From 2025 through 2029, the University of Alabama will play 10 football games against Power 5 competition.
UA made that so by adding a home-and-home series against Ohio State for 2027 and 2028, it announced on Thursday. It will play at Ohio State in 2027, the same year it concludes a home-and-home series with West Virginia by hosting the Mountaineers, and host the Buckeyes in 2028 while they start a home-and-home with Notre Dame in South Bend.
UA will host Wisconsin and go to Florida State in 2025, while hosting Florida State and traveling to West Virginia in 2026. In the ensuing decade, UA will again have a 10 Power 5 game schedule (assuming the SEC stays with its eight-game schedule model) when it holds home-and-homes with Arizona and Oklahoma in 2032 and 2033.
“This series with Ohio State adds another outstanding non-conference opponent to our future football schedules,” Alabama Director of Athletics Greg Byrne said in a statement. “We are thrilled at the progress we’ve made in securing such quality home-and-homes that will provide tremendous opportunities for our team and an exciting game day atmosphere for our fans in the coming years.”
UA coach Nick Saban has been vocal about his desire to add more Power 5 competition to UA’s future schedules.
“I can promise you that we want to play more games against Power 5 team and should play more games against Power 5 teams, all of us,” Saban said in August. “If we don’t, fans are going to quit coming, and I can’t say I blame them.”
The series adds to UA’s long list of future home-and-home series against some of the biggest brands in college football, such as Texas in 2022-23, Florida State in 2025-26, Notre Dame in 2028-29, Oklahoma in 2032-33 and Virginia Tech in 2034-35.
Reach Brett Hudson at 205-722-0196 or bhudson@tuscaloosanews.com or via Twitter, @Brett_Hudson
