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Update: OU was quick to fill the while in their schedule and has added a home-and-home with SMU.
OU, SMU add home/home series; 2023 at OU, 2027 at SMU
— Brett McMurphy (@Brett_McMurphy) September 14, 2022
The SEC has directed the Georgia Bulldogs and Tennessee Volunteers to not play their home-and-home series with the Oklahoma Sooners, according to ESPN’s Pete Thamel. Since these were originally intended to be non-conference games and Oklahoma is joining the SEC in the near future, it made no sense for Georgia or Tennessee to play the road games of these series first and then have the return game be a conference game.
Sources: The SEC has directed Georgia and Tennessee to not play their home-and-home non-conference series against Oklahoma. The Bulldogs had OU scheduled in '23 and '31. The Vols’ 2020 game in Norman was cancelled amid COVID and was expected to be made up down the line.
— Pete Thamel (@PeteThamel) September 14, 2022
This is the unintended consequence of conference realignment, along with college football’s desire to schedule games nearly a decade in advance. As Thamel notes, there was set to be a eight-year gap between Georgia and Oklahoma’s return game. Do we really know if the college football landscape would have those two teams in the same conference in 2031?
This is also a sign the SEC believes it could get Oklahoma (and Texas) into the SEC earlier than expected. We’ll see how the conference shifts once those two schools come in but the gears are turning already when it comes to future schedules.