Boise State, Troy schedule 2017-18 Home-and-home Football Series

By Kevin Kelley -
Bronco Stadium
Troy will play on the blue turf in 2017. Brian Losness-USA TODAY Sports

The Boise State Broncos and the Troy Trojans have scheduled a home-and-home football series for 2017 and 2018, both schools announced today.

Boise State will host the first game of the series and first ever meeting between the two schools at Bronco Stadium on Sept. 2, 2017. In the second and final game of the two-game set, the Broncos will travel to face the Trojans at Veterans Memorial Stadium on Sept. 1, 2018. Both games will be the season-opener for each school.

Boise State now has four non-conference games scheduled for the 2017 season. The Broncos host Troy on Sept. 2, travel to Washington State on Sept. 9, host Virginia on Sept. 23, and travel to BYU on Oct. 7.

In 2018, BSU now has the trip to Troy to compliment their Oct. 20 home game against BYU.

The Broncos have been very active as of late in setting their future football schedules. Boise announced a 2015/17 home-and-home with Virginia in February and a 2019-20 home-and-home with Florida State last week.

Boise State is the first scheduled non-conference opponent for the Troy Trojans for both the 2017 and 2018 seasons.

“This is another marquee matchup that is exciting for both our fans and our football program,” Hartwell said. “Boise State has been one of the most successful teams in the country recently and this series will further enhance Troy’s image in the national football spotlight. It is important to our football program to schedule these types of games and we will continue to seek out series like this and the one with Duke in the future.”

Troy also announced today that the date of their 2014 home game against Duke will be Sept. 6 and that they will also host Abilene Christian on Sept. 13. ACU will be an FCS school in 2014.

Football Schedules

Comments (43)

This is a major negative for those who believe that Boise State needs to step it up in non MWC scheduling to make up for their weak slate of conference games. Combined with UT Martin this year and Southern Miss, the parade of patsies to Boise continues in perpetuity.

Southern Miss being awful this year isn’t Boise’s fault. It was their first losing season in like 17 years. Troy normally is solid as well and has knocked off big time teams like Oklahoma State and Missouri and won five straight Sun Belt titles from 2006-2010. They’re not a powerhouse by any means, but not your typical “cupcake” either.

AC, you are only looking at the few positives of this scheduling. who cares if southern miss was great? i actually think they are still a better “Non-AQ” team, just with one down year. who cares that Troy had a few upsets in PREVIOUS years? that doesn’t take away from the fact that boise state could be scheduling better opponents. i don’t care what anybody says, when you are in boise state’s shoes, take what you can get with higher profile opponents. quit acting like you deserve a one for one with them. eventually, if you are good enough, and you start beating these higher profile teams in their home stadiums, you will be even more respected and noticed than you are now.

that is the problem with boise state. they think they are a top tier program. they rarely play anybody AQ at the AQ’s home turf. if they took notes from FSU in the past with scheduling, they would be more respected.

this scheduling does nothing good for boise state when it comes to making a name for themselves. troy is a good team and never to be taken lightly, but that’s it.

If Boise is truly serious about upgrading their non league schedule, then this was a mistake. Troy has zero appeal outside southern Alabama and with Boise weak MWC schedule, this game does nothing to advance their cause. Southern Miss will never be mistaken for a powerhouse, even the Idaho Vandals beat them and they are doormat of the entire west. The UT Martin game still sticks in my craw as another wasted opportunity. In 1982 to build up their reputation, Florida State went on the road for 5 straight weeks playing Nebraska, Wisconsin, Ohio State, Notre Dame and Pittsburgh. Boise limits it exposure to one good team a year, and no top tier teams until 2019 with Florida State. Washington, WSU, Oregon State and BYU have regional interest but are not in the national picture. Virginia, year in and year out is in the bottom tier of the ACC

Southern Miss is the original Boise…they had a horrible season last year but they are no cupcake. They went 12-2 in 2011.
As for the Trojans…not a power but ask Oklahoma State, Mizzou and Mississippi State about Troy.

Southern Miss isn’t really comparable to Boise. They have been Div. 1A for 50 years, while Boise only stepped up to D1A in 1996. They are similar in playing a spate of bowl games in the last 15 years or so, but that is more due to the proliferation of bowl games than anything unusual in common between the two teams. Southern Miss had a great season two years ago and a terrible one last year, but the thing that really pops out at me is their OOC schedule this coming September…AT Nebraska, AT Arkansas, and AT Boise State…WOW, talk about Murderers Row…that is a tough month! That is a schedule for a big time team.

