As much heat as we're taking for the '26 schedule

by KGB, Belly o. the Beast, Thursday, May 21, 2026, 10:47 (3 days ago) @ beattherush
edited by KGB, Thursday, May 21, 2026, 15:27

take a good hard look at 2027. Woof. Unless Dabo finds his BK 2.0 gear or someone comes out of the woodwork, it's likely to be even less competitive. Auburn will be a curiosity, but let's face it -- they fucking suck. LOT of "7 win, just happy to have qualified for a bowl" teams here. So I agree that Kent State as the 12th opponent feels like a missed opportunity, particularly when there's an early September hole in the schedule which could have been filled by a serious program that might actually boost our SOS.

(I will mention this again, because it annoys the everlovin' shit out of me and I think that Swarbrick deserves to be flogged over it, but scheduling shitbag Purdue and shitbag Michigan State concurrently (!) for multiple years (!!) on top of a mostly milquetoast ACC slate has fucked us in a bad way. It's a challenge to dig out from under when the foundation of the schedule is so decidedly...beige. Some of our 'traditions' just drive me up a goddamned wall.)

But your final paragraph is the nut of the whole thing here IMO. Someone over at The Athletic did a rundown a few days ago on projected CFB TV schedules for the month of September, and holy hell, man. The pussification of the B1G is having a serious downstream impact on the quality of inventory, and I am skeptical that the networks who have sunk billions into the sport in recent years and who largely control the behavior of power players like Sankey and Petitti are going to be satisfied with that as the new normal, watching college football get its face ripped off weekend after weekend in September by the NFL on ratings.

I believe that ND has a ton of value here, moreso than any other school, because we combine being one of the biggest national draws with much greater flexibility in scheduling than our conference-laden peers. Assuming that Pete isn't simply an enormous pussy, he should be in conversation with networks outside NBC trying to save upcoming big-ticket series like Texas & Alabama in addition to adding more deals of a similar type in future years. The networks are hungry for those games, and quite frankly, the expanded playoff hasn't delivered enough of them (and 24 ain't gonna do it either). That's his card to play.