The Southeastern Conference may be working to help alleviate Alabama’s football schedule next season, but don’t expect Arkansas to make a change in dates.
The Tide is scheduled to play six teams coming off open dates next season, a high number that caught the attention of the SEC office this offseason. Shifting of games and dates on the Alabama schedule is expected, and Arkansas’ trip to South Carolina on Nov. 6 was mentioned by the Tuscaloosa News in a recent report as a possibility of being moved to Oct. 2.
Of course, the move was only mentioned as a possibility. Even so, I reached out to Arkansas athletic director Jeff Long about the report.
“I have been contacted by the SEC office and there are no plans for a change to our 2010 football schedule,” Long said.
The SEC is expected to announce changes to Alabama’s upcoming football schedule at the end of this month, according to the Tuscaloosa News. The change could affect several schools in the SEC.
Here are the possibilities lined out in the report:
Only two conference games — Auburn-Georgia on Nov. 13 and Arkansas-South Carolina on Nov. 6 — could be moved to alleviate the problem without also moving other games. Auburn and Georgia share an idle date on Nov. 20, and moving that game into the Nov. 20 opening would eliminate the Tigers’ open date prior to its game against Alabama the following week. Similarly, Arkansas and South Carolina share an idle date on Oct. 2. Moving that game to Oct. 2 would put the Gamecocks in action rather than being idle before facing Alabama on Oct. 9.
The hope is that SEC teams will face no more than three or four “idle-rested” teams in the future, according to the report. The SEC is working on making that a reality in the future.
Arkansas is scheduled to face one team coming off a bye week in 2010, when it hosts Louisiana-Monroe on Sept. 11.
Make sure to check out WholeHogSports.com and the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette for more coverage. You can also follow us on Twitter for breaking news updates with @bmarcello and @wholehogsports.
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Why should Alabama be exempted from this? This happened to Vanderbilt last year and Tennessee the year before that. The SEC office needs to start treating the schools in this league as equals and cease practices of overt favoritism, regardless of the officiating issues which also tends to favor certain teams in both major sports.
Thomas,
This did not happen to Vandy last year or Tennessee the year before. Alabama is playing 6 conference foes coming off a bye tis year. The next closest is LSU with 5 overall over the last 3 seasons including their schedule this year. If Bama plays the schedule the way it is now, that will make 15 teams that Bama has played coming off a bye in the last 3 seasons. 3 times as many as the next team. Checkmate!!!
yeah thomas listen to my boy Joey and stop hating on alabama
This is not fair for any team to have to deal with that many fresh teams in one season… or the last 3 seasons. ARK and USC should change their dates
Arkansas wouldn’t beat Alabama with three open dates before Oct. 9th. It’s a moot point.
Wake up people who cares poor Alabama… Its football. Tell that to the playoff systems also.
Thanks,
The rest of the SEC
wait and see scooter .. wait and see what the Hogs do to Bama this year
Arkansas should quit being a bunch of whiners about this. Alabama-Arkansas is the fourth game of the season, so it’s not like alleviating Bama’s schedule is going to be any disadvantage to Arkansas.
Playing six in one season (five in a row) when each team only has one bye week is unprecedented. The SEC needs to get their act together on this. Surely they can just write a piece of software that makes sure that no team plays more than three idle-rested teams. Not that hard.
And for the record, here are the number of idle-rested games the teams in question had:
2009: Alabama – 3, LSU – 2, Vandy – 0, Tenn – 0
2008: Alabama – 3, LSU – 0, Vandy – 2, Tenn – 4
(2008 everyone had two bye weeks)
Well, at the Athletic Directors meeting they voted unanimously to adjust the schedule. It basically came down to “do you want this to happen to you?” and everyone said “no”. It looks like now they are unwilling to make changes when it effects them. For those teams that are unwilling to move, the SEC should make sure they play as many rested opponents as possible in the next 10 years.
And 2007: Alabama – 4, LSU – 2, Vandy – 1, Tenn – 0
Clearly, over the past three years Alabama has been getting the short end of the stick on this one.
I’d be more sympathetic if Alabama hadn’t played Vandy 9 more times than us, since we joined the SEC. In fairness, Vandy used to be one of Alabama’s regular opponents from the other division, but I don’t think it’s a coincidence that Arkansas has played Vandy fewer times than any other SEC team since joining the conference. Specifically, Arkansas has played Vandy 4 times since joining the SEC, whereas we’ve played Georgia 8 times, even though we should have only played Georgia once more during that span, if all things were fair.
The SEC office regularly screws Arkansas with scheduling (4 consecutive games against top-10 teams in 2008, anyone?), but that’s okay, apparently, because we’re not Alabama.
