West Virginia is going to pound Delaware State in 2017. I say that with a certainty I would not assign to Liberty last season and will not assign Youngstown State this season. But the Hornets have been a below-average FCS program for a while and don’t figure to be all the way out of the muck by next fall.

As such, that’s the blemish on the 2017 schedule, and though you may not like to see WVU playing FCS teams, you might want to get used to seeing one every so often.

The Mountaineers play BYU and Missouri this year and two Power 5 opponents every year from 2018-24 — and in 2017, the exception year, WVU plays Virginia Tech and cruiserweight East Carolina — plus nine Big 12 teams.

There’s one opening every season from 2018-24, and there just have to be some FCS games in there. I believe that. The FCS and neutral-site games. They’re on the horizon, because both make sense. There’s not much logistical room for some 2-for-1 series with a Group of 5 team — I mean, they could be spread out over, like, eight years, but still…why? — and the Mountaineers have long been interested in not getting tied up in said arrangements (see: Marshall, ECU). You need one-off games, and FCS and neutral-site affairs do just that.

Don’t forget, there’s a 13th game looming, and the sole purpose of that conference title game is to give the league’s most-eligible College Football Playoff candidate an optimal catapult toward inclusion. WVU’s non-conference schedules plus the conference games plus the new title game ought to be enough, if navigated successfully, to get into the CFP.

I’d say the same for everyone who’s taken scheduling as seriously as WVU, and many of the Big 12 teams have. So why should WVU, or anyone, avoid the cost-friendly FCS? Why jeopardize a CFP spot with an additional overly ambitious first, second or third game of the season? No one will be or needs to be reckless, especially when the Big 12 has been so good — or at least better — about scheduling and has no rule prohibiting FCS opponents.

And then, consider the ransoms the Group of 5 schools are requesting and being paid and ask if it really makes much sense or even much of a difference for WVU to overexert in scheduling.

A September blowout against a team from the FCS won’t hurt, least of all in the ledger, and the bank account’s voice will never be ignored. WVU paid Liberty $400,000 last season and will pay $500,000 to Youngstown State this season and Delaware State next season. You say those are boring teams that don’t matter geographically or competitively, and you want someone else like a team from, say, the MAC.

Oklahoma paid Akron $1 million for a game last season. Illinois will pay Bowling Green $1 million in 2020, and that’s $225,000 more than WVU paid the Falcons in 2011.

How about the Sun Belt? WVU paid Georgia Southern $850,000 last season. Nebraska will pay Arkansas State $1.65 million next season. How about Conference USA? Charlotte, which would make a lot of sense for the Mountaineers, made $900,000 for a game at Kentucky last season and will make $1.2 million for a game at Illinois in 2021.

How about the Mountain West? UNLV, which WVU paid $740,000 in 2010, is getting $1.5 million from Southern California in 2019. How about the AAC? Tulane will be paid $1.5 million to lose at Ohio State in 2019.

It’s a price the Mountaineers don’t need to pay, and it’s conceivable they cannot, either. In the 2014-15 athletic year, WVU football cleared $5,094,659. That includes a $3.2 million payday for playing Alabama in Atlanta’s Chick-fil-A Kickoff Game. Pretend that didn’t happen. WVU’s now down to $1,894,659 in revenue, and that’s before paying someone to fill Alabama’s spot on the schedule. Clearly, it’s in football’s best interest to schedule an FCS team for about half of what a Group of 5 team would want.