June 26, 2011
="" alt="Knight Head" border="0" class="imported"> Read the Knights Insider | ="" alt="Twitter Logo" border="0" class="imported">Follow us on Twitter | ="" alt="Facebook Logo" border="0" class="imported">Get social with the Knights on Facebook
By Marc Daniels
UCFAthletics.com
ORLANDO, Fla. (UCFAthletics.com) - The art of scheduling in college football is a special skill. Coaches deal with non-conference games, television contracts and a desire to build a schedule that allows their team to win as many games possible.
George O'Leary has been able to secure another season where his non-conference slate will be played the first four games of the schedule. O'Leary believes his team benefited from being able to focus on the conference slate for eight straight games and hopes for a similar formula in 2011.
In analyzing UCF's schedule there is a very interesting item to note. Take a look at who UCF's opponents play the week before they face the Knights and there is a trend. A trend that shows tough matchups featuring rivals, tough conference opponents or games against teams that could make-or-break a season.
UCF's second game of the season is against Boston College. BC opens the season the week before against Northwestern at home. Northwestern returns the bulk of a bowl team and features a senior quarterback.
Before UCF faces FIU, the Golden Panthers will play at Louisville for a Friday night nationally-televised game.
UCF's final non-conference game of the season is a Friday night ESPN game at BYU. The Cougars, now an independent after their run in the Mountain West, return everyone on offense and are poised to better a 7-6 record. Before the Knights arrive for the Sept. 23 game, the Cougars will play at Mississippi and at Texas before playing their biggest rival, Utah, the week before UCF.
The BYU-Utah game will be the 87th meeting between the two and the rivalry is intense. Of the last 14 meetings, 12 have been decided by a touchdown or less.
UCF opens Conference USA play against Marshall. Before facing the Knights, the Herd will play back-to-back games at home against Virginia Tech, who should be highly ranked for that game, and then Marshall plays at Louisville.
SMU has a bye before UCF heads to Dallas. The Mustangs do play at TCU in their game before that bye.
The following week UCF plays at UAB. While the Knights face SMU, UAB plays a tough road game at Tulsa.
Memphis continues to rebuild and the Tigers will come to UCF for the second of back-to-back road games which has them at Tulane for the first half.
UCF will face Tulsa on a short week on a Thursday night, in what might become one of the league's best games of the year. Before coming to Orlando, Tulsa will face SMU in what looks to be a key game in the battle for the C-USA West Division title.
When UCF travels to Southern Miss, they will face a Golden Eagles team that is coming off back-to-back conference road games at UTEP and at East Carolina. That means Southern Miss will fly a lot of miles over the course of two weeks before the UCF game.
The 11th game of the season sends UCF to Greenville to face East Carolina. The Pirates make the long trip to El Paso to face UTEP the week before.
The regular season ends with a Thanksgiving weekend game on Friday against UTEP. The Miners make the long trip to central Florida after tough home games against East Carolina and Tulsa.
Facing a team coming off a tough game does not guarantee anything but you never know. The Knights face only one team, SMU, who is coming off a bye and the majority of opponents have a tough game or games before facing UCF.
Knights notes and more: BCS Executive Director Bill Hancock will go before a congressional committee this week to answer questions about the validity of the BCS. A bunch of part-time college football fans sitting behind a big table with a microphone, known as your political leaders, will ask a lot of questions and Hancock will answer them. Some of his answers will make sense, others will be very vague. When the hearing is over some college football media types will make a big deal and then nothing will happen...Kentucky's John Calipari said the only way to either pay or at least provide full-cost scholarships to student-athletes is for the "haves and have nots" to split and have four conference with 16-18 teams. Calipari says then you can have a playoff in football and then have all 72 teams in basketball make the tournament. Don't laugh. His idea is not that crazy, as long as UCF is among the list of "haves."...Final thought: Did the guy who invented brick roads test drive a car on those roads or was the horse and buggy all he needed?