Mississippi State’s Future Scheduling
Dec 31, 2013; Memphis, TN, USA; Mississippi State Bulldogs head coach Dan Mullen before the game against the Rice Owls at Liberty Bowl Memorial Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Justin Ford-USA TODAY Sports
In just the past few weeks Mississippi State has announced future football opponents from three of the other four power conferences.
This, of course, is due to the new SEC rule which requires each team to schedule at least one non-conference game with a team from a power five conference. This was done in lieu of going to a 9th conference game, and was done because UGA, USC, UF and UK already have rivalry games vs. ACC schools each year. Perhaps Texas A&M will schedule Texas as an annual matchup, and Missouri will play Kansas every year but that remains to be seen.
The new rule goes into effect starting in 2016. So for the next eight seasons, MSU has solidified it’s non-conference game vs. a power five school from 2018-2023, leaving only an opponent for 2016 and 2017.
In Scott Stricklin’s column a couple of weeks ago he said finding a team to play in ’16 & ’17 was proving to be tough work due to the fact that so many schools schedule so far in advance – as evidence look at how far we are scheduling N.C. State and Arizona. To me, he is sending a message to the SEC to help us out in finding a team to play.
The 2015 schedule has been finalized internally, but MSU is waiting to announce with the rest of the league. There will be home games vs. Louisiana Tech and Troy plus a trip to Southern Miss. The fourth game has not been announced but you can bet your bottom dollar it will be a FCS team. If we continue on the three year rotation we’ve had of Jackson State, Alcorn State and UT-Martin during Mullen’s tenure, then we’ll be playing JSU.
In 2016, South Alabama returns to Starkville to complete that agreement, Tulane comes to DWS and we travel to LA Tech. So unless we find a way to wiggle out of one of those games there will be no FCS game since we have to play the fourth game against a power five team.
Will it be a kickoff classic type game like State played in 2013 vs. Oklahoma State? If so, we’d have to do something similar in 2017 as well. Is that the best option or it is the only option at this point?
The 2017 schedule is more open with only a home game vs. LA Tech on the docket. So there is plenty of room for a FCS game and a power five game.