What hurts us for our OOC schedule and the possibility of playing different Big 5 opponents is that UL is OOC. Michigan/Ohio State, Oregon State/Oregon, Baylor/TCU, Oklahoma/Oklahoma State, Alabama/Auburn, Ole Miss/Mississippi State, etc. have their big rivalry game built in conference. This allows many of those schools to do a home and home with a different school every 2 years. I love how Ohio State and Oregon set up 2 year deals with different teams every couple years. If UL wasn't on our schedule, we could do that. I would love to do a home and home with programs like West Virginia, NC State, Pitt, Virginia, Northwestern, Pitt, Purdue, Rutgers, etc. Games that we have a chance of winning, but also a little bit of excitement in getting a different Power 5 team in.
I know this won't happen because we play UL every year OOC, but fun to think about.