RE: The Last Thing We Would Want is Great Games
UNC doesn't want to play App anymore.
Let's, then, take a look at how they typically schedule to get an idea of the kind of school they would want to schedule instead. I got the information based off fbschedules.com.
Here's what UNC's non-conference schedule looks like over a 15 year period (2012-2019 and 2021-2027, with 2027 being the last year they have a full four team non conference schedule in place and with 2020 not included because it was the Covid year with all ACC games).
The time period will have included 60 non-conference games. Four per year. This was the breakdown:
FCS Home Games: 16; 26.67% of NC. (Only one year was there no FCS game played, and two years UNC played two FCS teams.)
Power 5 Home Games: 9; 15% of the non-conference schedule
P5 Road Games: 11; 18.33% of the NC schedule
P5 Neutral Site Games: 4; 6.67% of NC
G5 Home Games: 13; 21.67% of NC
G5 Road Games: 7; 11.67% of NC
Let's look, then, for the patterns. I'm going to allow myself to do a little rounding.
First, one of UNC's four non-conference games is FCS at home almost all of the time. Like it or not, this is absolutely the norm throughout the vast majority of FBS.
Second, again, doing some rounding, about two thirds of the time, UNC plays a P5 at home. Two thirds of the time, UNC plays a P5 team on the road. Notre Dame has helped a lot with these two categories.
Third, an average of about once every four years, UNC plays a neutral site game against a P5.
Fourth, UNC plays a home game against a G5 almost every year (13 times in 15 years) and a road G5 game about every other year (7 times in 15 years).
A typical UNC schedule, I conclude, looks most often something like this:
- One FCS home game about every year
- One G5 home game nearly every year
- One G5 road game every other year
- A P5 home game twice in three years
- A P5 road game twice in three years
- A P5 neutral site game once every four years
That works out to about two G5 home games for every one G5 road game. That is the pattern. 2-for-1. Against G5 teams.
The question is, "Which G5 teams should UNC schedule, since they clearly schedule them quite regularly?" UConn? UMass? MAC teams?
It's clear that if they're saying, "No more App State," it's not because they're above playing G5 teams, home or on the road. It's because they would rather play G5 teams with an established history of losing.
Here's the list of G5 teams that made up the 20 games in 15 years:
ECU (4)
App (3)
Charlotte (2)
UConn (2)
Ga. State (2)
ODU (2)
JMU (1)
UCF (1) (AAC at the time)
San Diego State (1)
MTSU (1)
Idaho (1) (WAC at the time)
Which schools make the most sense for UNC to play? Which will get the most people to literally attend the games?
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The Last Thing We Would Want is Great Games
