CFB insider explains how ACC, Big Ten, Pac-12 alliance could affect SEC scheduling

With the SEC adding Oklahoma and Texas in the near future, other conferences around the country are beginning to join together in an alliance of sorts.

The Pac-12, ACC, and Big Ten are reported to be forming an alliance after the news of the realignment broke.

Dan Wetzel of Yahoo Sports joined “McElroy and Cubelic in the Morning” on WJOX out of Birmingham, Alabama to talk about what this means for the SEC scheduling in the future.

.@DanWetzel of @YahooSports joined @macandcube to discuss his article on a Pac-12/ACC/Big Ten “alliance” and break down some of the potential scheduling details (including how it could affect the SEC). pic.twitter.com/EZLtGpqKUd

— WJOX 94.5 FM (@WJOX945) August 24, 2021

“Hopefully not right?” Wetzel said. “Because this is the part that we like about college sports. It doesn’t have anything to do with Florida or Florida State, you wanna see them play football. That would be unfortunate. The discussions they are having, and whether they enact them or what they come up with is, let’s take the Big Ten. They would drop a league game, they currently play 9, they would go to 8 league games, but they then would have to play a Pac-12 or an ACC team each year. So essentially, you’re dropping a league game and adding 2 or this alliance game. ”

This could be trouble for rivalry games with other conferences like the SEC. Wetzel said the conferences would focus on preserving the rivalry games.

“Now those four schools: Louisville plays Kentucky, Tech plays Georgia, Clemson gets to play South Carolina, Florida State plays Florida,” said Wetzel. “They wanna keep those games. That’s gonna be a big issue. Do they still have play two more games as well?”

This could also add to the number of Power 5 games each year. For example, the ACC only plays 8 power five conference games each season.

“Now you’re up to 11 Power 5 games a year,” said Wetzel. “The SEC could only go to 10 league games. Then where do you go with that? There’s things like, USC and Stanford already play Norte Dame every year. That could count as their ACC game, and they only had a Big Ten game. It’s a general way to create more big television games, strengthen all the different conferences, and at the same time other than those big rivalry games, there’s not gonna be a lot for SEC teams to go out and say I wanna go play you guys. If you’re a mid-level program like Michigan State and Iowa, which isn’t a big non-conference game to get. They’re like, ‘Man we’re full. We’re playing 10 games, I’ve gotta get some wins here. Do we still wanna play an in-state Mid-American Conference team or something like that? You would be able to freeze the SEC out on a lot of marquee games. That would be the question on how you could maybe limit the SEC in a bit.”

Grant Bricker

Grant Bricker was a former freelancer for The News TN in his hometown of Nashville, Tennessee. He now freelances for Saturday Football. Follow on Twitter @GrantBricker.