08/09 schedule is out. and it's not pretty

the first thing that struck me when looking at the new schedule is the lack of easily winnable games. yes, Central Arkansas finished last in the Southland Conference last year, and yes, UMKC, SMU and UC Riverside were all terrible. but road trips to Stanford and Butler have the potential to be monster defeats, and we all know that NU is just 2-9 in the ACC/Big Ten Challenge. even TAMU-CC made the dance in 2007 and played Wisconsin very tough as a 15 seed. the Brown game has no buzz now that Craig Robinson has left, but this is still a road game against an opponent that made it to the postseason last year. and remember that the Bears picked up a win in Welsh-Ryan last November.

one of the things that has allowed Carmody's teams to hover around .500 has been the ability to rack up wins against small schools in December. that way, when we go 6-10 in the conference (in a good year) we can still cross our fingers for the NIT. with this year's schedule, i'd be surprised if NU owns a winning record heading into 2009.

for those of you without the BTN, you will only have to suffer through four games on national TV. there is the ACC Challenge game at home vs. FSU; a weird pre-January conference opener in State College @ noon on New Year's Eve; a Thursday night home game in January vs. Purdue (who figures to be the best team in the league); and another home game vs. the Illini in February. the fact that this team gets three home games on national TV is further proof of the number of NU/Medill alums working for the WorldWideLeader. seriously, that's the only possible explanation.