Alright let’s wrap this up in a nice, neat little package

Oh man did you actually believe that?  LITTLE?  Have you not noticed what I’ve been doing the last little while?  Oh this will not be a little package I assure you; but it will be an important package of information that you, the college football fan, would like to see (I hope).

So yes, you will see what I believe the College Football Playoff and the New Year’s Six will look like.  You will get bowl projections from yours truly.  You will also get my Heisman ballot which is usually a big steaming pile of horseshit.  And you will get my coaching hot seat list which, honestly, is usually pretty good if I say so myself.

Let’s get right to it with the top of the pyramid (scheme)…the College Football Playoff predictions.  You probably have a good idea from the conference predictions as to who will end up here and you also know that there is a good chance I will fail miserably with one of these picks:

December 31st	Fiesta Bowl	#2 Ohio State	#3 Georgia
December 31st	Peach Bowl	#1 Alabama	#4 Clemson

New Year’s Eve semi-finals.  Will they never learn?  Anyway, Bama is the easy call here as I see them running the table and then beating UGA in what may be the biggest SEC Championship ever (and that’s saying a lot).  This also means that Georgia is probably a fairly easy call as well.  Sure, they will lose to the Tide but if they go in at #2 (which I expect them to) and lose to #1 (which I assume Bama would be) then a drop to #3 is as far as they will go.  No way they are leaving out a one-loss Big Ten champ so tOSU gets in and takes advantage of one of Alabama or Georgia having to lose to get to the #2 spot.  OK take advantage is a strong phrase since being #2 means very little other than avoiding #1 until, potentially, the title game.  Clemson ends up beating out Texas A&M, Michigan and NC State, all one-loss teams who didn’t win their division, rather easily to grab the final semi-final spot.  Oregon would have their shot at the Pac-12 Championship but lose to Utah making The Committee’s job (at least for these two games) rather straightforward.

Now we will go to the New Year’s Six bowl games where, thanks to the NFL, none of them are on New Year’s Day.  Eat shit, Rose Bowl.

January 2nd	Rose Bowl	#6 Michigan	#10 Utah
January 2nd	Cotton Bowl	#11 Oregon	#8 Houston
December 31st	Sugar Bowl	#5 Texas A&M	#9 Baylor
December 30th	Orange Bowl	#7 NC State	#12 Notre Dame

As always, it’s debate time.  Every year which is fine as long as the debates devolve into some stupid Twitter spat.  Only one conference championship loser is getting in here and that’s Oregon.  They’ll be high enough in the rankings (potentially in the Top 4) going into Conference Championship weekend that there is no way they drop out of a NY6 bowl.  Houston won’t be this year’s Cincinnati but they will be this year’s Group of Five representative in the New Year’s Six and they will coast to get here.  Michigan is going to have another good year but they have the audacity to be in the same division as Ohio State.  Assholes.  This will be enough to keep them out of the CFP.  Same goes for TAMU and NC State.  What were they thinking being in a division with other good schools.  And you wonder why I hate divisions.  We could have a tOSU-UM rematch and a Clemson-NCST rematch for conference championships.  Talk about a lot more being on the line and a hell of a lot more intrigue.

Utah, with their win over Oregon in the Pac-12 Championship, gets the other Rose Bowl spot opposite Michigan.  Luckily, they should ascend to somewhere around the #10 ranking that I have them in so they will look like they belong.  Baylor also gets the benefit of a good bowl tie-in and I have them facing their old Southwest Conference foe, the Aggies of Texas A&M.  Just like Utah, the Bears will be good enough to belong here and not spark any crazy debate about bowl tie-ins.  The only debate will be for the final spot.  Look, it’s Notre Dame.  If the Irish go 10-2, they are not being left out of this group of bowl games.  As much as some of you want that to be the case, it never will be (until the CFP structure changes).  They beat out UCLA, Oklahoma and Marshall.  Very few, other than those schools’ fans, will be super upset they were left out.

Now it’s time for the rest of BOWL SZN.  At least I know these bowls won’t be cancelled…I hope.

January 2nd	Citrus Bowl	#17 Tennessee	#18 Michigan State
January 2nd	ReliaQuest Bowl	Florida	#20 Minnesota
December 31st	Music City Bowl	Ole Miss	#22 Purdue
December 30th	Gator Bowl	Arkansas	#19 Pittsburgh
December 30th	Arizona Bowl	Boise State	Northern Illinois
December 30th	Sun Bowl	Louisville	Oregon State
December 30th	Duke’s Mayo Bowl	Kentucky	Penn State
December 29th	Alamo Bowl	#15 Oklahoma	#13 UCLA
December 29th	Cheez-It Bowl	Iowa State	Miami
December 29th	Pinstripe Bowl	Iowa	Florida State
December 28th	Texas Bowl	LSU	#21 Texas
December 28th	Holiday Bowl	Virginia Tech	#24 USC
December 28th	Liberty Bowl	South Carolina	#23 Oklahoma State
December 28th	Military Bowl	Wake Forest	#16 UCF
December 27th	Guaranteed Rate Bowl	Nebraska	Kansas State
December 27th	Birmingham Bowl	Auburn	#25 Cincinnati
December 27th	First Responder Bowl	Colorado State	Troy
December 27th	Camellia Bowl	Coastal Carolina	UAB
December 26th	Quick Lane Bowl	Maryland	Miami-OH
December 24th	Hawaii Bowl	BYU	Fresno State
December 23rd	Independence Bowl	Memphis	Army
December 23rd	Gasparilla Bowl	Boston College	Tulsa
December 22nd	Armed Forces Bowl	TCU	UTEP
December 21st	New Orleans Bowl	#14 Marshall	UTSA
December 20th	Boca Raton Bowl	Appalachian State	Florida Atlantic
December 20th	Idaho Potato Bowl	San Diego State	Toledo
December 19th	Myrtle Beach Bowl	Georgia State	Liberty
December 17th	Frisco Bowl	San Jose State	South Alabama
December 17th	Las Vegas Bowl	Mississippi State	Arizona State
December 17th	LendingTree Bowl	Louisiana	Kent State
December 17th	LA Bowl	Washington	Air Force
December 17th	New Mexico Bowl	Utah State	Western Michigan
December 17th	Fenway Bowl	North Carolina	SMU
December 16th	Cure Bowl	East Carolina	UNLV
December 16th	Bahamas Bowl	WKU	Central Michigan

More bowl games!  Honestly, I don’t care nearly as much as I used to.  It’s more football at this point.  Once the 12-team playoff (or whatever it ends up being) comes to fruition, I will be interested to see what happens to some of the lower-level bowl games.  Hey, as long as Canadians can see most of these games on TSN then there’s no real problem.  Let’s look at a few points from that long table of information I just posted:

• Only two games between ranked teams?  Good lord.  UT-MSU at the Citrus and Oklahoma-UCLA at the Alamo and that’s it.  Those two bowls are used to having fairly big matchups.  It would probably be more of a shock if the Bahamas Bowl had a Top 25 matchup (although it would definitely intrigue me that’s for sure).
• I’m not bothering with listing bowl tie-ins and or conferences that couldn’t fill their bowl quota or even 5-7 teams that I have in to fill the bowl games that don’t have two teams.
• Some of the other good matchups after the Citrus and Alamo:
  • Ole Miss-Purdue in Nashville
  • Arkansas-Pitt at the Gator
  • Iowa-Florida State playing in the cold of the Bronx
  • Wake-UCF in the Military Bowl
  • LSU going into Longhorn country (kind of) to play Texas
  • Marshall-UTSA in Nawlins
  • Nebraska-Kansas State in a Big Eight matchup in Tempe
• The Husker one is very interesting because they have the longest Big Ten bowl drought.  Can you fucking believe it?  I would have bet money that it was Rutgers or…Rutgers.  Nope.  The Huskers went to the Music City Bowl in late 2016 and haven’t gone back to a bowl game since.  Wow.

History states at least one of the CFP semi-final games will not be that good.  I hate to do this to the Tigers but sorry, Bama should win that one easy.  The Buckeyes will have big problems with the Dawgs but in the end, they will punch their ticket to the national title game to lose to the Tide who will be back on top once again.  No real surprises here.

So now that COVID is…well not behind us but it is not nearly as serious as it was, we can really get back to normality. That means that the college football head coaches are getting shorter leashes again, folks! The shitcanning season will be upon us at some point this Fall!

And when I mean short leashes I mean seriously short. Like maybe a foot long. Some athletic directors are now realizing that the college football world is pretty much fully back to normal and they have some time to make up. Some coaches received reprieves in the past two seasons thanks to the pandemic but that leeway is fucking gone now.

Look I don’t want to toot my own horn but I usually do fairly well with this list. So let’s just get right down to it, shall we? If you recall, the order is from most likely to be fired to most likely to keep their job. They are also categorized in a few different sections. Let’s go!

Almost Guaranteed Shitcanning

1. Geoff Collins (Georgia Tech) – This should be a surprise to absolutely no one.  The experiment to move away from the option to more of a pro-style offense has failed spectacularly in the ATL.  I honestly see no possible improvement here and a possible in-season firing.  Needed to keep his job – Get into the final few weeks of the season with at least a mathematical possibility of going bowling.  Prediction – He’s going to get shitcanned some time in November in the midst of a ten-loss season for the Rambling Wreck.
2. Karl Dorrell (Colorado) – Can we say that weird 2020 season was an aberration?  I think we can as the Buffaloes are dropping down the ladder once again in the Pac-12 as realignment goes wild everywhere.  Needed to keep his job – Have a shot at bowl eligibility going into the final two games.  Prediction – A whole lot of frustration for Dorrell, the Buffaloes, the other coaches, alumni and current students. And no job for Dorrell…he may end up not coaching the final game of the season.
3. Neal Brown (West Virginia) – Brown’s first year in Morgantown was considered a success.  Last year’s, not so much.  And with an improving Big XII around them, I see them falling even farther in Brown’s third year when he has most of his recruits in.  Not looking good for a guy who was a big up-and-comer not too long ago.  Needed to keep his job – Not continue the downward slide.  Prediction – I remember going to Wet n’ Wild as a kid. It doesn’t exist anymore. But it had some cool waterslides. That is how ol’ Neal is going to feel this season. He’ll end the season on the unemployment line.
4. Mike Bloomgren (Rice) – No one is really expecting Rice to be a power player in football.  Saying that, they had to the American Conference next season and I can’t see Bloomgren being the head coach.  Other than a couple of good seasons, he’s done very little in the Houston area and has fallen FAR behind their neighbour.  Needed to keep his job – Something more than what I feel they will do this year.  Prediction – The bloom has come off the rose (ha ha) and he will be looking for a new school to coach at for 2023.
5. Herm Edwards (Arizona State) – It feels inevitable that, at the very best, Herm will be done at the end of the season.  Their recruiting issues are well known and it may end up being the NCAA coming down hard on ASU (and, eventually, Herm himself).  It won’t help his cause that the Sun Devils won’t be as good as they were last year.  Needed to keep his job – I don’t know if there is anything short of a Pac-12 title that would save his job (and even then).  Prediction – Herm is shown the door before the last game of the season as the powers that be in Tempe decide it’s time to rebuild again.

