Steve1981
Heisman
Posts: 5,440
Joined: Nov 2010
Reputation: 269
I Root For: UMass
Location: North Quabbin Region
|
RE: !!! Official Schedule Change Thread !!!
(09-14-2017 02:07 PM)chess Wrote: (09-14-2017 11:37 AM)robertfoshizzle Wrote: http://www.umassathletics.com/news/2017/...dules.aspx
Looks like the UMass game at USF will be rescheduled in 2022 or 2023 and UMass will pick up a game on December 2 against FIU, which had to cancel its game at Indiana.
Wow! It will be like a puzzle to put the schedules together.
A lot of co-operation and saw this article from the UConn perspecitve and beat writer Mike Anthony.
Quote:After about a week of conversation that required the cooperation of more than a half-dozen athletic departments and football programs, the American Athletic Conference on Thursday announced football scheduling changes that restore a high-profile conference game at Rentschler Field.
UConn-South Florida is back on.
The Huskies and Bulls will play Nov. 4 in East Hartford. The game was originally scheduled for Sept. 9 but called off because of Hurricane Irma and USF's preference not to travel.
UConn will play Saturday at Virginia, as originally scheduled. But instead of a bye week that was to follow, the Huskies will play East Carolina Sept. 24, a Sunday, at Rentschler Field. (Rentschler is booked with an MLS game Sept. 23.)
These are two results of an incredibly complicated endeavor, one that required changes to numerous schedules, as well as plans for preparation and travel, even the tearing up and re-drawing of new game contracts. Five AAC teams and two others — UMass and Florida International — ultimately agreed to conditions that will allow for the USF-UConn game to take place.
"It's amazing what can be accomplished when you work together as a team, and this is certainly a fantastic outcome to what was a difficult situation," UConn athletic director David Benedict said during a teleconference. "I never lost hope. I never lost my optimism throughout the process. But I will tell you there were a lot of different scenarios they went through. I couldn't tell you whether this was the fifth, sixth or seventh scenario, but they worked it. I hand it to the conference. They could have shelved it. They could have said, 'We tried a lot of different ways and it hasn't worked.' To go to the extent they have really says a lot."
About $650,000 in gross revenue was on the line in an attempt to reschedule the game, Benedict said. UConn is insured for the loss of a game. Still, playing was important from standpoints financial and otherwise — and rescheduling required many university presidents, athletic directors and coaches who were not impacted by the hurricane last week to agree and make sacrifices.
UMass, for instance, agreed to replace an Oct. 14 game at South Florida with a Dec. 2 game at FIU (agreed upon, but no contract as of Thursday afternoon), and the Minutemen will now have consecutive bye weeks, with no games between Sept. 30 vs. Ohio and Oct. 21 vs. Georgia Southern.
"I would like to thank our presidents, athletic directors and our head football coaches for their outstanding collaboration and cooperation to resolve this unprecedented situation in as fair a manner as possible," AAC commissioner Mike Aresco said in a statement. "I would also like to acknowledge and thank [athletic director] Ryan Bamford of UMass for his cooperation and understanding. This was not an easy process, but we feel that this revised schedule is a significant step toward giving us the best opportunity to decide our champion on the field."
As an independent, the Minutemen have developed a strong relationship with the AAC, which assigns their game officials.
"When they called and said we're in a bit of a pinch with all this Hurricane Irma stuff, I said, 'Let us know how we can help,'" said Bamford, whose main interests were replacing UMass' USF game this season, and making sure the canceled USF game could be played in 2022 or 2023, which it will. "These things happen. You can't predict the devastation from Irma. The last thing I thought, probably, is that it would affect us. But in college athletics, you never say never. It's a chance to help and it didn't impact us a ton, [not] as much as it has some members of the AAC. So we were happy to listen. Once all the pieces came together we were happy to acquiesce.
"We weren't going to do something that didn't make sense for the University of Massachusetts, but for the greater good it made sense. We've done some things with UConn and BC in the past, moved some UConn games around and moved some BC games to allow them to play each other, which as I said two years ago is good for FBS football and good for college football in New England. I still feel strongly about that."
http://www.courant.com/sports/uconn-foot...story.html
|
|