The Indiana Hoosiers have added the Eastern Illinois Panthers to their 2019 football schedule, FBSchedules.com has learned.
Indiana will host Eastern Illinois at Memorial Stadium in Bloomington on Sept. 7, 2019. The game will be the first-ever meeting between the two schools on the gridiron.
The Hoosiers will pay the Panthers a $375,000 guarantee for the game, according to a copy of the contract obtained from Indiana University by FBSchedules.com via a state public records request.
Eastern Illinois is a member of the Ohio Valley Conference in the Football Championship Subdivision (FCS). The Panthers finished the 2017 season 6-5 overall and 5-3 in OVC play.
EIU is the second FCS opponent added to Indiana’s future schedules since the Big Ten relaxed their policy on strength of schedule. The Hoosiers previously announced the addition of games against Indiana State in 2025 and 2027.
Indiana’s 2019 football schedule was previously complete with three non-conference games: at Ball State on Aug. 31 (in Indianapolis), vs. Western Kentucky on Sept. 7, and vs. UConn on Sept. 21.
The Eastern Illinois game took the place of the Western Kentucky game, but it’s not immediately clear if the WKU game will be the one moved to another season.
In Big Ten action in 2019, Indiana is scheduled to host Ohio State, Rutgers, Northwestern, and Michigan and travel to Michigan State, Maryland, Nebraska, Penn State, and Purdue.
Update (3/6/2018)
Indiana’s home game vs. WKU in 2019 has been pushed back to Sept. 17, 2022.
Future Indiana Football Schedules
Didn’t the Big Ten all agree to stop scheduling FCS schools?
It was mentioned right there in the article.
Yes but of course that did not last, they changed it.
If the BIG has four conference home games from a nine game schedule, they can add a FCS.
Moreover, the B1G changed another scheduling rule, no longer mandating its programs schedule a P5 OOC game.
Rather, Fresno St, USF, Conn, Cincin, BYU, Boise St and other G5 programs are now considered P5 by the B1G.
And now various B1G programs are cancelling games playing havoc on the schedule of other programs. Shame.
They didn’t change the rule on P5 teams, they just grant an exception for certain ones.