I looked at their last 5 years and other than close wins against such powers as Navy and Virginia their resume is littered with losses to every major team they played and highlighted by wins over such powers as Arkansas State and Middle Tennessee-a couple of real juggernauts.

Boise state was cowardly. Play bcs schools exclusivelly or uh oull never be one if the top 4 for the playoffs. Troy what a joke!

Amen. And when Boise goes into a tail spin with a so so season watch for attendance to fall @ Bronco stadium.

Actually when the Kellen Moore-Doug Martin era ended I heard some comments among the Bronco faithful that they were glad, because the bandwagon-jumpers would bail and Boise State would be back to its core fan base like it was ten years ago. I would rather see them stay a national power of course, and continue on an upward trajectory, but my sentiment is definitely not universal.

Troy is not a joke. Boise is..they think they are Oregon, Texas or Ohio State but they are not. Troy wants to be Marshall or So. Miss or Boise!!!!

Attention! It is bad luck to dis an opponent! So we scheduled a series with Troy, so what. Don’t whine about it, get the wins! Boise absolutely should focus their OOC scheduling on high profile competition, a steady diet of Pac-12 and B1G schools would be best. But no Bronco fan should ever say this opponent sucks, Boise is wasting their time. That is bad juju, apparently you have never heard of a thing called bulletin board material. A win is a win.

A win is a win. I would rather play a good game on the road @ Ohio State or Nebraska and fall short than rejoice in beating a bunch of doormats. That will also gain greater respect nationwide. Why do you think that the whole nation belittle Boise’s strength of schedule. Remember, beating all your grandparents and uncles in arm wrestling @ the Thanksgiving day table is no feat of strength.

So do you think they turned down Ohio State or Nebraska in order to schedule games against Troy? I doubt it. If they can get those teams to schedule them I’m sure they would prefer it. Better to get the games scheduled and maybe cancel later, rather than have it like their 2014 schedule looks now, 14 months out and only 2 OOC games scheduled. That seems like a good way to get stuck with an open date, or a game against the East Portland Clutch & Transmission Institute.

East Portland Clutch & Transmission Institute is the UT Martin of Oregon. Troy is the Idaho Vandals of Alabama. Boise’s attitude is that they want parity=a home and home series with nationally ranked schools. Until Bronco stadium seats 50,000 plus, they will find very few takers. It makes no economic sense to barely cover your expenses to come Boise and play in front of 36,500 when you get 70,000-100,000 plus at home and make a few million. Watch my word, the last few thousand tickets available to the UT Martin game will be offered @ 2 for 1, with a couple hot dogs thrown in to fill those seats, and that might not even be enough.

I know times have changed, but I wouldn’t mind a bit seeing the Broncos slide into a national championship the way BYU did in 1984. They were in the WAC, and their only ranked opponent all year was their opener against Pitt. Their closest margins of victory were against Air Force, Wyoming, and Hawaii. On the other hand, teams like TCU and Utah are now swallowed up in big conferences, and if they get to a bowl game at all it is no bigger than the ones Boise gets in a down year. Winning counts! The haters are going to hate anyway, I say just win Baby!!

This sorrowful series is proving to me that Boise is deserving of being considered a top program: they are scheduling so far down.

Thats pretty funny coming from a Cornhusker fan….considering all the cupcakes they play everywhere!

TCU went from 10 wins and a spot in the Poinsettia bowl against Louisiana Tech to 7 wins and a bowl berth against Michigan State in leaving the MWC, so I would they certainly improved their lot with a 6th place finish in the Big 12 vs a 2011 MWC championship spot before Christmas in front of 22,000 fans in meaningless bowl watched by few fans.

Strength of schedule will become much more important in the coming years so that an undefeated season against the Wyoming’s , New Mexico’s, UNLV’s, San Jose State’s and beatdowns of UT Martin, Southern Miss and Troy will keep in the backwater bowls of Las Vegas and Albuquerque and out of the national spotlight.