Probable Shitcanning

6. Dino Babers (Syracuse) – How long has Dino been on the hot seat?  Everything was looking golden in 2018 for Babers but since then…yeesh.  I’m not saying Syracuse is a destination spot for coaching but you know things are getting tense within the athletic department with this.  Needed to keep his job – The Orange to recapture at least some of that 2018 magic.  Prediction – Dino will be a coordinator somewhere next year.
7. Scot Loeffler (Bowling Green) – I’m sure there are times where Scotty (Scoty?) would love to be back at any of the schools he used to be at.  This is his first head coaching gig and it has been a rough one to be honest.  Even though Bowling Green isn’t exactly a hotspot in college football, at some point the athletic director will be done with the team not performing.  7-22 isn’t exactly the type of record that keeps a job.  Needed to keep his job – 4 or 5 wins and look competitive inside the MAC.  Prediction – Double-digit losses and a pink slip.
8. Danny Gonzales (New Mexico) – Speaking of tough places to coach, here are the Lobos looking at potentially another coaching change on the horizon.  Definitely a spot a younger coach in the West would maybe take a shot at.  Beware though: the last time UNM won at least ten games was four decades ago.  Unfortunately between them and NMSU, the state is a dead spot for college football.  Needed to keep his job – Close to bowl eligibility.  Prediction – Three wins and a tough decision to be made from the higher ups.

Possible Shitcanning

9. Seth Littrell (North Texas) – Littrell hasn’t done bad in Denton.  Five bowls in his six seasons there is pretty darn good for a team in Conference USA.  Problem is he has lost every single one.  It truly does feel like they are kind of stuck in the middle of the conference and that’s getting some people antsy.  Needed to keep his job – At least 5 wins and competing for bowl eligibility near the end of the season.  Prediction – That’s exactly where I have the Mean Green. I think he probably survives the season but the leash will be extremely short going forward.
10. Bryan Harsin (Auburn) – This was considered a coup when the Tigers plucked him from Boise State.  His first season on the Plains was…rocky to put it mildly.  There was an attempt to get him ousted after last season ended.  Obviously it didn’t work but there are some thinking maybe he just doesn’t fit at Auburn (or the SEC for that matter).  Needed to keep his job – A winning record and better recruiting.  Prediction – I got the Tigers winning 7 to stay out of the basement of the SEC West. That should be enough to save him at least into ‘crootin season. That’s where he needs to improve or otherwise he may not see the 2023 season on the field at Jordan-Hare.
11. Ken Niumatalolo (Navy) – It is tough putting Ken on this list, I’m not going to lie.  Problem is, Navy has been pretty bad for three of the past four seasons.  That 2019 season where they won 11 games seems like a fluke, almost.  I’m sure it would take a lot to fire Niumatalolo but another season like the previous two and who knows.  Needed to keep his job – At least 6 wins.  Prediction – I have the Middies only winning three so this could be a very interesting offseason in Annapolis.
12. Terry Bowden (ULM) – I might get some flak for this one.  I know he’s only been in Monroe for a season.  I do think this year the Warhawks are going to be one of the worst teams in the FBS. Maybe there is someone on his staff who will take over for him next year so that ULM brass will feel OK to fire him? I don’t know but this doesn’t seem to be leading anywhere in a much-improved Sun Belt Conference.  Needed to keep his job – Improvement from the previous season.  Prediction – As I said, they won’t be good. I have them predicted at 1-11. I can see this being done relatively quietly in the offseason (Terry’s shitcanning that is).
13. Rick Stockstill (Middle Tennessee) – Stockstill has been at Middle for what seems like forever.  And it doesn’t feel like anything would happen because of that.  Saying that, the Blue Raiders need to do something since they have been mediocre most of the last few seasons. They also turned down a (possible?) invitation to the MAC so this is their chance to become the best of a not-so-good bunch. Will Rick lead them through that though?  Needed to keep his job – Got to be bowl eligibility really.  Prediction – I got MTSU winning 5 games which will make for some very interesting offseason chatter in Murfreesboro.
14. Greg Schiano (Rutgers) – This isn’t the Schiano that went 56-33 in his final seven seasons during his first run in Piscataway.  That was in the Big East and Rutgers is…well, they definitely aren’t in a conference like that anymore.  Still, fans were hoping for something a bit more from a guy who runs blitzes during kneel down plays.  Unfortunately, I think this won’t be that year.  Needed to keep his job – Real bowl eligibility, not the 5-7 you are a smart school kind.  Prediction – I have the Scarlet Knights regressing a bit this year. Whether Schiano returns has a lot to do with whether they think they’ve truly bottomed out and if they believe they can get a good coach in.
15. Jake Spavital (Texas State) – Has anyone ever expected the Bobcats to do anything of significance on the football field? Really, that lack of winning culture could be the one thing that gives Spavital one more season at the helm. Needed to keep his job – 5 wins and some meaningful November football. Prediction – 4 wins and a short leash into 2023.

Doubtful Shitcanning (although it still could happen)

16. Jeff Scott (USF) – Not a whole lot has gone well for the former Clemson coordinator down in Tampa.  Remember when the Bulls were #2 in the nation?  Not even Pepperidge Farms remembers that I don’t think.  What it does say, though, is that you can win at this school.  Now it’s just a matter of how long the USF athletic department will give Scott to truly turn things around.  Needed to keep his job – Stay out of the American Conference basement.  Prediction – They aren’t going to a bowl game but expect them to win around four games and be quite clear of the bottom rung of the AAC.
17. Scott Frost (Nebraska) – It has become a difficult job to recruit players to Lincoln.  I think Frost has finally figured it out and the Huskers, at the very least, should be back bowling this season. Now watch them completely tank.  Needed to keep his job – Bowl-eligibility at the very least.  Prediction – No Kool-Aid this time but I have the Huskers winning eight games. Don’t laugh.
18. David Shaw (Stanford) – I remember when Shaw was getting Stanford to bowl games and contending in the Pac-12 on a consistent basis.  Make no bones about it, he’s still a great head coach.  Give him time and he will have the Cardinal back on top of what will be the Pac-10 going forward.  Needed to keep his job –  Look better than the 2021 season.  Prediction – I have Stanford winning 4 games but the bottom of the Pac-12 North is crowded so an upset or two isn’t out of the realm of possibility for this team. Shaw is safe for another season at the very least.
19. Mike Norvell (Florida State) – Things are finally looking up in Tallahassee.  For real this time. It would have to get really bad for the Noles this season for Norvell to be let go.  Needed to keep his job – Bowl eligibility at the very least.  Prediction – Eight wins and a new lease on life. Teams won’t have it easy against this team this season.
20. Tom Allen (Indiana) – I would put Tom farther up this list as Indiana was BAD last year and won’t be a whole lot better this season.  Thing is, his buyout is huge so unless the Hoosiers absolutely have to fire him, he won’t be let go.  Needed to keep his job – Don’t do something illegal or unethical.  Prediction – Other than punching the coach of the opposing team, I can’t see Allen doing anything bad. Yes I only have them winning three games this season but that doesn’t really matter here in the grand scheme of things.

One of these days I have to go back and see how truly successful I have been at this hot seat list. I still think the numbers will back me up.

Now from a normally good section (for me) to a notoriously horrible section (for me). My Heisman ballot is back. And I don’t know if it can be any worse than what I have done for the past few years. But, I always give it my all so here’s another edition of Bossman’s Heisman Trophy Ballot If He Got a Vote (which he most certainly should not):

My Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Heisman Ballot

1. C.J. Stroud, Ohio State – Last year’s ballot was horrifically bad but I did have Stroud in at #4 (and Bryce Young at #5).  So it wasn’t all bad (but mostly it was).  I have the Buckeyes getting to the National Championship and he will be the main reason why. It will be a close race this year, I believe, but Stroud will put up the numbers and get the big victories that put him over the top.
2. Bryce Young, Alabama – Yes, I do have the Tide winning the national title this year.  It still won’t be enough to not join the list of players who had a shot at pulling an Archie Griffin and came up short.  Unlike everyone else on the list, he won’t make it easy on the other contenders. The only thing holding him back is how many other Heisman candidates this team has. They are loaded.
3. Caleb Williams, USC – It was a huge coup for Lincoln Riley to convince Williams to follow him from Oklahoma to USC.  Among the contenders, Williams may have the toughest job helping turn around a 4-8 team so quickly.  This is one of the few instances where a team only being so good might end up costing a player during a Heisman campaign.
4. Will Anderson Jr., Alabama – I believe Anderson is the best defensive player in the country and it’s really not even close.  He’s also one small part of the reason that I think Bryce Young won’t win the Heisman.  He will take some of the votes that would have been thrown Young’s way.  It could work in reverse as well. Anderson could be primed to be the first defensive player in a long time to win the Heisman Trophy but all the good Bama players, including Young, makes it a bit more difficult for him.
5. D.J. Uiagalelei, Clemson – Should we try this again? Why not.  *clears throat*  Ahem…Oo-ee-un-guh-luh-lay.  Just like last year.  And just like last year I have him #5 in my Heisman rankings.  He will have to show some serious improvement and I am betting he will.  It will help that he will have a better team around him that will be competing fort he College Football Playoff.  I think we will have a good idea what kind of season he will have once September ends.
6. Tyler Van Dyke, Miami – This guy looked like the real deal down the stretch last season and could have been considered the best ACC player the last few weeks of the regular season.  The Canes will be better but, as per usual, doing better will help a lot. If the Canes can somehow win the ACC title, Van Dyke’s chances might soar.
7. Dillon Gabriel, Oklahoma – A fantastic quarterback at UCF.  And thanks to TransferPortalMania, he ends up in Norman, replacing Caleb Williams (and, sure, Spencer Rattler).  Being the quarterback for the Sooners is always a pressure situation but the pressure should be a lot less this season which may allow Gabriel to thrive.
8. Bijan Robinson, Texas – Running backs still get shafted, to an extent, when it comes to Heisman voting.  It takes a phenomenal year for one to win it and you have to pair it with no outstanding quarterbacks.  An uphill battle for sure.  But if there’s one running back who could break through this season, it could be the new king of dijon mustard, Bijan Robinson. He will be the guy who makes the Texas offense go so if they win even 9 games this year, look for him to get a lot of attention from voters.
9. Jaxon Smith-Njigba, Ohio State – Hey, how about the guy who had a breakout game for the ages at the Rose Bowl?  He will have arguably the best quarterback in the country throwing to him.  As we know, that’s a plus and a minus when it comes to the Heisman.  At the very least, he is the highest rated receiver coming into the season so that counts for something.
10. Hendon Hooker, Tennessee – This may feel to some like an out-of-nowhere kind of pick.  Hooker showed what he could do running a decent Vols offense.  With Tennessee having a lot more talent on that side of the ball this season, he may have some crazy stats. If Tennessee somehow gets to a New Year’s Six bowl, he will get a ton of hype.

