How AAC made sense of its schedule after Hurricane Irma
Pat Forde
All that required an extraordinary amount of juggling of ticket sales, hotel rooms, charter flights, stadium rental and more. Aresco said he and his associate commissioners, Scott Draper and Tom Odjakjian, looked over three or four scheduling models before settling on one. They presented changes one at a time to individual athletic directors, then got them all on a conference call to ratify the new schedule.
Remember, this was the consolation-prize league, assembled from schools that couldn’t work their way into Power Five conferences. And as recently as a year ago, most of them were angling like crazy for a possible spot in the Big 12 (33) if it expanded. So it was important to see a disparate group come together for its own good, and to preserve the viability of its league season.
Now the American can crown a legitimate champion, without asterisks or dispute due to teams playing an uneven number of league games. And that champion right now would seem to have a great shot at a New Years Six bowl bid (though San Diego State could have something to say about that).