I don’t follow. TCU got a trip to the Chicken Wing Bowl in Tempe to play against A Michigan State team that went 6-6. You have to explain to me how that is a step up from Boise’s last 2 trips to the Muffler Bowl, where they played a 7-5 Washington team and a 6-6 Arizona State team. They may be getting a windfall in revenue from being in the Big-12 compared to staying in the Mt. West, but their bowl game fortunes are no better thus far. And I shouldn’t need to remind you that TCU got a trip to the Rose Bowl from the Mountain West the year before, which would have belonged to Boise if they hadn’t choked against Nevada. Fact is, if Boise goes undefeated next year and nobody else in the FBS does, or even if one other team does, Boise probably gets a spot in the National Championship game. The only reason TCU didn’t two years ago was because Oregon and Auburn were both undefeated also. If either Oregon or Auburn had lost a game, TCU is in the National Championship game…out of the Mountain West.

The comparison was that TCU’s record could fall to 7 and 6 finish 6th place in the Big 12 and still get to go play Michigan State, when the prior year as MWC champion with a far better record (10 and 2)they were stuck with a no name in Louisiana Tech . Moral to the story if you have a mediocre record it is better to be in a higher rated league and if you are in the MWC, an an unbeaten season is no assurance of a place in the National Championship game. With a 4 team playoff coming in 2014 a unbeaten MWC record will still be no assurance of a National Championship opportunity unless all of the major conference champions have at least 1 or 2 losses. That is why it so important for Boise to have as challenging an OCC schedule to improve their chances of an appearance in the big time. Scheduling UT Martin and Troy does not enhance that opportunity.

Louisiana Tech was 8-4 in 2011, so don’t be hatin’. That’s better than Michigan state’s 6-6 in 2012.

I think we agree on a lot more than we disagree on. Being a dominant mid-major might be the best Boise can do for awhile. They could expand their stadium to seat 55,000 but if they can only get more than 30,000 in the stands once or twice a year it doesn’t make a lot of sense. The population of the Boise metro area is about 600,000 so they may just not have a big enough local fan base to support a bigger setup for awhile. With that in mind, what is in it for the USC’s of the world to schedule a game in Boise? A chance to get a dent kicked in their win-loss record early in the year, that is about it. At least Troy is an FBS school, scheduling a mid-pack Sun Belt Conference dweller is about like putting one more Mountain West opponent on the schedule. Not a tragedy, but not another Florida State either.

At 600,000 Metro Boise is a lot larger than Metro East Lansing; Lafayette; Columbia MO; Columbia, SC; State College; Charlottesville; Eugene; Auburn; Provo; College Station; Lubbock; Waco; Starkeviile; Iowa City; Gainesville; or Fayetteville.

They are similar in size to Madison, Baton Rouge and Knoxville.

Tell me again why they can’t expand the stadium AND fill it.,

Eugene has a population base of 250,000 within 60 miles and yet they sell out every game even against the no names that they like to beat up on prior to the Pac 10. Lincoln Nebraska has a population base of 90,000 yet they have sold out every gamer since 1962 currently 81,000. Corvallis has a base of about 80,000 within a hour’s drive yet they get 42,000-46,000 @ every game. Your population argument doe not hold water. Even BYU gets 63,000 @ every game and I know they are smaller than Boise. Are Boise people cheap, don’t care or pine for the day that Vandals ever have a decent team?

I don’t know what the real impediments might be to Boise State growing a legitimate big-time football program. Boise is among the most regionally isolated cities out of those mentioned, although looking at a map not a lot more so than Provo, Eugene or even Lincoln. Where do the fans come from to watch the Cornhuskers and Ducks? Omaha and Portland? Places like E. Lansing or State College might be small towns but there are 10 million people in Michigan and 13 million in Pennsylvania, so those markets are basically different from Idaho. What else is there? Size of the student body? I’ve never lived in Boise but I doubt people there are significantly cheaper than college football fans in other places. The other obvious thing is that they just haven’t been at it as long, so it will be interesting to see how their program grows over the next ten years or so. If they continue to win as much as they have been recently the program should grow. Schedule good competition, win a lot, expand the stadium and hopefully the fans will show up to fill it.

Boise St’s record against AQ teams at their home stadium:

08-31-12 L @ Michigan St 13-17
09-20-08 W @ Oregon 37-32
09-08-07 L @ Washington 10-24
09-10-05 L @ Oregon St 27-30
09-03-05 L @ Georgia 13-48
09-20-03 L @ Oregon St 24-26
09-07-02 L @ Arkansas 14-41
09-01-01 L @ South Carolina 13-32
10-07-00 L @ Washington St 35-42

so in 13 seasons all they could schedule is 9 true road games against BCS opponents? they are 1-12 in these games. look it up if you don’t believe me. sure they have won some games at home or at a neutral site, but why are they so afraid to schedule them on the road?

boise state needs to step it up, i am not buying this whole “we will play anybody” gimmick, it’s a lie and a joke.

