With the Belt doing it’s thing and Rising, you think we should consider establishing official “Rivalry weekend” games? Could put us all in more media light?
Is it too early to consider and should let the conference gel a little more, or ride the wave?

Let it happen. New dynamics. Don't force anything. I'd observe a couple years and use best regional matchups and then talk to the schools about a real rivalry day. Remember someone isn't even playing on that day due to 7 teams in division and that will likely rotate anyway.

From a fan standpoint, having Marshall and App as the last 2 games of season may be one of the best schedules of all time if we win out. I'll enjoy the ride until then. Summer is too long to wait to wish for the end of the schedule already. At least for us.

That is probably the hardest weekend to get on TV. There are sooooo many TV friendly games in the P5 that weekend.

Ohio State-Michigan
Auburn-Alabama
Florida-FSU
Georgia-Georgia Tech
Clemson-South Carolina
LSU-A&M
Louisville-Kentucky
(Whichever two matchups are playing among USC/UCLA/Notre Dame/Stanford/Cal)
Oregon-Oregon State
Washington-Washington State
Penn State-Michigan State
Nebraska-Iowa
Ole Miss-Mississippi State
NC State-UNC
Virginia-Virginia Tech
Oklahoma-Oklahoma State

Not to mention...
Arkansas-Missouri
Indiana-Purdue
Illinois-Northwestern
Minnesota-Wisconsin
Arizona-Arizona State
Utah-Colorado
Tennessee-Vanderbilt

And other random P5 games.

How will the Sun Belt get any time slot on any TV network that weekend?

(09-14-2022 06:22 PM)MUther Wrote:  Let it happen. New dynamics. Don't force anything. I'd observe a couple years and use best regional matchups and then talk to the schools about a real rivalry day. Remember someone isn't even playing on that day due to 7 teams in division and that will likely rotate anyway.

+1

(09-14-2022 06:45 PM)Michael in Raleigh Wrote:  That is probably the hardest weekend to get on TV. There are sooooo many TV friendly games in the P5 that weekend.

I kinda like what the SBC did this year, at least for ODU JMU. We have the game the week before, so we will have students and a less congested weekend slate. Could the SBC carve out a niche for doing rivalry weekend a week early, a parallel to scheduling thursday/friday night games for getting a TV time slot?

We should have our rivalry week 1 week before everyone else for TV reasons and to make it unique across FBS. Since there would be 7 teams per division, I would be fine with Marshall/Southern Miss being the odd game out each year.

I personally don't like the idea of "rivalry week". It seems like almost every game in the East is going to turn into a "Rivalry" for App.

It's fine to spread the "main rivals" throughout the season, to give each of the games their space, instead of cramming everyone in one day.

(09-15-2022 10:07 AM)Surbadger Wrote:  We should have our rivalry week 1 week before everyone else for TV reasons and to make it unique across FBS. Since there would be 7 teams per division, I would be fine with Marshall/Southern Miss being the odd game out each year.

Maybe as a crossover rivalry every other year? The USM/Marshall rivalry will be replaced with Marshall/APP and USM/UL in my opinion.

I don't know what other school's experience, but our attendance usually drops significantly when we play at home Thanksgiving weekend. I think if we want to create the best SBC packages and atmospheres, then we need our best games to be in October and early November. I think we're de-valuing what we offer best trying to compete against the established Rivalry Weekend games. Let's put us best offering where its most likely to get picked up for TV and most likely to get fans in the house.

(09-15-2022 10:07 AM)Surbadger Wrote:  We should have our rivalry week 1 week before everyone else for TV reasons and to make it unique across FBS. Since there would be 7 teams per division, I would be fine with Marshall/Southern Miss being the odd game out each year.

That screams of trying to hard IMO. It's like the AAC calling themselves P6. Rivalry Week is rivalry week for a reason. Moving big games a week earlier and "calling it" rivalry week doesn't change anything. We could make our own Thanksgiving parade and have it the week before, but the Macy's parade is still gonna get all the TV attention. Just my 2 cents.

