Late last month, the Mississippi State Bulldogs quietly rolled out a substantial batch of future football scheduling updates on their official athletics website. The revisions included the trimming of previously announced series with Memphis, Southern Miss, Troy, and Tulane, along with the addition of new matchups against Louisiana Tech and Chattanooga.
FBSchedules.com obtained copies of the amended contracts from Mississippi State University. The updated details are as follows:
Memphis Tigers
Mississippi State had originally been scheduled to visit Memphis in 2028 and host the Tigers in 2029. That home‑and‑home has now been reduced to a single contest in Starkville on September 16, 2034. MSU will pay Memphis a $1 million guarantee for the game.
Southern Miss Golden Eagles
The Bulldogs and Golden Eagles were previously set to begin a home‑and‑home series in 2030 in Hattiesburg, followed by a return trip to Starkville in 2031. That arrangement has been replaced with a single game at Davis Wade Stadium on September 15, 2029. Southern Miss will receive a $1.3 million guarantee.
Troy Trojans
Mississippi State and Troy had agreed to a home‑and‑home series for 2026 (Starkville) and 2027 (Troy, Ala.), but the SEC’s shift to a nine‑game conference schedule prompted a revision. The two‑game series has been consolidated into one matchup at Mississippi State on September 14, 2030, with Troy earning a $1.25 million guarantee.
Tulane Green Wave
MSU has also reworked its future series with Tulane. The Bulldogs were slated to host the Green Wave in 2030 and travel to New Orleans in 2032. The 2030 game has been canceled, and instead of a road trip in 2032, Mississippi State will now host Tulane on September 11, 2032. Tulane will receive a $1 million guarantee.
Louisiana Tech Bulldogs
Mississippi State will host Louisiana Tech at Davis Wade Stadium in Starkville, on September 16, 2028. Mississippi State will pay LA Tech a $1.1 million guarantee for playing the game.
Chattanooga Mocs
Mississippi State, already scheduled to host Chattanooga in 2027, has added a second future contest against the Mocs on August 27, 2033. The Bulldogs will pay guarantees of $550,000 for the 2027 game and $575,000 for the 2033 matchup.
If its not power 4, we are not gonna to play you at your house. You scheduled all of these home and homes, but we will use the excuse that we are playing 9 game conference schedule now so we will only play group of 6 teams at home. I should not be surprised!
Yes, and this one is more over-the-top than some others.
Mississippi State is only P4 because of history and geography. They are much more like Tulane, Memphis, and even Southern Miss than Texas, Alabama and Georgia.
These are to some extent geographic rivals. Mississippi State has Tulane more often than they’ve played 11 SEC teams, Memphis more often than they’ve played 7 SEC teams, and Southern Miss more often than they’ve played 5 SEC teams.
They are already living of the stipend they are getting from the upper half of the SEC. At least honor your contracts and keep the games against teams you’ve played 125 times before.
Jeff: Yes, that’s pretty much it.
If I was a season ticket holder at any of the schools who gave up home dates for money,I would get a refund the second the ticket office was open. You paid to see to Mississippi State visit your school and compete in front of home crowd.
And the same goes for the bigger schools…….I am not paying hundreds of dollars to see you cancel a quality SEC/Big12 school only to schedule Chattanooga. Until season ticket holders and fans in general start staying from these kind of games,nothing will change.
I don’t see how you cancelling season tickets would help any of those schools. MSSU would have told those schools “if you don’t amend the contract, we’ll just drop all your games”. Then those schools would have to negotiate a buy game with someone else anyway on relatively short notice (or a HaH with another G5 school; you still wouldn’t get to see an opponent the caliber of MSSU on your home field).
Home football games are needed for the power schools to stay competitive.
The power teams are going to want as many home games as they can get from this point on and the non-power teams will need every buy-game they can get.
State is ZERO future OOC away games on the schedule as they attempt to become bowl eligible every year. I’m ok if they want to pay G6 teams to come play at their place. I’m not ok that one for their games every year is against an FCS team. If you have to schedule all home OOC games, at least schedule an FBS team please!