How Has The SEC Gotten Away With Not Playing Meaningful OOC Road Games For So Long?

by HD Handshoe
Founder—Block-O-Nation



Seriously, can anyone answer this question, with at the very least, a semi-cognizant thought?

Since 1991, I think most people would agree the best team from the SEC has been the Florida Gators, and Alabama has arguably been a close second, just edging out LSU and Georgia in my opinion.

Over that span, Florida has won three national championships (1996, 2006, 2008) and Alabama has won two (1992, 2009).

Now, I know that basically every Florida, Alabama, and SEC fan in general will try to defend their pathetic out-of-conference road schedules until the death, but facts are facts, and they cannot be ignored any longer.

If UF, Bama, and the rest of the teams from the SEC do not start playing at least one true OOC road game per year during the regular season versus a decent team from a BCS conference, instead of some hopeless and weak FCS cupcake (examples: Charleston Southern, Memphis, Hawaii), then I say the entire conference should be banned from playing in the BCS title game indefinitely.

(I fully expect to, and cannot wait to hear from the likes of Le Roi, Larry, Carson, Sean, etc. after that last paragraph!)

I'm not just shooting my mouth off without the facts to back up my statements here. To further strengthen my stance, let's compare the OOC road games played by Florida, Alabama, and,—oh I don't know,—how about Ohio State—say from 1991, through 2009.


Florida Gators (1991-2009) OOC Road Games (0-1)

1991 @ Syracuse, a 38-21 loss

Sadly, that's it--that's the entire list of OOC road games for UF.


Alabama Crimson Tide (1991-2009) OOC Road Games (4-3)

1991 @ Memphis, a 10-7 win

1992 @ Tulane, a 37-0 win

1996 @ NC State, a 24-19 win

2000 @ UCLA, a 35-24 loss

2002 @ Hawaii, a 21-16 win

2002 @ Oklahoma, a 37-27 loss

2003 @ Hawaii, a 39-27 loss

2004-present, no OOC road games for the Tide (and no, "neutral site" games do NOT count as true road games).


Ohio State Buckeyes (1991-2009) OOC Road Games (10-3)

1992 @ Syracuse, a 35-12 win

1993 @ Pitt, a 63-28 win

1994 @ Washington, a 25-16 loss

1995 @ Pitt, a 54-14 win

1996 @ Notre Dame, a 29-16 win

1997 @ Missouri, a 31-10 win

1998 @ West Virginia, a 34-17 win

2000 @ Arizona, a 27-17 win

2001 @ UCLA, a 13-6 loss

2004 @ NC State, a 22-14 win (NFL star Phillip Rivers was the NC State QB)

2006 @ Texas, a 24-7 win (Colt McCoy was the UT QB)

2007 @ Washington, a 33-14 win (a healthy Jake Locker was the UW QB)

2008 @ USC, a 35-3 loss


Over the past two decades, you can plainly see, UF has played one OOC road game outside of the state of Florida, Alabama has played seven true road games away from the state of Alabama (excluding neutral site games), and Ohio State has played 13 OOC road games outside of Ohio—and not against the likes of Memphis, Tulane, and Hawaii either.

I know a lot of the responses will include references to UF and LSU beating the Buckeyes in 2006 and 2007, and that's fine. I won't dispute that, but I will say this.

If the teams of the SEC are so great, why not step up and play at least one real OOC game per year lke the Buckeyes do, instead of relying on the totally false "our conference schedule is too tough, so we need a break in our OOC games" excuse / crutch?

Florida beat Ohio State after they has nearly 60 days off, and LSU beat OSU essentially at home in 2007 in New Orleans.

Forgive me if I want to see just how well UF, LSU, or Alabama would fare against the Buckeyes in Columbus—and no, not just because of the weather.

That could be a factor depending on when played, but I'm more interested in seeing how those teams would deal with playing on the road, after living out of a hotel for three days, and then playing in front of 105,000+ Buckeye fans in a hostile environment behind enemy lines instead of always in the SEC backyard...


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Five Top 10 Teams— Five Pathetic OOC Schedules

by HD Handshoe
Founder
BlockONation.com


This isn't just a Buckeye site.

We follow the college football scene across the board and when something catches our eye and we believe it's worthy of bringing it to you, that is what we do!

After researching the 2009 out of conference schedules of several of the top teams in college football, I have compiled a list of what I believe to be the top five weakest, most pathetic OOC schedules for 2009.

The teams I have selected are all teams that will be in, or very near the top ten of the AP poll to open the 2009 season.

I think I speak for many, if not most, college football fans when I say teams need to start "manning up" and stop playing I-AA or DII teams and start playing other top teams on the road, during the season!

Follow the example set by Ohio State and USC last year and this year. Hopefully, they do it again soon because the big time games during the season are amazing!

They can be high-risk in terms of a BCS title run, but with high risk comes high reward for the team that wins!

Now, on with the show!

No. 5: Texas Longhorns

Texas has a great coach in Mack Brown and a Heisman contender at QB in Colt McCoy. They also have loads of talent on defense so they could probably beat just about any team in the top 25, but scheduled these OOC games instead:

9/5/09—vs. University of Louisiana Monroe

9/12/09—@ Wyoming

9/26/09—vs. UTEP

11/7/09—vs. Central Florida


No. 4: Penn State Nittany Lions

It's not Lewis & Clark, it's Royster and Clark! JoePa has another talented squad one year removed from a Big Ten title and a near miss at a trip to the BCS title game.

Penn State's schedule got even weaker in 2009 so will we really know how good they are before the bowl season? Not against these OOC opponents we won't, and they're even all home games of course.

9/5/09—vs. University of Akron

9/12/09—vs. Syracuse

9/19/09—vs. Temple

10/10/09—vs. Eastern Illinois


No. 3: LSU Tigers

Charles Scott should be the best back in the SEC and the Tigers should be improved over last years team.

They don't dodge the bullets in the SEC, but they play these teams out of conference, so they're another team we may not know much about outside of the SEC until their bowl game.

9/5/09—@ Washington

9/19/09—vs. Louisiana

10/31/09—vs. Tulane

11/14/09—vs. Louisiana Tech


No. 2: Ole Miss Rebels

In their defense, Ole Miss hasn't been a top team since Eli Manning left in 2004 so the reason they have a weak OOC schedule is acceptable.

But, it still ranks at No. 2 on my list because they are very good now even if they, or nobody else saw it coming!

The OOC opponents they will be facing however; not so much!

9/5/09—@ Memphis

9/19/09—vs. Southeastern Louisiana

10/17/09—vs. University of Alabama Birmingham

11/7/09—vs. Northern Arizona


No. 1: Florida Gators

It was tough narrowing this list down to the top five.

It was not tough putting Florida at No. 1.

They have arguably one of the best coaches in the game in Urban Meyer, a two-time BCS Championship and Heisman winning quarterback in Tim Tebow, and they have all eleven defensive starters and all eleven back-ups to those starters back from last years SEC and BCS championship team.

I didn't think it was possible for their OOC games in 2009 to be even more pathetic than 2008, when they played a down and rebuilding Miami Hurricanes team along with home games vs. Hawaii and The Citadel.

Then, I looked at 2009 and realized I may have thought too soon:

9/5/09—vs. Charleston Southern

9/12/09—vs. Troy

11/21/09—vs. Florida International

11/28/09—vs. Florida State

All four of these games are home games and even though it's a traditional rivalry game, Florida State is not what they once were.

I wanted to address that in case anyone tried to defend UF's OOC games by saying FSU is a good team.

No, they are not!

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Thanks for reading and as always, feel free to agree or disagree in the comments section!

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