Honourable Mention

• TreVeyon Henderson, Ohio State
• Jahmyr Gibbs, Alabama
• Braelon Allen, Wisconsin
• Jaxson Dart, Ole Miss
• Quinn Ewers, Texas
• Spencer Rattler, South Carolina
• Grayson McCall, Coastal Carolina
• Jordan Addison, USC
• Devin Leary, NC State

I am going to wish the players on this list good luck since there is a chance the winner is nowhere to be found here. Because I am terrible at this.

All the predictions I have are now complete! In about five months or so I will find out how poorly I did.

Next up will be…hold on let me check my notes…yes….YES……YEEEEEES! College football is back! Week Zero! I mean it’s just Week Zero but still….WEEK ZERO! I will have the schedule up at some point early in the week. I’ve already been asked about the specialty packs as it pertains to this coming Saturday. My guess is they won’t show anything since normally they don’t because…who knows but I will chalk it up to some sort of incompetence since what they (Bell and Rogers) tell me makes no sense. I will keep everyone updated. Have a great rest of the weekend everyone!

Are we looking at chaos? – Week 3 College Football Recap

After this past week, you have to wonder.  Clemson, Notre Dame and Oklahoma all won but they were close games against teams they should have blown out of the water.  Cincinnati struggled for a little over a half with Indiana but was able to pull away late.  Virginia Tech and UCLA lost.  Even Alabama almost allowed Florida to come all the way back to beat them.  Remember what I said last week about Bama?  You can scratch that…kind of.  I still think Alabama, and probably Georgia, are a cut above the rest.  But it’s not like they are unbeatable.  And the rest of the Top 10, at this point, has looked vulnerable.  Many in the college football media are already looking at possibly comparing this season to 2007.  It may be a bit too soon to say that but there has been more chaos than normal through three weeks.  Usually, as Fall officially begins, you can still look at like 10-15 teams and say they are serious contenders and they are in that tier above everyone else.  This season?  Yeah, might want to put the brakes on that idea.  I hope it does end up that way because it’s always fun to see some college football chaos!  I mean unless you’re a college football coach and fans of certain teams.

Alright, enough comparisons.  Let’s get to the action from the weekend of college football!

Fun-Time Crazy Recap!

• Well, the Buckeyes sure didn’t look too sharp against Tulsa.  Luckily they had TreVeyon Henderson go off for over 250 yards on the ground since other than that, no one would be scared of the rest of the Buckeyes that played this past Saturday.  Remember, this is the Tulsa team that lost to UC-Davis.  It totally fits in to what I mentioned above with teams having fairly big questions already in the season.  Now that I say that, watch them blow through the rest of their schedule to finish 11-1 and be #1 at some point.
• If you missed the Arizona State-BYU game, boy did you miss a good one.  Just look up this one play.  Jaren Hall throws an ill-timed interception as he’s falling down.  Arizona State picks it up and the defender runs down the sidelines.  Then Tyler Allgeier catches up to him, jumps over his back and knocks the ball out of his hands and back into play.  After all that, Jaren Hall is the one that recovers the fumble.  Absolutely insane.  The Cougs would win this one and are now 3-0 against the Pac-12.  The Pac-12 had a pretty horrific weekend unless you talk about to the people I encountered on Twitter…
• So I made a tweet during the third quarter of the USC-Washington State game.  The score was tied at 14 and I said “I see the Clay Helton firing really got the Trojans going.”  Then Kedon Slovis goes down with an injury and Jaxson Dart replaces him and plays amazing and the Trojans score 31 unanswered.  So yeah, the tweet did not age well and I said that.  That wasn’t enough for some USC fans.  Some mentioned the same thing and I am fine with it.  Someone called me “son” for some reason.  And some buffoon put a pic that said “I don’t even have a meme for this kind of fuckery.”  Really?  Very classy.  I don’t mind normal discourse on Twitter which a few of them did (and rightfully so) but why go over the line?  To make themselves feel better.  Maybe because their lives are shitty so they want to take it out on someone else.  Who knows.  It’s the one major thing I hate about Twitter (and social media in general): people can’t help but be assholes to others just because they can.  As Mike Tyson said, “Social media has made acceptable to say things to people that they would never say to their face.”  So true.  By the way, Mike Tyson Mysteries?  Hilarious show (RIP Norm MacDonald).
• College Gameday was in State College this past weekend.   The whiteout was in full effect and it showed during their primetime game with Auburn.  The offense struggled at times with the crowd noise.  They still didn’t play poorly as if it wasn’t for a couple of miscues, the Tigers would have had a chance to win.  I think both teams could be en route to the New Year’s Six if they keep playing like that (especially against lesser teams).
• I did not pass the Hawaii test.  I just couldn’t.  I assume the game didn’t end until 4 in the morning and I was already feeling kind of crappy by 11 so I felt good just to get to the end of the normal late night slate.
• A horrible blown call (one of quite a few this past weekend) cost Boise State a touchdown against Oklahoma State and, eventually, the game.  I mean not that either team really wanted to win after the first half since there was absolutely no scoring in the second half.  None.  Very un-Boise and un-Poke like for sure.  I’m surprised Mike Gundy’s mullet didn’t start shedding from the panic.  Also, I can’t remember the last time Boise State started 1-2.  I assume it was in Division 1-AA (remember that?).
• Uh, what the hell happened in Clemson?  I get that a two-hour lightning delay can mess up a team’s flow.  But how do they allow Georgia Tech, who is still learning how to live without the option, almost beat them at home?  I would say that maybe their run at the top of the ACC is done but then I see what Virginia Tech did in their loss to West Virginia and, even worse, how Miami got beat up by Michigan State and realize they’re still fine for now.
• Oh, UCLA.  The Bruins were looking pretty damn good through their first two games this season.  Then in comes Fresno State to the Rose Bowl, a team I figured would suck this season.  Boy was I (along with many others) wrong.  This was an amazing game that had four lead changes in the final eight minutes that ended with injured Bulldog quarterback Jake Haener willing his team to the winning touchdown and the upset.  After getting off the hot seat it seemed for the rest of the season, Chip Kelly maybe feeling a tiny bit of a temperature hike now.
• Alabama plays Ole Miss in two weeks.  Considering what Ole Miss did to Tulane (yes the same Tulane that almost beat Oklahoma), the over/under for this one should be 100 and I think I’m being conservative with that number.
• I don’t like the new overtime rules.  After one overtime, it becomes a two-point conversion contest.  The equivalent of hockey’s shootout (which I also despise).  It may have finally got to the point that the NFL somehow has the better overtime system (and it’s still not that great).  Can there be a perfect system for overtime?  I don’t know to be honest but it feels like college football is going backwards.
• How about what went down in The Swamp?  Early on it looked like yet another Bama rout as they were up 21-3 14 minutes into the game.  So I stopped watching for a bit and focused on other games.  I would see in the ticker that Florida got a touchdown.  Then another.  The Tide responded but then the Gators got another TD to get it within 5.  Florida would score a touchdown with three minutes to go but couldn’t convert on the two-pointer and that was the margin of victory.  So the Fighting Sabans aren’t so dominating it seems.  This is a very interesting turn of events for this already crazy 2021 season.
• In another episode of “Refs Make The Darndest Calls,” Memphis’ Calvin Austin scored on a questionable punt return where the back official seemed to have signaled for the clock to stop but the play kept going.  In the end, Mississippi State had a chance to tie it on a two-point conversion but failed, losing by the same 31-29 score as the game in the previous point.  Look, I get that officials aren’t perfect.  And this is fine.  It is what it is.  But when something happens that becomes a turning point or the reason (at the end) that one team wins or loses, then it’s tough to swallow.  Let’s not even get into the gambling aspect of what this can do.
• It looked like Louisiana Tech was going to get a huge home victory over a good SMU squad.  But LaTech allowed SMU one final shot and they took advantage with a 33-yard Hail Mary touchdown pass on the final play of the game.  This was a game with almost 750 yards passing combined from two former Oklahoma quarterbacks.  How are the Sooners losing these quarterbacks?  I get that Spencer Rattler is really good but it’s not like the two starters in this one, Austin Kendall and Tanner Mordecai, aren’t.  It’s nice to see these guys get their shot at other programs.
• Finally, speaking of Oklahoma, that was yet another less than impressive showing by the Sooners.  They barely got out with a win yesterday over Nebraska.  Yes, the same Nebraska that has struggled for a few years now and lost to Illinois to start their season.  Scott Frost had to be happy with his team’s performance and the fact that his hot seat will get slightly cooler.  Oklahoma, on the other hand, does not look like the national title contender I thought they were going to be and that has to be a bit concerning in Norman.  Conference play will show all of us what this Sooners team is really made of.

So another great weekend of college football.  My remote control suffered as I believe I watched portions of almost 40 games.  As for my Top 25, well, here it is!

#1	Alabama
#2	Georgia
#3	Oregon
#4	Oklahoma
#5	Texas A&M
#6	Penn State
#7	Cincinnati
#8	Iowa
#9	Notre Dame
#10	Clemson
#11	Ohio State
#12	Iowa State
#13	Florida
#14	Coastal Carolina
#15	Wisconsin
#16	Ole Miss
#17	BYU
#18	North Carolina
#19	Arkansas
#20	Michigan State
#21	Michigan
#22	Auburn
#23	TCU
#24	Liberty
#25	Fresno State

Is it really truly fair to rank teams this early in the season?  That’s debatable but everyone else is doing it so I might as well, too.  Nice to see Cincinnati, Coastal Carolina, Liberty and Fresno State in the Top 25 with a few other Group of Five teams lurking just outside.  Should be an exciting race to the Group of Five spot in the New Year’s Six.  Also, are we heading to undefeated Michigan State playing undefeated Michigan the night before Halloween?  Can you even imagine the media hype, let alone the fan banter?  I’m almost getting sick of it already.

Have a good week everyone.

Someone might want to avoid airport tarmacs – the Week 2 Recap

The camera’s not on him all the time so I am sure he has that reaction a lot.  And that reaction definitely came up the other night a lot.  USC looked like complete garbage in most of their loss against Stanford.  It feels like Kedon Slovis, after a promising start to his young career, has had his progress stall.  A lot of that has to land on Helton.  This team has had the talent to contend before and they have underperformed almost every season under his watch.  It feels like, with ten games left in the season, that he will have to win at least eight of those to keep his job.  And even then, that might not be enough.  He is on one of the hottest seats right now for sure.

This week of college football really had a dearth of marquee games (other than the top two), as is somewhat usual for Week 2.  But, as per usual, it overdelivered giving us a wild weekend of football.  Let’s go through the week that was!

