In my opinion, I would rather not have played another 1AA school, simply because Saturday's game was nothing more than a scrimmage. It didn't count toward bowl eligibility, and really the team and coaches treated it like a game that didn't count, almost like you have exhibition games in basketball.
My ideal schedule have had Arkansas State in place of UNA, so that we'd still get the cupcake, but the win would count.
Now, on the attendance deal, I complained about the scheduling of UNA from the beginning, not necessarily because it was a cupcake, but because we scheduled it in mid-November, and not in September. I was fine with 4 cupcakes, but the majority of those games should be played early, and if we were going to be forced to find a 1AA, we should've found one that was open on September 12, our other open date.
We had 58,000+ for SELA on September 19. When you throw a 1AA in the mix during the heart of SEC play, you're going to get a smaller crowd. You play that same opponent, but you do it in September before the meat of the schedule, and we would've had 50,000 to 55,000.
Essentially, if we could've worked a deal to play an Arkansas State or ULM on September 12, you'd have had my ideal OOC schedule. 3 cupcakes to open the season before the first SEC game, so that the fans are still excited about any football, and you get 3 rent-a-wins, and you have a 4th cupcake during the middle of October for homecoming, and the other thing is all 4 would count toward a bowl.
By the way, the one thing you neglect to mention is that if we played Georgia Tech or Wake Forest, we'd have to have a return trip to their place. So, if we play one of those games and draw 60,000, is that better than drawing 40,000 two years in a row for two cupcake home games? 2 x 40,000 > 60,000.
