Any idea as to when the MAC football schedule will be announced?

There is no set date for their release but last year the schedules were released on March 15.

it will be after MAC Madness and from what I've heard, probably in mid to late [/u]April

blows.

I'm asking this question respectivefully.

Is the expected holdup (April????) because of OOC schedule issues? conference games? Conference games but ESPN TV? something else?

Do remember that ESPN gives us some November mid-week games on both ESPN2 and ESPN-U which means that ESPN is doing programming 9 months down the line.

From looking at the '08 OOC schedule thread, I assume the '08 OOC schedule is pretty well set.

why the holdup in football schedules being published?

yes - to the individual schools doing some last minute changes

yes - to TV, the MAC is on the lower tier to fill in TV time slops for ESPN and other networks, but still, unlike a decade ago, at least we now can see our teams on major networks even if it's week night games

yes - it's become an annual tradition to have our schedule be so late; no matter if we had 12 or 12 football members[/align]

I know that OU's non conference schedule is still getting worked out. Nothing official yet but we will have 3 straight away games to open the season, followed up by a home opener against an I-AA school.

The BG website has a weekly "Ask the AD" feature and here is a question and answer that was posted today, Feb 18:

"Q: What is the 2008 BG football schedule?
David in Perrysburg

A: We expect to announce our football schedule in conjunction with other MAC institutions within a week or so. Our non-conference games have been publicized before and are road games at Pittsburgh, Boise State and Wyoming. We also host a Big Ten team at The Doyt for the first time ever, when Minnesota comes to Bowling Green on Sept. 6."

A week or so. That sounds a lot earlier than late April. So who should I believe, the BG AD or Vandelay?

BG Warthog Wrote:The BG website has a weekly "Ask the AD" feature and here is a question and answer that was posted today, Feb 18:

"Q: What is the 2008 BG football schedule?
David in Perrysburg

A: We expect to announce our football schedule in conjunction with other MAC institutions within a week or so. Our non-conference games have been publicized before and are road games at Pittsburgh, Boise State and Wyoming. We also host a Big Ten team at The Doyt for the first time ever, when Minnesota comes to Bowling Green on Sept. 6."

A week or so. That sounds a lot earlier than late April. So who should I believe, the BG AD or Vandelay?

It depends on the definition of 'or so' I couldn't resist.

My guess and I'm not the BG AD, or Vandelay or HuronDave but I believe last year's release (March 15, according to HuronDave) was because of big time scheduling problems.

I believe that Temple had some commitments they entered into as an independent that they needed to get out of once they became a full time member of a conference.

I won't have any heartburn if the schedule comes out around March 15 this year.

Sometime this month is even better.

I should be in MI the end of August through the 1st week of Sept. I'd love to see GAME TIMES.

If EMU @ MSU is a noon game and Minnie Sota @ BG is an evening game, that's a double header for me.

I can see the EMU home opener on Aug 28, and my schedule is open for Sat. Aug 30.

BG Warthog Wrote:The BG website has a weekly "Ask the AD" feature and here is a question and answer that was posted today, Feb 18:

"Q: What is the 2008 BG football schedule?
David in Perrysburg

A: We expect to announce our football schedule in conjunction with other MAC institutions within a week or so. Our non-conference games have been publicized before and are road games at Pittsburgh, Boise State and Wyoming. We also host a Big Ten team at The Doyt for the first time ever, when Minnesota comes to Bowling Green on Sept. 6."

A week or so. That sounds a lot earlier than late April. So who should I believe, the BG AD or Vandelay?

Believe the BG AD. Afterall, he's been telling BG fans for a few years that Boise State is coming to the Doyt!

Let me piggyback this comment onto Vandelay's (about TV).

Remember that those weeknight games in November are for TV.

Therefore, it makes NO sense to schedule them WITHOUT a commitment from the ESPN family to televise them.

ALSO, do remember Comcast-Local goes out of business I believe next month.

Therefore, scheduling a game like EMU @ CMU on a Friday night would make NO sense this year (unless ESPN-U was going to pick it up). In '07 it was a Comcast-Local game.

ALSO, I assume the early conference scheduling (late September to mid/late Oct. might also reflect what agreement the MAC does OR does not have for over-the-air TV ala in '07).

IF the MAC is going to have the over-the-air TV package again this year then we could see some key games (e.g., UB/Temple, Kent/Akron, Mia/Ohio, CMU/BSU, etc.) moved up into late September/early-mid October.

