ASU’s Todd Graham says scheduling weak opponents is ‘un-American’
Though Arizona State coach Todd Graham thinks progress has been made in college football with the implementation of the College Football Playoff, he still says changes need to be made with the way teams schedule.
Graham says scheduling should be “equal for everybody,” with all Power Five teams playing the same amount of conference games instead of scheduling mediocre teams to put up easy wins.
“Everybody should play nine conference games,” Graham said per AZfamily.com. “Why nine games instead of eight? Because you play one more conference game that your fans want to see instead of scheduling a team that no one wants to see because you’re scheduling wins and don’t want to be out of the four-team playoff.”
The Pac-12, Arizona State’s conference, and the Big 12 already play nine-game conference schedules and the Big Ten will begin doing so in 2016. However, the ACC and SEC have relented and will continue with an eight-game conference schedule moving forward, but each team must schedule a non-conference game against another Power Five opponent.
Graham said the fans want to see more interesting matchups instead of the usual early season cupcakes.
“We need to consider what the fans want,” Graham said. “Fans don’t want to see you schedule four easy wins, then get two conference wins to get into a bowl game. That’s un-American.”
Arizona State opens up the upcoming season with a neutral site game against Texas A&M and has games locked in with Texas Tech, Michigan State, BYU and LSU in the future. Still, Graham’s team has non-conference games scheduled with Cal Poly and New Mexico this season, Northern Arizona and UTSA in 2016 and New Mexico State in 2017.
Those aren’t exactly juggernauts, but Graham’s point about all Power Five teams playing nine conference games certainly makes sense. Graham has some other ideas, too, including expanding the playoff to eight teams.
“In the future, I would love to see us expand to an eight-team playoff and keep the major bowls intact,” Graham said. “Every conference champion gets an automatic bid. You’d have five automatic bids and three at-large.”
Graham thinks the playoff will expand and will do so “in the near future.”
For more Arizona State news, visit ASUDevils.com.
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Sam Cooper is a contributor for the Yahoo Sports blogs. Have a tip? Email him or follow him on Twitter!
