Warde Speaks on UM-ND Renewal

The problem with switching the MSU game is that when MSU plays at the Big House, the good guys would have 6 B1G games at home and 3 away. It would require some other team to switch venues as well, and who knows how that affects their 5/4 balance. I believe B1G schedule is made up to 2019. The schedules made after that is when Warde needs to reset our present rivalry home/away imbalance.

Wandered over to RCMB to get their take on the scheduling imbalance.

They are still angry over the scheduling imbalance in the 50's, so.........

I just don't think playing Notre Dame regularly is in our best interest, given that Harbaugh likes to recruit nationally.

Playing Notre Dame is redundant with us playing a Big Ten schedule.  It does not cover any new ground for us.

We're better off playing teams like UCLA, TX, and FL that are national games in recruiting hot spots.

Maybe put ND on the schedule for a home and home once a decade.  But that's about it.
 

 

IMO you really only want one traditionally strong power 5 conference opponent per year.  If you win the B1G and go undefeated you'll likely get into the playoff.  If you lose a game, you're likely out unless  you lose to a bottom half team and beat the quality teams on your schedule and the rest of the country only has a minimum of 2-3 undefeated teams.  I don't think you need multiple quality out of conference opponents.  Having a Okla & ND in the same year in addition to the B1G schedule is just adding another potential loss.  I know it's great for the fans, but in terms of potential to be in the playoff there's more to lose than gain.  Harbaugh and the players probably don't see it that way and maybe there's more to consider like coverage, TV time, recruiting, etc, but I think there's more to lose than gain with multiple quality out of conference opponents. 

if he can change the road game imbalance I will be much less upset about starting at ND. Still pretty ridiculous since we ended it in south bend but it sounds like he's already working on getting osu/msu things fixed on its own. keeping the upcoming UT/OK/UCLA games will also be made possible by the "maybe not every year" comment. I think cancelling Arkansas freaked us all out that he'd cancel those too, but it seems like we should be ok. I still don't like the $2 mil. bath, but that might have been necessary to mend relations with ND. We have to give something to make it happen, even if we feel like we already gave a lot when it ended. That's how any good relationship (business or not) works.

I don't have a problem with anything except that stupid MSU/OSU imbalance every year. Get rid of that and it's all good.

I'd love to hear what ND "compromised" to get this deal done. So far, M compromised:

• ~$2M to Ark, which some say is chump change, but apparently the whole reason Warde went with this sched. was so M could have 6 home games every year, b/c apparently only 5 home games puts M in the red in any given year. Christ on the cross, they get $35M from B10 network (soon to be 45?) and they are still living on a margin of ONE home football game every year?
• OSU/MSU/ND all on the road or at home. I'm actually not too upset about this b/c it's 6 of one, half dozen of the other. Sure it's nice to try and smooth out the schedule, but as bad as the even years are, the odd years are that much to the good. I understand season ticket holders not liking it, but the same theory applies and you still get PSU and NE (and Wisc?) at home. Not awful. PLus, that was more of a B10/Dave Brandon screw over than an ND one.
• Playing in A2 in Oct- middle of the B10 schedule. doesn't M have like 3 open dates in Sept in '19? ND couldn't make ANY of those work?
• ending in South BEnd and starting there - NBD to me since this is a 2 game series short term - tho would like to start in A2 post 2019 to right the sequence.

I mean, did ND amend their ACC schedule? The USC series?  the MSU/Pur/Navy/BC series?

I always thought the ND series should be two years on, two years off. Every player gets at least two games, schedule can still be interesting in different ways, and it now would mean the MSU/OSU/ND glut can be flipped. We're not locked in on this forever. I like it.

I got a better idea. How about we not play Noter Dame at all. Kelly went .500 against Brady Hoke. Same as Kyle flood and Randy Edsall.

with regard to future schedules.  I fully expect that we will continue to play all 3 rivals on the road in the same year and would not be surprised at all to lose some or all of the home and home series with Texas, Oklahoma and UCLA.

We also won't be seeing another night game until ND in 2019.  When it comes to football scheduling, Manuel is DB part II, Electric Boogaloo.

& haven't asked any friends who are yet but:

how often does the AD send out surveys & stuff to gauge interest in different sports, opponents, projects, etc?

Do they do this often, just rely on concerned emails, big donor-whims ?

I'd think a 10 question survey with a stongly agre/diagree scale once a year might be helpful in anticipating fan/donor opinion on certain AD directions.

Now that Dave Brandon (who was born knowing what was best for everyone) is gone.

the BIG10 president etc stepped in and just made the schedule balanced. They obviously know we got screwed on this. Just my opinion

Not sure I'm liking his scheduling methodology but assuming he is trying to meet some desires by JH with limited time flexibility

You know what is really crazy. I am not happy about playing Ohio State, Michigan State, and Notre Dame on the road in the same year, but let's not act like it's an impossible feat.

