Well we only have had one to date and that was Mississippi State. Navy will be our second.

For Mississippi State it was a no brainer. Mobile is Alabama High School Central. MSU got to show its brand in Mobile. Pluse MSU has a lot of Alumni who are from Mobile. They may not live in Mobile but don't mind the excuse to visit home. My best friend from high school is an alumni of MSU.

Navy was easy as well. Pensacola NAS is 48 miles away.

Our next P5 and G5 home opponents are NC State, UAB, Oklahoma State, Louisana Tech, Tulane and Southern Mississippi.

NC State is the tail end of a 2 for 1;

UAB hopefully will be a sell out, it is a B'ham-Mobile thang!

Oklahoma State is 1 for 2 with the first game being in Mobile. I think that was smart. We get our game in first just in case OSU drops the later games.

La Tech should be a sell out as well. I think their fans (5,000) will travel to Mobile and by that time.

Southern Mississippi is 90 miles away but it is only 90 minutes. To many folks in Mobile from Hattiesburg and just like MSU their are a ton of USM Alumni from Mobile.

Tulane is to easy.

As far as others, I would like to see if Air Force, Ga Tech, Memphis and Middle Tennesse would come to Mobile.

I think for GS to get a P5 we should concentrate on middle to lower P5's that don't usually get to play in Georgia.

Some examples are:
Iowa St
Texas Tech
TCU
Kansas
Baylor
Indiana
Rutgers
Illinois
Iowa
Minnesota
Purdue
Washington St
Utah

Same goes for any G5 that does not have a team in Georgia. MW, CUSA American or MAC should want to play a home and home to get their brand in front of recruits.

Some have said that ESPN can be very helpful in getting things set up if they see a
reason to do so. Unless you want the money game believe what others have said
about your AD having to ask for more than a particular school is willing to pay to get
some P5s to do a home and home. Standing pat if they know the other schools needs
a particular spot filled. (Am sure you really are glad a certain SB is no longer doing that.)

(09-15-2014 10:14 PM)slycat Wrote:  A lot depends on who your AD knows too. Another favor can be who else is near you to get games.

At TXST it's hard to get teams to come when they can go 45 mins south to a larger stadium in San Antonio. The big schools like destination games for their fans as well.

Teams that don't live up to "destinations" like the ULM, UL, or stAte have great ADs with guts.

The TXST AD got Texas Tech to come but that's about all I expect for a P5. We got Navy, Houston, and UTSA set up so he will consider those home runs and not reach past that.

We had Hawaii til he and Fran messed it up.

Since we have a 6 game series set with UTSA it'll be more difficult to be flexible but I hope we get TCU or Baylor to come.


Posted from my mobile device using the CSNbbs App

I think we are doing well with the OOC Schedule. To get three consecutive weekends with games on ESPN News means Teis is doing something right. We get a nationally televised game at Illinois and we get paid $860,000 for the visit. Not bad.

The AAC is doing the best job of any G5 conference in scheduling P5 schools at home. They have multiple P5 home games lined up this year and into the future. The one thing they have in common is that each school plays in a stadium that seats at least 30,000. The larger stadiums and larger markets make them more attractive to P5 schools.

The message to the SBC should be don't bring in a school that plays
in a small facility unless they have plans to expand. Idaho got in because they were already FBS, but they need to expand to at least 25,000 to attract a better home schedule and to stay FBS. Texas State expanded from 16,000 to 30,000 when we went FBS. That cost $33 million. Any school thinking about moving up should be in the 25,000 to 30,000 seat range and should be thinking about how they will pay for this expansion.

Do you think Tommie Hicks is eavesdropping on us?

What non-conference opponents would you like to see South Alabama play on its home field in future?

http://www.al.com/sports/index.ssf/2014/...cart_river

This is a great question for other "G5" schools. This had been an issue for Boise State for several reasons. Primarily, scheduling quality home games was difficult because of the geographic isolation and lack of fertile recruiting grounds near Boise. The Broncos are not an easy win so there was that issue. Our AD at the time (and the current one) disliked 2 for 1 games as BSU makes considerable income off of home games and strives to have six home games every year. The advantages for BSU were (are) they are not dependent on "money games" and thus do not schedule "one and done" games at the opponents home stadium and ESPN has been a partner in getting BSU into neutral site season opening games. It was a long process which took program development, winning enough that ESPN became interested, and an AD who was strong in negotiating games (he took a lot of flack for refusing a one and done with Nebraska). As a result, BSU has Washington, Virginia, Washington State, Florida State, and Oklahoma State at home on future schedules. They have one for ones with other G5 schools including Louisiana, Troy, Connecticut, and Cincinnati (BTW, what is up with Troy? They look to be doing a USM imitation). The Broncos are in the midst of a 10 year home and away agreement with a good regional opponent in BYU. These are teams that make a quality home schedule. Be patient. Most of the formula is having a well networked and resolute AD acting over a period of years.

(09-18-2014 09:26 AM)FloridaJag Wrote:  Do you think Tommie Hicks is eavesdropping on us?

What non-conference opponents would you like to see South Alabama play on its home field in future?

http://www.al.com/sports/index.ssf/2014/...cart_river

UAB and USM getting a few votes. I was very glad to see us have Troy, Georgia State, and USA on our future schedules.

(09-18-2014 03:33 PM)BeliefBlazer Wrote:  

(09-18-2014 09:26 AM)FloridaJag Wrote:  Do you think Tommie Hicks is eavesdropping on us?

What non-conference opponents would you like to see South Alabama play on its home field in future?

http://www.al.com/sports/index.ssf/2014/...cart_river

UAB and USM getting a few votes. I was very glad to see us have Troy, Georgia State, and USA on our future schedules.

I wish GS could get teams like UAB, So Miss and Tulane for home and homes and I guess that is a possibility but so far our AD has been focusing on the MAC.

I live in Monroe GA, so I'd love a trip down to Statesboro to watch the Blazers. The last 3 series we've scheduled have been against Sun Belt teams, so it is a possibility.