• Michigan 31 Washington 10 – What a game this was for the Wolverines.  Washington is, to put it one word, awful.  This team should have the talent to at least be sniffing the Top 25 and they are nowhere close.  Maybe that loss against Montana wasn’t an aberration after all but more a warning for things to come in Jimmy Lake’s first full season at the helm.  As for Michigan, this could be an interesting year in Ann Arbor with perhaps a shot at a New Year’s Six bowl?  The next few weeks will tell a lot about this team.
• Texas A&M 10 Colorado 7 – A classic Big XII matchup that had an absolute dearth of offense.  Yes, the defenses both played well but the offenses were pretty bad.  There were a couple of opportunities for the Buffs to extend their lead and they just couldn’t do it.  The Aggies survived and may have lost their quarterback Haynes King for an extended period of time.  A little bit of sweating in College Station going forward.
• Oregon 35 Ohio State 28 – It felt that the Buckeyes would, at some point, comeback and win this one.  I mean it’s Ohio State in the Horseshoe.  They almost never lose there.  Even without Kayvon Thibodaux, the Ducks played very well on defense for most of the game and didn’t allow tOSU to really get their offense humming.  Oregon did just enough and Joe Morehead showed he still has quite the mind for offense as he called a masterful game.
• Jacksonville State 20 Florida State 17 – For fuck’s sake Mike Norvell.  If everyone thought it was bad during the Willie Taggart era, then strap in for this one.  The Noles allowed JSU to stay close with their offense just not playing well at all.  McKenzie Milton looked off and the running game was non-existent.  But it looked like FSU would still hold on for the somewhat undeserving victory.  Then it happened.  The Gamecocks score on the final play of the game on a pass to the 20-yard line that the receiver was able to run in.  No laterals.  Not a Hail Mary.  Just a pass and run.  Norvell didn’t think to put more players closer to the goal line because there was, and I quote, “still six seconds and they were on their own side of the field.”  What in the blue hell are you talking about, Mike?  They only had one play left.  That was it.  Yes the tackling, or lack there of, was horrible there but no excuse not to put more players back there.  What a fucking disgrace.  And yes, Norvell is on a seat that’s only a couple degrees cooler than Clay Helton’s.
• BYU 26 Utah 17 – The Cougars celebrated their acceptance into the Big XII by beating the Utes in a game that wasn’t as close as the score indicated.  BYU was superior in pretty much every aspect of the game.  They look better than advertised, even with Zach Wilson gone, as Jaren Hall had a great game.  Definitely quelled the worries of the Provo faithful over the quarterback position.
• Coastal Carolina 49 Kansas 22 – As I’ve said before many times, I don’t have a horse in this entire college football race.  I just hope to watch some exciting football and with the college game, I get that at least once a weekend during the season.  Saying all that, I was kind of pulling for the Jayhawks to at least keep it close.  They didn’t, but even in a 27-point loss, it felt like they have taken more strides in game two under Lance Leipold than they had in the previous two entire coaching regimes.  That’s how bad things have got in Lawrence and how much ground they have to make up in the Big XII, now with extra BYU and AAC sauce.
• TCU 34 California 32 – Now let’s go to a game that very few people watched but probably should have.  I am not being facetious here.  This was just a fantastic game from start to finish.  Don’t think TCU played poorly or down to the Bears.  They are a good team and could start moving up the rankings soon.  California has had a rough start.  Two good games played and no wins to show for it.  Yes, starting with Nevada and TCU isn’t exactly a recipe for sure success but it has to be a bit frustrating to not be at least 1-1 at this point.  I expect they will still be a bit of a player in the Pac-12 North though.
• Alabama 48 Mercer 14 – Alabama beat Mercer.  Ho hum.  It was fun, though, to turn to TSN2 (yes this game was actually aired on TSN2) and see Nick Saban getting seriously pissed off at his squad after they went up 31-0.  Only Saban.
• Notre Dame 32 Toledo 29 – Toledo almost upset Notre Dame.  In the hindsight is 20/20 department, it would have made more sense for Toledo’s quarterback, instead of running for that 30+ yard touchdown late in the game, to fall around the 1 and then drain the clock to allow the Rockets to kick the winning field goal.  But they didn’t and Toledo’s defense decided to get a flag on almost every play, and the Irish made them pay.  If Brian Kelly wanted to execute his team last week, I can’t imagine what he is thinking today.  And all this was over on the ‘Cock!  Yep, that’s right, it was on NBC’s streaming service, Peacock, not on NBC proper.  I’m sure no one was upset by this at all because college football fans tend to be rational people, right?
• Miami 25 Appalachian State 23 – It was quite the exciting game down at Hard Rock Stadium and I wasn’t that surprised by it.  People getting on the Canes have to realize that the Mountaineers are quite a good team.  So not totally shocking for it to go almost down to the end.  The most exciting thing to happen there that game, though, had nothing to do with what was happening on the field.  A cat all of a sudden was shown dangling from the upper deck.  No, I do not know how it got there or why it was dangling there.  All the fans in the area were watching and hoping the cat didn’t get hurt or die by falling.  The cat did fall…right into a guy holding an American flag who caught the cat in the flag.  On the 20th anniversary of 9/11.  Don’t be surprised if there’s a 30 for 30 Short on that one day.
• Iowa 27 Iowa State 17 – Um, could this finally be the year that Kirk Ferentz takes the Iowa Hawkeyes to the Big Dance?  This team is looking seriously good.  No mistake that they looked overpowering compared to Iowa State on Saturday.  And don’t think the Cyclones are out of it just yet.  I think their College Football Playoff hopes, however slim, are probably squashed but a New Year’s Six spot is still theirs if they can win out the rest of the regular season.  Don’t be surprised if both of these teams are playing on conference championship weekend in games that mean a whole lot.
• Rutgers 17 Syracuse 7 – Don’t look now but the 2021 version of the Rutgers Scarlet Knights football team is 2-0.  And looking pretty good doing it, especially on defense.  Yes it’s early and yes the Scarlet Knights might be in the second toughest division in college football but things are finally looking up for a team that has been not a lot better than hot garbage since joining the Big Ten.
• Arkansas 40 Texas 21 – Oh boy is Texas not back.  The Longhorns were boatraced by Arkansas in a game that may not even been as close as the score indicated.  I’m mistaken.  Texas is back…..back bacon.
• Pittsburgh 41 Tennessee 34 – At times this game was like snorting coke off a hooker’s ass, then taking a shot of absinthe, then getting on a motorcycle and gunning the engine to jump out of a plane.  It was that ridiculous.  At times both teams did everything they could to win, then not minutes later both teams would be trying their darndest to lose.  Completely bonkers.  In the end, it was a Volunteering that happened, not a Pittening.  I’m sure fans on Rocky Top are not happy right now because Tennessee?  Not back.
• Oklahoma State 28 Tulsa 23 –  I know people love to use the College Football Transitive Property.  Team A beat Team B who beat Team C so Team A is better than Team C.  It was almost to the point in this one where we’d have to say that UC-Davis was better than Oklahoma State because of that.  Now Vanderbilt’s victory over Colorado State probably does fit.  East Tennessee State beat Vanderbilt who beat Colorado State.  So ETSU is better than CSU.  Which may be true because the Rams got trounced by South Dakota State in Week 1.  Ouch.
• Houston 44 Rice 7 – Hey, who was possibly the only guy on the Internet to pick Rice to win this one?  That would be me.  And it’s a lesson to all you out there that I have mentioned multiple times before: do not use my picks to gamble with.  You are playing with fire if you do so.
• Army 38 Western Kentucky 35 – It seemed fitting that Army won on the anniversary of 9/11.  WKU did not make it easy as they have a seriously prolific passing game with Bailey Zappe under centre.  But Army’s option offense is, much of the time, too difficult to defend against because they don’t deviate from it, ever.  Georgia Southern and Navy and Air Force, they have times were they pass the ball a decent amount.  Hell, Georgia Tech has abandoned it altogether.  Not the Black Knights.  The option.  That’s it.  And it works most of the time.
• Purdue 49 UConn 0 – The Huskies have not scored a point since Randy Edsall quit/retired.  Not that they scored a lot of points anyway during his second tenure in Storrs.  This is going to be a looooooooooooong season for that fanbase.

Recap complete!  As I always say, some of the worst looking weeks on paper end up being some of the best to watch and this past weekend was a ton of fun to watch.  You know what?  Let’s bust out the first Bossman Top 25!

#1	Alabama
#2	Oregon
#3	Georgia
#4	Texas A&M
#5	Oklahoma
#6	Iowa
#7	Cincinnati
#8	Notre Dame
#9	Clemson
#10	Penn State
#11	Ohio State
#12	Florida
#13	Coastal Carolina
#14	Wisconsin
#15	Iowa State
#16	UCLA
#17	North Carolina
#18	Virginia Tech
#19	Ole Miss
#20	Miami
#21	Arizona State
#22	Auburn
#23	TCU
#24	Arkansas
#25	Liberty

Always seem to be close to the AP Poll but there’s always interesting differences.  Yes, I had Oregon moving all the way up to #2 and deservedly so.  Also, I didn’t quite move Iowa into the Top 5 as many had (and AP did).  Give it time and I’m sure they will get there.  I try not to go crazy and overrate a team after one huge victory.  That is why I only put Arkansas at #24.  If they start stringing more victories together, then sure I will definitely move them up.  They have to earn it right?  Well, it is college football polls so “earning it” can be a very subjective measure.

Another recap done and getting in the football groove with Fall just around the corner.  I will be going back to the normal college football schedule on Thursday, NFL schedule on Friday format that you all know and love (well, at least I think you love….I know you know).  It’s getting slightly cooler (although it was quite humid today) and it is starting to feel a bit like football weather.  I love it.  Have a great week everyone!

How my predictions did, short Super Bowl preview, and a few other things

College football is pretty much done for the season (kind of…I will explain this towards the end of the post).  The NFL is almost done for the season.  I have made the decision to not do as many mock drafts this year.  I will do at least one, just before the draft but that may end up being all.  I have no idea when the CFL will begin.  If they are planning a 2021 season then it will begin in late May.  It would be nice to have a season after not having one in 2020.

But let’s get to the main crux of this post: how good or bad my predictions were.  I always assume I did bad so when I do good, I feel good.  Set the bar low and you will always leap over it.  I should be a motivational speaker (a la Matt Foley).  Alright let’s get on with this:

College Football Playoff and New Year’s Six

• I don’t even know if I need to go through this since I did it before the Big Ten and Pac-12 even decided to play:
  • Clemson – Picked them #1 and they ended up #2 and avenged a regular season Trevor Lawrence-less loss against Notre Dame in the ACC Championship.  One for one.
  • Alabama – I figured this was a no-brainer.  I will say I was a bit surprised at how dominant they were though as they rolled to #1 and the national championship.
  • Oklahoma – I had them #3.  Unfortunately the Big XII was trash so the Sooners fell just outside of the Top 4.  And by just outside, I mean WAY outside (even though they were still Top 10).
  • Texas A&M – If the Irish hadn’t beat Clemson earlier in the year, Jimbo would finally get his chance to win the big one in College Station.  #5 ain’t bad, right?
• How about my New Year’s Six picks? Not as good.  But I am taking a pass here.  Having two conferences not in my predictions made it near impossible to match what actually happened.  Saying that, I REALLY whiffed on LSU.  I figured they wouldn’t be as good as last season but that was quite the drop.
• Let’s see, I had Cincinnati ranked….#25.  Damn.  I thought App State would run the table and finally get to a New Year’s Six bowl.  Instead, Coastal Carolina took the conference, and the college football viewing public, on a ride that few will forget.
• I had BYU, Georgia and Virginia Tech being just on the outside of the NY6 looking in but playing in good bowls. BYU was awesome all season, Georgia was also really good despite not winning the SEC East and VaTech wasn’t that bad (but not nearly as good as I thought they would be).  So I did well with these three picks.

