Many college football teams annually save their rivalry games for last—The Game, the Iron Bowl, Bedlam, and the Apple Cup, just to name a few. There are exceptions, but conferences often put the most heated rivalries last in the regular season schedule.
In years past, successful teams had several weeks to recover from the emotional toll of that final rivalry and prepare for a bowl game. In today’s college football landscape, those rivalry games are sometimes only the beginning. Ohio State survived a challenge from archrival Michigan at the Horseshoe last season and immediately had to start preparing for a conference title game match-up against Wisconsin in Indianapolis.
And with the College Football Playoff, there are still two more postseason games for which the top teams must prepare. Even with just four teams in the playoff, the final three or four games of a top team’s schedule can be a grueling grind. Along the title run, the Buckeyes had to go through the three Heisman Trophy finalists and needed to beat the winner of that trophy in the title game.
SEC teams have long been savvy enough to prepare for the college football season endgame by heading to the kitchen to bake a cupcake the week before the final weekend of the regular season. The week before this year’s Iron Bowl, Alabama will host Charleston Southern (quick show of hands, how many of you knew they were known as the Buccaneers?), while Auburn will host Idaho. The Florida Gators will prep for Florida State by hosting Florida Atlantic the weekend before. Our own Ramzy refers to this annual SEC tradition as “Chickenshit Saturday.”
That’s not to say Ohio State always plays the toughest opponent the week before The Game, but at least they’ve kept it in the conference. The Buckeyes hosted Indiana in 2013 and 2014 the week before the annual showdown with Michigan.
But there have been more difficult weekends before Michigan, such as a trip to Madison to play the Badgers in 2012. In 2011, Ohio State hosted No. 17 Penn State the week before the trip to Ann Arbor. In 2009 and 2010, the Buckeyes squared off against nationally ranked Iowa teams the week before the big season-ending rivalry.
So it’s not a complete surprise to see a team like Michigan State pop up on the 2015 schedule just seven days before the Michigan game. Sparty is expected to be Ohio State’s main challenger for the Big Ten East title in 2015 and both teams could be undefeated heading into that Nov. 21 showdown in the Shoe. Should the Buckeyes survive, they must pick themselves up, dust themselves off, and prepare for a trip to Ann Arbor—a town, and potentially a team, rejuvenated by the hiring of favorite son Jim Harbaugh as head coach.
In order to repeat as national champions, the Buckeyes will have to run a gauntlet that includes Michigan State, rival Michigan, a conference championship opponent and two other final four teams. That could arguably be the toughest five-game run of games in school history.
What about the other contenders? Well, Michigan State is in a similar boat. The Spartans host Penn State the weekend after their trip to Columbus. We’ve already established that Alabama and Auburn have incredibly easy pre-rival opponents.
If Oregon gets in, the Ducks will earn it too. USC and the Civil War rivalry game against Oregon State would precede the Pac 12 championship, although Oregon does get both those teams at home in Eugene's Autzen Stadium. Likewise, USC’s stretch run goes through Eugene and then there's the annual showdown with UCLA.
TCU is highly ranked. How do they stack up schedule-wise down the stretch? Pretty well, actually. The Battle Toads go to Oklahoma Nov. 21 and host rival Baylor on Nov. 27. Baylor hosts Texas the week after traveling to TCU. Since the Big XII doesn’t have a title game, you also have to include the previous week's (to the Baylor-TCU clash) regular season game, which puts Baylor at Oklahoma State and TCU at home against Kansas.
We’ve already talked about Alabama and Auburn, with Chickenshit Saturday preceding the Iron Bowl. Florida State does the same thing. The Seminoles will host Chattanooga on Nov. 21 before the season finale against Florida, which at least is on the road this year. The Georgia Bulldogs will spend Chickenshit Saturday facing Georgia Southern, as a tune-up for Georgia Tech on Nov. 28.
Notre Dame? They aren’t technically in any conference (#goacc), but the Irish finish the regular season with Wake Forest, Boston College and Stanford, with the latter two contests being on the road. Clemson gets Wake Forest at home Nov. 21 before the Tigers travel to South Carolina for their season-ending rivalry game.
Based on all of the above, the road through the final five games would probably be toughest for Ohio State, USC, Michigan State, Oregon, and, If Texas has a good season, you can throw Baylor into the mix.
Any of those teams would more than earn their title if they end up on top at season's end.