Just a quick P.S. to my post.

I'm a political junkie at heart. (I actually worked an exit poll many years ago for a political survey research company).

When I see the '08 conference schedule I should be able to forecast whether or not the MAC has the over-the-air TV package like last year.

If the key games are 'front loaded' then that is a clue that the schedule was designed with a TV package in mind.

rocketfootball Wrote:

BG Warthog Wrote:The BG website has a weekly "Ask the AD" feature and here is a question and answer that was posted today, Feb 18:

"Q: What is the 2008 BG football schedule?
David in Perrysburg

A: We expect to announce our football schedule in conjunction with other MAC institutions within a week or so. Our non-conference games have been publicized before and are road games at Pittsburgh, Boise State and Wyoming. We also host a Big Ten team at The Doyt for the first time ever, when Minnesota comes to Bowling Green on Sept. 6."

A week or so. That sounds a lot earlier than late April. So who should I believe, the BG AD or Vandelay?

Believe the BG AD. Afterall, he's been telling BG fans for a few years that Boise State is coming to the Doyt!

"A week or so" leaves a lot of wiggle room. If the schedules were announced in the next week I would be stunned...and it would be a record for the MAC!

Several of the MAC SID's have said the schedule announcement may not come until April.

As I mentioned, last year the league released the schedules March 15 which was shocking...a February release would be coronary-inducing! (Just in case, I am stocking up on Bayer Aspirin).

rocketfootball Wrote:Believe the BG AD. Afterall, he's been telling BG fans for a few years that Boise State is coming to the Doyt!

Boise St will come to BG someday!

Seriously though, the MAC office has caused BG to lose it's home game with Boise St. I was wondering if the "schedule release" by BG might just be a pre-emptive strike against the MAC office whereby BG announces it's OOC games. If they put out an official announcement, it would be much harder for the MAC office to ask us to make changes, AGAIN. So maybe this is just to thumb our nose at the league office, if it happens like that.

I'll go with Dave.

Because TV becomes MORE complicated year by year, I'd suspect TV would cause delays in finalizing conference schedules.

If I were Chryst I'd not finalize a conference schedule until all the I's are dotted and Ts cross with TV.

I'll repeat what I posted earlier, if we retain the over-the-air package (I believe it was written as a 2-year contract subject to cancellation based on poor ratings performance) then it behooves the MAC office to get marque games lined up from mid/late Sept. to mid October.

Games which might be played in early/mid November now would be moved up to late Sept or early/mid-Oct.

When do we find out who's playing only seven conference games? They can't wait until March or April for that, can they? How are those teams supposed to find another OOC game?

zibby Wrote:When do we find out who's playing only seven conference games? They can't wait until March or April for that, can they? How are those teams supposed to find another OOC game?

The actual school's will know more about who is playing 7 or 8 conference games before the fans will.

Most schools probably already know. Toledo's AD told me that UT is playing 8 conference games again in 2008.

from BG Warthog...

The BG website has a weekly "Ask the AD" feature and here is a question and answer that was posted today, Feb 18:

"Q: What is the 2008 BG football schedule?
David in Perrysburg

A: We expect to announce our football schedule in conjunction with other MAC institutions within a week or so. Our non-conference games have been publicized before and are road games at Pittsburgh, Boise State and Wyoming. We also host a Big Ten team at The Doyt for the first time ever, when Minnesota comes to Bowling Green on Sept. 6."

A week or so. That sounds a lot earlier than late April. So who should I believe, the BG AD or Vandelay?

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After the latest article in the Cincy Inquirer about the Temple/UK/Miami scheduling mix, perhaps ole' VanDelay was right again about his time frame. Which by the way, was late March to mid-April, and not late April.

If you are going to quote me, then get it right.

Vandelay Wrote:it will be after MAC Madness and from what I've heard, probably in mid to late April

Geez, sorry to have mis-quoted you.

Vandelay Wrote:After the latest article in the Cincy Inquirer about the Temple/UK/Miami scheduling mix, perhaps ole' VanDelay was right again about his time frame. Which by the way, was late March to mid-April, and not late April.

If you are going to quote me, then get it right.

http://bgsufalcons.cstv.com/genrel/022508aac.html

See Editors Note at bottom. BG to announce their schedule Tuesday, Feb. 26. Guess ole' Vandelay doesn't know what he is talking about.