It is bad enough for mediocre schools to go fishing in the IIA pool, but Florida’s scheduling of a game against Charleston Southern University is especially comedic. Florida is favored, depending on one’s source between 63 and 73 points. How this can constitute anything other than a joke of a “game” is beyond me. While the game was, no doubt, scheduled well before the Tebow/National Championship Era that Florida currently finds itself in, it seems to me (at least) that a top team in the top college football conference should be able to at least play exclusively Division IA patsies.
The Opposite of Manning Up? (SCU@Florida)
With the dawn of college football this week, one has to ask the question; is it at all legitmate for a Football Bowl Subdivision Division IA program to be playing a Football Championship Division IAA school? I understand the need for college teams to have a “preseason” game or two before hitting their conference schedules. However, there are 120 IA programs, many of which are pretty abysmal, so the notion of going outside of that pool strikes me as indefensible simply from a competitiveness/sportsmanship point of view.
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Fully agree. I’m watching (via Tivo delay) Alabama open its season against Virginia Tech, the year after opening its season against Clemson. Under the current system, it’s really very foolish to do that. And that’s a shame.
I’ve long been in favor of a “Super Division” of maybe 32 or even 48 teams that play only one another. So, maybe the SEC would play the Big 12 one year for all their out-of-conference games. That would be far, far more exciting than the joke filler games.
Seems to me it wouldn’t be that hard to at least do away with FCS games.Heck, if the press would just stop counting those games in records, I think that would provide a sufficient disincentive for the teams that have aspirations of being ranked. The NCAA or BCS itself could, too, but they lack incentive.
Forcing them to play FBS teams, even crappy ones, would change the calculations. They would need to offer the weaker teams bigger payouts as they become more in-demand, thus allowing the weaker teams opportunities to improve their facilities. And it would add at least a little more incentive to schedule games against higher-profiled opponents (who are likely to be better).
30 years ago I remember Joe Paterno being quoted in SI. He was asked when PS would start scheduling Notre Dame and Nebraska. Joe Pa’s reply- After he retires.
Nebraska had a home and home series with PSU in the early 80′s and ND was on the Nittany Lions schedule for 5-10 yeas starting sometime in the 80′s also. Remember PS used to be an independent.
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