20-game conference schedule is considered
Pac-12 football teams believe they’re at a disadvantage in establishing playoff credentials by playing more conference games than most Power-5 conferences. Men’s basketball, on the other hand, might need to play more conference games to keep pace with other leagues.
The conference reportedly is considering moving to a 20game conference schedule, up from the current 18, according to the Mercury News.
It quoted Arizona head coach Sean Miller as saying, “It’s the way the sport is going. We don’t want to be the conference that needs a couple of years to catch up.”
A Pac-12 spokesman said there is no current plan to lengthen the conference schedules for either the men’s or women’s teams, but “we are constantly evaluating potential strategic initiatives and our conference schedules are an important one of these.”
The Big Ten is going to a 20-game conference schedule next season, the ACC the following year.
If Pac-12 athletic directors follow suit, the change probably wouldn’t take effect until the 2019-20 season. Each team would add one home conference game and one road game in the middle of December, while reducing its nonconference games by two.
For Cal and Stanford, that would mean booking two fewer games against teams from the Big West, Big Sky, WAC and Summit conferences. Pac-12 teams typically pay those teams to come to their arenas. If the change is approved, each conference school would save some of that money but would have to pay the travel costs of an additional road trip to play a Pac-12 school.
Cal and Stanford each struggled to a 6-7 record in nonconference play this season. The Bears lost at home to UC Riverside, then-unranked St. Mary’s, Central Arkansas and Portland State. Stanford lost at home to Eastern Washington and thenNo. 9 North Carolina.
Getting an additional Pac-12 home game, for most teams, would boost attendance. The proposed change, however, also would increase the need to schedule beatable nonconference opponents while maintaining strength of schedule for the NCAA Tournament selection committee.