The Longest Yard: A Look at How Far Every FBS College Football Team Will Travel in 2016

Every fall, the college football season fires up and gives fans an opportunity to eschew responsibility in favor of sitting on the couch every Saturday for 15 weeks. Beautiful.  With 825 games on the docket for the regular season, plus conference championships and bowls, all of our couch time comes at the expense of plenty of travel for all 128 FBS teams this season.

 

This season, I took a look at every team’s away and neutral site schedule and determined how much travel is necessary for each team. The list uses a handful of assumptions that I’ll hit on below, but the top team should be no surprise.

 

The Rainbow Warriors of Hawai’i will be the most traveled team in 2016, racking up 46,762 miles, all in the air of course, over the course of the season.  That’s enough to circle the globe– twice. On the other side of the spectrum, Auburn likely won’t step foot in an airplane during their regular season, traveling a mere 1748 miles all season.  Let’s take a look at the difference.  First here’s Hawaii’s flight plans, including starting the season in Sydney, Australia against Cal:

And now, Auburn’s short trips through the Southeast:

 

 

It’s clear to see the differences between the two, and the associated travel nightmare that the Rainbow Warriors tend to have to deal with annually. In fact, Hawaii will fly more than twice as far as the second most-traveled school in the FBS this season. That second team, surprisingly, is not Cal (who is third) with a trip to Sydney accounting for 15,000+ of their 20,000 miles this season. No, second place belongs to the mighty Minutemen of UMass, who will be playing in Gainesville, FL, Norfolk, VA, Columbia, SC, Troy, AL, Salt Lake City, UT, and Honolulu, HI, while playing all their “home” games across the state in Foxboro, a 92 mile trek. This sums up to 21,096 miles round trip.  Before we continue on with more facts, let’s take a look at my assumptions.

 

Assumptions:

• “Power Five” conference teams will fly for anything longer than around 300 miles or five hours drive.
• Non-P5 teams will fly for anything longer than around 500 miles or eight hours drive.
• Driving mileage is via Google Maps’ quickest route.
• Flying mileage is via GCMap’s direct route between the most suitable airport nearest to campus to the nearest suitable airport for the opposing team.
• Teams return home after every week, which I’m pretty sure happens as even Hawaii has two weeks between away games this season.

 

With that, there may be a few cases where a team is likely to fly below the limit (e.g. Auburn budgets X plane trips a year and the plane is available), but I think this analysis should get you generally close to what reality will end up being.  Taking a look at the conference breakdown, it’s no surprise that the Mountain West Conference takes the cake, with Hawaii dramatically raising the average distance. Below that is the Independents, who don’t receive the geographic benefits of being in a conference. Then the first Power Five conference with the Pac 12, the largest geographic spread of any major conference. At the bottom of the list, we find the SEC, with the average team traveling almost half as much as their Pac 12 counterparts. This is largely attributable to a compact footprint, even after the recent expansion added geographic outlier Texas A&M.  Here’s the full conference average:

 

Conference	Average distance
Mountain West	13308
Independent	13118
Pac 12	8471
Sun Belt	8369
Conference USA	7734
The American	7259
ACC	6188
Big 12	5549
Big East	5534
Big Ten	4465
MAC	4291
SEC	4152

 

On the individual team level, beyond the previously mentioned top three and bottom, here are some other interesting notes.

• Notre Dame will do the most travel of a “Major” team (though not Power Five, I’m pretty sure most will consider them that, even as begrudgingly as I do as a Purdue fan) that does not leave North America (Cal goes to Sydney, Boston College to Dublin).
• Unsurprisingly, Rutgers and Maryland travel the most of Big Ten teams, more than 2200 miles farther than the longest-traveling “Original” Big Ten team (Minnesota)
• Eighteen teams will be flying to all their away games this year: Hawaii, Cal, Boise State, Notre Dame, FIU, Miami, Texas State, USF, UCLA, UTEP, Oregon State, USC, FSU, Missouri, Utah, Duke, Pitt, and LSU.
• Four teams will be driving to all their away games this year: Auburn, Western Michigan, Akron, and Miami of Ohio. That’s Auburn and 25% of the MAC.
• Arkansas State will spend the most time in the bus of any team this year, riding for 3,642 miles. MTSU is second with 3,518.
• Baylor will spend the most time in the bus of any Power Five team, with 2,228 miles on the roads to and from Waco. South Carolina is second with 2,738.

 

Okay, so enough random facts, here’s the whole list so you can see where your team falls:

