Report: Florida State Looking to Schedule Alabama & Auburn

By Kevin Kelley -

The Florida State Seminoles are looking to schedule neutral-site games against Alabama and Auburn, according to a report by Tomahawk Nation.

The Florida State-Alabama game, if it materializes, would be a Chick-fil-A Kickoff Game in 2017 at the new Atlanta Falcons Stadium. FSU last faced Alabama in Jacksonville in 2007, a game in which they won 21-14 but later vacated due to NCAA sanctions.

Alabama currently leads the overall series against Florida State 2-0-1. Each of those games were played prior to 1975.

Last summer, the AJC reported that a Georgia Tech-Tennessee matchup in 2017 in Atlanta was nearly set. It’s possible that Georgia Tech-Tennessee and Florida State-Alabama could both be played, as the Chick-fil-A Kickoff has had dual matchups in the past.

Tomahawk Nation also reports, per a source, that Florida State could meet Auburn in 2019 at EverBank Field in Jacksonville.

Florida State and Auburn have squared off 19 times, most recently in the 2014 BCS National Championship Game in Pasadena. The two also met in the 1989 Sugar Bowl in New Orleans, but have never faced each other at a neutral site during regular-season play.

Auburn leads the series against FSU 13-5-1 and has claimed four of the last five meetings.

Florida State has openings for both neutral-site games in 2017 and 2019. Currently, they are slated to visit Florida both seasons and also host Boise State in 2019.

Alabama has a lone game scheduled for 2017, a Sept. 16 home tilt against Colorado State.

Auburn has no non-conference games announced for the 2019 season.

The Seminoles opened the 2014 season with a neutral-site win over Oklahoma State at AT&T Stadium in Arlington. FSU is also scheduled to face Ole Miss at Orlando Citrus Bowl Stadium to open the 2016 season.

Football Schedules

Comments (33)

Now these are the type of match-ups we need to see more of from the SEC. Wished they would be home and home series though. The NCAA really should adopt 1-1-1 rule, where a neutral site game must be accompanied with a home and home series.

I got this comment from Fox’s site from a poster when commenting on the proposed games, “They need to add somebody. GA Tech is the only Top 10 team on their schedule this season. Must be nice to have a stroll in the park week after week, year after year….”

I find Scout.com to be one of the most informed sites and they have Bama at #3 and LSU at#7. Followed by Georgia at #12, South Carolina at #14, Auburn at #15, Tenn at#16 and Arky at #17….

Only the Vols and the Razorbacks return starting QB’s. Everything is conjecture at this point.

I played at a D3 school and am an American who has lived abroad for nearly two decades, so I have no dog in this fight. I just love the college game. I am tiring though, of the “Ess EEE See” crap year in and year out, especially after they got they trucked the only time a title shot was not handed to them.

I cannot wait for more of these games.

This year FSUs schedule isn’t as tough as it was a year ago but they do play Clemson, which may not be a top ten team in the rankings but hands down are on the playing field. A underranked team to start most seasons due in part to the generous preseason rankings given to some of the PAC12 teams. But then again in my opinion quite a few ACC teams are undervalued. What’s even more funny is how you think the SEC got rolled this year because they didn’t win the National Title and lost a few more bowls than normal. They were literally one play away from beating OSU (a poor pick six) and then would have destroyed a pathetic defensive team from the PAC12. Defense has and always will win national championships, as is why the PAC12 hasn’t nor will for a while. And is why the SEC has won so many. USC will stand a chance, especially with the recognition the PAC12 gets. People love to hate. So are there as many haters in other countries as there are in ours? And once again it makes it even more hard to compare conferences that have a diff number of teams, some of which are on entirely different playing levels. Compare records and scores and hypotheticals all you want but if the top teams don’t play each other at the end of the season we won’t ever know who is better. This is clearly evident after seeing how the two so-called best conferences, the SEC and PAC12, haven’t played against each other in a bowl in who knows how many years. Other than when Auburn beat Oregon in the National Title. The regular season is meaningless unless we have better bowls. Considering how many years in advance the games are scheduled some don’t even end up being good games because of up and down seasons. In my opinion the regular season games are fine, however, I would love to see more great inter confernce matchups like these but more importantly I believe we need to see better bowls. Who cares about rematches, especially if they are OOC and early in the season. Would have loved to have played Georgia again in a bowl. I say these for a few different reasons, one being, Clemson played Oklahoma this year in a bowl. We were ranked 17th or 18th in my opinion a little low as well as coming off a huge win. We played Oklahoma a team not even ranked. A much better team than their ranking. Nothing for Clemson to gain with a win and a lot to lose for the ACC with a loss. And when they compare teams the way they do now. They look at one specific stat, the number of ranked teams we played and beat. Clemson should have played a better more highly ranked team. God I would have loved to have played UCLA last season. Haha. Thanks for letting me rant fellas. Go tigers baby.

