There are bound to be some hiccups along the way, but coordinating the schedules of 18 schools in numerous sports from coast to coast has been a significant challenge for the Big Ten.
At least in the first year of the new conference, which added UCLA, Southern California, Oregon and Washington, the scheduling puzzle has come together and we'll see how it plays out.
From Purdue's perspective, the Big Ten's expansion increased the athletic department's travel budget for the 2024-25 school year, adding “less than $500,000 in new expenses,” athletic director Mike said Bobinski at GoldandBlack.com.
It's been almost a year since the league voted to add these four schools. The official first day for all 18 Big Ten schools is Monday (July 1).
“From an execution standpoint of the reality of their arrival, I think the Big Ten has done a really good job of managing the travel circumstances for each program in a reasonable and least disruptive way that you could hope for,” Bobinski said.
“We all talked about it early on – we didn’t know if we could do it. Given the math of the 18 teams, the schedules and all that, what I’ve seen so far is that no team in the core 14 teams has made more than one trip to the West Coast in any sport in a competitive season.”
The volleyball and women's soccer schedules have been announced, and the opponents for the men's and women's basketball games have been revealed without a date. Purdue will travel to Oregon and Washington in all four sports and host UCLA and USC. Will the winter and spring sports schedules be the same?
“We’re not going to play all four newcomers on the road in any given year,” Bobinski said.
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Other Big Ten schools follow a similar scheduling model. For example, Ohio State and Penn State travel to UCLA and USC in those four sports and host Oregon and Washington. However, Northwestern's men's basketball team hosts UCLA and USC, while the women's basketball team plays the Los Angeles-based schools.
When the Boilermakers travel to the Pacific Northwest, they will play Oregon and Washington on the same trip in volleyball and football, and both basketball teams expect the same. Basketball and football are now five-day trips based on two days between games. Volleyball will play two games in three days against the Ducks and Huskies, likely requiring a four-day stay.
“It’s an extended stay,” Bobinski said. “Extra hotel nights, meals and everything that goes into that $500,000 figure. It makes sense. Every coaching group that’s looked at it and everybody that’s looked at it has said it’s the most rational solution. Everybody thinks it makes sense.”
“Now, once you operationalize it and live it for a year, you might think differently. Everyone thinks this is the right initial approach to take.
The American football team will travel to the West Coast, but not to a Big Ten school. Purdue will play at Oregon State in September, fulfilling a two-year contract between the two schools that began with a 2021 game at Ross-Ade Stadium.
Since that game was already scheduled, the Big Ten didn't send the Boilermakers on another long trip.
“We're going to be able to test this trip on the West Coast to see what it's all about,” Bobinski said.
The heaviest travel burden falls on the four new schools in the East. UCLA, USC, Oregon and Washington will make multiple trips to the Central and Eastern time zones to play conference games.
Travel partners seem like a logical way to plan.
When UCLA and USC play at Purdue in football, they will also face Indiana on the same trip. In volleyball, however, when UCLA plays at Purdue, the Bruins will travel to Northwestern two days later. Same goes for USC, which will play Northwestern (Nov. 21) and Purdue (Nov. 23) on the same trip.
“All of those things have been factored into the equation to make it as efficient as possible,” Bobinski said. “They’re members of our league and we want to treat them as such. We don’t want to disadvantage them in any way beyond what geography requires.”
It will be interesting to see the influence of television on basketball programming during games.
The travel environment, “in general, is horrible,” Bobinski said. Inflation spikes in food, transportation, charter airline availability and other expenses have intensified over the years and will likely continue to climb.
Bobinski does not anticipate a significant increase in travel expenses in the coming years, but these items will need to be monitored.
“The situation is not expected to escalate significantly at this point,” Bobinski said. “We will assess the situation as it unfolds. We will learn from it. What is the best and most efficient way to travel? Is commercial air travel acceptable or not? We will find a solution.”
Related: Big Ten travel distances
