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Who exactly sets the non conference schedule? Is it the AD? If say Miami wanted to play Northwestern, is it Miami's AD that would contact Northwestern's AD to set up a game? I think this is the case, but I am having a hard time finding a source to confirm it.

The head coaches probably contact each other first, and then hand it off to the AD's to hammer out the details.

Sometimes it's set up years in advance. Unfortunately, some years are harder to schedule than others. The AFCA has a page at which coaches and ADs can shop for games. You post your open dates and your preferences for home or away. This happens at many levels of football, but many fans don't know about it.

http://www.afca.com/article/article.php?id=18

The first one at the time I accessed it tonight is Sam looking for a FBS-guarantee game on either of two dates for next season. Their associate AD is the POC for scheduling. Other schools route that through the AD or the head coach. For example, further down, Lehigh (HC is the POC) is looking for games for '13 and '14. There's a box you can use to limit the search by level.

TV networks (mainly ESPN) have a say as well. We were scheduled to play at Georgia Tech opening week, but ESPN came calling, asking them to move up their game with VT for TV purposes. GT bought us out, leaving us with the option of either finding an opponent for an extra home game or looking for another guarantee game. As fate would have it, Missouri moved to the SEC, leaving them with some holes in their schedule. While a 6th home game would have been nice, the extra guarantee check will come in handy.