What is up with the schedule?

A comment in our schedule thread reminded me a question I've had with this year's OOC schedule:

Why are we playing so many teams from the Northeast? I can maybe see one team but three seems like a poorly thought out strategy.

If we are going to play schools from the eastern side of the B1G Ten footprint and the Northeast we shouldn't be playing any teams from outside Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, and then maybe throw-in a New York or NJ school every once in a while.

Can someone explain the thought process.