“due in part to the generous preseason rankings given to some of the PAC12 teams.” What improv do you play at this weekend, Pat Ryan? I want to see the rest of your show.

Well Jack, in my opinion UCLA was far from deserving of #7 preseason ranking. They played maybe two good games the entire season, their best game being their bowl game, the last game of the season, yet they just sat in the top 12 the entire season. I guess I am alright with where Stanford was ranked, they are a quality program, however in my opinion still a little generous. USC definitely didn’t deserve to be ranked in the top 15. They got beat by BC, who everyone loves to downplay when they play FSU, GT, Clemson but yet they got beat on the three sport intermural field. Another decent win the ACC got no credit for. And I don’t care which ranking it came from ASU was not deserving of #13 or #16 and Washington was not deserving of even a top 25 preseason ranking. I think they slide those Pac12 teams into those spots undeserving and it sets the stage for the entire season. They start high and if they loss they fall but have far less of a hill to climb than teams who start lower in the rankings. UCLA got
much more credit for beating KSU than Clemson got for beating Oklahoma. Two equally matched teams. UCLA was not deserving of a top 10 final ranking. Five spots ahead of Clemson with the same record. UCLA couldn’t hold Clemsons jock strap. Haha yet they prolly beat more ranked teams, again due to a joke of bowl matchups. It’s pretty consistent all around. Arizona, USC and Utah all ranked ahead of Louisville with the same record. Louisville a non ranked team going into the bowl season played top 10 Georgia in a bowl. What do ta know. Who’d ranked Utah play in their bowl a non P5 team who just lost their coach. Oh wait, Arizona scored the weakest BCS bowl and still lost. I can go all day with many more variables you guys seem to miss or ignore.

I think you missed my point that pre-season rankings are useless and nothing but conjecture.

True. But the problem with the easy non-conference schedules is because so many don’t play them or won’t do a home and home, especially SEC schools. Talk about a joke. Alabama had no business in the playoff. Oregon probably would have beat them soundly since Alabama struggled all season against teams that could spread them out. That conference is vastly overrated. Some good teams but only morons believed South Carolina and Texas A&M were preseason top 10 and top 25.

” Alabama had no business in the playoff.” Really? So does that mean Oregon had no business in the playoffs either since they got taken to the woodshed by OSU. At least Bama put up a fight at the end & there is no “probably” about Oregon beating Bama soundly, you don’t know that & are just guessing. Option teams do give Bama a run for their money but that does not mean Bama would lose to them. Not sure who you would of had to replace Bama in the CFP but I don’t think the SEC is a joke or overrated.

Guess, yes but an educated one. Alabama had problems with West Virginia, Miss. St. and Auburn last year, none could beat Oregon. And while Ohio State did take Oregon to the woodshed, Ohio State also did that to Alabama. The score of that game isn’t indicative of exactly how much better the Buckeyes were. If not for 2 turnovers inside their own 20 that Alabama turned into 14 points, OSU likely wins by 3 or 4 TD’s. As far as who should have been there instead of Alabama, TCU I thought was better.

