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SEC scheduling and playing teams off their bye
Posted on 12/12/24 at 12:14 pm
Posted on 12/12/24 at 12:14 pm
Finally did a little digging on this and ended up about where I figured Bama would be. Some interesting data in there. Just copied and pasted from my tl;dr post on the Bama board.
I've been curious about this, as it seems we've been getting shafted on this for a number of years, so just did a quick run through to see if the numbers matched the feeling. This is only counting conference games where intra-conference teams took a bye before a conference opponent. There could be a couple extra for each team if I dug deep into OOC schedules each year, but I'm not going to do that. This is a basic 40min effort. Could be off by 1-2 I guess, I did this by hand.
SEC opponents played off of their bye week since 2010:
Bama - 38
Arkansas - 14
Auburn - 11
Florida - 23
Georgia - 24
Kentucky - 14
LSU - 29
Mississippi St - 14
Missouri - 9
Ole Miss - 12
South Carolina - 14
Tennessee - 9
Texas A&M - 17
Vanderbilt - 9
2010 was a bit of an outlier for Alabama since we played 6 teams off of their bye that year, so here is that data if we remove 2010 and start at 2011.
Alabama - 32
Arkansas - 14
Auburn - 11
Florida - 23
Georgia - 23
Kentucky - 14
LSU - 28
Miss St - 14
Missouri - 9
Ole Miss - 12
South Carolina - 14
Tennessee - 9
A&M - 16
Vandy - 8
Of the 15 years I looked at, there are only 8 years where we played 2 or less SEC teams coming off of their bye, those years were:
12
14
16
17
18
20
22
23
Interesting data. Would be cool if Byrne would put his foot down about scheduling, we've been getting shafted (with LSU close behind) for years.
More random data outliers:
Only Bama and LSU have played at least one opponent coming off a bye every season since 2010. Tennessee and Missouri have EIGHT seasons where they did not play a single team coming off of a bye. Auburn comes in behind that at 7 seasons.
Alabama has 7 seasons in the last 15 where they played 3 or more SEC opponents off of their bye week. LSU has 5, UF has 4, UGA has 3.
I've been curious about this, as it seems we've been getting shafted on this for a number of years, so just did a quick run through to see if the numbers matched the feeling. This is only counting conference games where intra-conference teams took a bye before a conference opponent. There could be a couple extra for each team if I dug deep into OOC schedules each year, but I'm not going to do that. This is a basic 40min effort. Could be off by 1-2 I guess, I did this by hand.
SEC opponents played off of their bye week since 2010:
Bama - 38
Arkansas - 14
Auburn - 11
Florida - 23
Georgia - 24
Kentucky - 14
LSU - 29
Mississippi St - 14
Missouri - 9
Ole Miss - 12
South Carolina - 14
Tennessee - 9
Texas A&M - 17
Vanderbilt - 9
2010 was a bit of an outlier for Alabama since we played 6 teams off of their bye that year, so here is that data if we remove 2010 and start at 2011.
Alabama - 32
Arkansas - 14
Auburn - 11
Florida - 23
Georgia - 23
Kentucky - 14
LSU - 28
Miss St - 14
Missouri - 9
Ole Miss - 12
South Carolina - 14
Tennessee - 9
A&M - 16
Vandy - 8
Of the 15 years I looked at, there are only 8 years where we played 2 or less SEC teams coming off of their bye, those years were:
12
14
16
17
18
20
22
23
Interesting data. Would be cool if Byrne would put his foot down about scheduling, we've been getting shafted (with LSU close behind) for years.
More random data outliers:
Only Bama and LSU have played at least one opponent coming off a bye every season since 2010. Tennessee and Missouri have EIGHT seasons where they did not play a single team coming off of a bye. Auburn comes in behind that at 7 seasons.
Alabama has 7 seasons in the last 15 where they played 3 or more SEC opponents off of their bye week. LSU has 5, UF has 4, UGA has 3.
This post was edited on 12/12/24 at 12:50 pm
7
Posted on 12/12/24 at 12:21 pm to bamabenny
Quality post.
It does seem like they’d try to balance this out more. I’m surprised there’s such a big difference between schools.
It does seem like they’d try to balance this out more. I’m surprised there’s such a big difference between schools.
Posted on 12/12/24 at 12:21 pm to bamabenny
Tennessee hasn't exactly scared a bunch of people in the last 14 years 
Posted on 12/12/24 at 12:22 pm to Violent Hip Swivel
quote:
Tennessee hasn't exactly scared a bunch of people in the last 14 years
Should have absolutely zero bearing. Schedules should be equitable regardless of each preseason's expectations.
Posted on 12/12/24 at 12:24 pm to bamabenny
quote:
Only Bama and LSU have played at least one opponent coming off a bye every season since 2010
Mostly because each team takes the bye before each other all the time
But not only is it just because it's our game, it's just a good time to have a bye. End of October going into the final month of the season, November is generally the most important month, home stretch. I think UGA and Florida very often has byes before the cocktail party as well which accounts for why they round up the teams that are over 20 in your list.
It kind of is what it is, the smaller schools are gonna try to put byes before their toughest opponents.
