ohio state Cancelling Games Against Washington

[isucy86]

Earlier this week ohio state cancelled a home & home series against Washington in football. The reason cited by Dennis Dodd of CBS was "nothing more than a reaction to a tougher conference schedule with the addition of USC and UCLA. Don't read anything more into it"

Is ohio state really saying the Big10 conference is so tough by adding USC & UCLA that they are going to schedule cupcakes in their non-con? Pretty weak reasoning since:

• It's not like the Big10 is the SEC. This past season was the first time the Big10 had 2 Playoff teams.
• There is a rumor that TV partners want USC & osu be protected rivals under the new Big10 deal. But my assumption would be osu would drop playing Penn State every year.

Gene Smith explained it would allow ohio state to play 8 home games the year they were scheduled to play in Seattle and obviously receive the $10M+ it earns from ticket, concession, etc. sales. To be fair, in 2025 ohio state was scheduled to play Washington and Texas. But they could have easily rescheduled that years game to a later date. But for the 2024 season ohio state's non-con schedule are giant killers Southern Miss and Western Michigan. Also this approach is just a different version of the SEC approach which has been 8 SEC games, 1 Quality Non-con and 3 cup cakes.

I guess this leads to some interesting speculation:

• With the 12 team playoff starting with the 2024 season, is this ohio states way of creating an easier schedule to ensure they are a 9-3 or better team, enhancing their chances to make the playoff?
• With fewer competitive non-conference games, does this give a committee fewer data points to compare Big10, SEC teams against Big12, Pac12 and ACC teams. Thus favoring blue blood programs or names that committee members may over-value.
• Does this mean anything for the CyHawk game? Will 2nd tier Big10 team take a similar approach or will they value competitive non-con games to enhance their SOS?

I am a firm believer that when we move to a 12 team playoff, using a committee for the selection process should be eliminated. Go with a computerized algorithm to rank teams. Get the human bias (or perception of) out of the selection process. The Sic Em 365 guys had Gene Taylor of K-State on their show earlier this week and he mentioned expanding to 12 teams doesn't create clarity to the process as the difference between teams 9, 10, 11, 12 and teams 13-20 isn't so clear cut. Basically, it's harder to find a clear choice among teams that are 10-2 or 9-3.

 

[mcblogerson]

Washington is an easy win for OSU most years.
Its more likely they’ll add another easy MAC team to play at home knowing they’re a lock for the layoffs almost every year at 12 teams.
Or Oregon and Wash will be joining the B10 and they want to find another non-con to play.