What are we waiting for?

Now that the MWC released its schedule on Monday, there's only a few loose ends to be tied up to start determining the 2010 television selections for college football. One of these is a big deal:

• The SEC technically hasn't released its schedule. Yes, virtually every team has posted their tentative schedules but Alabama has raised concerns, genuine in many cases, that half their SEC opponents will play the Tide after coming off a bye week. Don't know how successful the SEC will be in changing the schedule, but two of those games include the Iron Bowl vs. Auburn and the annual matchup with Tennessee.
• ESPN still has an open Thursday night slot on 11/18. Originally it might have been a Boise St. window, but they're the kings of Friday night. The Big East might be targeted since this is one of the few Saturdays where all eight teams play each other in conference games.
• Syracuse still has an open slot. As an Orangemen fan (I refuse to call them the singular Orange), this really ticks me off. Having to play two FCS teams in a season after rarely, if ever, playing one before Dr. Daryl Gross became AD kinda sucks. I can understand that virtually every team has one FCS on the schedule now that the game can count towards bowl eligibility, but it would be nice to find out what the schedule is.
• A few bowl tie-ins are still being finalized. The PapaJohns.com Bowl confirmed that they would swap the No. 8 and No. 9 SEC picks with the Liberty Bowl. This likely will keep the PapaJohns.com game tied to the Big East's No. 5 pick. Bowls tend to fall all over themselves to get tied in with the SEC, but it generally is good for ticket sales and even the No. 9 team is worth it.

With the SEC scheduling mess, a ton of games/opponents could change over the next few weeks. Will be interesting to see how it all shakes out.