Home Away From Home 2015

A 2015 USF football season full of advantageous road games is still in play.

I haven't been to a home game at my dear alma mater since Homecoming 2007, but I have had the pleasure of catching them on the road a few times. A certain perfect storm could put nearly all of USF's road games on accessible turf for me.

Let's start with what we know. USF's out of conference road games are at College Park and at Florida State. College Park's a given, with family in Maryland and DC. And as long as schedules and resources allow, I can see me and my buddy James road tripping down to Tallahassee for the game at FSU.

While we don't know the conference schedule, the recently released 2014 schedule may provide a clue. ECU travels to Tampa in 2014, so chances are good that if we see the Pirates in 2015, it will be in Greenville, just across the state from me. We miss Temple in 2014, as we did in 2013, so there's a good chance they rotate back onto our schedule for 2015, and if the game's in Philly, it's right up the road from my parents. And finally, we could see Navy up in Annapolis in their first year in the conference.

It would be the perfect storm having ECU, Temple, and Navy all on the road in one season, and frankly, I'm not sure it's one I want. The American hasn't shown its hand yet as far as divisional structure; with the spread of the teams, they could go North/South, East/West, or random a la Atlantic/Coastal or Leaders/Legends. If they go East/West, which I'd prefer, ECU, Temple, and Navy are all divisionmates. If we'll see them each every year, I'd rather some split in the home/away rotation to ensure I've got at least one accessible game every year. With a North/South split, they're all in the other division, which means there's a very slim chance we get them all in the same year and no chance they're all on the road.

Regardless of which way the schedule breaks for 2015, it's looking like from that year and beyond it will be favorable for travel for yours truly.