I give Boise credit for beating Virginia Tech @ Fed Ex Field in Wash DC, that was a home game in every sense of the word for Virginia Tech, also beating Georgia in Atlanta was a home game for Georgia. That being said, both were done with a once in a generation QB in Kellen Moore and his outstanding cast of teammates. maybe Coach Peterson is concerned and those seasons represent the high water mark with what he can do @ Boise State which would explain why he is unhappy with attempts to upgrade the OCC competition and is so concerned with winning every game that he wants to dumb down the competiion like most of the big boys do. His challenge is that his whole conference season is a dumb down which is exactly why he needs to elevate as much as possible his OCC. His greatest challenges are over before the end of September and by December Boise’s best opportunities will have occured so far ago that they easily become an after thought. The challenge this year is that with the Washington game in Seattle at renovated Stadium with revenge in mind for the Husky pratfall at the Maaco bowl and the game in Provo with BYU seeking revenge, a loss by Boise in both of those games will keep Boise out of the top 25 and any national recognition even if the sweep the MWC.

You have to explain to me how a team could be 1-12 in 9 games. Going back to 2000 you are right Boise’s road performance against BCS teams is pretty weak, but it looks like they have scheduled the games wherever they could get them. Looking at the Peterson era, since 2006, and including neutral-site games including bowl games against BCS teams, the numbers are a lot better…7-2 away from home. The losses were at Washington and Mich. State. I think the total against BCS teams in the Peterson era is 10-2 to date. I don’t have any insight into their scheduling, but I would like to see them play more top-25 teams anywhere.

Herm, my mistake entirely, i meant to say 1-8 in 9 games over 13 seasons. mixed all the numbers up haha

Also, Herm, they actually do quite well since Peterson took over. the problem is that most of those games are bowl games, not scheduled ones. Plus, most of their wins outside bowl games are either home games or neutral site games. they need to challenge themselves more, that is all i am saying…

I agree. Looking at their schedule Boise could schedule home-and-home series with Stanford and Cal in 2014, 2015 and 2016. All three teams have the openings on their schedules, they could play one in 2014-2015 and the other one in 2014-2016. And as of now they all have the flexibility to where they could schedule either date at either place. That would be more like it for Boise. And I think Stanford downsized their stadium in their recent renovation to 50,000 so Bronco Stadium’s current capacity of 37,000 isn’t a huge amount smaller, that shouldn’t be a deal-breaker. The fact that the first game of the Troy series isn’t for another 4 years makes that a little bit easier to swallow, but they need to make their OOC games count more in terms of quality.

Wow! Why so late? It seems that all the other FBS schedules are out already. Just seems like a matter of plugging in conference games!

When Boise beats Alabama and Auburn the same year as Southern Miss did in 1990 give me a call

You can’t tell what you are going to get when you schedule OOC opponents 4 or 5 years ahead. Would you give Boise as much credit for beating Auburn last year as if they beat Cam Newton’s crew? They do need to make their OOC games count, with as many Pac-12 and B1G types as possible as opposed to Sun Belt and CUSA types.

It would be nice if they would do as you say but the evidence is just not there. Southern Miss may or may not be a worthy opponent (they certainly aren’t now), but they are a no name and not much of attention getter whether win big or not. Troy is even a lesser opponent ( with a 5 plus year wait before that regrettable series is over) and one that plays in a lower tier league in a smaller stadium and market than Boise. UT Martin takes the cake. Boise is only their 2nd or 3rd game again top tier teams (they lost to a down Tennessee team 50-0 in 2010). There is not enough lipstick in this world to make that pig attractive. Beating the worst Auburn team is history gets you more recognition than the greatest Southern Miss or Troy team ever would. In addition, going to Troy or Southern Miss and winning in front 15,00-20,000 fans doesn’t make you any money either.

Not to mention if you wreck your equipment truck by hitting a cow on the way there. Not so good for the insurance rates!

Maybe self insurance is the way to go. Being related to Sheriff Andy or Cousin Gomer might help you get out of town quickly.

lol, you know it happened last year on the way to the So. Miss game right? I didn’t make it up. The Boise State equipment truck is a nice conventional cab Peterbilt. I don’t know if you saw the pics, their truck got seriously F_ed up, blood and shit everywhere!