Heisman Trophy

• I had Trevor Lawrence and Justin Fields as my #1 and #2.  Hey at least they were in the Top 10 at the end.
• I didn’t have DeVonta Smith on my list.  I had put his teammate, Najee Harris on the list, and he ended up as a finalist.  I have a feeling a lot of experts didn’t have Smith on their list so this non-expert feels just fine.
• My picks were mostly OK but I missed BADLY on some.  I mean Bo Nix at #8?  Myles Brennan and Adrian Martinez in the Honourable Mention section?  Sweet Jesus.  Brutal.  Nothing more to say here.

Just A Bunch of Predictions

Normally I would split the good and the bad and the hot seat stuff into separate sections.  I’m not going to bother here

• So many in the media said the Ivy League cancelling Fall sports would be the catalyst for FBS being entirely cancelled.  Guys like Dan Wolken.  It’s amazing who keeps employed in this day and age but we have all seen sports media go to shit so it’s not surprising.
• I couldn’t figure out which conferences were starting their schedules or when and at one point I had the MAC and Mountain West completely opting out and playing in the Spring.  What a gongshow.
• I have said a few times that the Spring season will not happen.  And now it is starting to look more and more like I will be correct.  As of this point, I believe about 15% of the FCS schools have opted out with a few weeks still to before the season begins.
• I figured Texas A&M would lose two games and they would be close and I was bang on.
• Normally the guys in the Doubtful Shitcanning section of my Coaching Hot Seat list do well.  Let’s see how that went this season.  Dino Babers and Syracuse were awful.  Matt Viator was fired and then Tom Herman was also fired at Texas.  So yeah, not a good time for that list.
• I should apologize to Philip Montgomery though.  Man was Tulsa fun to watch this season and came very close to upsetting Cincinnati in the AAC Championship and putting Coastal Carolina in the New Year’s Six.  I thought Tulsa would win one game.  Yikes.
• I said you would see a lot more Sun Belt football on television this year.  I was right.  Which is good because you got to see a lot of Coastal Carolina.  That’s a good thing.
• One more Coastal Carolina point.  I don’t know if there has been a bigger surprise in college football in a long time.  Jamey Chadwell deserved every accolade he got (and some he didn’t get).  If they repeat this next year, look for another conference to take a closer look at the team from Myrtle Beach (OK they are in Conway, but close enough).
• Somehow, no one picked up Billy Napier to coach at a bigger school.  I am a bit surprised.  But Louisiana is very happy he is staying for at least one more season since the Ragin’ Cajuns have become one of the new standards of the Sun Belt (and the Group of Five to a lesser extent).
• Marshall.  An amazingly hot start that went to shit during their last three games.  And it cost Doc Holliday his job.  They are now hoping another coach from the Nick Saban coaching tree can put this program over the hump.
• I should have gone all-in with Oklahoma in the Big XII.  Yes, Sooner fans.  At least plan out your trip to JerryWorld in December every year for the next few.  Nothing is going to change.
• Can anyone win at Kansas?  I am hoping that I am right that next year is the year that Les Miles can pull them out of the basement but I’m not so sure.
• Notre Dame almost won a conference in their first try!  Good for them.   I guess the ACC doesn’t like that so Notre Dame will not be in a conference again starting in 2021.  Poor Irish.
• I had the top 4 in the ACC correct.  NC State did well as the fifth best team in the conference so I missed on them.  But beyond that?  Ugh.  Again, I fell for the Florida State Koolaid.  Damn it.
• Nice to see BYU do so well.  That game against Coastal Carolina was a fun contest that was set up TWO DAYS IN ADVANCE.  See college football?  It can be done.
• Full disclosure: Liberty did WAY better than I ever thought they could have.  But I think that happened to most people, including Liberty fans.
• I almost nailed the American conference except for Tulsa, which I mentioned above.  Had Navy improving, Tulane getting a bit better, Temple struggling, and USF not being good.  I’ll give myself a pat on the bat and a wee bit of scotch.

I had no predictions for the Big Ten and the Pac-12 because they are stupid and started late and thought everyone would follow them.  Same with the MAC and Mountain West.  God, I hope we don’t have to deal with this again.  So yeah, the amount of predictions that I am looking at is a rather short list but there’s not a whole lot I can do.  Also, I am not even going to bother doing a Stassen score since I didn’t have a full set of predictions.

Am I going to even gauge how well I did?  No.  No point.  It was a mess this season.  Let’s forget about 2020.  I know I am trying to.  Now, we are 211 days away from the 2021 FBS season beginning.  Maybe I should try and improve my life in that time.  We’ll see.

The Pro Bowl would have been this Sunday but somehow we have received some luck and it won’t happen.  The Pro Bowl fucking blows.  I don’t understand why it continues like it does now.  Make it completely different or just abolish it already.  Anyway, there will be some weird Pro Bowl Celebration show airing on ABC, TSN1 and TSN5.  It starts at 3.  Who knows what it is.  I doubt I will watch it.

As for the Super Bowl itself, we have Tampa Bay and Kansas City.  I was hoping for Buffalo but they had a great season nonetheless.  The game will air on CBS, CTV, and TSN 1, 4, and 5 on February 7th.  Right now, KC is the 3 point favourites.  That could (and probably will) change between now and game time).  I am not going into a huge preview.  Instead I will just give my prediction.

Chiefs 35 Bucs 23.

I believe Mahomes and the Chiefs’ offensive weapons will be too much for Tampa’s defense.  The game should be close into the second half but I see KC pulling away, giving the Chiefs their second straight Super Bowl win.  So even though the Buccaneers are the first team ever to play the Super Bowl at their home stadium, I think we will have to wait at least another season before a team wins a Super Bowl at their home stadium.

Alright what do we have to look forward to:

• How my NFL predictions panned out.  I already took a look.  Not good.
• Spring football schedAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.   No.  I can’t see us getting any of those spring games up here and really, I don’t care.  And I don’t mean the normal Spring Games that most of the programs have.  I’m talking about quite a bit of the FCS (and New Mexico State) playing Spring football.  I wouldn’t be surprised if most of it got shut down to be honest with you.
• Conference tournament schedule leading up to March Madness.  This could be very interesting because we know March Madness is different this year.  Will the conference tournaments be different?  I’d be surprised if they weren’t.
• Then a pretty big break until the NFL Draft.  I will have a mock draft close to draft time.  I may have one earlier than that but at this point I haven’t determined if I will do that or not.  If you want mock drafts, there are plenty out there.  My favourite is from the site WalterFootball.com.  A lot of great analysis there.

So not much coming up over the next three months.  As per usual.  Remember, the Senior Bowl and Polynesian Bowl college all-star games are still scheduled for this Saturday.  UPDATE: The Polynesian Bowl will not be shown on Saturday on CBS Sports Network.  However, the Hula Bowl, another college all-star game, will be shown on CBS Sports Network.  This game will be at 9:30 on Sunday.  Then that’s it, that’s all for college football for the 2020 season (kind of…I don’t really count the spring schedule as the 2020 season).  Have a great weekend everyone!

SUPER MEGA HYPER OMNI POST! V4.0.1

This post is really long.  Like seriously fucking long.  So if you are not fully awake or have some caffeine in your system, you might want to wait to read this.  Viewer discretion is strongly advised.

I have done this three times before.  It’s time for number four!

Instead of doing a full recap and then a full bowl projections post, I figured I would combine them into one insanely long post!  Why?  To save time! That is complete bullshit but that is what I have told myself every year so I will continue to do so.  It was an…let’s call it an OK week of college football that contained a few exciting games.  We are headed into an exciting finish to the season.  Now we can see how COVID will wreak havoc on it since it will most certainly happen.  We just don’t know when and to what team(s).

Let’s start with recapping the week that was.  There were a few fun things that happened and I slept in way too long Sunday morning.  A Fall tradition.

