If you want respect, schedule good teams, Part 1 of 4

1/4.

Everyone argues that strength of schedule should mean everything in college football, until someone calls their team out on scheduling Directional Community College...

I don’t know the real reason Penn State pulled a U-ie by dropping Arkansas State from the 2008 schedule, replacing ASU with the Oregon State Beavers. But I know one thing; they didn’t do it for the jokes. Could it be that Tim Curley grew a set and went door to door, asking for any BCS school to come to Happy Valley? Even more surprising was that OSU didn’t demand a return game. But even if they did, it would allow PSU to really test the guts of the program. If the team can make a trip like that and pull off a win in a tough place to play—OSU ended USC’s 33-regular-season-game win streak in 2006 in Corvallis—it would pay enormous dividends in recruiting and national perception.

That aside, I’ve heard for years about PSU’s lack of interest in using the new 12-game schedule to renew the rivalry with Pittsburgh. Some have even said that if PSU doesn’t want to play Pitt any time soon, at least have an on-going rotation of former eastern rivals like Maryland, Rutgers, Syracuse and West Virginia. While I understand that PSU might not want to lock themselves into a long-term deal with one school—Lord knows, the Michigan/Notre Dame series has failed miserably and never gets good ratings—the atrocious scheduling policies used by PSU athletics is hurting the program. There’s no excuse for scheduling a I-AA school. I don’t care if Florida, Michigan (we know how that one worked out) or Texas does it. Penn State has gained a reputation for not being able to beat good BCS teams, and scheduling bottom-feeders won’t help.

The fight over whether or not a school should schedule I-AA’s will never end, so I’m just going to move past that. I’m just not buying PSU’s line that “We need the seventh home game.” It’s not so much that PSU wants to have seven home games; that’s perfectly fine. I don’t like that they’re using it as justification for not being more aggressive in their scheduling of BCS schools, and—dare I say—playing some away games.


In 2000, PSU and Pitt played their last games against one another, and if you subtract the Kickoff Classic, it was a pretty ordinary 11-game season—six home games, five away games. You didn’t hear PSU crying like a baby for that seventh game then. Now take a look at 2001. There were only three out-of-conference games that season, and all three slots were used for quality opponents. I’d say opening with Miami, taking on a good Southern Miss program and then traveling to Charlottesville is a damn good job of giving your team the upper hand when people look at strength-of-schedule.


I think 2002 was a fluke. No team should be allowed to play eight home games in one season. But it wasn’t even like that helped PSU, as it couldn’t even go through the home slate clean. That’s beside the point. 2002 and 2003 felt like a scheduling onslaught, with PSU traveling to Lincoln (remember Nebraska was still considered a power then) and taking on Boston College. At this time, Temple was still technically a BCS team, playing in the Big East. Penn State knew that 2002 and 2003 would have 12 games, and scheduled two very good BCS teams. It didn’t kill the program.

I almost have to give PSU a pass on 2004 and 2005, as Alabama was supposed to play a home-and-home series, but backed out like pussies. Just think of how strong PSU’s schedule would have been had it played Bama those two seasons. Would it have changed the landscape of 2005? We can only wonder. Overall though, I’d give PSU a failing grade for 2004, as I believe they could have found some better team than UCF to replace Bama. 2005 was a much better deal, since PSU sort of lucked out with CMU turning out to be one of the better MAC teams. Cincinnati and South Florida, looking back, had a lot of future stars in 2005.


Probably the most disappointing schedule in a long time was the 2006 docket. Youngstown State was the first I-AA team scheduled in, well, a really long time. That was sort of the final straw for me. There were dozens of better choices for that spot. I remember hearing that SMU was free that week. How cool would it have been for PSU to play SMU in a revenge game for 1982? Great story line for the ESPN guys to harp on. They should have put Craig James on the crew for that one. Buffalo in 2007 was a curious choice. It wasn’t horrible, but not good. Florida International was a worse team to play than YSU in 2006. There are 70 teams in I-A which could be considered “quality” opponents. Penn State basically told everyone that it was too lazy to go out and find one of them to play.

*Temple: Before I finish up, just a word on Temple. It’s a nice idea to have Temple back on the schedule again. It builds excitement in the eastern part of the state, and strengthens PSU’s ties to South Jersey. It’s also a great situation with the Owls getting better, and several former PSU standouts are leading them to respectability. Even if it’s just a farce, and PSU is in it only for the quick buck (which I’m sure they are) I’m relatively happy that Temple will be on the schedule in the future, as long as the Owls are the only OOC “cupcake” PSU plays each season.

I'll have Part 2 up by the end of the week. In that installment, I'll look at some of the worst BCS team schedules played all over college football since 2000. Next week, I'll have Part 3, a look at the best BCS team schedules since 2000. Then, in the final installment I'll list the matchups I'm looking forward to seeing, and the ones I would love to see.