Recently on the FishDuck Forum there was a thread started by iubhounds titled “Having To Fly East For Games”. In the thread, I poked the bear and said, in effect, “there’s no evidence that travel and unbalanced schedules with random bye weeks impact the results of the games. OBD wins regardless of travel.” Jon Joseph wrote an outstanding reply that ...

Is ‘Flexible Symmetry’ the Answer to Big-10 Scheduling?

Love this article and thanks for the velvet hammer. My great reply did not get a pass from you, Professor. I get it; been there and velvet-hammered before. For the most part, all hammering was well deserved.

Chancing a deserved critique, might I suggest the following B1G add-ons, with the understanding that the next media deal will see B1G teams keeping the majority of money they earn in the postseason, and media revenue will be shared by eyes on the prize; how many people are watching you play ball.

Cal, Stanford, CU, Utah, UNC, and Duke. (Notre Dame, if amenable, would take the place of one of these six teams. If ND agreed to go B1G, perhaps add UVA with ND.)

Three eight-team divisions. Twenty-four-team playoff. Flex schedule the last two weeks of the regular season for playoff play-in games.

Seven division games. Four cross-over games. One OOC game.

PS - Two trips to the Eastern time zone in November of 2026 is cruel and unusual, but usual for OBD.

I love what Mike Whitty is proposing, as sometimes you try things, (like removing divisions) and then realize things were better the way they used to be. His proposed movement of teams every two years is quite interesting as well.

And WHO would be the final two teams added to the Big-10? Great stuff...

Predictably, Jon Joseph presents some enticing arguments that provoked my mind to consider different directions for reply.  That’s a good thing.  It is exactly what I hoped for while writing the article, and more.

Jon does not really ATFQ of which two schools the B1G should consider for expansion because he gives us six!  And not two divisions, but three.

I struggle to understand how three divisions with four cross-over games can ever be symmetrical.  Of necessity, there is no way the teams will be playing comparable opponents in the cross-over games. 

The Socratic question to you, Jon, is: “How is that symmetrical?”  Hence, is it fair?

I have considered the flex schedule at the end of the regular season before, but Jon gave me a new twist that I will address in the next article.  Hint, maybe there is a way for the B1G to achieve symmetry with only 18 teams and not expand.  Thanks for that.

Notre Dame is an obvious candidate for expansion.  Charles and I have discussed this possibility and he believes that the Irish broadcasting deal with CBS will keep them independent.  More to discuss there.

If expansion and a new alignment means only 2 schools are to be taken (without ND being a possibility) I say Stanford and Cal. This seems like a no-brainer to me. They are among THE finest private and public, respectively, schools in this land. I believe that their fan support will skyrocket with membership in the Big-10 after their few years of purgatory traveling to Clemson, SC. Gross.

If ND is in the mix? ND and Stanford.

Go thoughts, Feather. I miss playing Cal and Stanford. I wonder whether the experience that schools in the B1G before bringing in OBD, fuskies, UCLA and USC are having with the expanded conference as is would cause them to object to two more from the west coast.