What also made it tougher to get games was the generally sissy scheduling philosophy carried by the Big 12.

From 2001-2010 the Big 12 has 12 teams and an 8 game conference schedule. Yet look how few ranked teams (final top 25) they played in the regular season:

Pac- 82 (10 team league with mostly 3 nonconference games)
ACC- 79
SEC- 59
Big 12 -52
Big 10- 47

Nonconference road games 2001-2010:

ACC- 131
Pac- 116
Big 12- 109
Big 10- 106
SEC- 88

Games vs. FCS:

Big 12- 79
ACC- 77
SEC-74
Big 10- 55
Pac- 36

Did some scheduled nonconference games have to get canceled as a result of the 9 conference game schedule? Sure. Were the FCS games one of them? No way.