For all of those arguing for scheduling more OOC cupcakes as threatened by Bama's AD.

I understand his point but also think that if every elite SEC team plays 2 OOC games against 2 different P4 leagues, wins most of them, then it's a much bigger positive at the end of the year than beating up on the Sun Belt.

The thing we have to do moving forward is spread out the OOC games to the B1G and the BXII. And they won't agree to games we need to loudly make that clear to everyone.

Next year, for example, tons of opportunities for wins, but way too many clustered in the ACC.

- @ FSU, FSU
- @ Miami
- @ Georgia Tech
- @ Louisville
- @ Clemson, Clemson
- Syracuse
- Virginia Tech, @ Virginia Tech

- @ Baylor
- Arizona State
- Kansas

- Wisconsin
- Michigan
- @ Ohio State

- Notre Dame, @ Notre Dame

I think a lot more attention should be directed toward the SEC and B1G offices for their utter failure to put together even remotely balanced conference schedules.

Fans don't want it, but coaches hoping to survive and play meaningless bowl games are for scheduling cupcakes.

When the playoff committee rewards it, it bakes it into the cake.

Only rewarding strength of schedule will change it.

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The thing we have to do moving forward is spread out the OOC games to the B1G and the BXII. And they won't agree to games we need to loudly make that clear to everyone.

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This is the key. Fans want big games, just look at the TV ratings. It's the Big 12 & the B1G coming up short. They need to step it up, if scheduling cupcakes is incentivized it just keeps all the crabs in the same bucket.

The B1G and SEC seem to have a bit of a Molotov-Ribbentrop agreement when it comes to OOC scheduling.

Obviously there are the in-state OOC games that the SEC and ACC have that will be - and should be - played.

The B12 has had so much change of membership and the way OOC games are scheduled years in advance makes that difficult. Hell, Texas or TAMU could schedule Texas Tech OOC and TTU may be in the ACC or Pac 12 by the time that game is actually played. Who would have thought Florida-UCF or MSU-ASU would have been SEC vs. B12 games when the contracts were signed?

Avoiding losses is by far the optimal path to the playoff.

There are other factors but that's clearly the dominant one.

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The B1G and SEC seem to have a bit of a Molotov-Ribbentrop agreement when it comes to OOC scheduling.

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First off, beautiful historical analogy

That is thawing some in the next decade, though (but we've already lost some and that this point seem likely to lose more).

Alabama - Wisconsin
Alabama - Ohio State
Alabama - Minnesota
Georgia - Ohio State
Mississippi State - Minnesota
Missouri - Illinois
Oklahoma - Michigan
Oklahoma - Nebraska
Ole Miss - Purdue
Tennessee - Nebraska
Texas - Ohio State
Texas - Michigan
Vanderbilt - Purdue

One of the biggest issues is the B1G plays 9 conference games, so their OOC inventory is 16 games less than ours. That was originally seen as "good", but at this point it feels more like a way to isolate yourselves.

Iowa hasn't played an OOC game vs a P4 other than Iowa State in like a decade. Northwestern rarely plays anyone but Stanford, Duke or Vanderbilt.

Scheduling has to get fixed. If that means having a blank spot on everyone's schedule each year that gets filled with a SEC/B1G Challenge type game, so be it. But something has to be done to figure out a better way to cross pollinate games between leagues to get a better idea of who is good and who is a fraud.

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for their utter failure to put together even remotely balanced conference schedules.

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I don’t think this is even possible in the NIL era. The outlook on teams’ upcoming season can change overnight.

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When the playoff committee rewards it, it bakes it into the cake.

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Except they didn’t. They punished for LOSING to bad teams.