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The 2014 NFL regular season is complete, with final standings in each division solidified on Sunday. With the completion of the 2014 season, the 2015 season's schedule reaches its first step toward being assembled in the league offices: finalization of the opponents for all 32 teams.
Each year, any given division in the league will face every team from another division within their conference and every team from a division in the other conference. Those eight games, four at home and four on the road, are then paired with the six games that comprise the annual home-and-home series for the team within it its own division. That means 14 of the 16 games played by each team mirrors the schedule of the other three teams in the division. It also leaves two games to be played against the teams that finish in the same position in the two divisions from the same conference that the team is not already scheduled to play.
For example, the AFC East is slated to face the AFC South and the NFC East in 2015. Each team in the AFC East will face the Houston Texans, Indianapolis Colts, Jacksonville Jaguars, Tennessee Titans, Dallas Cowboys, New York Giants, Philadelphia Eagles, and Washington Redskins. They will also face each of the other teams in the division twice. The remaining two games will be scheduled against the AFC North and AFC West team that finished in the same position in their respective divisions as the AFC East team.
The Miami Dolphins finished third in the AFC East this year, behind the New England Patriots and Buffalo Bills, ahead of the New York Jets. A third place finish aligns them with the Baltimore Ravens in the AFC North and the San Diego Chargers in the AFC West.
The Dolphins' 2015 slate of opponents, broken into home and away games, is:
Home:
Buffalo Bills, New England Patriots, New York Jets, Houston Texans, Indianapolis Colts, Dallas Cowboys, New York Giants, Baltimore Ravens
Away:
Buffalo Bills, New England Patriots, New York Jets, Jacksonville Jaguars, Tennessee Titans, Philadelphia Eagles, Washington Redskins, San Diego Chargers
The Dolphins' schedule is already partially set, with the club scheduled to "host" the Jets in London during the league's Week 4, which will be October 4, 2015. If the league keeps with their custom of scheduling bye weeks for teams the week after a game in London, the Dolphins will have their off week during Week 5 of the season, not playing on the October 11 weekend.
The league will likely release the schedule sometime in the spring, typically in mid to late April.