UW football: FCS foe Cal Poly rounds out 2008 schedule
The University of Wisconsin football team has scheduled Football Championship Subdivision foe Cal Poly as its 12th opponent for 2008, athletic director Barry Alvarez confirmed Friday.
The game will be played Nov. 22 at Camp Randall Stadium, marking the close of the regular season. The agreement was first reported in today's San Luis Obispo Tribune. For the story, click here.
The Badgers, who have a bye from Big Ten Conference play on that date while the other 10 teams square off, gain a lucrative seventh home game. They were able to do so without sacrificing a Sept. 20 open date that precedes a challenging start to the Big Ten slate that Alvarez dubbed a "murderer's row."
It kicks off with a Sept. 27 game at Michigan in coach Rich Rodriguez's conference debut, followed by home dates with Ohio State, which has played in consecutive Bowl Championship Series title games, and Penn State, which handed UW one of its three league league losses last season, a 38-7 drubbing in Happy Valley.
Wisconsin originally had a game slated against perennial powerhouse Virginia Tech on Sept. 20. But when Bret Bielema took over from Alvarez as coach prior to the 2006 season, he asked that the agreement be nixed because the "brutal" early league slate figures to take a physical toll on the players, if not the Badgers' record.
So, while the shift over time from Virginia Tech to unheralded Cal Poly may not be pleasing to season ticket-holders, Alvarez had no reservations defending the decision, even though he prefers BCS foes as well.
"It's hard to find someone to come in here the last game of the season," said Alvarez, who noted that other BCS conferences have games scheduled on that date.
"We were fortunate to get someone. I hope they understand we're very limited" in our options, he added.
UW ticket-holders have reacted negatively in recent years to scheduling opponents from the NCAA's lower division, notably an appearance by the fledgling Buffalo program in 2006.
That stigma may linger despite the events of last season, when two-time FCS champion Appalachian State stunned Michigan in Ann Arbor to open the season and The Citadel put a scare into the Badgers in Madison, forging a halftime tie before fading in a 45-31 Wisconsin win.
Alvarez reiterated a theme he has expressed often in recent years: It has become increasingly difficult for teams from BCS conferences to schedule nonconference opponents since the advent of the 12-game regular season.
Because there is a limited supply of teams willing to travel to places such as Camp Randall, they have been able to demand more for appearance fees.
Buffalo, for instance, received $600,000 from UW to play in Madison. Iowa paid Montana, an FCS school, $650,000 for a game that same year, the New York Times reported.
"It's so hard to find nonconference opponents, especially when you've got people trying to hold you up. They're asking astronomical numbers" for guaranteed paydays, Alvarez said. "And I'd like to play them here if we can."
Alvarez declined to address the payday for Cal Poly because he was not completely sure of the exact dollar figure, but said it was "reasonable."
Cal Poly, which is located in San Luis Obispo, Calif., -- 95 miles north of Santa Barbara on the Pacific coast -- has not played a BCS opponent since it elevated its program to Division I-AA status in 1994. The Mustangs, who went 7-4 last season, compete in the Great West Conference in the Football Championship Subdivision.
Cal Poly is 2-5 against Bowl Subdivision opponents under coach Rich Ellerson, most recently losing to Idaho 20-13 last season. The Mustangs defeated San Diego State 16-14 in 2006, the same year the Badgers downed the Aztecs 14-0.
Cal Poly loses just one starter off an offense that finished second in the nation in total offense (behind Appalachian State), surpassed the 500-yard mark in total offense four times, shattered the school record for most points scored in one season and scored 30 or more points seven times last year. Click here for a season prospectus.
"It will be an adventure," Ellerson, who is 48-31 in seven seasons Cal Poly, said in a statement.
"The danger here is that, if we're looking at a playoff berth, we could put ourselves in physical danger, but it will feel a bit like a bowl game. We will get to test ourselves and find out how difficult it is to play those teams at that level."
The game against Cal Poly firms up the Badgers' 2008 schedule, as talks about moving a game at Iowa to after Thanksgiving are dead.
"We didn't move forward on that," Alvarez said.
In December -- soon after Big Ten presidents voted to allow conference games to be played after the holiday -- Alvarez disclosed that coach Bret Bielema had opened conversations with Iowa coach Kirk Ferentz about moving their game in Iowa City to Nov. 29, from its current date of Oct. 18.
However, a source in the Iowa athletic department told The Capital Times that such a move would have been problematic for the Hawkeyes on three fronts.
First, as the schedule stands now, Iowa will face a presumably tired UW team after the aforementioned tough stretch. That's a competitive advantage that seemed foolish to surrender.
Also, the change would have created a two-week dead period for the Hawkeyes in the middle of the season, because they already have a bye scheduled for Oct. 25.
Last, the University of Iowa closes campus the week of Thanksgiving. Not only would that cause logistical headaches for the football team, but it would deplete their peer fan base; traditionally, many students head home the weekend prior to the holiday to take advantage of the extended break.
However, the notion of creating a conference-wide bye during the heart of the Big Ten season in future season is on the front burner, Alvarez said, noting that league representatives will discuss the issue this week.
One possible course of action is pushing back the final 3-5 weeks of the regular season in entirety, creating a midseason gap in the schedule.
However, the teams that already have nonconference games scheduled during their league byes in that time frame are reluctant to make that move, fearing that they will find rescheduling those games as difficult as the Badgers found the task this season before lining up Cal Poly.
2008 UW FOOTBALL SCHEDULE
August 30 -- AKRON (Hall of Fame Day)
Sept. 6 -- MARSHALL (Alumni Band Day)
Sept. 13 -- at Fresno State
Sept. 20 -- open date
Sept. 27 -- at Michigan
Oct. 4 -- OHIO STATE
Oct. 11 -- PENN STATE (Badger Blast)
Oct. 18 -- at Iowa
Oct. 25 -- ILLINOIS (Homecoming)
Nov. 1 -- at Michigan State
Nov. 8 -- at Indiana
Nov. 15 -- MINNESOTA (Parents' Day/National W Club Day)
Nov. 22 -- CAL POLY
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