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Notre Dame Still Has Plenty Of Non-Pac 12 Options For 2020 .... For Now

The Pac 12's decision to go conference only in 2020 impacts the Notre Dame schedule

The Pac 12 has now joined the Big Ten in announcing it intends to play a conference-only schedule in 2020. That means Notre Dame’s schedule is now down to nine opponents.

Notre Dame’s October 10 home contest against Stanford is now gone, and the season-ending game against USC (November 28) is also gone.

This season will be the first time since 1945 that Notre Dame and USC have not met in football. That came during World War II, when the two schools did not play for three seasons. 

It will be the first time since 1996 that Notre Dame and Stanford haven’t met in football.

Notre Dame clearly will have work to do when it comes to filling out its schedule, but don’t expect big changes any time soon. The Irish must still wait on the ACC, SEC, American Athletic Conference, Mid-American Conference and other leagues to make decisions before knowing just who will remain on the schedule, and who will be available to schedule.

Should those leagues choose to continue playing non-conference games the Irish would then have nine games on the docket. At that point, the next decision will be how many games do each team play. Part of that will be the 10 commissioners and Notre Dame director of athletics Jack Swarbrick making a decision on how many games teams must play to quality for the College Football Playoff.

This was mentioned on Twitter by ESPN college football writer Heather Dinich, which you can read HERE.

Should Notre Dame need to schedule 12 games many of possibilities I discussed earlier in the week still stand. You can read the full article HERE.

Another part of this will be determined by the season actually starting on time. Should opening weekend change it would create a great deal more uncertainty, but for now we’ll work with the start date remaining the same.

Step one for Notre Dame would be moving Navy to October 10 in place of Stanford. Navy had an open date that weekend, so it would be an easy switch for the Midshipmen. Notre Dame’s bye week would then be the week of October 3. 

Step two would be adding a SEC, Big 12, AAC, ACC or Independent program to the schedule. The options are more plentiful than we discussed earlier in the week due to the Big Ten bowing out of playing out of conference opponents. If the SEC keeps itself open the Irish could schedule Alabama.

I would imagine the MAC would be more than willing to have a team travel to South Bend. That conference is in big trouble financially, and all of its programs would benefit from a Notre Dame pay day, even if it’s not as big as normal. Notre Dame already plays Western Michigan this season, so adding another is an option.

Step three would be scheduling BYU on November 28 to replace USC. The Cougars were supposed to play Stanford that weekend, but both teams now have open dates. As I’ve discussed in multiple articles this week, Notre Dame scheduling a road game against BYU makes a lot of sense this season.

All of this will change if other leagues follow suit and go conference only, but if any of them stand firm, work with other leagues that have similar or identical testing systems (which is supposedly what this is all about), then Notre Dame still stands in position to fill out its schedule.

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