Beavers add to future football schedules

Oregon State announced today the scheduling of five future football games, one of the final public acts of departing Athletics Director Bob DeCarolis' tenure.

The most notable news is a home-and-home series with the Oklahoma State Cowboys, which, unless they encounter each other in a bowl game between now and then, will be the first time that the two orange & black clad OSUs will meet in football, although they've met in both basketball and baseball in the last nine months.  The first game will be in Corvallis, and will be the kickoff game to the 2019 season on August 31.  The second game will be in Stillwater on September 5, 2020, also likely the kickoff to the season, when the Beavers venture into Cowboy country.

It will be the first visit to Reser by a Big XII team in 21 years, since Baylor in 1998.

In lesser scheduling news, the Beavers also announced the scheduling of three BCS Big Sky schools to fill out their home schedules.  Idaho State will visit Reser in 2016, Portland State in 2017, and Southern Utah in 2018.   Hopefully, these games end up being the dial-a-win games they are intended to be.

It will be the second meeting ever between the Beavers and Bengals, and the first meeting with the Thunderbirds.

That leaves upcoming non-conference schedules as such:

2015

Sept 4 - Weber State

Sept 12 - at Michigan

Sept 19 - San Jose State

2016

Sept 1 - at Minnesota

Sept 17 - Idaho State

Sept 24 - Boise State

2017

Sept 2 - Portland State

Sept 9 - Minnesota

Sept 16 - Nevada

2018

Sept 1 - at Ohio State

Sept 8 - Southern Utah

Sept 15 - at Nevada

2019 (1-2 games yet to schedule)

Aug 31 - Oklahoma State

Sept 7 - at Hawaii

2020 (1 game yet to schedule)

Sept 5 - at Oklahoma State

Sept 19 - at San Jose State

2021 (2 games to schedule)

Sept 11 - Hawaii

2022 (2 games to schedule)

Sept 3 - Boise State

2023 (2 games to schedule)

Sept 2 - at Boise State

Thoughts:

2016 and 2017 are both slated to have seven home games right now.  All three non-conference games in 2017 are scheduled to be at home. It's particularly notable in 2017, being a year with the Civil War on the road, which means only 4 home Pac-12 Conference contests.

I'm excited to see the upcoming series against Minnesota and Oklahoma State.  It's good to see OSU scheduling Power 5 conference teams for home and home games, as opposed to the non-returned visits to Ohio State and Michigan.  I can't get very excited about a season when we have only one non-conference home game and it's an FCS foe (2018, probably 2020).

Oregon State will now play another OSU in three consecutive seasons.

I'll also be curious to see if the new AD/coach combination decides to take advantage of the Hawaii exception in order to schedule 13 games in 2019.  I do hope so.

I've been looking for an excuse to cross a few states in the lower midwest off my list, maybe the game in Stillwater will give me the needed incentive to get to that part of the country in 2020.

What do you think about these five additional games?  Chime in below, and vote in the poll if you have an opinion.