A team that spends most of the regular season in the rankings and then drops out at the very end gets a lot more publicity and exposure than an unranked team that finishes strong and only reaches the top-25 in the final rankings. 

A couple of simple changes that could help:

1) Play Hawaii every year and play an easier game in Week 0 every year. When we play Hawaii in Provo, play in Week 0 using *Hawaii's* scheduling flexibility. PAY Hawaii to make this happen. With an early season win, we get good, early exposure and are more likely to have a winning record early and throughout the season. Note, that this doesn't require us to forego the great September matchups...it just starts the week earlier than the rest of college football. 

Bonus = extra late-season bye week, when good games are more difficult to come by.

2) DO NOT play MAC, CUSA, or Sun Belt teams on the road. Just stop. Those are usually Eastern time zone games, where we don't have a great record to begin with. Road games in independence are oh so precious. Let's treat them that way. We should PAY the MAC, CUSA, and Sun Belt teams to play us in Provo. Period.

Please notice that these two recommendations are actually within our control and would be a great use of resources. If we're going to spend money, spend it in ways that structurally help BYU to have better chances at better win-loss records and rankings.

These two straightforward changes might cost us a couple million dollars more each season, but it would absolutely be worthwhile and pay dividends.

Here are our 2020 and 2021 schedules if we were to follow this strategy - subtle changes, but significant:

2020

• Hawaii
• @Utah
• Michigan State
• @Arizona State
• @Minnesota
• Utah State
• Missouri
• BYE
• Houston
• @Boise State
• BYE
• San Diego State
• North Alabama
• @Stanford

HOME(7): Hawaii, Michigan State, Utah State, Missouri, Houston, San Diego State, North Alabama. 

AWAY(5): Utah, Arizona State, Minnesota, Boise State, Stanford

Changes = add Hawaii home game in Week 0. Remove NIU road game. Push Houston game back 1 week and replace with BYE. Move @Boise State game up 1 week and replace with BYE. 

2021

• Georgia Southern
• v. Arizona (in Vegas)
• Utah
• Arizona State
• USF
• @Utah State
• Boise State
• @Baylor
• @Washington St.
• Virginia
• BYE
• @Hawaii
• Idaho State
• @USC

HOME(7): Georgia Southern, Utah, Arizona State, South Florida, Boise State, Virginia, Idaho State 

AWAY(6): Arizona (in Vegas), Utah State, Baylor, Washington State, Hawaii, USC

Changes = add Hawaii road game in November. Move Idaho State back 1 week. Move Georgia Southern to Provo in Week 0.

Boom.