I can respect TCU getting in & if it was not for OSU destroying Wisconsin then they would of been but so would of Bama. As for West Virginia, Auburn & Miss St not being able to beat Oregon, once again, a guess. The games were never played so we will never know. Oregon also had a hell of a time with Zona, Wash St & Cal, its not like Bama is the only team that struggled last year. The Bama vs OSU was great game but don’t forget that Bama turned the ball over as well & fought back to try & win at the end, they had 3 chances & could not do it. Sure, OSU could of won by 3-4 tds but Bama could of came back & won as well but only lost by 7. Buckeyes were better but not by much.

Lost in Va, I think you are referring to the Gators and the “stormed out” opener which was cancelled this past year…..That being said I would like to see more of these ACC/SEC games.

There are plenty of ACC vs SEC matchups yearly. A few more would definitely be nice. Clemson usually plays two Sec teams a year. When Sec teams schedule a top notch program like Clemson yearly, that doesn’t entirely count as shying away from great competition. Along with all the other rivalry games and then the few other matchups that happen. I would much rather see more ACC/SEC teams play more PAC12/Big12/Big10 teams, which we are being scheduled more now than in the past.

Bob, where did South Carolina finish the three prior seasons to last year? I would have loved to have seen your top 25. This year we can all make ours and see how we end up. With the way SC had been playing in prior years I could definitely have made a case for why they deserved that ranking. Prolly a little high but who cares. The SEC is not overrated and is the best football confernce. For many many many reasons. They will have their down years as we saw this year. If you really want to try and call it a down year. Haha You all have fun trying to justify that the SEC wouldn’t have won all those titles with a playoff system in place. We will see in the future. But the best talent comes from the south and most of it stays in the south. So I personally don’t see this trend changing all that much.

And I do believe it was one single play that basically decided the outcome of the game. The pick six. Without that one play the game would have been entirely diff, with a diff winner. OSU was the hottest team and flourished after beating Wisconsin and then finding out they are in the playoff. Urban Myer is one of, if not the best coach in college now. He can get his team ready to play against anyone, especially with a few weeks to prepare. Totally different story if OSU was in the SEC and had to play against those quality teams week in and week out. Let’s be honest most teams in most conferences would not be wanted in the SEC.

What idiot thought the SEC should have been left out of the playoff? The same person that thought a Big12 (10 teams) with no conference championship game. Haha

P. Ryan. Tell your step-sister to come back home and not neglect your afternoon delights. I cannot, even in the darkest corners of my mind, fathom how lonely the trailer park must be without her/him/it to satisfy you until football season starts.

Most of us here would rather civilly discuss football schedules and not a grammar school game of, “My step-dad can beat up your step-step-step dad”.

Oh and with that comment, you sound very civil. Its funny you actually sound exactly like Schoup. Haha you guys friends or are you posing as someone else. That last comment makes you sound even more ignorant. It’s ok, you are a hater and not much more. I understand how most people in this country are. You fit right in with the majority. But that sh*t won’t cut it in the SEC. Haha. And I’m not even a SEC fan. A fan of the ACC. I do believe the last to schools to beat the undefeated Buckeyes came from the ACC. My tigers being one of them. I bet you thought they deserved to be in the national title game then too, right? But yet Clemson ranked just inside the top 15 played the undefeated #3 Buckeyes and beat them. It’s ok, I do know that most people can not differentiate between two evenly matched teams and you are one of them. It’s very obvious with your comments. But unless you have direct experience in that field you wouldn’t know what your missing. It’s not all your fault, believe what you want to believe. However, go tigers baby. We too deep. Deshaun Watson, true sophomore, coming off a win against our rival SC with a torn ACL is already at about 80%. He’s far ahead of schedule. We will once again be one of four schools to have another ten win season and end inside the top15 for four straight seasons. Although, if our defense can pull it together again I expect much more, a Hiesman Trophy winner and spot in the playoff. Calling it this early… Do you have kahunas big enough to make any predictions? Love to hear something before the fact….