• One of three ranked-on-ranked games on the week had Iowa State outlast Texas.  The difference here was mostly one guy: Breece Hall.  His work on the ground was a boon for the Cyclone offense as he was able to help ISU milk a lot of clock in this one.  He is a lot like a Clone legend: Troy Davis.  A great player who won’t get any Heisman hype because of the team he plays for.  So now Iowa State has almost clinched their ticket to JerryWorld which will be a nice change from seeing mostly bluebloods in the Big XII Championship since it returned.
• Florida beat Kentucky easily.  Georgia beat South Carolina even easier this past weekend.  The Dawgs have to be rooting for the Vols to win this Saturday over Florida to have any chance at being in the SEC Championship.  I can see many UGA fans having a bad taste in their mouth for having to root for Tennessee but it is what it is.  You know what?  Blame it on COVID.  It will make it feel a bit better.
• You all saw it I’m sure.  Sarah Fuller became the first woman to play in a Power Five football game.  That, in and of itself, is a huge accomplishment.  And of course Twitter, being full of very level-headed people, went crazy over it.  Many loved it but there were some that said it was nothing but a PR stunt.  Here is my take on this.  Vandy had no kickers.  They needed to find someone to kick the damn ball during their game against Missouri.  Was Fuller the best option?  Who knows but she was at least a decent option as she played for the Dores’ SEC Championship women’s soccer team.  So let’s get to her kicking off to start the second half of the game which was her first opportunity to kick the ball.  It was a squib kick that went a little over 30 yards.  For people that don’t think it was a squib kick, give me a fucking break.  The ball wasn’t on a tee, it was held by a player and the Commodores overloaded on the right side, where the squib went.  They wanted to do something different to hopefully get anything going for them in this game.  That was Fuller’s only kick of the game as Vandy was shutout 41-0 by Mizzou.  I think people have to realize something about all this.  Vandy is straight trash this season.  No COVID excuses here: they are just awful.  This felt like trying something different to try something different.  That it was historic is icing on the cake.  Now there seems to be other issues as Derek Mason was just fired and it sounded, from the words of Fuller, a few players and a couple of coaches, that there was no energy on the sideline most of the season and it’s like many had given up before the season had started.  They need a jolt in Nashville to get this team at least being competitive in the SEC.  And that might involve a complete rethinking of the football program at Vanderbilt.  Thank you for coming to my college football Ted Talk.
• LSU’s offense basically took the day off on Saturday.  If it wasn’t for a late touchdown they would have been shutout by Texas A&M.  It’s funny that a 20-7 dominating win over the defending national champions does very little to move the needle for the Aggies.  I still think they have an inside shot at the College Football Playoff but will need to run their next two opponents off the field to convince The Committee.
• Oregon blew it against Oregon State.  But that wasn’t the story.  The story was the Pac-12 officiating crew calling the game.  Oregon goes offside (that anyone could see) and it’s not called.  The Beavers scored a touchdown but it was called short.  This meant another play had to be run where their quarterback got injured.  This was all in the final minute.  And the officials seemed to have no idea how to call anything.  It was atrocious.  I am sure they will get a pay raise for it.
• In almost-upset news, Iowa almost gakked their game away to Nebraska in the annual Black Friday CornHub game.  And this is not really a good Huskers program these days.  They really have not been a contender for a long time (and no I don’t include that time they started 7-0 a few years back and then were terrible the rest of the way).  I am sure they long for the days of Bo Pelini.  Hell they may desire the Bill Callahan days!  Scott Frost will be on a seriously hot seat to start next season and now some have to look back and take back their thoughts of basically poaching him from UCF as the Knights are still doing quite well under Josh Heupel.
• The game that was created mere days in advance, put on late night on ESPN because of other cancellations, then moved into the ABC primetme spot due to MORE cancellations, did not disappoint.  It was all Utah in the first half and then all Washington in the second half.  The Huskies ended up holding on for the victory after taking a late lead and stay undefeated.  This may only lead to a possible New Year’s Six bid but at this point I am sure Pac-12 teams are very happy to be playing (when they get the opportunity to play that is).
• SMU got boatraced for most of the game by *checks notes* East Carolina?  What the hell?  It was 45-7 at the half for the Pirates.  So either ECU is much better than most of us figured or the Mustangs are not nearly as good as many of us thought.  I’m going to go with the latter so this doesn’t seem like a massive upset.
• If you missed it, history was made in western New York.  Buffalo Bulls running back Jaret Patterson went off on Kent State.  Patterson scored eight rushing touchdowns, tying Howard Griffith’s 30-year-old record!  He also came within 18 yards of Samaje Perine’s single-game record of 427 rushing yards.  An absolutely unreal performance.  And get this: Bulls head coach Lance Leipold had no idea he had tied the record and took him out for their final drive (where Patterson’s backup scored a touchdown).  Worst part is Patterson will get no Heisman hype at all.  But some NFL team will be very happy to have him on Sundays (and Thursdays and Mondays and sometimes Tuesdays).
• A game that almost no one would have watched had a great finish in Big XII country.  Baylor finally got their second win under first-year head coach Dave Aranda.  It was a wild fourth quarter against Kansas State where 31 points were scored and the Bears scored with no time remaining.  Hey remember early on in the season when the Wildcats were getting some contender hype?  Yeah, neither do I.
• Penn State and Michigan played football on Saturday.  That’s almost all I can say about that.  At least the Nittany Lions got their first win of the season.
• Let’s get back to some insane football, Big XII Style.  Oklahoma State and Texas Tech put on an (offensive) performance for the ages during the third quarter of their game.  The two teams combined for five touchdowns in six minutes of play.  Crazy!  That included the Cowboys getting a touchdown off a Red Raider onside kick.  The Pokes ended up winning, keeping their very slim Big XII Championship hopes alive.
• And now to look at something that was not so good.  Late in their game against NC State, Syracuse quarterback Rex Culpepper gets sacked on third and long.  So now, with no timeouts, they have to run a play as there is less than 10 seconds remaining.  Instead, he gets under centre, gets the ball, and spikes it.  That is really the perfect example of Syracuse’s season.
• Finally, a week after Northwestern beat Wisconsin to take full control of the Big Ten West, they get upset by Michigan State and look terrible doing it.  College football, everybody!

Normally I would look at the conference championships and give out scenarios as to what may happen.  With two weeks left, I won’t be doing that.  Also, the fact most of the conference races are a mess doesn’t help.  I will try and bring you this next week..

Alright, on to my bowl projections as of this moment, which may have no worth to them:

Sugar Bowl	CFP Poll #1 vs. CFP Poll #4	Alabama vs. Ohio State
Rose Bowl	CFP Poll #2 vs. CFP Poll #3	Notre Dame vs. Miami

Clemson out, Notre Dame in.  I think the Irish win the rematch in the ACC Championship to clinch the #2 spot.  Ohio State’s resume took a hit with the cancellation of their game but I still see them holding on to the #4 spot.

Which means the New Year’s Six has changed.  But how has it changed?

Orange Bowl	ACC Champ vs. SEC #2	Clemson vs. Texas A&M
Fiesta Bowl	CFP At-large vs. CFP At-large/G5 #1	USC vs. Oklahoma
Peach Bowl	CFP At-large vs. CFP At-large/G5 #1	Florida vs. Cincinnati
Cotton Bowl	CFP At-large vs. CFP At-large/G5 #1	Iowa State vs. Georgia

A lot of changes.  I already mentioned Clemson losing to Notre Dame again but with Miami in the Top 4, they are slotted in the Orange Bowl as the ACC representative.  I have decided that Texas A&M might be picked instead of Florida for the Orange Bowl.  I don’t know why, I just thought that.  So that moves Florida to the Peach Bowl.  Oklahoma, losers of the Big XII Championship, would still be high enough to get the Fiesta Bowl bid since The Committee obviously doesn’t want to put BYU in.  Iowa State, now Big XII champions in my projections, go to the Cotton Bowl and face Georgia who replaces Texas as the final team in.

Now the rest of bowl season which is a shitshow with the pandemic and every team being bowl-eligible and no one knowing the criteria anymore and man I think I need to make myself a drink.

Outback Bowl	SEC vs. Big Ten	Kentucky vs. Northwestern
Gator Bowl	SEC vs. ACC	Ole Miss vs. NC State
Citrus Bowl	SEC vs. Big Ten	Auburn vs. Indiana
Birmingham Bowl	SEC/ACC vs. G5	Mississippi State vs. BYU
Texas Bowl	SEC vs. Big XII	Missouri vs. TCU
Liberty Bowl	SEC vs. Big XII	Tennessee vs. West Virginia
Arizona Bowl	MWC vs. MAC	Nevada vs. Buffalo
Sun Bowl	Pac-12 vs. ACC	Colorado vs. Boston College
Armed Forces Bowl	Big XII vs G5	Baylor vs. Liberty
LA Bowl	Pac-12 vs. MWC	Arizona State vs. San Jose State
Music City Bowl	SEC vs. Big Ten	LSU vs. Iowa
Duke’s Mayo Bowl	Big Ten vs. ACC	Wisconsin vs. North Carolina
Alamo Bowl	Big XII vs. Pac-12	Texas vs. Oregon
Cheez-It Bowl	Big XII vs. ACC	Oklahoma State vs. Virginia Tech
Military Bowl	American vs. ACC	Memphis vs. Virginia
Guaranteed Rate Bowl	Big XII vs. Big Ten	Kansas State vs. Nebraska
Independence Bowl	Army vs. Pac-12	Army vs. Utah
LendingTree Bowl	Sun Belt vs. G5	Appalachian State vs. SMU
First Responder Bowl	Big XII/ACC vs. G5	Texas Tech vs. Louisiana
Cure Bowl	G5 vs. G5	Florida Atlantic vs. UCF
Gasparilla Bowl	SEC/ACC vs. G5	Wake Forest vs. Miami-OH
Camellia Bowl	G5 vs. G5	UTSA vs. Fresno State
New Mexico Bowl	MWC vs. G5	Air Force vs. Louisiana Tech
Montgomery Bowl	ACC vs. American	Pittsburgh vs. Tulsa
New Orleans Bowl	C-USA vs. Sun Belt	Marshall vs. Coastal Carolina
Boca Raton Bowl	G5 vs. G5	Central Michigan vs. Charlotte
Idaho Potato Bowl	MWC vs. MAC	Boise State vs. Western Michigan
Myrtle Beach Bowl	G5 vs. G5	Ohio vs. San Diego State
Las Vegas Bowl	SEC vs. Pac-12	Arkansas vs. Washington
Frisco Bowl	G5 vs. G5	UAB vs. Troy

A few notes for your perusal:

• Did you notice the missing bowl?  I am guessing probably not.  The Pinstripe Bowl has been cancelled due to concerns over COVID-19 and I have a feeling it won’t be the last.
• The tie-ins actually work better this year with the pandemic parameters (pandameters?).  Putting all the G5 teams into a pool after the conference tie-ins are satisfied and having all teams eligible makes it easier to fill in the bowls.  Now the chances of me being right have gone way down because of it but that’s a different conversation.
• Army, as far as I know, is still the only team that has accepted a bowl bid.  They accepted it over a month ago.  I am not joking.
• I still have no idea if the Las Vegas Bowl is being run.  The website says the 2020 Las Vegas Bowl will be run but it doesn’t mention a date.  So I will keep it in until I find out otheriwse.
• I still don’t understand the idea of split tie-ins.  Just pick a conference and go with it.  Or have a pool of teams to pick from like they have done this year (and I hope they do in the future).  That would at least make more sense.  Then again, nothing much makes sense this year.

Other than those few items, not much to talk about specifically about the bowl projections.  A fair amount has changed in terms of what I am projecting but they aren’t wild changes.  That might change starting this coming weekend.  With only two weeks left in the regular season (kind of), much will happen over this time.  The problem is, with all teams bowl eligible, I can’t see many accepting bowl bids until conference championship weekend.

UPDATE:  The Sun Bowl, one of the longest running bowl games in college football, has been cancelled this year.  See what I mean?

Now I figured instead of doing the conference championship scenarios, I will look into potential scenarios of the future and what they would like in this crazy 2020 season (using the current AP poll rankings).

The five-team CFP

I have advocated for one more team to be added to the College Football Playoff instead of going to eight which is what many want.  What would that do this season?  This:

• Peach Bowl (play-in game): #4 Clemson vs. #5 Texas A&M
• Sugar Bowl: #1 Alabama vs. Clemson/TAMU winner
• Rose Bowl: #2 Notre Dame vs. #3 Ohio State

I would dig this.  Doing the Peach Bowl on the opening day of bowl season would allow this to happen.  Now, other things would have to take place because the schedule is a fucking mess but if it had been set up properly, this could occur.  Ratings, baby!

The six-team CFP

Two teams added.  OK.  Let’s see how this could work out:

• Orange Bowl: #3 Ohio State vs. #6 Florida
• Peach Bowl: #4 Clemson vs. #5 Texas A&M
• Sugar Bowl: #1 Alabama vs. lower-ranked winner from play-in weekend
• Rose Bowl: #2 Notre Dame vs. higher-ranked winner from play-in weekend

Again, I could go for this for sure.  Is it adding a game for two teams possibly?  Yes.  There are ways around this for sure.  Like get rid of conference championships?  Oh wait, that’s money in the conference’s pockets.  Can’t do that.  And yes, I have ISU predicted at #6.

The eight-team CFP

This is what people want.  OK what would it look like for this season?

