BOULDER — Start booking your plane tickets.

The Pac-12 announced its 2022 football schedule on Thursday, including the schedule for the Colorado Buffaloes. The non-conference games have been scheduled for years, but the conference schedule was unknown prior to the announcement.

Here’s what the Buffs will face next fall:

9/2 (Fri.) vs. TCU
9/10 @ Air Force
9/17 @ Minnesota
9/24 vs. UCLA
10/1 @ Arizona
BYE
10/15 vs. Cal (Family Weekend)
10/22 @ Oregon St
10/29 vs. Arizona St (Homecoming)
11/5 vs. Oregon
11/11 (Fri.) @ USC
11/19 @ Washington
11/26 vs. Utah

Another Friday night opener

For the second-consecutive season, Colorado will open the season on a Friday night.

The benefits of playing the opener a day early are plenty; less competition for TV slots, the ability to start camp a day early, etc. This time around, though, there’s one huge reason to play the game on Friday instead of on Saturday…

Colorado will get an extra day to prepare for Air Force.

The Air Force triple-option offense is no fun to defend. It’s unlike any other offense current Buffaloes will face in the rest of their time in Boulder, and it’s probably unlike any other offense most of them have faced in their careers.

The Falcons force defenses to play especially disciplined football, and pure talent, size and speed are not nearly as valuable as they are in any other game. The worst part is that the time spent preparing for Air Force doesn’t provide many lessons that will apply for the rest of the season.

Colorado played Air Force for the first time in 45 years back in 2019, in the first half of a home-and-home series. The Buffaloes lost in overtime, and it stung.

The extra day preparing for the triple-option could prove to be valuable.

Plus, who could complain about the start of Buffs season starting a day early?

The bye comes early

Every team in the Pac-12 will have a bye sometime between Week 5 and Week 8, except for Stanford which has Week 2 off so that it can play Notre Dame later in the season.

Colorado, for the second-consecutive season, is in the first block of byes.

There are, of course, pros and cons to having an early bye. With such a young team, it might not hurt to have a week off after a fairly challenging non-conference slate. On the flip side, the seven-game, week-in, week-out stretch to close the year could be a slog… kind of like it was in 2021.

But let’s not linger on that.

The schedule is backloaded

Colorado will take on its toughest competition in the final month or so of the season.

The Buffs have games scheduled against Oregon, USC, Utah and Washington in November. Oregon and Utah played in the Pac-12 title game this season. USC picked up Lincoln Riley in the best coaching hire of the offseason. Plus, the Buffs have never beaten the trojans. Washington was a mess last season, but its typically one of the top programs in the Pac-12, and the recent coaching change could be what’s needed to unlock some of the Huskies’ talent.

Before hitting this final four-game stretch, the Buffs will host Arizona State, maybe the next-most talented team in the Pac-12.

The schedule down the stretch is brutal, but that’s preferable to playing some of the toughest divisional games of the season in the opening weeks of conference play, as was the case in 2021.

That Friday night game against USC is worth noting, too. One less day of prep and a Pac-12 After Dark matchup could be what’s needed for CU to get its first win against the Trojans.