If Alabama can win a national championship by winning vs Wisconsin, @ Georgia, @ A&M, vs LSU, @Mississippi State, and @ Auburn, I like our chances @MSU, @OSU, @ND, vs Nebraska, vs Wisconsin, vs Penn State.

We should have an incredibly deep squad by then who will be battle tested and ready to perform. I think sometimes we forget that we used to win at MSU, at OSU, and at Notre Dame all the time. Brady Hoke's road woes and Rich Rod's road AND home woes have made us believe it is impossible to win consistently on the road -- which is not the case.

I was waiting for the other shoe to drop with regard to playing OSU, MSU, ND all on the road, and all we got from Warde was, 'Wish it could've been different'???? Eff Notre Dame!  They're not worth it.  I'd rather have that date be another P5 school at home in the years we play M/OSU on the road.  We didn't even get dinner and foreplay out of this.

Atleast Warde understands the issues with the schedule and is attempting to fix future seasons.  I'm curious what is going to happen in 2020/21; If i'm Va Tech or Washington i'm getting nervous about getting a cancellation phone call.

I just listened to the podcast of his interview. Like some already speculated, it all came down to the 9 conference game schedule change and making sure we have 7 home games post-2018 as opposed to 6. Manuel said playing in South Bend in two years was the only way to accomplish that.

I don't know. It's just annoying as hell that Notre Dame gets the best end of this deal despite their calculated dick move timing of ending the series in the first place. The fact that Michigan had to do a ton of sacrificing and I haven't heard of any sacrificing that Notre Dame has had to do to get this series back makes it seem obvious that Michigan wanted this game back much more than the Irish.

What's the hurry, though? Why not start the series back up in 2020 or some time shortly after? We've had breaks with ND before and the world still went on.

When Maryland and Rutgers joined the Big Ten and the conference established the two divisions, it became obvious that the B1G wanted two of Michigan, Michigan State, Ohio State and Penn State to play each sease either at Maryland or at Rutgers.

Once that was established, the conference then had to decide how to rank the remaining teams in the Eastern Division.  Based on what happened with the schedule, it looks like they kept the same rankings that were in place when Nebraska joined and the B1G had the Leaders and Legends Divisions.  Ohio State was #1, Penn State, #2, Michigan State was third and Indiana was ranked fourth.  The conference evidentally thought it wise to put #1 and #3 on one home/road schedule rotation and #2 and #4 on another.  That's how Ohio State and Michigan State both ended up as either home or road games.

So if you swap the MSU game and put it opposite OSU, then the conference probably also needs to move the home/road roation Michigan has with Penn State (rather than Indiana).  The new home/road rotations for the Eastern Division would then be:

Rotation 1:  Ohio State, Penn State, Rutgers, One B1G West Team

Rotation 2:  Michigan State, Indiana, Maryland, Two B1G West Teams

Would people be happy with this?  Keep in mind that the Big Ten has also planned to have teams from the East and West play one another based on their relative strengths over a four-year cycle.  That's why Wisconsin is on Michigan's schedule from 2016 through 2019 and is currently lined up on the same scheduling cycle with Penn State, Indiana and Maryland.  

Fast forward to 2020 and let's assume we have the swap I mentioned above is in place and Nebraska is on the schedule from 2020 through 2023.  Then this is what the rotations would look like:

Rotation 1:  Ohio State, Penn State, Rutgers, One B1G West Team

Rotation 2:  Michigan State, Indiana, Maryland, Nebraska, One B1G West Team

People need to keep in mind that it's not as simple as moving Michigan State.  A second Big Ten East team (probably Penn State) has to be swapped as well.  You also have to consider what Big Ten West team is going to be on the 2020 through 2023 schedules each season.  It would probably be Nebraska with perhaps Iowa being the second choice.

Manuel also said that having seven home games each season.  Assuming the Big Ten keeps the same rotation of five and four home conference games intact through the next decade, the only non-conference team on the correct home/road rotation that allows seven home games per year is Washington.  With that in mind, I expect Michigan to drop Virginia Tech and replace them with a couple of pay for play games.

The UCLA, Texas and Oklahoma home-and-home series locations will also have to be swapped to ensure that Michigan has seven home games per season.  Of course, who knows?  By the time those games are played (starting in 2022 with UCLA), the Big Ten may have expanded or announced a planned expansion and the schedule will be scrambled all over again.

 

 

Won't make a difference. Michigan will go 3-0 on the road in 2018 vs ND, MSU and OSU.

/prays a little

I'd like to see ND included with other P5 conference representatives in some sort of rotation:  1 P5 opponent home, 1 P5 opponent away each season, rotated on 6 year cycles (e.g. Y1 home, Y4 away).

So every thiird year we get: a) a Big 12 team & an ACC team; b) ND & a PAC12 team; c) an SEC team & an All-America, another Indepedent, or another PAC12 team.