Urban Meyer thinks two schools need to be called out for one thing they are doing this college football season.
The former Ohio State coach said on his “Urban’s Take with Tim May” podcast that the NCAA should mandate non-conference scheduling, citing the weak slates scheduled by Georgia and Michigan as evidence.
“Real quick: I just also think the NCAA should mandate scheduling,” Meyer said, via Paul Harvey of Saturday Down South. “When I see the Wolverines and Georgia’s preseason schedule, I just think with this 12-team Playoff, if I’m the head coach at Ohio State, I could care less about my preseason schedule, the non-league schedule.
“Your object is to get in the Playoff. I just worry — Why would Ohio State play Notre Dame anymore? Why not play a MAC conference schedule to keep everybody healthy and get to ripping and roaring into a season? I think there are some shortcomings. Just for the good of the game, I hope. You should play a top-25 — I think you should play a premier school, a middle school and then you can play a smaller school. But I think that should be some kind of mandate.”
Complaints about power teams scheduling weak non-conference schedules are nothing new, and coaches have been defending against it for years. Meyer is fundamentally right that there is not much reason for teams with tough league schedules to challenge themselves outside of it, since they are rarely punished for it.
Michigan, for what it’s worth, will have one handicap in non-league play this season, though it probably won’t make much of a difference.
