Colin Cowherd has a bone to pick with the integrity of Alabama’s football schedule this year. For some reason he also accused Arkansas of loading its schedule.
The Fox Sports Radio personality is wrong on both counts, and Arkansas shouldn’t have even been included in the conversation.
In case you missed it (and since Cowherd’s show is hardly relevant now that it isn’t on ESPN Radio, you probably did), he went on a rant about how Alabama doesn’t schedule quality conference opponents, and then stacks its creampuffs the week before big games after bye weeks. This is where the argument ends, and I haven’t even addressed the Hogs’ part of this. Alabama opens with USC, a top-25 team with a storied tradition, in a neutral-site game at AT&T Stadium in Dallas. That is a quality opponent, and was probably even saltier than it is now when scheduled.
Cowherd doesn’t like the Crimson Tide playing Western Kentucky the week before Ole Miss (Sept. 17) or Chattanooga the week before Auburn (Nov. 26). The SEC sets the conference schedule, not Bama. I don’t know any AD in the country that would play a big-time game the week before the conference opener, let alone a conference opener which happens to be a top-10 team. Everyone plays mid-major programs. Everyone and every coach who opened their conference slate in September would do this.
Same goes for the Chattanooga game. The Crimson Tide needs to play another nonconference game to fill the schedule, and it’s not going to be from a Power 5 Conference. It’s just not and no one blames them.
Cowherd places too big of a value on playing a creampuff the week before a big game. Does it really give a team that big of an advantage? Starters can be rested, sure, but injuries can still happen in those games, too. It’s not a huge advantage unless maybe the opponent is playing a ranked team that week and has to come back the next week for another big game. However, that doesn’t happen often.
No matter who Alabama plays in its nonconference, it will be tested in the conference slate playing in the SEC West where several top-25 teams await. It is the toughest division in college football, and it isn’t even close. Even if the West teams played four creampuff nonconference games, which they don’t, the conference slate is enough to keep those schools on the list of the tougher schedules in the country.
Now, on to Arkansas. Did Cowherd just glance down at his Lindy’s Sports SEC preview magazine and pick on the Hogs because they follow Alabama in alphabetical order. I have never heard of Arkansas being accused of softening the schedule. Consistently in the past, their schedules rank among the toughest in the nation. They have played solid nonconference opponents such as Texas, Texas A&M (before they joined the SEC), and Texas Tech and had Michigan on the schedule before the Wolverines ditched the series.
This year’s schedule begins with a home game against Louisiana Tech and a roadie in Fort Worth, Texas against top-10 TCU. Tech may not be what it was last year, but it isn't Akron either. Alcorn State? I will give him that. That game shouldn’t be on the schedule (or at War Memorial Stadium, but that will be a topic for late September). But I give Jeff Long, and Frank Broyles before him, the benefit of the doubt since most years those really poor teams aren’t included. When you look around the West, you see LSU playing a marquee game against Wisconsin at Lambeau Field, Auburn playing Clemson, Texas A&M playing UCLA, Mississippi State playing at BYU and Ole Miss playing at Florida State. Hmm.
And ditto for Arkansas on the SEC slate. Tough, tough, tough. Let’s see Iowa, Nebraska, Ohio State, Oklahoma, Oregon and others play in the SEC West. Most of these West schools if placed in other leagues could win eight games at least. Picking on their schedules when other teams play lesser conference schedules is stupid.
If you want to rail on Saban, criticize him for being a jerk with the media and hypocritical when it comes to how he disciplines players. Those are valid flaws. His team’s schedule isn't. And to include Arkansas or any other SEC West team is also nonsense.