Could Western go undefeated if it had Marshall's non-conference schedule?

[nashvillegoldenflash]

With Marshall's non-conference schedule consisting of Miami University, Rhode Island, Ohio, and Akron, what are the chances that Western could go undefeated if it had the Herd's schedule? But unfortunately, the Toppers have the 36th strongest non-conference schedule and not the 124th strongest non-conference schedule (see link). I would love to see Marshall play Bowling Green, Illinois, and Navy and then see what its record would be like at the end of the season. Perhaps Marshall will be as good as some people claim, but when you play the weakest schedule in the nation the possibility of an undefeated regular season record is not all that impressive.





Non-conference strength-of-schedule rankings

 

[ILiveingville]

I'll be pulling for them and every other C-USA team unless they're playing Clemson or WKU. I'd like to see 4 or 5 teams with less than 4 losses in the conference. We certainly would have a better shot with their schedule, but we'd still probably lose 1-4 games.

Scheduling weaker teams has worked out well for Kent St, NIU, and other teams from non-BCS conferences. Can't blame them for trying to schedule teams they can beat. As a fan, I would hate it. Talk about boring. I can't wait to see how our team stacks up in the years to come against good teams from other conferences. I think our Administration does a good job scheduling games the fans can get excited about.


This post was edited on 7/27 1:00 PM by ILiveingville

 

[nashvillegoldenflash]

Last year Kent State played at LSU and Penn State and this season the Flashes play at Ohio State so I'm not sure your claim that Kent State plays a weak schedule is valid.

 

[svw311]

Originally posted by nashvillegoldenflash:

With Marshall's non-conference schedule consisting of Miami University, Rhode Island, Ohio, and Akron, what are the chances that Western could go undefeated if it had the Herd's schedule? But unfortunately, the Toppers have the 36th strongest non-conference schedule and not the 124th strongest non-conference schedule (see link). I would love to see Marshall play Bowling Green, Illinois, and Navy and then see what its record would be like at the end of the season. Perhaps Marshall will be as good as some people claim, but when you play the weakest schedule in the nation the possibility of an undefeated regular season record is not all that impressive.

You bring up a good hypothesis scenario here for discussion. While Marshall's non-conference games are definitely "more winnable" with the toughest opponent likely being Ohio, I still think it would be tough to have an undefeated season regardless when you consider C-USA opponents, namely, Middle Tennessee and Rice. But, it's been brought up that originally Marshall was scheduled to play Louisville this year until the whole move to the ACC thing happened a while back and the Cardinals ended up dropping the Herd from their schedule. So, in essence, I think it would still be extremely hard for WKU to pull off the undefeated plateau with Marshall's schedule and let's try not to hate on the Herd too much, they are really good too.

 

[ILiveingville]

Originally posted by nashvillegoldenflash:
Last year Kent State played at LSU and Penn State and this season the Flashes play at Ohio State so I'm not sure your claim that Kent State plays a weak schedule is valid.

Sorry, let me clarify. I was referring only to the year Kent St and NIU we both ranked in the top 20 when they played. That year Kent St lost to UK and beat a pretty good Rutgers team. Replace UK and Rutgers with Penn St and LSU and more than likely Kent St has 2 losses going into the NIU game and is not even in consideration for a BCS bowl and nobody is taking notice of them.

Weaker was probably not the best word to use to describe Kent St's schedule, and their schedule that year was way harder than Marshal's is this year. It's actually very comparable to ours this year.

The point I'm making is that while strength of schedule matters, if you over schedule you could have a very good team, but still not have a good record to show for it. And nobody will be talking about a 2 loss non-bcs team at the end of the year. Whereas if you have a good team and play teams that aren't quite as good, your chances of having a good record are better, and other people will take notice of you if you have good record.

Lots of respect for Kent St. They're a very good program that doesn't back down from anyone. I was only trying to point out that there is something to be said about only playing teams you have a realistic shot at beating.