presented by the Dental Offices of Wendy Swantkowski, DDS
The Absolute BEST in family and cosmetic dentistry for the Houston-Memorial Area
Now Accepting New Patients --- 281-293-9140
As conferences across the nation make decisions about how they will independently handle playing college football in the face of what, by then, will be an unknown point of our current worldwide pandemic, we've now seen a few make official moves. While the Ivy League has gone ahead and canceled fall sports all together, the Big 10 soon after assumed first-mover status in moving to a proposed conference-games-only schedule.
I'm not an athletic director, an NCAA schedule-maker, or a stakeholder in any position to know how policy will be shaped for the remainder of the conferences, but something seems perfectly obvious: once one major conference goes conference-only, it's kinda forcing everyone else's hand to do the same.
Looking in the Big 12 alone as it relates to the Big 10's move to conference-only, it doesn't really mess with schedules that badly. WVU was scheduled to play Maryland on 9/19 and Iowa State was scheduled to play Iowa on 9/12. It's still a decent-sized little set of snafus, though. How are you going to schedule a replacement game and get all the contracts and details and travel figured out in an environment where no one knows what sort of regulations, protocols and restrictions could be coming down the pike as things progress?
Now, we have Stadium's Brett McMurphy saying it is only a matter of time before the ACC follows the Big 10's lead while Nicole Auerbach of the Athletic is reporting that the Pac 12 is also expected to make the same announcement in the coming days. If these things come to fruition, out-of-conference play for the Big 12 gets even more chaotic. Here are the Big 12 games that would be affected should this reporting come to fruition:
9/3/2020
Oregon State @ Oklahoma State
9/5/2020
WVU @ Florida State
TCU @ Cal
9/12/2020
Iowa State @ Iowa
9/19/2020
Maryland @ WVU
Boston College @ Kansas
Arizona @ Texas Tech
That's just for the Big 12, and you could surely go through every other conference and find ways that the inter-conference play to start out the season co-pollinates from grouping to grouping. Once the Big 10 made the move to conference-only, it was a domino that, in most cases, basically has to lead to the rest of college football doing the same. It was the ball that rolled off the side of the table and into a cup tied to a lever that releases an electric train to move forward on its tracks like the world's most depressing Rube Goldberg machine.
The hopeful news is that there is still hope for a season -- and the most important part of the season at that: conference play.
I was born on October 3rd, and I don't think I've ever had a better birthday present than what I could have this year, with Texas traveling to Kansas State to start the would-be delayed season and enter the conference gauntlet after a short delay to start. Let's assume for the sake of conversation that this is how it will go. We don't know a thing as of now, but we can make educated guesses and this scenario seems as likely as any. What effect would this have on the Longhorns in 2020 and moving forward?
1) You get to skip the LSU game.
Yes, I know LSU will not be as good this year, losing its epic playcaller, Heisman QB and basically the rest of the entire team to the NFL draft, but that was never going to be an easy out. It was, without a doubt, a Top 2-3 most difficult game on the schedule no matter how you slice it. That possible loss is out the window. It's tough to lose from a fan perspective because it would have been a big-time game with lots of national attention and buzz, but it's still a major liability for the state of the W/L column off the books in this scenario.
2) You get a staff with 7 new coaches a little time with their new players
Texas basically has an entirely new staff and will be implementing and installing new base offenses and defenses that will not only take time to learn, but also coach the finer points of at a positional-level. Texas, more than most any program I could think of, could use a little extra time to get prepared.
3) Every game matters
It already pretty much is the case in college football, but in this case, it really does come down to nine games to win the conference. There is something clean and sort of special about that.
4) It's easier for starters to stay healthy
Pretty obvious, but the truncated schedule leaves players 25% less vulnerable to injuries given less time on the field.
5) Not as much run for backups
Just take a look at the playing time distributions from 2019 when looking at backups versus starters as it pertains to conference vs. non-conference play. The early non-conference games are typically good ones to use to get your eyes on some of the younger players:
6) More redshirts
Looking at the incoming 2020 class, you could legitimately make the case that RB Bijan Robinson and the two big-time DL prospects, Alfred Collins and Vernon Broughton, are the only three guys we could see with their shirts burned during a college football season that is sure to be different than any we've seen before. One way or the other, and however things end up going, we're diving head-first into something that will be truly unforgettable.