Cameron, we have front-loaded schedule, unfortunately, and accommodating Alabama would require moving our bye week to the end (i.e. soft part) of our schedule. Why you think we should do that is beyond me, because Arkansas isn’t one of the teams with a bye week before playing Alabama (i.e. we didn’t cause the problem) and nothing was done to alleviate any of the injustices pertaining to our past schedules, either (see above.)
Well, we may not have had 6 opponents who had open dates before they played us, but I do remember 3 or 4 years ago we played games on 11 consecutive weeks without a break, while everyone else had bye weeks during the meat of the SEC schedule. We tried to make changes, but couldn’t. I didn’t see the SEC jump through hoops to assist us in that situation, so I have little sympathy for Alabama in this matter. Everyone in the SEC knows they get favorable treatment from the conference and have for decades. For them to whine about this is laughable.
Matthew, playing ranked opponents is not something you can change. You don’t know who’s going to be ranked at what time in the season, and the fact that you played so many ranked opponents is merely a testament to the quality of the SEC. Obviously Alabama has to play those same West opponents, and we’re going to have to play Florida this year too. That’s something that simply comes with being in the SEC. Playing five consecutive idle-rested teams (and playing six idle-rested teams in seven games) is an entirely different matter, as it is possible to be evened out among all the teams. I understand that Arkansas has a front-heavy schedule so I suppose that’s acceptable to not want to change, but do you really think that “front-heaviness” makes it tougher than playing six idle-rested teams?
As for East opponents, no, Vandy was not a regular opponent of Alabama. Each SEC team plays all other teams in its division, plus three from the other division. One of those three is permanent (Bama plays Tennessee every year, Arkansas plays South Carolina every year), and the other two are home-and-home series that rotated in order.
I’m willing to admit that it’s reasonable for Arkansas to not want to change, but you have to recognize that it’s irresponsible of the SEC to make such a ridiculous schedule, especially when this mistake has been repeated in the past (as I mentioned earlier). You’d think they’d fix the problem instead of making it worse.
WizardofhOgZ, (nice name) the fact that you had 11 games before your bye is not unheard of. Auburn had that for 2009 and will have it again for 2010 if the schedule is played as it stands now. Naturally, that’s a legitimate complaint to make. I cannot remember a time though when a team played six bye-rested SEC opponents in a seven game streak (five of them in a row). This is an easily avoidable error that should never have happened, especially since it’s already been hitting us particularly hard already in the past few years. You have to admit, if Arkansas were in this situation you’d be saying the exact same thing as I am.
Arkansas needs every advantage it can get….so does S.C. and Auburn and Georgia….hind teat programs understand one thing…take advantage of every situation whether right or wrong….that is what your Obama/DEMOCRATIC government is teaching its citizens…
I’m a die hard Razorback fan, so I’m obviously unbiased in this issue. I would definitely be saying the same thing Bama is saying if the shoe were on our foot (however, nothing would be done about it). Playing that many rested teams is definitely unfair. I think they should change the schedule to alleviate it for this year and set up a system to avoid it in the future.
It was just a few years ago when Arkansas had one of their two bye weeks on the first week of the season — useless! Then a couple of years later, the bye week was in the second week, and they had to play the remaining 11 games non-stop. That was unfair also, but I blame the Arkansas administration for that more than the SEC.
We Hog Fans just need to calm down, let the SEC make the changes, and then watch our Hogs romp through the schedule we’re given. The Hogs will beat o’Bama anyway and then they can cry all they want about how unfair it was that we have an NFL quarterback and they don’t.
for any bammer to even mention moving the auburn/georgia game back a week for the tigers wouldnt have an open week is a complete farse !!! when auburn has to play 11 straight weeks and the bammers play georgia st who has never even fielded a team before which is no more than a light scrimmage is a joke at best,
Poor Poor Alabama, what a f..ing joke, that got all the great big paid for athletes with acceptance rates rival community colleges..and big alumni’s to pay for all the extra coachs..so why not SEC..why not let them buy you off to.. Please
Alabama stop whining, you are the defending National Champions…go out and play your games and stop making excuses before you even lose a game. The Arkansas fans and officials hate Alabama and wouldnt dream of doing anything to help you be successful on the gridiron…Arkansas already gave you a gift…Me!!! the greatest coach to ever walk the campus in Tuscaloosa, that should be enough losers
Woooo Pig!!!!
Cameron ” the fact that you had 11 games before your bye is not unheard of. Auburn had that for 2009 and will have it again for 2010 if the schedule is played as it stands now.”
Not sure why you assumed Arkansas’s schedule had 11 games “before” our bye. Our bye was the second week of the season after we played Missouri State. Which made it practically useless. We basically had our off-season extended by 2 weeks.