Payrick please. Given who South Carolina lost entering the season, no they shouldn’t have. Saying otherwise is foolish. The SEC is overrated and has not been the best conference for years. I can make that argument all day long, problem is you won’t listen, which is fine, your opinion means little as it is literally ESPN verbatim. Simply winning the BCS title game doesn’t mean you’re the best. And I don’t need to have “fun justifying that The SEC wouldn’t have won all those titles without the playoff system in place”. Only a moron would think that they would have with it. Nobody knows for sure but pure and simple logic says they wouldn’t have. Just go through the history of the BCS. Literally half of the seasons had a controversy over who should have got in. That includes seasons in which your precious SEC won the title. I know you’re young, but it’s all there on the Internet, just look it up. And you can believe the one single play thing all you’d like. Ohio State’s 2 turnovers inside their own 20 was bigger. If it wasn’t for that, the game wouldn’t have been close as Ohio State was better in every phase of the game and outgained Alabama by nearly 200 yards. Alabama had more turnovers, but only 1 hurt them they themselves actually benefitted more in that area. And let’s do be honest, most teams would love to p,at in the SEC, lower academic standards which helps to get better recruits, guaranteed to play an FCS opponent, no non-conference road games and will have either Kentucky or Vanderbilt on the schedule yearly. Missouri has been to the SEC title game twice while basically beating nobody, hell Georgia got there just a few years ago and didn’t beat a single team all season that finished better than 6-6. But keep living in that fantasy world, eventually someone will believe you.

Personally, I want to see more of these SEC vs. FBS match ups.

Bama vs. Charleston Southern
Arky vs. Tenn Martin
Auburn vs. Jacksonville State
Georgia vs. Southern
Kentucky vs. Eastern Kentucky
LSU vs. McNeese State
Miss. State vs. Northwestern State
Mizzou vs. Southeast Mizzou State
Ole Miss vs. Tenn. Martin (Not a Missprint)
South Carolina vs. The Citadel
Tennessee vs. Western Carolina
Texas A&M vs Western Carolina (Not a Missprint, or Incarnate Wood, yet)
Vandy vs. Austin Peay

Florida is the only SEC school without a FBS school on its schedule.

Hoo…….Ray

I would love to hear why they shouldn’t play any FCS schools and why it would be better for college football as a whole. How would you be able to calibrate a team like Georgia Southern, who for many years while in the Southern Conference, was probably better than a decent amount of FBS schools? I know it doesn’t always happen this way but sh*t GSUs first year in the league they go 9-3 and come close, although it was early in the season, to beating a legit Georgia Tech team. I would have loved to see one of the lower Pac12 bowl eligible teams play GSU, since we who know football, know how they play defense in the Pac12, practically nonexistent.
I personally think it is good for college football to play one FCS school a year. Especially for an in-state game. It’s good for the players on both sides. The FCS schools get to play a top notch program and experience something entirely diff from what they are accustom to. It’s also good for the backups on FBS to get some much deserved playing time. I sure am glad they aren’t there to please your personal preferences. This would be a thirty team league and a joke just like the NFL with the route you want to take.

Well for one, there is no financial benefit and in most cases no competitive benefit. But using Georgia Southern is a bad analogy as they run a type of offense that is rarely seen. It’s why they beat Florida just 2 years ago and did so without completing a pass. Doesn’t need to be a lower level Pac-12 school when in the conference that supposedly knows how to play defense can’t stop the triple option and doesn’t have the offensive firepower to answer to augment the problem and Florida at the moment is considered a lower level team. The triple option is tricky, stop it and you dominate that team, don’t and you have either an upset or a near upset like when Navy lost on a late TD to a top 15 South Carolina team back in 2011

