Of all the talk about weak out of conference schedules and their impact on the college football playoff, is it fair to consider ND basically has 4 "out of conference" games each season?
ND will always play USC and Navy and Kelly has been pretty adamant about maintaining Stanford on the schedule and it seems Stanford would like to see the series continue as well. It appears to be scheduled definitively through 2019. Those 3 games, plus the 5 ACC games basically makes an 8 game conference schedule.
The out of conference opponents are:
2015- 1 ACC game due to a scheduling quirk that saw them play only 4 in 2014. UMass, Temple, Texas. Not exactly a murderer's row
2016- Texas, Nevada, Mich St, Army. 2 excellent games, 2 probable walk overs
2017- Temple, Georgia, Miami OH, MIch St. Again, 2 excellent games, 2 probable walk overs
2 of the next 3 years ND has scheduled 2 top flight games "out of conference". It's virtually unheard of for most major powers to have more than 1 top flight OOC opponent. If the ACC trends upward, ND will consistently have a top 10 schedule. I don't understand why this isn't a more common retort from ND regarding their scheduling. They are basically as locked into 8 games a year as virtually every other Power 5 team outside of the Big 12 who play 9 in conference.
ND will always play USC and Navy and Kelly has been pretty adamant about maintaining Stanford on the schedule and it seems Stanford would like to see the series continue as well. It appears to be scheduled definitively through 2019. Those 3 games, plus the 5 ACC games basically makes an 8 game conference schedule.
The out of conference opponents are:
2015- 1 ACC game due to a scheduling quirk that saw them play only 4 in 2014. UMass, Temple, Texas. Not exactly a murderer's row
2016- Texas, Nevada, Mich St, Army. 2 excellent games, 2 probable walk overs
2017- Temple, Georgia, Miami OH, MIch St. Again, 2 excellent games, 2 probable walk overs
2 of the next 3 years ND has scheduled 2 top flight games "out of conference". It's virtually unheard of for most major powers to have more than 1 top flight OOC opponent. If the ACC trends upward, ND will consistently have a top 10 schedule. I don't understand why this isn't a more common retort from ND regarding their scheduling. They are basically as locked into 8 games a year as virtually every other Power 5 team outside of the Big 12 who play 9 in conference.
