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UK vs. Eastern Michigan preview
Check below all week for coverage of the University of Kentucky football team leading up to its game against Eastern Michigan on Saturday.
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Kentucky football fans hoping to see the Wildcats enter into a series with another Power Five program other than Louisville won’t get a chance to see that happen for at least six years.
UK’s regular-season slate of four non-conference opponents is set through 2024, based on open-records information obtained by FBSchedules.com, a site that specializes in college football schedules. UK’s four-game non-conference schedule for the 2026 season is also complete.
Southeastern Conference play currently consists of eight games for each school in the league. In all six of those seasons, Louisville is the only non-conference team from a Power Five league that the Wildcats will play unless circumstances were to lead to a contract buyout. Based on known agreements, the earliest year that UK could schedule a game against a non-SEC school from a Power Five conference — the ACC, Big Ten, Big 12 or Pac-12 — is 2025.
FBSchedules.com reported Thursday that UK and U of L have agreed to a five-year extension of their annual series that takes the Governor’s Cup all the way through 2027. The extension keeps the game as the last contest played by each school in the regular season, and maintains alternating sites between the campuses. Kentucky took a 16-15 lead in the series with its 56-10 win in Louisville last year.
Every season from 2020-2024 as well as the 2026 schedule includes a game against an opponent from the NCAA Football Championship Subdivision, formerly Division I-AA. FCS schools provide fewer full scholarships to their players.
Kentucky’s FCS opponents in those years are: Eastern Illinois (2020), Chattanooga (2021), Youngstown State (2022), Eastern Kentucky (2023), Murray State (2024) and Youngstown State (2026). The Wildcats this season will pay $500,000 to FCS visitor Tennessee-Martin.
UK Director of Athletics Mitch Barnhart last month said FCS programs are important for maintaining opportunities in college football.
“We’ve gotta keep those folks alive. Those folks can only stay alive if they have a game or two on the schedule (where) they can get some money from an FBS school that allows them to be able to keep their program strong,” Barnhart said. “It’s really important to do that. The game of college football’s not in trouble, but it needs some help. We’ve gotta make sure that we prop it up in the right way, and propping it up in the right way means scheduling some of these FCS schools and making sure that they have a chance to keep their programs viable, because that creates opportunity and keeps people excited about the game of football.”
Non-conference games against Toledo are on the schedule for 2025, 2027 and 2028. The 2027 date is scheduled to take place at Toledo.
Most of UK’s non-conference games against Football Bowl Subdivision opponents in the next half-decade will come against teams from the Mid-American Conference. Outside of Louisville, Louisiana-Monroe (Sun Belt), New Mexico State (independent) and South Alabama (Sun Belt) are the only non-MAC, non-FCS schools Kentucky plays through 2026. ULM and New Mexico State visit Lexington in 2021; South Alabama is on the schedule for 2026.
“I think we’re in a good spot,” Barnhart said in August. “Our scheduling philosophy has worked out pretty well.”
