Robber,
Y'all gotta up the ante if you want us back, though. At least, that's what I'd prefer.
Paper: Houston Chronicle
Date: FRI 08/30/02
Section: SPORTS
Page: 1
Edition: 3 STAR
Longest season may set a trend /Teaff: 12 games won't go away
By MICHAEL MURPHY
Staff
Saturday night, Maryland and Notre Dame will hook up in the annual Kickoff Classic at Giants Stadium in New Jersey, a game one might assume would mark the official start of the college football season .
You would be wrong to make such an assumption.
Before the Irish and the Terps mix it up at 7 p.m., there will have been 93 college football games already kicked off.
The overabundance of games is thanks in part to a raft of relatively anonymous preseason "classics," but also because of an NCAA rule that allows teams to take on a 12th regular-season game in years there are 14 Saturdays between Labor Day and Nov. 30. In addition to this season , teams will be able to pick up an extra game in 2003, 2008, 2013 and 2014.
So many teams have taken advantage, booking a 13-game regular season , with the possibility of a 14th game should a bowl invitation come their way. The extreme is represented by Nebraska and/or Texas Tech - should either (or both) make the Big 12 title game and then a bowl, it would mean a 15-game season - just one weekend shy of an NFL schedule.
Which means starting the season earlier.
A glance through the University of Houston media guide shows only three times that the Coogs have played before September - two Aug. 31 games (against Sam Houston State in 1996 and Louisiana Tech in 1991) and one Aug. 30 game (vs. Alabama in 1997).
But 11 of the 14 teams involved in this year's preseason games (such as the Hispanic College Fund Football Classic and the John Thompson Foundation Classic) will have played two games before September.
Get used to it because if Grant Teaff, executive director of the American Football Coaches Association is correct, such lengthy seasons might soon become the norm.
"The (school) administrators are saying, `Well, we're only going to do this (add another game ) every four years,' but I think that once they look and say, `Well, with 12 (regular-season ) games we can bring in another $1 million or $2 million,' I think we stand a real good chance of ending up getting 12 games every year," Teaff said. "It won't happen next year because it's not in the legislation, but there's a good possibility it will happen."
Which could lead to some of the absurd situations we're seeing this year - Auburn playing four games in the season 's first 18 days, Michigan State's 12 -game schedule that features eight home games, and San Jose State and Arkansas State playing on 13 consecutive weekends (Kansas, BYU and Iowa will go 12 straight).
Another factor to consider - some true freshmen will have played a game or two before attending a class. That means less time to earn money for the upcoming school year, adding to the financial burden student-athletes are forced to endure.
If the additional game is indeed adopted, as Teaff seems to think, then expect to hear coaches lobbying to expand more than the regular season .
"Simply put, with 85 scholarships, with 13, 14 and 15 games, that's pretty slim pickings with depth over that period of time because of injuries and so forth," Teaff said. "That's the problem the coaches face.
"Will it (a 12th regular-season game ) happen? I think it's a possibility, and if it does then we have to look at the real strong concern that we have concerning the 85 scholarships. Our desire would be to go to 90, which would go over like the proverbial lead balloon.
"What happens, and this is the statistical truth because over the last 19 years we (the AFCA) have done surveys based on retention, is that we average 79.5 guys on scholarship at any given institution. That's an average. That means that while you have 85 scholarships (available), but you never have 85 on scholarship. Very seldom will that occur.
"You have injuries and such (that thin the rosters), but you also have to think about kickers, quarterbacks and snappers who don't play (any other position), which cuts into that 85 (players) even more.
"So when you start talking about playing 12 , 13, 14 or 15 games, the question is, `Can you hold up?' It's not a major concern right now, but it's something we'll probably have to deal with eventually."
That's because for most teams, the decision to add the extra game was easy. As Teaff indicated, money is the motivating force behind the glut of games.
"(Each home game ) means about $1.8 million per game for us," said Michigan State assistant athletic director John Lewandowski, who referred to the Spartans' eight home games as a scheduling quirk. "And that's just from ticket sales and not anything else.
"We're a little bit different from other folks because we don't get all the concessions and we don't get all the parking (revenue), but in just ticket revenue it's roughly $1.8 million per game ."
Which means 1.8 million reasons (or more - Nebraska makes between $2.5 million and $3 million per home game ) to put an additional burden on the student-athletes.
Part of that load will be eased next year when the NCAA axes all preseason games except the Black Coaches Association Classic, which has a TV contract that runs through 2004.
Still, the college football regular season seems to swell with each passing year, leading to the inevitable question - if kids can play a 15-game season , why can't they participate in a playoff system?
The argument most often used against a playoff has been the number of games it would require, a number usually quoted as (gasp!) 15 games.
With the Bowl Championship Series contracts extending until 2004, college football fans are stuck with the current bowl system. And that system has been bloated by meaningless games - now 28 - meaning 56 of the 117 Division I-A teams are invited to the postseason.
All those games, yet no playoff system to crown the champion?
"Will there ever be a form of a playoff? Possibly," Teaff said. "Say you took four teams at the end of the (BCS) bowl season and have a two-game playoff. That could happen. But you're never going to have a tiered playoff. That is not going to happen.
"But certainly a valid argument (for a playoff format) is there. If you're going to play 14 or 15 games in a season , why couldn't you do it? Well, you could, but the right people don't want it."