The Absolute BEST in family and cosmetic dentistry for the Houston-Memorial Area
Now Accepting New Patients --- 281-293-9140
As conferences across the nation make decisions about how they will independently handle playing college football in the face of what, by then, will be an unknown point of our current worldwide pandemic, we've now seen a few make official moves. While the Ivy League has gone ahead and canceled fall sports all together, the Big 10 soon after assumed first-mover status in moving to a proposed conference-games-only schedule.
I'm not an athletic director, an NCAA schedule-maker, or a stakeholder in any position to know how policy will be shaped for the remainder of the conferences, but something seems perfectly obvious: once one major conference goes conference-only, it's kinda forcing everyone else's hand to do the same.
Looking in the Big 12 alone as it relates to the Big 10's move to conference-only, it doesn't really mess with schedules that badly. WVU was scheduled to play Maryland on 9/19 and Iowa State was scheduled to play Iowa on 9/12. It's still a decent-sized little set of snafus, though. How are you going to schedule a replacement game and get all the contracts and details and travel figured out in an environment where no one knows what sort of regulations, protocols and restrictions could be coming down the pike as things progress?
Now, we have Stadium's Brett McMurphy saying it is only a matter of time before the ACC follows the Big 10's lead while Nicole Auerbach of the Athletic is reporting that the Pac 12 is also expected to make the same announcement in the coming days. If these things come to fruition, out-of-conference play for the Big 12 gets even more chaotic. Here are the Big 12 games that would be affected should this reporting come to fruition:
9/3/2020
Oregon State @ Oklahoma State
9/5/2020
WVU @ Florida State
TCU @ Cal
9/12/2020
Iowa State @ Iowa
9/19/2020
Maryland @ WVU
Boston College @ Kansas
Arizona @ Texas Tech
That's just for the Big 12, and you could surely go through every other conference and find ways that the inter-conference play to start out the season co-pollinates from grouping to grouping. Once the Big 10 made the move to conference-only, it was a domino that, in most cases, basically has to lead to the rest of college football doing the same. It was the ball that rolled off the side of the table and into a cup tied to a lever that releases an electric train to move forward on its tracks like the world's most depressing Rube Goldberg machine.
The hopeful news is that there is still hope for a season -- and the most important part of the season at that: conference play.
I was born on October 3rd, and I don't think I've ever had a better birthday present than what I could have this year, with Texas traveling to Kansas State to start the would-be delayed season and enter the conference gauntlet after a short delay to start. Let's assume for the sake of conversation that this is how it will go. We don't know a thing as of now, but we can make educated guesses and this scenario seems as likely as any. What effect would this have on the Longhorns in 2020 and moving forward?
1) You get to skip the LSU game.
Yes, I know LSU will not be as good this year, losing its epic playcaller, Heisman QB and basically the rest of the entire team to the NFL draft, but that was never going to be an easy out. It was, without a doubt, a Top 2-3 most difficult game on the schedule no matter how you slice it. That possible loss is out the window. It's tough to lose from a fan perspective because it would have been a big-time game with lots of national attention and buzz, but it's still a major liability for the state of the W/L column off the books in this scenario.
2) You get a staff with 7 new coaches a little time with their new players
Texas basically has an entirely new staff and will be implementing and installing new base offenses and defenses that will not only take time to learn, but also coach the finer points of at a positional-level. Texas, more than most any program I could think of, could use a little extra time to get prepared.
3) Every game matters
It already pretty much is the case in college football, but in this case, it really does come down to nine games to win the conference. There is something clean and sort of special about that.
4) It's easier for starters to stay healthy
Pretty obvious, but the truncated schedule leaves players 25% less vulnerable to injuries given less time on the field.
5) Not as much run for backups
Just take a look at the playing time distributions from 2019 when looking at backups versus starters as it pertains to conference vs. non-conference play. The early non-conference games are typically good ones to use to get your eyes on some of the younger players:
6) More redshirts
Looking at the incoming 2020 class, you could legitimately make the case that RB Bijan Robinson and the two big-time DL prospects, Alfred Collins and Vernon Broughton, are the only three guys we could see with their shirts burned during a college football season that is sure to be different than any we've seen before. One way or the other, and however things end up going, we're diving head-first into something that will be truly unforgettable.
