Easiest SEC permanent opponent draws - T-14: Arkansas, A&M
The first of three pairs of teams with the exact same three opponents— something of an odd artifact of this new scheduling philosophy— both the Aggies and Hogs also make this first tier of permanent opponent difficulty.
A&M and Arkansas may not play each other annually, but they’ll have a lot of data points to compare. They both face off with Missouri, Texas, and LSU as their three permanent opponents, which maybe makes more sense for Arkansas than the Aggies— Mizzou is more of a rival to the Hogs than the Ags.
LSU is a team that is perennially talented, and boasts one of the toughest home environments in the nation. That won’t be an easy game by any stretch of the imagination, but at least in the Aggies’ case, they have something good going at home against the Tigers.
The Texas rivalry is historic for both programs, but obviously means a little more for the Ags than the Hogs. Regardless, I expected this one to be on both slates.
This concludes the top tier for schedule difficulty, as there’s a significant drop-off before the next team. These sets of permanent opponents are about one-and-a-half standard deviations above the mean for schedule difficulty, and the next one is right smack dab at one.