• Peach Bowl: #1 Alabama vs. #8 BYU
• Fiesta Bowl: #2 Notre Dame vs. #7 Cincinnati
• Orange Bowl: #3 Ohio State vs. #6 Florida
• Cotton Bowl: #4 Clemson vs. #5 Texas A&M

I mean this gets Cincinnati and BYU in so that would be a plus.  I still kind of don’t like the idea of moving to eight teams but I know it will happen for the new CFP contract.

G-5 Playoffs

What if the Group of Five decided “Fuck it we are having our own tournament to crown a champion.”  They won’t but I could see a lot of people watching these games.  The quarter-finals would look like this:

• Cincinnati vs. Buffalo
• BYU vs. Liberty
• Coastal Carolina vs. Tulsa
• Marshall vs. Louisiana

I would watch the hell out of this, not going to lie.  Now I assume that, at least for the quarter-finals, the higher-ranked teams would play at home but who knows.

Alright that is it.  No more.  A seriously long post is complete.  Later this week I will try and piece together the college and pro schedules.  I think I have a better chance of herding squirrels.  Have a good week everyone!

‘Tis the season for some football – Week 12 College Football TV Schedule

So much damn football!  You gotta love it!

Of course the Footballgasm alludes to football every day until a couple of days before American Thanksgiving.  It is a great time of year to be a football fan, college or pro.  Here’s the news stories going into this week since none of them, I don’t think, warrant the entire introduction (I’m picky that way):

• Thanks to Miami’s COVID-19 issues, a bunch of ACC games were moved around.  I won’t go through them all here.  One of the games moved, however, is Miami’s game against Georgia Tech which has been moved to December 19th.  What else is that day?  Oh yeah the ACC Championship.  So this game will only be played if Miami is not in the ACC Championship and if the result wouldn’t impact who plays in the title game.  Good god.
• MACtion graces our screens on weekdays now.  MACtion is fun to watch I will admit.  Usually some pretty good close games.  Or if they aren’t close they usually have some awesome performances, like Buffalo’s Jaret Pattersion last night.  And the attendance issue isn’t an issue because it’s really an issue everywhere.  So enjoy MACtion!
• Back to COVID, more games have been postponed or outright cancelled.  The latest two are two American Conference games.  Houston-SMU and Navy-USF are being moved into December (hopefully).  As I said before, move the conference championships to December 26th and use December 19th as a make-up date.  Why is this so difficult?
• The conversation on BYU and Cincinnati is intensifying.  Many are saying that they should have a shot in the College Football Playoff if they both run the table.  The chances are still slim and they have to hope for upsets above them.  First up is this week where these two teams hope Clemson and Florida somehow lose to teams that are 30+ point underdogs.  Good luck.

Anyway, other than that, not much to discuss so let’s get into the schedule alright?

Wednesday

		US	Canada
Toledo at Eastern Michigan	7:00 PM
Western Michigan at Central Michigan	7:00 PM

MACtion!  Hey it’s weekday football.  So for you basketball fans, between every pick of the NBA draft, head over to one of these games.  You’ll thank me later.

Thursday

		US	Canada
Tulane at #25 Tulsa	7:30 PM
Utah State at Wyoming	9:00 PM

Ranked Tulsa!  The Golden Hurricane could cause a lot of issues inside the AAC if they keep winning.  The other game is a Mountain West game so let’s just be happy we can watch Mountain West football this Fall.  I just hope at least one of these games stays close or otherwise it’s off to Thursday Night Football.

UPDATE #2: USU-Wyoming has been cancelled and will be declared a no contest.  I prefer double disqualification or double countout but that’ll do.

Friday​

		US	Canada
Purdue at Minnesota	7:30 PM
Syracuse at Louisville	7:30 PM
UMass at Florida Atlantic	8:00 PM

OK let’s be honest here: we have three relatively average games.  The Conference USA game is important since FAU is probably the only team that could possibly challenge Marshall in the East division.  Minnesota, despite not being near the team they were last season, are still a dangerous team and Purdue might be better than advertised if they can stay healthy.

Saturday Early​

		US	Canada
#4 Clemson at Florida State	Noon
Michigan State at Maryland	Noon
Georgia Southern at Army	Noon
#6 Florida at Vanderbilt	Noon
Appalachian State at #15 Coastal Carolina	Noon
#9 Indiana at #3 Ohio State	Noon
Illinois at Nebraska	Noon
LSU at Arkansas	Noon

We get the Rodney Dangerfield of programs (well maybe not anymore), Indiana, facing Ohio State in a game with serious College Football Playoff implications.  We get a pretty bad Florida State team trying to derail Clemson’s postseason hopes.  We also get Coastal Carolina’s next big game on the path to a historic season as they host the Sun Belt’s preeminent team (up until now) Appalachian State.  And there’s a few other good games as well.  Oh and also Illinois-Nebraska which will be cool to watch if the weather is bad.

UPDATE #4: Clemson-FSU has now been postponed.   So Florida-Vandy has been moved to ABC, almost 25 years to the day since the last time a regular season SEC game was aired on ABC.  AppState-CCU moves to ESPN and, I believe, TSN2.  (I was wrong.  UF-Vandy stays on TSN2).

Saturday Afternoon​

		US	Canada
#10 Wisconsin at #19 Northwestern	3:30 PM
Iowa at Penn State	3:30 PM
San Diego State at Nevada	3:30 PM
#7 Cincinnati at UCF	3:30 PM
#22 Texas at Kansas	3:30 PM
California at Oregon State	3:30 PM
Kansas State at #17 Iowa State	4:00 PM
Kentucky at #1 Alabama	4:00 PM

Two huge games in the afternoon timeslot.  Cincinnati visits Orlando hoping for a win that would make them the undisputed king of the Group of Five going into the final quarter of the season and Northwestern has one of their biggest games in program history as the Big Ten West title is essentially on the line in Evanston with Wisky coming into town.  Now will this Big Ten West matchup have College Football Playoff impact?  Perhaps if either team runs the table.  Also if we get Kentucky somehow upsetting Bama we will finally fully get a season that matches the kind of year it has been (although it’s getting close already).  This game will start on TSN1 in progress starting at about 5:00 but will be shown, in its entirety, on TSN3.  And yes, the Mountain West is on CBS!

UPDATE: We are barely into this and UT-KU has been postponed to December 12th.

Saturday Primetime​

		US	Canada
San Jose State at Fresno State	7:00 PM
Tennessee at #23 Auburn	7:00 PM
#14 Oklahoma State at #18 Oklahoma	7:30 PM
Michigan at Rutgers	7:30 PM
Arizona at Washington	8:00 PM

And now, we have Bedlam!  Oklahoma and Oklahoma State, despite both of them being fairly far out of the Top 4, have the biggest Big XII game of the season.  This game will decide if Oklahoma State honestly has what it takes to get to the CFP or if the Sooners are still the cream of the crop in the conference.  TSN gets Tennessee-Auburn in this timeslot.  I don’t understand this.  Normally they would just also broadcast the ABC game if it was the better game, deciding to ignore showing another game for Canadians to watch.  This week they, ahem, volunteer to show this one.  I’m at a loss.  I’m very interested in seeing if Rutgers can actually beat what could be considered a team closer to the top than the bottom in the Big Ten.  Now the Wolverines aren’t the Wolverines of even last season but still, they can be a tough out.

Saturday Late Night​

		US	Canada
#20 USC at Utah	10:30 PM
Boise State at Hawaii	11:00 PM
Washington State at Stanford	11:00 PM

USC-Utah is a pretty big game in the Pac-12.  Winner still has Colorado to deal with but gets a big step up in the Pac-12 South.  Boise State needs to absolutely destroy Hawaii to get back in the New Year’s Six race and the race to leave last place in the Pac-12 North ends the week.

UPDATE #3: The race for last place in the Pac-12 North has been cancelled due to issues with COVID for Wazzu.

Games to set your eyeballs on

Indiana at Ohio State (Noon, FOX) – This is the Game of the Week and I don’t think others are close.  So it’s not GOTW A, it’s just GOTW.  Indiana could do what no one thought they could and that’s beat the Buckeyes and take control of the Big Ten East.  Honestly here, the winner basically clinches the division because unless something crazy happens, they have essentially a two-game lead with three regular season weeks to go.  The loser is probably still in play for the NY6 though.  Plus, when does Big Noon Saturday ever get the big game of the week?  This is one of the very few times that has happened.

Wisconsin at Northwestern (3:30, ABC) – This should have more hype attached to it and it may by the time the game beings.  This game just feels like a classic Big Ten matchup despite the fact we will see two underrated quarterbacks in this one.  But the defense and the running game will show up because it is a B1G game and we know this.  And even if the Wildcats win, I wonder how much they will rise in the rankings because it feels like a team that will receive their fair share of disrespect.  I mean not like Pat Fitzgerald will get the Coach of the Year award (hell, he won’t even get the Big Ten COY) but he has done an amazing job getting the Cats back to the top of the Big Ten West.  I would love if somehow the Big Ten got two CFP spots and those two teams were Indiana and Northwestern.  The college football media would explode.

Oklahoma State at Oklahoma (7:30, ABC) – Speaking of big tests, Oklahoma State has, arguably, their final regular season test here.  Win Bedlam and they are off to JerryWorld for the Big XII title game.  It would be a nice turnaround for a team that, despite their record, looked outright bad early on in the season.  This is not the case of a non-traditional power doing well and even the AP Poll not giving them their due.  They fully deserved to be where they were in the rankings.  But the Pokes are high enough in the rankings now that four straight wins to finish their regular season would put them, at least, in the Top 6 going into conference championship weekend.  I don’t know if we can say the same thing for the two-loss Sooners as even winning their final three will probably not be enough for a semi-final matchup in New Orleans or Pasadena.

Cincinnati at UCF (3:30, TSN2) – Is UCF back?  A win here would convince everyone that the Knights are back as one of the premier Group of Five teams.  But this is the Bearcats, one of the best G-5 teams ever.  Cincinnati wins this and they cement their spot at the top of the G-5 rankings and plant themselves in the catbird seat for the NY6 spot.  A loss by them opens this up to a lot of teams as we shall see in the next paragraph.

Appalachian State at Coastal Carolina (Noon, ESPN2) – This is the game that everyone in the Sun Belt has waited for.  The Chanticleers have their chance to prove their mettle and actually move up the rankings a bit if they can beat the Mountaineers here.  They will also be closely watching the game above as well since a loss by Cincinnati could put this team, of all teams, in the New Year’s Six driver’s seat.  Now that would be 2020-esque.

Honourable mention: Kansas State at Iowa State (4:00, FOX); Liberty at NC State (7:00, ESPN3…no I am not joking); USC at Utah (10:30, TSN2)

Some gambling fun and games

My picks weren’t all bad last week.  I mean I lost on SMU but many people did, Troy-CCU never got played, and lost my other upset pick as Miami pulled one out of the fire.  So hey it wasn’t so bad so let’s go for not-so-bad this week (keeping my expectations low).  Here we go:

Iowa State over Kansas State

Appalachian State over Coastal Carolina (minor upset)

NC State over Liberty (I don’t know if this is an upset or not)

UCF over Cincinnati (huge upset!)