Having big games throughout the rest of the season is fine to get ratings....but I would much rather have our game with Appy on a Saturday at the end of the season and not on TV than on a week night in the middle just for TV. We've done both and I prefer a Saturday night game.

I could get on board with the next-to-last week being a week for the big rivalries. Mathematically, they couldn't all be done the same weekend, but several could.

The time slots might be there that weekend, and the one before, for that matter.

The SEC is infamous for playing FCS and "easy" G5 games in November before Thanksgiving. Those games are going to relegated to ESPN+ and the SECN.

Also worth mentioning is that for generations, the B1G held their rivalry weekend the Saturday BEFORE Thanksgiving. This gave them quite the spotlight that weekend while then-powers like Florida State were playing Wake Forest. The B1G bumped rivalry weekend up to Thanksgiving weekend because (a) they weren't getting enough weeks off with the new 12 game schedule, (b) they needed to have games the weekend before their new CCG, and © the conference was going out of sight, out of mind at the end of the season, with no games Thanksgiving weekend or CCG weekend.

Those B1G issues wouldn't apply to the SBC.

Personally, I prefer playing ULL earlier in the season.

(09-14-2022 06:45 PM)Michael in Raleigh Wrote:  That is probably the hardest weekend to get on TV. There are sooooo many TV friendly games in the P5 that weekend.

Ohio State-Michigan
Auburn-Alabama
Florida-FSU
Georgia-Georgia Tech
Clemson-South Carolina
LSU-A&M
Louisville-Kentucky
(Whichever two matchups are playing among USC/UCLA/Notre Dame/Stanford/Cal)
Oregon-Oregon State
Washington-Washington State
Penn State-Michigan State
Nebraska-Iowa
Ole Miss-Mississippi State
NC State-UNC
Virginia-Virginia Tech
Oklahoma-Oklahoma State

Not to mention...
Arkansas-Missouri
Indiana-Purdue
Illinois-Northwestern
Minnesota-Wisconsin
Arizona-Arizona State
Utah-Colorado
Tennessee-Vanderbilt

And other random P5 games.

How will the Sun Belt get any time slot on any TV network that weekend?

Move it to Thursday and you’ll get tons of views.

(09-15-2022 10:07 AM)Surbadger Wrote:  We should have our rivalry week 1 week before everyone else for TV reasons and to make it unique across FBS. Since there would be 7 teams per division, I would be fine with Marshall/Southern Miss being the odd game out each year.

Nah, I like it at the end of the year...it makes for a better dialogue. Sometimes it's the one thing standing in the way of a conference championship berth, maybe a NY6 game, or a perfect season. And even if your team is down, it's still that one game that you can win and put the feather in your cap as a high point...just ask Georgia Southern

(09-16-2022 03:56 PM)Fanof49ASU Wrote:  

(09-14-2022 06:45 PM)Michael in Raleigh Wrote:  That is probably the hardest weekend to get on TV. There are sooooo many TV friendly games in the P5 that weekend.

Ohio State-Michigan
Auburn-Alabama
Florida-FSU
Georgia-Georgia Tech
Clemson-South Carolina
LSU-A&M
Louisville-Kentucky
(Whichever two matchups are playing among USC/UCLA/Notre Dame/Stanford/Cal)
Oregon-Oregon State
Washington-Washington State
Penn State-Michigan State
Nebraska-Iowa
Ole Miss-Mississippi State
NC State-UNC
Virginia-Virginia Tech
Oklahoma-Oklahoma State

Not to mention...
Arkansas-Missouri
Indiana-Purdue
Illinois-Northwestern
Minnesota-Wisconsin
Arizona-Arizona State
Utah-Colorado
Tennessee-Vanderbilt

And other random P5 games.

How will the Sun Belt get any time slot on any TV network that weekend?

Move it to Thursday and you’ll get tons of views.

You want us to all play on Thanksgiving? Opposite the NFL?