Auburn’s bye was actually usefully considering it give them two weeks to prepare for Bama
I sure did mess that sentence up.
correction: Auburn’s bye was actually usefull considering it gave them two weeks to prepare for Bama.
So Mallet is an NFL QB huh? Then we must have an NFL Defense because Mallet didnt show me squat. The guy has a big arm in a pass happy scheme. He is going to have numbers put up and have a few weeks where he puts up great numbers. But to be considered a great QB, first you have to win. I have only been living in Little Rock for a year and all I hear is about waiting till the next year. Your never going to have another good team if you continue to let what little talent you do have leave the state to play for other programs.
Speaking of “o’Bama”, it seems there’s a socialist mindset creeping in. “Oh you’re rich? Well we’ll tax the hell out of you to give you as big a disadvantage as possible, and then freely use that disadvantage for the benefit of those who who didn’t earn as much as you.” Honestly, if there has to be a central planner at all (the SEC in this case), they’ve got to set people on a level playing field. That is, equal rules for all, not equal redistribution of resources for all.
Granted, that’s an oversimplified (and obviously not perfectly parallel) analogy, but that’s still kind of what’s at work here. Like I said, if Arkansas were the ones playing six bye-rested teams, their fans would be FAR more indignant than Alabama fans are right now. They would be outraged that the SEC treated them unfairly and would be even more upset that Alabama refused to alter its schedule in the name of preventing “front-heaviness.”
That being said, I guess we’ll just have to take what we’re given because, like “Bear Bryant” (on this article) said, “Arkansas fans and officials hate Alabama.” Oh well, I guess it’ll make victory that much sweeter.
I’m looking forward to September 25th. I’ll be in Fayetteville for the game. RTR, folks.
see you on the field tide boys. be prepared for a beat down
Topher, maybe you should move back under the rock you came from
IMHO if you dont like the schedule then leave. The SEC made a mistake inviting USC to join and the more I read it seems that Arkansas wants to be in the same conference as the teams from Texas. The statements made about the schedule shows some of the fans post incorrect information “THOMAS” do your homework before you quote facts.
Topher…you did have an NFL type defense lat year, but not this year, u need a lil DB help…especially against an experienced Mallett
*last
When the 2010 SEC schedule was finalized, 2 SEC teams (Alabama & Auburn) had 6 SEC opponents which potentially were idle the prior week. After non-conference games were added, Alabama had 6 SEC opponents which actually were idle the prior week, while Auburn had none. Similarly, 2 SEC teams (Tenn & Georgia) had 5 SEC opponents which potentially were idle the prior week. After non-conference games were added, Georgia had 1 SEC opponent which actually was idle the prior week, while Tenn had none. It seems clear to me that, where possible, Alabama’s opponents scheduled their idle weeks to precede the Alabama games. Guess that’s the price of winning it all the prior year.
For the record, in 2009, 1 team (Auburn) had 6 opponents potentially idle the prior week, but ended up with only 1 actually idle after non-conference games were added. Florida had 5, and ended up with only 1 actually idle. Five teams had 4 opponents potentially idle the prior week, with Alabama actually having 3 idle and LSU actually having 2 idle.
Could the SEC arrange the conference schedule to limit the number of each team’s SEC opponents which potentially could be idle the prior week – thereby limiting the actual result? Sure. Mathematically, it should be possible to limit to 4 the number of each team’s SEC opponents which potentially could be idle the prior week (the total number was 42 in 2009 and 41 in 2010 – so, with 12 teams, all could have 3 potentially idle opponents, which some would need to 4 potentially idle opponents).
And should they? Probably. The cost – possibly changing the dates on which some games traditionally are scheduled.
But what about 2010? If Alabama does not want to “man up” and take the 2010 schedule the way that it falls, I suggest that Alabama should bear the burden – and here’s how: (1) Alabama & LSU each have open dates on 10/30, with their game scheduled for 11/6. Move their game to 10/30, which shifts their open dates to 11/6. Now LSU plays Auburn the week prior to playing Alabama, instead of having an open date. (2) As a result of the above change, Alabama now has an open date on 11/6, as does MSU, with their game scheduled for 11/13. Move the Alabama/MSU game to 11/6, which shifts their open dates to 11/13. Now MSU plays Kentucky the week prior to the Alabama game, instead of having an open date. As a result, Alabama now plays only 4 SEC opponents which are idle the prior week.
Frankly, I think that it would be bad karma for Alabama to change the schedule, much the way that Auburn invited bad karma by changing their schedule at the 11th hour a few years ago. But that’s Alabama’s problem . . . .
Huge trap game for OU next week with Mizzou coming to Norman. Their D is beat up, but their O could be potent with a mobile QB.
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