10 schedule facts about the first week of the SEC season
Who doesn’t like some quick schedule facts?
They’re quick, easy and most importantly … they’ll make you sound really smart when you drop them into casual conversations.
A few weeks ago, we took a look at 50 interesting facts about the 2015 SEC schedule.
Today, we’ll narrow our focus to 10 interesting tidbits about Week 1 of the SEC schedule:
- The combined series record of the SEC in its Week 1 matchups is 34-49-5. All but three of those losses come from the South Carolina/North Carolina series.
- The Gamecocks and Mississippi State are responsible for 48 of the league’s 49 losses. To be fair, they are also the only teams to have played their Week 1 opponent more than three times.
- Just one of the 14 games on the Week 1 schedule would be classified as a true road game for the SEC (Mississippi State at Southern Miss). There are eight games in SEC stadiums, and five being played in what could be construed as neutral sites.
- Speaking of the five Week 1 neutral-site, each will be played at a different NFL team’s home venue (Texans, Cowboys, Panthers, Falcons, Titans).
- South Carolina, Auburn and Alabama are the only three SEC teams that will leave their home state for a Week 1 game.
- There are no conference games being played in Week 1 this year. There were two in 2014 (Texas A&M at South Carolina and Arkansas at Auburn).
- Kentucky (UL-Lafayette), Texas A&M (Arizona State), Tennessee (Bowling Green) and Ole Miss (UT-Martin) are squaring off with opponents that each program has previously never played.
- Though typically viewed as a tune-up week, only three of the SEC’s 13 scheduled meetings with FCS opponents will occur in Week 1 (Ole Miss vs. UT-Martin, LSU vs. McNeese State, Missouri vs. Southeast Missouri).
- The Texas A&M vs. Arizona State game will be the only meeting between the SEC and Pac-12 in the 2015 regular season.
- Three of the SEC’s 10 games against Conference USA will take place in Week 1. It is the conference that the league will play most frequently in 2015.