Major conferences like the SEC shouldn’t be ridiculed for playing FCS and low-level G5 teams because they need the payout, however, when they don’t play a single P5 opponent or simply just 1 in a neutral site game that is a bottom tier P5 it’s hard not to question the strength of the SEC. Hands down it’s a really tough football conference and more often than not deserved the national title but the BCS was a bad joke. 2 teams!? Really? In years that the #1 and #2 spots were SEC teams they could of lost to a 3 and/or 4 seed team if the playoff system had been implemented, just look at this past season. Now of course that’s just speculation because it happened the way it happened and there is no changing it now. The reason why a lot of people are saying the SEC is overrated is for the simple fact that it’s true, there’s always an SEC team ranked higher than it should be especially in the preseason. For the record the preseason rankings are a bad joke too. We also see that their rankings are highly inflated when so many of their teams are ranked higher than the average then the one who wins the game is declared the #1 team in the nation for beating the #3 as well as the #5, #9, and #15 when those teams weren’t even deserving of those rankings in the first place, it’s all very misleading. Another case in point of it being inflated is when you have several teams at 4-0 in OOC play but they haven’t played anyone truly note worthy, no offense to those other programs. Neutral site games are simply a money making scheme for the likes of Alabama, “Let’s make the rich richer!” it’s degrading to the game because now you have 7 home games, a neutral site game, and just 4 road games that all in conference and usually within the same region not to far from home, how convenient. Tough OOC road games make good team’s great! It tests their metal by making them rise up to the challenge when in a hostile environment miles and miles from home. Okay it can also hurt you but hey risk rewards my friends, you don’t gain anything by playing it safe all the time unless you’re the SEC apparently. One more thing, I don’t want to here “Oh well we play in the toughest conference against the toughest teams week in and week out blah blah blah blah blah…” that’s all an excuse, not all SEC teams are the likes of Alabama, LSU, Georgia , and Auburn in standing at least not on a consistent level and even these teams have their struggles. No one is invincible.

I respect your opinion on this but when you say ” there’s always an SEC team ranked higher than it should be especially in the preseason” you can say this about any conference, there are always teams that are ranked higher then they should be & there are teams that are not ranked that float into the top 10 at the end of the year. Whether people like preseason polls or not, they are here to stay. That’s what gets people in the conversation of college football. People bashed the system we had before the BCS, then people bashed the BCS & now people are bashing the new system, no one will ever be happy. There is more that goes into a neutral site game then just the money. You say the “Let’s make the rich richer” of course, colleges make a lot of money but they also dish-out a lot of money too. SEC is not the only teams playing in these neutral site games & they are all not close to home. You will also see more home/n/home in the future from SEC teams traveling to the West Coast, Midwest & Northeast. It all balances out in the end.

You still thinking of me Striker. Whats even more funny is how long you guys will talk about the past even with this article coming out about how two Sec teams are scheduling as good a program as they can. Is there a better program that the Sec could be playing? And who’s your team Jack?

The matchups against fcs(1aa) games basically serve as an off week for teams. Nothing wrong with that. I will say FBS teams should play instate fcs teams when possible, or play close by interstate fcs teams. Tennessee vs Western Carolina, Knoxville is just on the other side of the mountains from Cullohoee, NC. I know I misspelled that but oh well. Auburn vs Alabama a&m, Auburn vs JSU good to keep money in-state. JSU aint that bad by the way, ask Old Piss about that. South Carolina, Clemson, Virginia, and Va.Tech do good by playing in-state fcs programs. I will say I hate seeing fbs teams playing more than one fcs team though. A lot of times its because an fbs team pulled out of contract and there wasn’t another fbs team available, but there are a couple ACC teams that have a bad tendency of doing that. Alabama should play JSU or Samford instead of Charleston Southern or Western Carolina. As an Auburn fan would love to see home and home against the service academies. West Point in Fall I heard is awesome. War Eagle!

FSU crushed bama in 2008. Is the writer smoking crack. At least look up the damm schedules before you wrote the false article! Gees o mighty.

I can’t wait till FSU plays schedules Auburn!! Cause then I can make a really really SWEET bet with my good friend Alicia from California on the winner!! . and if FSU wins I might finally get to SEE EM and find out what all the fuss has been about all these years!! Cause there’s been a fuss no doubt. WooooHoooo. Go Noles. Roll em up them Tigers

John Vegas, that game was in 2007. and you could have saved him for not doing his homework! And the score was 21 to 14. That is not a crushing. it was Sanin’s first year. Alabama would crush Florida State now.

correction that should read ” and you criticized the author for not doing his homework!” you do your homework. Damn microphone.