Schurr football coach Elvin Dick was talking about the Spartans’ schedule this season, and he said “If you look at our schedule, we don’t play any powder puffs.

“We want to play teams that will get us ready for our league.”

That raises the question about whether to follow Dick’s lead and play strong opponents as warmups for league, or load the preseason schedule with stiffs to ensure a winning record that would provide a better chance of drawing an at-large berth into the postseason tournament should your team fail to earn one of the league’s automatic spots.

The latter choice does involve a risk because sometimes strength of schedule is part of the criteria used for determining potential at-large candidates.

Soft preseason schedule, or one that tests a team’s mettle from the opening kickoffl?
Which is better? And why?