Kent State football's profitable, but potentially disastrous month opens Saturday in Washington
Kent State’s football program will pick up the first of three deep seven-figure September paychecks this weekend by visiting the University of Washington for its 2022 season opener on Saturday.
The Golden Flashes will be paid a national-high $5.2 million in guarantee money for playing against the Huskies of the Pac-12 on Saturday in Seattle ($1.8 million), then visiting perennial national powerhouse Oklahoma on Sept. 10 ($1.5 million) and travelling to defending national champion Georgia on Sept. 24 ($1.9 million).
This year’s non-conference schedule, compiled by former Kent State Director of Athletics Joel Nielsen and deputy athletic director Casey Cegles before they departed in 2021, is easily toughest in the nation and the most difficult one Kent State has ever faced.
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Flashes fifth-year head coach Sean Lewis, whose team was picked to finish second in the MAC's East Division, is taking the September meat grinder in stride.
“Externally it’s holy cow coach, there are only five teams in the country that have won 65 games over the past five years, and you’ve got to play two of them this September," said Lewis. "I stay very neutral in my thinking about it all. It’s not good, it’s not bad, it’s OK. As we go through it, we’re either going to win or we’re going to learn. Let’s lean into the work and let’s go do it. We’ll get some real high-level stress really early on in the season, and we’ll know who we are, and that’s great.”
Still, the potential for disaster in September looms. Due to a preseason camp injury, KSU will enter the 2022 season with a true freshman and a junior college transfer who just joined the program in early August as backup quarterbacks.
The Flashes have been scheduling three “money” non-conference contests each year since 2018, which has benefitted the entire athletic program by solidifying the football program’s overall financial status.
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Second-year Kent State Director of Athletics Randale Richmond has expressed his desire to “get away from that model,” if and when the athletic department can afford to do so.
The load on the football program will actually be lightened considerably next season.
Kent State will play non-conference games on the road in 2023 at UCF ($900,000 guarantee), Arkansas ($1.6 million) and Fresno State ($1.1 million). Those programs are all extremely solid – the teams combined to go 28-11 last year – but none compete for a national championship on an annual basis like the Sooners and Bulldogs squads Kent State will face this month.
However, the Flashes will pocket only $3.6 million in guarantee money next season - $1.6 million less than 2022.
In 2024, the Flashes will visit Pitt, Tennessee and Penn State. They’ve also committed to a Sept. 2026 contest at Ohio State, which will pay Kent State a $1.9 million guarantee.
This article originally appeared on Record-Courier: College football guarantee-game paydays await Kent State
