thing: the non-conference schedule also gives us the chance to go to parts of the country that are important for recruiting. Reducing those games reduces the variety of places you can go, although I guess you could argue that there would be some good East Coast exposure gained from going out to Rutgers and Maryland a little more often under the 9 or 10 game scenario.
Rod W.
On Feb 12, 2013, at 9:51 AM, Mike Jaixen <mikejaixen at yahoo.com> wrote:
> And how much of that is posturing for the negotiations about the conference scheduling.
>
> It ties back to the point I made: Schools must be have an incentive to schedule road games against USC, LSU, Alabama, etc. Ohio State says that they want to pull money from the conference to lessen the impact of six home games on budgets. We'll see how that actually materializes. I'm skeptical of that actually coming to fruition...though I'm not completely dismissing it.
>
> Of course, that money isn't going to magically appear. And since it's conference money, it's money that would be going back to the school anyway. So I'm going to retain my skepticism because the temptation to play a home game against Florida Atlantic for a $5+ million payday is going to be too great to resist.
>
> (And lets not forget that Ohio State scheduled eight home games last year; their biggest non-conference game was a home game against Cal...)
>
> I don't believe that the additional conference games are necessarily better. I think Nebraska is beefing up their future schedules with games against Fresno State, Southern Miss, and Northern Illinois. Those are the games that are going away with 9-10 game conference slates, and frankly, I'd rather play those teams than Indiana, Purdue, Minnesota, or Iowa. (Or Penn State, once the impact of NCAA sanctions fully hits.) There's a certain amount of inbreeding that occurs when you restrict yourself to only playing a certain set of schools and only those schools. You only get limited opportunities to measure yourself with other teams around the country, and those are the matchups that need to be retained.
>
> Mike Jaixen
> http://huskermike.blogspot.com
> http://www.cornnation.com
>
> --- On Tue, 2/12/13, Dave Ratchford <ratchfromneb at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> From: Dave Ratchford <ratchfromneb at gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [Husker] Big 10 to increase number of league games.
> To: "Mike Jaixen" <mikejaixen at yahoo.com>
> Cc: "Paul Dalen" <quesohusker at gmail.com>, "Husker Discussion List" <husker at tssi.com>
> Date: Tuesday, February 12, 2013, 8:59 AM
>
> Further weakening? That would be difficult from what we have now :)
>
> Don't worry, smarter guys than you or I are working on this. The net result will be more better games with plenty of money to go around. Smith even says that the additional conference games are often better than most of the non-conference match-ups and he is right. If it results in one less home game every few years, and programs like OSU and Michigan aren't afraid of it, then Nebraska shouldn't be as well.
>
>
> Dave
>
>
> On Tue, Feb 12, 2013 at 9:14 AM, Mike Jaixen <mikejaixen at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> Exactly. The games that disappear under a 9 or 10 game conference schedule are the games that you really DON'T want to disappear, unless (and this is a BIIIIIG if) the television networks incentivize teams to play on the road. In other words, the television revenue of playing a game at LSU, Alabama, Tennessee, Florida State, etc., more than offsets the $5 million that a school receives for scheduling Florida Atlantic.
>
>
>
>
> I don't see that happening. And so this will have the net effect of further weakening non-conference schedules.
>
>
>
> Mike Jaixen
>
> http://huskermike.blogspot.com
>
> http://www.cornnation.com
>
>
>
> --- On Tue, 2/12/13, Paul Dalen <quesohusker at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>
> From: Paul Dalen <quesohusker at gmail.com>
>
> Subject: Re: [Husker] Big 10 to increase number of league games.
>
> To: "Jon Johnston" <jon.johnston at gmail.com>
>
> Cc: "Husker Discussion List" <husker at tssi.com>
>
> Date: Tuesday, February 12, 2013, 7:49 AM
>
>
>
> In my line of work we call the issue of 7 vs 6 home games 'measurement
>
> space'...the deltas between proposed courses of action that actually mean
>
> something.
>
>
>
> I'm more than skeptical that this move would increase the overall strength
>
> of schedule of the conference, as I think it would guarantee that any
>
> non-conf away games would disappear and be replaced with pay-for-play
>
> teams. I'm not even sure that this should be considered a second order of
>
> effect...it's so obvious that it should be considered a first order effect.
>
>
>
> On Tue, Feb 12, 2013 at 7:42 AM, Jon Johnston <jon.johnston at gmail.com>wrote:
>
>
>
>> I have no idea how this can be considered good news.
>
>>
>
>> Jon Johnston
>
>> Corn Nation
>
>>
>
>> On Feb 12, 2013, at 3:23 AM, Dave Ratchford <ratchfromneb at gmail.com>
>
>> wrote:
>
>>
>
>>> Good news.
>
>>>
>
>>>
>
>> http://espn.go.com/college-football/story/_/id/8937704/big-ten-increase-number-league-games-eight
>
>
>>>
>
>>> Last paragraph talks about school budgets that rely upon 7 home games.
>
>>>
>
>>> Dave
>
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>
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