What's next when it comes to scheduling for West Virginia football?

The Big 12 Conference has made its decision when it comes to the 2020 scheduling model and the fallout still leaves some questions for the West Virginia football program.

The Big 12 Board of Directors have elected to go with the nine-plus-one model of scheduling meaning that the teams will play each of their nine conference opponents alongside one out-of-conference game.

That non-conference match-up must be a home contest.

For the Mountaineers that would mean their schedule is full with a date with FCS level Eastern Kentucky still left standing out of the original 12-game slate. That game was originally set for Sept. 12, but that is obviously up in the air depending on what other changes will occur with the schedule.

Contests against Florida State in Atlanta which was set for Sept. 5 and a home-date with Maryland Sept. 19 were already wiped off the slate due to their respective leagues making previous scheduling choices.

So we have a model, which was the clear front-runner behind the scenes, and it makes the most sense for many different reasons. It aligns the league with the other power five conferences and provides flexibility but more on that a little later.

But now comes the truly interesting part. When does the Big 12 Conference start playing this season and how is the schedule formatted?

West Virginia originally released its schedule for this coming season Oct. 19, 2019 which included the above mentioned non-conference portion as well as nine Big 12 match ups.

Those were as follows Sept. 26 against Kansas State, Oct. 3 at Texas Tech, Oct. 10 against TCU, Oct. 17 at Texas, Oct. 24 against Kansas, Nov. 7 against Oklahoma, Nov. 14 at Oklahoma State, Nov. 21 against Baylor and Nov. 28 at Iowa State. That gave the Mountaineers five home games and four on the road.

The original bye week was set for the Oct. 31 weekend, but now there could be significant changes. Sure, the Big 12 could use the same order and simply space out the games more or move dates, but it also could look at a complete overhaul.

What this 9+1 model does allow for is more flexibility to space out games if need be, which could force the league to look at an entirely new or modified schedule for 2020 as other leagues have done already. That way teams have the ability to move games if there are issues with the virus. But because the Big 12 already plays a round robin, there might not be a need to move things around significantly at least when it comes to order.

The out-of-conference game must come before the mid-to-late September start of conference play but when will that be? The Eastern Kentucky game is currently scheduled for Sept. 12, but could be moved earlier if needed. Could week 0 still be an option? The release didn't specify but it would fall in line with some other Big 12 teams.

What happens next will be the most interesting aspect of this all as the Big 12 will need to release information on exactly when the season will start and if the league does elect to push back the championship game. This new model allows for the league to push it back to either Dec. 12 or Dec. 19, which goes back to that flexibility that the 10-game model provides.

Given the fact that Oklahoma and Kansas have already started fall camp, it will be interesting to see how the conference handles the situation and which opponent teams with multiple games on the schedule decide to nix. Fortunately for West Virginia that isn’t an issue for now, but the Mountaineers could be forced into finding another opponent if FCS decides not to hold a season.

Still it goes without saying that one team is certainly easier to find than multiple ones which could have been the case if the league had decided to go in a different direction.

So one hurdle has been cleared, but a few still remain as the Big 12 now must release a start date and any adjustments to the schedule that could create.

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