Penn State Coach James Franklin Says Big Ten Made Huge Mistake With Football Scheduling Compared To SEC

James Franklin has been a part of the Big Ten Conference for over a decade, and helped continue the long tradition of winning football at Penn State. He's won the Rose Bowl, won two games in the College Football Playoff, and put his team in the Big Ten Championship Game in 2024. 

He's also extremely frustrated with how his conference has undermined itself in comparison with the other superconference: the SEC. 

Speaking at Big Ten media days, Franklin explained how he believes the Big Ten moving to nine conference games was "maybe the worst decision the Big Ten has ever made." 

Why? Because in his view, "Everybody has to play the same number of conference games. This ain't that hard. Everybody should be playing eight, or everybody should be playing nine. 

"Everybody should be playing a conference championship game, or shouldn't be playing in a conference championship game," he said. Franklin also wants Notre Dame to join a conference, because allowing independents is not comparing "apples to apples."  

READ: Penn State's James Franklin Wants Big Ten To Take A Page Out Of SEC's Offseason Playbook

And he made several other pointed references to how the SEC has taken advantage of its eight-game conference schedule.

Penn State's James Franklin Noticed One Thing About The SEC That He Wishes The Big Ten Would Copy (Photo by Michael Hickey/Getty Images)

James Franklin Isn't Happy With Inherent SEC Advantages

Franklin makes several good points: the SEC has a built-in advantage by playing only eight conference games. While scheduling discussions often revolve around non-conference games, the Big Ten is automatically scheduled for an extra Power-5 game because of the extra non-conference matchup. 

And it's not exactly like SEC schools use the extra non-conference game to play tough opponents; the vast majority use their fourth non-conference game to give themselves what amounts to a late-season bye week. Alabama, for example, played Mercer on November 16 in the 2024 season. The Tide won 52-7.

That doesn't mean SEC schools don't play difficult schedules, obviously it's a very deep conference with a ton of high-level programs. But the ability to play FCS schools, or bottom of the barrel FBS programs, for that extra week carries massive dividends. 

Just look at Ole Miss in 2024; the Rebels' non-conference schedule was Furman, Middle Tennessee State, Wake Forest and Georgia Southern. Four straight easy games to start the season, an easy 4-0 record and a top-5 ranking. That immediately makes Ole Miss a "quality" win or loss for the other SEC teams, because the ranking was enhanced by a ridiculously easy four-game stretch.

Sure enough, Ole Miss then lost three conference games, because conference games are harder. Imagine if the Rebels had to play a ninth conference game instead of Georgia Southern or Middle Tennessee State. Would they have finished 8-4 instead of 9-3? And still found a way to complain about missing the playoff?

This is why Franklin's right to bring up the difficulty of comparing across conferences. If SEC team played nine conference games, they would give themselves, collectively, 16 extra losses. If you assume that those games replace FCS-level teams, that is. And they would. Add 16 extra losses to the SEC and suddenly their records and rankings start to look a lot worse. 7-5 instead of 8-4. 9-3 instead of 10-2, and so on. 

The SEC has no reason to change, because it is benefitting from the current setup. Doesn't mean it shouldn't.