2022 Schedule is released! No true bye week this season.
Schedule would be better if WMU and Ohio were swapped. It’s ridiculous that game gets played on a weekday.
Election Day game
And there’s that as well. That’s an odd oversight by the MAC. I hope it doesn’t result in having 6 games that Wednesday and most of them ending up on streaming instead of TV.
All in all, not a bad schedule with only three weeknight games instead of four
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I hate it. Only three Saturday home games and one of them is the FCS. Both “Rivalry games” - the Bricks and Redbird - are on weeknights in November. Here’s another year the plea to play the Bricks game on a Saturday afternoon in October has been ignored. I suppose this is the new era of MAC football and it appears to be clueless about what it takes to sustain interest.
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It blows that we haven’t gotten OU at home since 2018 and have to settle for a weeknight. That being said, we can draw decent and energetic crowds for MACtion if we have enough success and momentum before that point (see Ball State in 2016, OU in 2018). It’s imperative we have some early season success in OOC play because if we crap the bed like usual in the month between true home games we won’t have much incremental fan support late in the season.
Minor gripe that NIU is also a weeknight since there’s less of a chance I can get to that game, but with Northwestern early on I can’t complain. NU is vulnerable, we should take that P5 scalp.
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I know our AD has lobbied to get Miami vs Ohio on Oct Saturday but ESPN/MAC objects
I would rather play Ball State on the Fri/Sat- we always seem to get that home Tuesday but never the away Tuesday before Thanksgiving
Me too. Our home game with UC again is in PBS. Somehow I don’t think the price for season tickets will be lowered however. I didn’t go to Miami, but I do live in Oxford and love to watch sports; so your move, Sayler.
I think ESPN pretty much calls the shots according to our contract.
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Why does ESPN care? In the grand scheme of things, people watch MACtion because it’s the only football on. Whether or not it’s a rivalry isn’t really going to drive viewership imo
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I don’t think that is true, and ESPN does not believe that is true. They have ratings to support that.
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Agree. I can’t imagine anyone but Miami and Ohio fans give a rats ass who they’re watching play on TV on a cold, rainy Tuesday night.
By playing on Thanksgiving Tuesday, we have the opportunity to have extra prep time for the MAC championship game.
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Nescacdad and MooreHawk…Why do you think Akron got only one night game this year? Obviously ESPN does not want their games for national telecasts. If it made no difference, ESPN would not want the best teams for more appearances, plus rivalry games bring more fans and also more emotion which keep viewers watching. People are more likely to keep watching a WM-CM rivalry game with good teams than they are BG at Akron game where both teams are down. I think you are both completely wrong about this particular point. ESPN wants competitive games between good teams, and if they are rivals, that is even better.
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If you are correct, MACtion will eventually be a poison pill for MAC football. If all the meaningful rivalry games between the better teams become mid-week, ESPN-dictated bad weather games at mostly rural campuses, the tradition of showing up in great numbers on our campuses for meaningful rivalry games - on nice Saturday afternoons - will be lost in history. The only attraction possible would be to host a name team every season as one of our three home weekend games. And that seems unlikely because of the need to play two buy road games every season and a home FCS team. Gathering collectively in Oxford to play Ohio on a Saturday afternoon appears to be lost in time. That makes me quite unhappy.
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Because they were 2-10? I don’t dispute that ESPN wants to put the better teams on TV. But I think if you had for example: 7-3 WMU vs 6-4 UB or 7-3 Miami vs 6-4 Ohio, that ratings just wouldn’t be very different.
No rivalry in the MAC has national significance that people would tune in to see specifically and it’s not the rivalries produce an big boost in attendance that makes the atmosphere for TV better.
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While I agree that it seems unlikely to make a big difference in tv numbers ESPN obviously feels differently. I can tell you that Miami has asked the MaC to protect the Miami vs Ohio game for the 3rd week in October and the MAC cant deliver because of ESPN.
ESPN–talk about love/hate. Love 'em when we’re playing at Buffalo on a Wednesday night and we have a good season going. Get to watch the game from the toasty family room—not too bad.
Hate 'em when you’re a season ticket holder (me!) and they play on a cold Tuesday night in November if you go to the game you get home at 1:30 am. That instead of a warm October Saturday and fun tailgate and friends and family.
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We should also love them for the money they give us.
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