Travel rank	Team	Conference	Total distance	Flight distance	Driving distance
1	Hawaii	Mountain West	46782	46782	0
2	Massachusetts	Independent	21096	20544	552
3	California	Pac 12	20074	20074	0
4	Nevada	Mountain West	15082	13684	1398
5	Boise State	Mountain West	13850	13850	0
6	New Mexico	Mountain West	13490	13042	448
7	New Mexico State	Sun Belt	12780	12688	92
8	Idaho	Sun Belt	12596	11988	608
9	Boston College	ACC	12228	12168	60
10	Notre Dame	Independent	11904	11904	0
11	UNLV	Mountain West	11878	10674	1204
12	San Diego State	Mountain West	11556	10878	678
13	Navy	Independent	11128	10444	684
14	BYU	Independent	11122	10432	690
15	Rice	Conference USA	10892	9410	1482
16	Georgia Tech	ACC	10378	10234	144
17	Florida Intl	Conference USA	10376	10376	0
18	Fresno State	Mountain West	10342	9742	600
19	Army	Independent	10340	8948	1392
20	Tulsa	The American	10102	8310	1792
21	San Jose State	Mountain West	9928	8702	1226
22	Miami FL	ACC	9660	9660	0
23	Tulane	The American	9446	8750	696
24	Georgia State	Sun Belt	9264	7624	1640
25	Air Force	Mountain West	9260	8862	398
26	Rutgers	Big Ten	9152	8750	402
27	Colorado	Pac 12	8982	8924	58
28	Texas State	Sun Belt	8806	8806	0
29	South Florida	The American	8786	8786	0
30	West Virginia	Big 12	8768	8340	428
31	UCLA	Pac 12	8584	8584	0
32	Stanford	Pac 12	8450	7634	816
33	Buffalo	MAC	8372	5260	3112
34	Ga Southern	Sun Belt	8296	5460	2836
35	UTEP	Conference USA	8290	8290	0
36	North Texas	Conference USA	8172	7006	1166
37	Louisiana Tech	Conference USA	8156	6384	1772
38	Arizona State	Pac 12	7926	7722	204
39	FL Atlantic	Conference USA	7880	7712	168
40	Old Dominion	Conference USA	7866	6146	1720
41	Oregon State	Pac 12	7836	7836	0
42	Maryland	Big Ten	7774	7376	398
43	UT San Antonio	Conference USA	7700	6948	752
44	Kansas State	Big 12	7622	7006	616
45	Virginia	ACC	7450	6394	1056
46	UCF	The American	7438	6798	640
47	Troy	Sun Belt	7372	5314	2058
48	Texas	Big 12	7328	6938	390
49	Oregon	Pac 12	7286	6278	1008
50	Arkansas State	Sun Belt	7230	3588	3642
51	Appalachian State	Sun Belt	7206	4364	2842
52	Southern Miss	Conference USA	7180	6848	332
53	Connecticut	The American	7088	6918	170
54	USC	Pac 12	7048	7048	0
55	Charlotte	Conference USA	7036	5456	1580
56	Wyoming	Mountain West	7010	5894	1116
57	Florida State	ACC	6976	6976	0
58	South Alabama	Sun Belt	6666	3794	2872
59	Missouri	SEC	6664	6664	0
60	Mississippi State	SEC	6632	6272	360
61	Arizona	Pac 12	6582	6348	234
62	SMU	The American	6516	5730	786
63	Temple	The American	6516	5662	854
64	Utah	Pac 12	6496	6496	0
65	N Illinois	MAC	6386	3796	2590
66	MTSU	Conference USA	6368	2850	3518
67	Washington	Pac 12	6322	5186	1136
68	ULM	Sun Belt	6290	2904	3386
69	Louisville	ACC	6246	5850	396
70	East Carolina	The American	6216	4224	1992
71	Marshall	Conference USA	6078	5520	558
72	Houston	The American	6064	5256	808
73	Washington State	Pac 12	6060	5472	588
74	Duke	ACC	5940	5940	0
75	Colorado State	Mountain West	5928	5532	396
76	Pittsburgh	ACC	5828	5828	0
77	Minnesota	Big Ten	5578	5042	536
78	Texas A&M	SEC	5576	5200	376
79	ULL	Sun Belt	5548	4146	1402
80	Cincinnati	Big East	5534	5172	362
81	Texas Tech	Big 12	5446	4790	656
82	Kansas	Big 12	5350	4516	834
83	LSU	SEC	5236	5236	0
84	Toledo	MAC	5216	4048	1168
85	Oklahoma	Big 12	5128	4378	750
86	Ball State	MAC	5090	2904	2186
87	Baylor	Big 12	5050	2228	2822
88	Indiana	Big Ten	5044	4096	948
89	Nebraska	Big Ten	4902	4298	604
90	North Carolina	ACC	4854	4446	408
91	Iowa	Big Ten	4816	3720	1096
92	Iowa State	Big 12	4728	3934	794
93	Utah State	Mountain West	4584	2160	2424
94	C Michigan	MAC	4572	2674	1898
95	WKU	Conference USA	4554	2574	1980
96	Syracuse	ACC	4522	3476	1046
97	Memphis	The American	4416	1584	2832
98	Florida	SEC	4400	3564	836
99	Ohio State	Big Ten	4234	3710	524
100	Ohio	MAC	4030	1408	2622
101	Arkansas	SEC	3932	2960	972
102	Mississippi	SEC	3862	3348	514
103	Georgia	SEC	3768	3298	470
104	Illinois	Big Ten	3722	2902	820
105	TCU	Big 12	3662	3042	620
106	South Carolina	SEC	3636	898	2738
107	Clemson	ACC	3562	2436	1126
108	Kent State	MAC	3430	1294	2136
109	Purdue	Big Ten	3420	3004	416
110	Alabama	SEC	3400	3086	314
111	E Michigan	MAC	3354	2038	1316
112	Virginia Tech	ACC	3304	2242	1062
113	Kentucky	SEC	3296	2796	500
114	Michigan State	Big Ten	3268	1676	1592
115	Penn State	Big Ten	3268	2536	732
116	Tennessee	SEC	3192	1610	1582
117	Wake Forest	ACC	2974	2608	366
118	Miami OH	MAC	2898	0	2898
119	Akron	MAC	2820	0	2820
120	Vanderbilt	SEC	2782	1726	1056
121	NC State	ACC	2708	1894	814
122	Bowling Green	MAC	2706	1106	1600
123	W Michigan	MAC	2612	0	2612
124	Wisconsin	Big Ten	2540	1086	1454
125	Northwestern	Big Ten	2488	1258	1230
126	Oklahoma State	Big 12	2404	632	1772
127	Michigan	Big Ten	2308	1794	514
128	Auburn	SEC	1748	0	1748