Alabama working on football schedule options

TUSCALOOSA | University of Alabama Director of Athletics Mal Moore confirmed Saturday that UA has agreed to Georgia Tech's request to postpone a home-and-home football series, and said that Alabama is “working busily” on options for the 2012, 2013 and 2014 seasons.

“Their athletic director (Dan Radakovich) contacted me and said they wanted to postpone the series and we were willing to work with them,” Moore said. “We do want to resume the series at some point in the future, but we did not work out any dates at this time.”

Alabama has been searching for a non-conference game for its 2012 season and now has what Moore says are “a lot of options” with the openings in 2013 and '14.

“We are looking at opponents for a home-and-home series, and we are also looking at the possibilities as far as neutral sites,” Moore said. “We have had a lot of success with those games, not only in Atlanta but also in Jacksonville (against Florida State in 2007.) We have had interest from a lot of cities about the possibility of playing neutral-site games.” Moore did not mention any specific cities, although a return to the Chik-Fil-A Classic, the season-opening event in Atlanta , at least once over the course of the four years beginning in 2011 seems like a strong possibility. The 2012 Chik-Fil-A game between Tennessee and North Carolina State is set, but Alabama might be interested in the game in 2013 or 2014. The 2011 game – which has not been finalized yet -- might also be a possibility, although with a road game against Penn State on the schedule it would reduce the home Bryant-Denny Stadium schedule to just six home games in that year.

Alabama has already announced a non-conference home game against Georgia Southern for November, 2011.

Officials in Dallas have also been active in pursuit of a game involving Alabama at Cowboys Stadium. Moore confirmed the interest from Dallas and said “there are other cities as well,” although he did not list them.

Moore, speaking prior to an event on campus, said that any neutral-site game or home-and-home series would have to involve “a quality opponent.”

Alabama has a home-and-home series against Michigan State on its 2016-2017 schedule.

Reach Cecil Hurt at cecil.hurt@tuscaloosanews.com or at 205-722-0225.