'You have to schedule strategically.' Why Indiana football cancels series vs Power 4 opponents

Indianapolis Star

5 days ago

BLOOMINGTON — Indiana football's future nonconference schedules took shape in recent weeks.
The Hoosiers canceled a home-and-home series against the University of Virginia for 2027 and 2028 while adding games against Kennesaw State (2027), Austin Peay (2028) and Eastern Illinois (2029). They still have openings to fill in 2026 and 2028, but as of now won't face a non-conference Power Four-caliber opponent until it heads to South Bend to play Notre Dame, an independent, in 2030.
Indiana athletic director Scott Dolson described the strategy as the best way to position the football team as a postseason contender in the years to come while factoring in the discussions over future format of the College Football Playoff.
'You can't afford a bad scheduling year,' Dolson said in an interview with The Herald-Times. 'You have to schedule strategically.'
Indiana's recent decisions align with the scheduling moves they made before Dolson hired coach Curt Cignetti. The Hoosiers started having discussions about canceling the final two games of a three-game series against Louisville for 2023-25 before the first game was played.
Louisville beat IU at Lucas Oil Stadium, 21-14, in 2023, but the home-and-home series that was on the books after that was scrapped. The Hoosiers added Western Illinois to their 2024 schedule and Kennesaw State in 2025.
'We want our nonconference schedule to put us in the best position for success at the end of the season,' Dolson said. 'What we really want to do is make sure we are competitive in the back half of the season and create meaningful games in the Big Ten because we are really playing for postseason opportunities."
Indiana's canceled series against Louisville and Virginia were scheduled at a time when the Big Ten was requiring member schools to face at least one nonconference Power Five opponent. The conference reversed course before adding four members from the Pac-12 to the league.
'If a game sticks out and doesn't fit what we are trying to do, we say let's try to get on that now, and be paying attention to that,' Dolson said. 'We don't just say well, we signed up for that, it's just going to be a tough year.'
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The Big Ten's shift in 2017 to a nine-game conference schedule factored heavily into IU's thinking as well. The SEC and ACC haven't followed suit and only play eight conference opponents each year.
It's a point that Cignetti brought up when addressing the criticism his team faced last year for having the second lowest strength of schedule among non-automatic qualifiers (ranked No. 35) in the College Football Playoff.
'When we entered last year our schedule looked pretty formidable,' Cignetti said in an interview with The Herald-Times in May. 'We played the two teams that played for the national championship and we had eight or nine teams that had been to bowl games the previous year. I think when you look at this year's schedule, the Big Ten part of it at least, it's a nice formidable schedule and we play nine conference games. There's a lot of value to that.'
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Dolson's team also analyzed national trends, and didn't see IU's nonconference scheduling strategy as an outlier.
That's true in the Big Ten for 2025 when the Hoosiers are one of five teams who won't play a Power Four opponent in nonconference, but they are the only team in the league without a Power Four opponent through 2029.
There are teams in the Big Ten with as many as seven openings on their schedule over the next five seasons, and could end up going multiple years without playing a nonconference Power Four opponent during that stretch.
Indiana's schedule isn't necessarily set in stone either.
"I think everything is on the table in the future, everything on the table,' Dolson said. 'I would say we are on a month-to-month basis. We look at the football schedule a lot, we have to stay nimble.'
The future of the College Football Playoff is driving the scheduling discussions teams are having. The format for the CFP in 2026 and beyond remains up for debate with conferences haggling over how many teams will make the field and what the format will be.
Much of the focus has been on a 4-4-2-2-1 model that would grant the Big Ten and SEC four automatic qualifiers and a 5+11 format that would include automatic bids for the five conference champions and 11 at-large selections.
'We hear different scenarios that are being played out in the media, or in our Big Ten AD room,' Dolson said. 'I bring those strategies back home and look at them with our team. How does our schedule fit with those?"
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Indiana will adjust its scheduling strategy accordingly once a final decision is made on the CFP's future. Cignetti will be involved in those discussions as they regularly sit down to discuss key issues impacting the program.
'If you are in a situation with automatic qualifiers and they are based only on your conference wins, that changes your nonconference tolerance," Dolson said. "You are willing to add more challenging nonconference games because it doesn't hurt your postseason chances.'
Under the current format, Dolson sees winning as the most important metric of all. That view is informed by his recent experience on the Division I Baseball Selection Committee that he was added to ahead of the 2024 season.
'I know it's different, but I know from sitting in those committees, no matter what you have to win,' Dolson said. 'Winning matters, but as things are tweaked we have to understand what goes into the process and put ourselves in the best position to succeed."