Colorado State to play at Alabama in 2013

By Kevin Kelley -
Jim McElwain
CSU head coach Jim McElwain coached at Alabama. Ron Chenoy-USA TODAY Sports

The Colorado State Rams will play at the Alabama Crimson Tide in 2013, CSU athletic director Jack Graham announced last night at a CSU Ram Club event.

Colorado State will face Alabama at Bryant-Denny Stadium in Tuscaloosa on Sept. 21, 2013. The game will be the first ever meeting between the two schools and will pit Bama coach Nick Saban against his former offensive coordinator Jim McElwain, now the head coach of the Rams.

Earlier this month, the Denver Post reported that Alabama and Colorado State were in talks for a game in 2013 and 2015.

The announcement gives Colorado State five non-conference games in 2013, meaning they will likely need to cancel or postpone one. Other games slated for CSU are Colorado (8/31; at Denver), at Tulsa (Sept. 7), Cal Poly (Sept. 14), and at UTEP (Sept. 28).

The most likely candidate for cancellation/postponement is a Sept. 7 contest at Tulsa. CSU will definitely play Colorado, and their two other opponents, Cal Poly and UTEP, just made announcements this week confirming the games.

In fact, the Colorado State-UTEP game had been set for Sept. 21 for some time, but the Miners announced the contest last night as Sept. 28. That cleared Sept. 21 for CSU to travel to Alabama.

But Colorado State could still face Tulsa if one of their Mountain West games includes a trip to Hawaii. Under the Hawaii Exemption, teams that play at Hawaii may schedule 13 games. CSU hosted Hawaii in 2012.

As for the Crimson Tide, their 2013 schedule is now complete. The Tide open the 2013 season in the Chick-fil-A College Kickoff against Virginia Tech (Aug. 31) and also have non-conference games at home against Georgia State (Oct. 5) and Chattanooga (Nov. 23).

Bama’s SEC slate, which was announced in October, includes home games vs. Ole Miss, Arkansas, Tennessee, and LSU and road games at Texas A&M, Kentucky, Mississippi State, and Auburn.

Football Schedules

Comments (19)

Next year’s Alabama non-conference schedule is a joke. Georgia State and Chattanooga? Really two Div I-AA schools? And Colorado St. isn’t much in their own right. One tough game against VT and their program has fallen off, anyway. No way should any team win a national title playing TWO Div I-AA schools!! I hope Notre Dame obliterates Alabama in the BCS title game next month.

Even if they are in the Sun Belt, Georgia State has only had their football program a few years. But they are Bama, they need some ‘easy’ games when they have to play LSU, A&M, & Arkansas. Arkansas will turn around W/ Beilima.

Two FCS cupcakes? Holy crow….Florida’s AD must doing the Tide’s scheduling now….SOS has to factored into ANY playoffs moving forward.

hey Kevin
how many times will you have to post to the SEC haters that GSU moves up next year
2 so far….

READ BEFORE YOU TYPE JINZO
or at freaking least pay attention to college football

Jinzo, Florida plays Toledo, at Miami, Georgia Southern, and FSU next season. Oh wait, I forgot your logic: Miami doesn’t count because it’s in-state and FSU doesn’t count because they play annually.

Georgia State is FBS in name only…..their talent level is still very much FCS….so maybe PNB should take her advice and study up on college ball a little more..
Saban could have done a little job scheduling,I think Colorado State is a decent opener but should have dropped either GSU or Chattanooga. Believe me,finding a mid level FBS team willing to travel to Alabama would not be hard….

and Matt F….as to defending Florida’s annually weak OOC schedule…really???

So one FCS team (who made the playoffs), Toledo (9-3), and two ACCs opponents, including one away game and one game against the league champion, makes up a weak OOC schedule…really???

as a Bammer hater I think SOS will be considered
Texas A&M, LSU, Ole Miss, Tennessee, Auburn, Miss State, Arkansas
shall I continue

as an AUBURN fan I do not like defending the “turds” but come on SEC haters get over it

It´s easy to build a winnig schedule in the SEC.

take a the weakest team of the PAC 12, Big 12, Big 10 and a weak FCS team and you have four easy wins.

Yes, I noticed no Florida, Georgia and South Carolina on the schedule. Very wimpy schedule. Even if Georgia St. is Div I-A next year, everyone knows they will be an easy win. Any school in their first few years of Div I-A football is typically never competitive against established programs.

Depending on how they do strength of schedule the SEC teams will not rank as high as voters typically rank them if they continue to play an fcs team, a sun belt team, and some other weak team.

G of C, couldn’t agree with you more. I really hope that when the playoffs start in 2014, that the selection committee pays due diligence to a team’s non-conference schedule. It better not be just all about a team’s conference schedule.

As of now Georgia Southern is ranked #75 in the combined FBS/FCS Sagarin ratings. that puts them ahead of bowl teams Bowling, Green, Nevada, SMU, Duke and Western Kentucky (76-80), MTSU (85), ECU (89), Rice (102), Air Force (107) and CMU (118).

GaSo is also rated ahead of SEC schools Auburn (83) and Kentucky (91).