Auburn to play Arkansas State in 2016, keep Idaho in 2015

• Auburn leads all-time series with Arkansas State 3-0%2C will play Red Wolves in 2016
• Idaho%27s bowl eligibility is %27not a factor%27 in staying on schedule
• Jacobs working on power conference opponent for 2016

AUBURN -- Arkansas State will be returning to the Plains in 2016.

A contract for the game between the Tigers and the Red Wolves is expected to be completed as soon as this weekend.

"We are (in discussions)," Auburn athletic director Jay Jacobs said Wednesday. "I think it'll be formalized by the end of the week."

Last week, Arkansas State athletics director Terry Mohajirtold AStateNation.com the Red Wolves were coming to Auburn in 2016.

Auburn defeated Arkansas State 38-9 last season as coach Gus Malzahn took on his former team, which he led to a 9-3 record and Sun Belt conference title in 2012.

The teams have met three times with Auburn winning each meeting.

Once official, ASU will be the first non-conference opponent on Auburn's schedule past 2015. Jacobs said a second non-conference game in 2016, against a power conference opponent, will be announced in the near future as well.

"We are (in negotiations for games in 2016)," Jacobs said. "I can't tell you who the team is, but we're talking to a BCS (conference) team right now. ... We're working on teams for '16 and moving forward."

Last month the SEC elected to keep an eight-game conference schedule, with the current 6-1-1 format, and require teams to play at least one non-conference game against a team from one of the five other major conferences or Notre Dame beginning in 2016. Most of the SEC's 14 teams, including Auburn, already had such non-conference games scheduled in the next two seasons.

Auburn travels to Kansas State this season and will play Louisville in the Chick-fil-A kickoff game in Atlanta in 2015.

Another non-conference opponent in 2015, Idaho, will remain on Auburn's schedule despite the Vandals almost certainly being ineligible for a bowl game following that season, as is the case for the upcoming season.

Idaho football's APR score (901) failed to meet the NCAA's threshold for bowl eligibility (930 over four years or 940 over the past two years) and has an insurmountable task to improve enough to be bowl eligible for the 2015 season.

Malzahn said Idaho's bowl eligibility is "not a factor" in keeping the Vandals on the 2015 schedule.

"I don't think that whether they're eligible for postseason or not will determine their strength on your schedule," Jacobs said. "It all depends on who they play and how they perform."

Idaho enters the Sun Belt conference this season after going 1-11 in 2013, but its caliber of play has been very poor in each of the last three seasons – with a combined record of 4-32.

Jacobs is pleased with the strength of Auburn's schedule in 2015, which also features home games against Jacksonville State and San Jose State, SEC road games against Kentucky, Texas A&M, LSU and Arkansas and conference home games with Mississippi State, Ole Miss, Georgia and Alabama.

"The strength of schedule, because of who we play in the conference, remains pretty high and I think it'll be the same in '15," Jacobs said.

In years when Auburn will play at both Georgia and Alabama, as is the case this upcoming season when it happens for the first time ever, Malzahn and Jacobs will likely have to choose between scheduling a non-conference opponent or an open week.

Jacobs said there is not a "mandate" for Auburn to have a home game in the final three weeks of the regular season, but few if any programs assemble such an economically undesirable schedule.

"I think you're always looking strategically at what's best for you with the scheduling," Malzahn said. "Strategically in the future ... we'll do our best to help us and try to get us better prepared."