Posted on 12/12/24 at 12:25 pm to bamabenny
price you have to pay for getting all calls from ref
no one in the west was griping when lsu had to play fla every season
no one in the west was griping when lsu had to play fla every season
Posted on 12/12/24 at 12:27 pm to bamabenny
Ole Miss seems to be play worse coming off a bye. If a team is hot and rolling, a bye week isn't always a good thing. I wish the Bye had been after Florida this year rather than before it.
Posted on 12/12/24 at 12:33 pm to nicholastiger
quote:
price you have to pay for getting all calls from ref
This is obviously a very popular LSU sentiment that has been proven laughably incorrect. But, keep up that low IQ argument if it makes you feel better I suppose.
Posted on 12/12/24 at 12:34 pm to Quicksilver
quote:
Ole Miss seems to be play worse coming off a bye. If a team is hot and rolling, a bye week isn't always a good thing. I wish the Bye had been after Florida this year rather than before it.
It's not an exact science on if bye weeks help or not, just analyzing the data. Hell, the worst two seasons Alabama has had in the past 15 years coincided with playing the league-leading number of opponents off of byes. Coincidence? Maybe. Maybe not.
Posted on 12/12/24 at 12:38 pm to bamabenny
I wouldn't mind playing Bama without a bye
It hasn't worked for LSU in a decade
It hasn't worked for LSU in a decade
Posted on 12/12/24 at 12:38 pm to bamabenny
quote:
Should have absolutely zero bearing. Schedules should be equitable regardless of each preseason's expectations.
There are many bye opportunities that don't get used.
For example, technically both Alabama and Auburn(most years) are given a bye before that game.
However, both teams typically schedule a FCS team that week, so it's not technically a bye week.
Because the SEC only does the 8 games.
Teams can request open dates and the SEC generally would try to honor them. Which is part of why Alabama got so many. But I'm thinking after the 2010 season they made some changes to prevent the 2010 Alabama thing from happening again.
So there isn't too much the SEC can really do unless they just schedule all 8 games within the same 8 week period.
Posted on 12/12/24 at 12:44 pm to bamabenny
I think your numbers are off. Not sure how Kentucky GAINED 10 more games off of bye weeks by removing a year.
It becomes pretty obvious when you look at which teams had the most success those years. Clearly the SEC was trying, somewhat subtly, to give a bit more parity by handicapping the traditionally better teams.
And Florida.
quote:
Alabama has 7 seasons in the last 15 where they played 3 or more SEC opponents off of their bye week. LSU has 5, UF has 4, UGA has 3
It becomes pretty obvious when you look at which teams had the most success those years. Clearly the SEC was trying, somewhat subtly, to give a bit more parity by handicapping the traditionally better teams.
And Florida.
Posted on 12/12/24 at 12:50 pm to skrayper
Good catch. I just fat fingered that while typing up the data. Kentucky's was unchanged.
Posted on 12/12/24 at 12:51 pm to bamabenny
Honest question, the numbers seem high for Bama, LSU, Georgia, and Florida. However, how much is that because every year they seem to both get byes before their games? Alabama vs LSU, and Georgia vs Florida
.
.
Posted on 12/12/24 at 12:51 pm to skrayper
The Ref's had BAMA's back so it prob a wash.
I'd be curious how many of those games yall lost
I'd be curious how many of those games yall lost
Posted on 12/12/24 at 12:55 pm to WaterLink
quote:
Mostly because each team takes the bye before each other all the time
Right?
If you just remove the by that Alabama and LSU get right before that game every year, that takes away 14.
Posted on 12/12/24 at 12:55 pm to WaterLink
quote:
think UGA and Florida very often has byes before the cocktail party as well which accounts for why they round up the teams that are over 20 in your list.
For years our bye was before AU. Once we changed to UF, we evened out the series.
Posted on 12/12/24 at 12:57 pm to KingSlayer
quote:
Honest question, the numbers seem high for Bama, LSU, Georgia, and Florida. However, how much is that because every year they seem to both get byes before their games? Alabama vs LSU, and Georgia vs Florida
The OP's data is interesting because it gives the true bye openings.
However, when people want to start looking at it from the perspective of the SEC office, then they need to do 2 things.
1. Remove all the OOC games.
2. Remove all the games where the opponent also had a bye the week prior(aka the games you mentioned) - even if one of them played an OOC game the week prior.
Then you can see where the SEC actually gave the opportunity for a team to have an uncontested bye.
This post was edited on 12/12/24 at 1:01 pm
Posted on 12/12/24 at 12:58 pm to bamabenny
Theres no excuse for Oklahoma. But that Vanderbilt game was just an A+trap game executed by them. They had the perfect team assembled to tremble Alabama following a bye week of their own and Alabamas victory over UGA feeling like they were on top of the world. I think Vanderbilt proved throughout the season they couldve done the same to a lot of other teams in that position.
Posted on 12/12/24 at 1:02 pm to wadewilson
quote:
If you just remove the by that Alabama and LSU get right before that game every year, that takes away 14.
Yeah I'm curious to see the data if you remove when both teams are coming off the bye going into the same game. OP, do you have the data for that? To show only the times when one team is coming off the bye and the other isn't?
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