I know that most of you are only half serious or just wishful thinking that Alabama would visit the Joan. But it got me to thinking, when do they ever leave Alabama for a non-SEC game and the answer is almost never. They have played @Penn St. in recent history but the last time they visited a non traditional power school was when they went to Duke in 2008 I believe. When do you think was the last time they visited a non-power conference school on the road? If you guessed Tulane in 1992 then you would be right. And I'm willing to bet that out of the 60 or 80 thousand people there that only about 20k were there for Tulane and that is probably being generous. That is the only reason they would schedule such a game.
Fact is we are lucky to have Purdue, Navy, and Louisville visiting the Joan in the future. It is going to be very hard to get mid to lower level power 5 conference teams to schedule us now that we are back on an upswing. Sure, Ohio State, Wisconsin, Miami, and others like them won't mind playing us because they are good enough to win, but won't ever come to Huntington. But the Northwesterns, Miss. St., Indianas, Wake Forests, etc will not play us home-home while they think we are going to be good.