Oklahoma over Oklahoma State

Northwestern over Wisconsin

Ohio State over Indiana

Utah over USC

Auburn over Tennessee

San Jose State over Fresno State

Florida Atlantic over UMass

Am I going to try and watch all 14+ hours of college football on Saturday, plus Friday nights games, plus the Thursday night affairs, PLUS tonight’s games?  Yes.  Yes I will be.  I might just be crazy.

NFL schedule tomorrow as per usual.  Enjoy the games everyone!

So let me get this straight – Week 3 College Football Recap

Alright I want to get this crystal clear in my brain.  This week’s AP Poll includes SEC teams as they start this coming week.  But no Big Ten teams because they don’t start for another month.  OK.  Here is the issue with this.  These rankings will mean nothing then.  I mean I will do them the same way but I contemplated putting Big Ten teams in.  Why did I not do it?  Because they won’t be playing for a month.  This is why pre-season rankings shouldn’t happen and maybe, just maybe, rankings shouldn’t happen at all until after the first set of games in October.  Maybe then we would have rankings that kind of mean something.  Or not.  I mean who knows.  It’s college football.  A sport that likes to rewrite the rules all the time is rewriting them like they are on speed.  On-brand for this year and this sport.

Alright enough of the rankings (until later).  Let’s get to the action from the weekend of college football!

Fun-Time Crazy Recap!

• Ugh.  The Cowboys did not look too sharp against Tulsa.  And now Spencer Sanders could be out for a while.  And the offensive line couldn’t really block for Chuba Hubbard.  Overall a shitshow on offense which makes me wonder why I picked the Pokes to go to the Big XII Championship in the first place.  I hope you didn’t use my post to bet on that.  I always tell you not to.
• If you missed the Citadel-Clemson game, don’t worry.  I can recap it for you.  Clemson went up 49-0 just before halftime.  And that ended up being the final score.  I am sure gamblers everywhere were livid at that happening.  Dabo even offered to go to the running clock and The Citadel said no.  And on top of that, I found out that the running clock isn’t an option.  You can shorten the amount of time in a quarter but you cannot go to a running clock in college football.  You learn something new every weekend in college football (or something like that).
• The U is…back?  Maybe Manny Diaz’s biggest victory so far as they looked awesome against Louisville.  I am sure many will be jumping on to the D’Eriq King bandwagon now and rightfully so.  He looked like money and could be the difference maker that the Canes have needed for years now to get over the hump.  As for the Cardinals, I wouldn’t worry.  They are ahead of their gameplan under Scott Satterfield so expect them to still have a winning record this season.
• College Gameday was in Louisville this past weekend.   And where are they going this coming weekend?  Miami, who played Louisville this past Saturday and will host Florida State this weekend.  I get it: it’s to ease up the travel for Kirk Herbstreit to get from the Gameday set to the ABC primetime game location (or wherever he ends up calling a game on Saturdays).  Saying that, I still think they should go places they have never gone before.  With no fans, who cares if Herbie is actually there?  Let him join via satellite when he needs to.  So saying this, I think Week 5’s College Gameday should emanate from Cincinnati for the first time to see the Bearcats host USF.
• Notre Dame is a good ACC team.  I’m not kidding!  Savour this as this may be the only year we can ever say that.
• A week after Louisiana helped the Sun Belt to their best week ever with their upset of Iowa State, they struggled mightily with fellow conference member, Georgia State.  The Panthers kept things very close and the Ragin’ Cajuns had to pull out all the stops to win in overtime.  Man, the Sun Belt is going to be a surprisingly fun conference to watch this season.
• I regretted it last year for a bit and I may do so again this season.  UCF looked mighty good in their win over Georgia Tech and their option offense normal pro-style offense.  I know it’s just Georgia Tech so I have to temper things a bit.  Saying that, I am already regretting my choice of Appalachian State as the Group of Five representative in the New Year’s Six.  UCF could prove me wrong once again and it wouldn’t surprise me one bit.
• Oh Dino Babers.  Syracuse really has not looked good so far this season.  Two seasons ago, it looked like Babers was really building something in Syracuse.  Instead, that season is looking like an anomaly that was all caused by the presence of Eric Dungey.  An 0-2 start to the 2020 season is putting Dino on a serious hot seat.  If things doesn’t improve, Babers will not get another season to attempt to rectify the issues surrounding the program.
• UTSA is 2-0!  Another thing we may never say again (no offense Roadrunner fans).  So embrace it.
• Look, do you want to know how small the schedule still is?  Texas State and ULM got to play on ESPNU…on Saturday afternoon.  Yeah.
• How about what went down in the bayou?  Navy was down 24-0 to Tulane with 7 minutes left in the third quarter.  I was starting to think I was so wrong about this team and that the lack of practices really hurt the Midshipmen.  Instead, they scored the final 27 points of the game to complete the biggest comeback in Navy history (in football).  So we cannot count them out when it comes to the American race.  Also, Army-Navy looks like it could be something seriously special this season, despite the fact it will share the schedule for the first time in a long time.
• Marshall beat Appalachian State.  Doesn’t feel like an upset despite my thoughts about App State.  Doc Halladay continues to do wonders in Huntington with this program.  Maybe, just maybe, the Thundering Herd have to be considered a dark horse contender for the NY6.  If the Mountain West decides not to have a Fall season (and that is still up in the air), the Group of Five race could be very wide open.
• Southern Miss has had a ROUGH start to their season.  They looked hapless in their opener against South Alabama and Jay Hopson ended up resigning before he was fired.  But things looked up on Saturday as the Golden Eagles were taking it to Louisiana Tech for most of the game.  Then LaTech starts their comeback from down 17 and a spectacular catch by Griffin Hebert on fourth-and-goal with only 14 seconds left that had to be reviewed and overturned sunk Southern Miss.  This could be a tough time in Hattiesburg this season.

So really it did end up being a fun day of college football despite having much fewer games to watch.  I am sure my remote control was happy…more like happier.  As for my Top 25, I won’t do one yet.  I don’t think it’s fair to rank teams when the season is in flux like it has been and will be for at least another month.  Once the Big Ten is about to begin their season I will do my first set of rankings.  Otherwise there will be way too much movement and teams will move down the rankings for having the audacity to watch the Big Ten (and perhaps other conferences) just decide to play football.  How dare they!

I will go back to the regular schedule this week.  College football schedule Thursday.  NFL schedule Friday.  Have a good week everyone.

Guess who’s back. Back again. Guess who’s back. Tell a friend. – Week 3 College Football TV Schedule

Yes the Big Ten is back.  They will start their fall season in late October and go straight through to conference championship weekend on December 19th.  Also during that week they will have an East-West Challenge of sorts which looks weird but we all know we will watch.  My guess is they thought they would be the trend setters with sitting out the Fall season.  The Pac-12 followed along, as did the MAC and the Mountain West, essentially the two G-5 conferences paired with the Big Ten and Pac-12, respectively.  Then they watched as most of the rest of the FBS teams and conferences decided to play anyway.  So now they look like idiots even though their initial thoughts weren’t bad.  But money and ego rule the day and that means the B1G is back.  It also means schedules will become a gongshow in about a month but I will cross that bridge when I come to it.

Alright enough about the Big Ten and everything going on with them.  Let’s talk about the teams that are playing right now and if we can see them in this country.  Not looking too great to be honest.

Friday

		US	Canada
Campbell at Coastal Carolina	7:30 PM

Yep, no Thursday games again.  That ends next week, I believe.  Anyway, how about Campbell getting more national exposure?  Same with the Chanticleers.  This actually could be interesting considering the Fighting Camels (one of the best team names in football) took Georgia Southern down to the wire and lost by one.

Saturday Early

		US	Canada
Navy at Tulane	Noon
Syracuse at #25 Pittsburgh	Noon
Tulsa at #11 Oklahoma State	Noon
#19 Louisiana at Georgia State	Noon
Liberty at Western Kentucky	Noon
Houston at Baylor	Noon
Boston College at Duke	Noon

So TSN is showing games all day but only on TSN2.  OK.  Tulsa-OSU is the only game that is for sure scheduled though.  The others are TBA.  Really?  There aren’t many games this week in college football that you could show.  Figure it out!  It is not rocket science.  Then again, I find anyone associated with Canadian media finds college football to be so very difficult to figure out.  It boggles the mind for sure.  And if any of them see this, please, don’t blame COVID and don’t blame ESPN and don’t blame whatever else.  Blame your own lazy asses.

UPDATE: Houston-Baylor has been postponed.  So FOX gave up the U.S. Open to NBC to broadcast other sports today.  Now they don’t have college football.  Maybe they are showing some baseball.  What a waste though.  Thanks to Twitter follower @pinopanza.

Saturday Afternoon

		US	Canada
#14 UCF at Georgia Tech	3:30 PM
#23 Appalachian State at Marshall	3:30 PM
Florida Atlantic at Georgia Southern	3:30 PM
The Citadel at #1 Clemson	4:00 PM
Troy at Middle Tennessee	4:00 PM

App State-Marshall could end up being a great game.  And how about that getting to be on CBS!  Even though the Mountain West made what they thought was the smart move considering the pandemic, they must feel shitty since this spot was supposed to go to Boise State and Air Force.  This is huge for the Sun Belt and Conference USA.  FAU-Georgia Southern should also be pretty good and gets an ESPN spot.  And finally, Troy and MTSU play their first of two games this season.  Yep, just like Liberty and New Mexico State last season.  2020 in college football is so all over the place.

UPDATE #2: Another cancellation.  FAU-Georgia Southern is now cancelled.  So now The Citadel-Clemson moves to TSN2.

UPDATE #4: Troy-MTSU has been moved to ESPN.  Filling in their original ESPN2 timeslot will be Stephen F. Austin-UTSA.

Saturday Primetime​

		US	Canada
SMU at North Texas	6:00 PM
#17 Miami at #18 Louisville	7:30 PM
Louisiana Tech at Southern Miss	7:30 PM
Texas State at ULM	7:30 PM
Wake Forest at NC State	8:00 PM

Well at least we have The U against the Cards here.  That could be good.  Or……ummmm……yeah.  Honestly any of the rest of the games, other than the SMU-UNT game, could be close which would at least make them exciting.  But really this is a bad primetime schedule.

UPDATE #3: LaTech-USM has been moved out of the TSN2 spot and WF-NCST has been put there instead.  My guess is that has a lot to do with The Citadel-Clemson being put on earlier in the day.  Makes for a smoother transition for TSN to stay on the same network.

Games to set your eyeballs on

Miami at Louisville (7:30, ABC) – Not many decent games this week as we slowly get into the season.  And none would be considered Game of the Year possibilities.  But this is the ABC Primetime affair and College Gameday will be in Louisville in front of approximately zero fans so this is as good a pick as any for the Game of the Week.  This could end up being a great game to be honest.  The loser of this game is probably eliminated from contention for the ACC Championship.  Yes it’s early to be saying that but I can be confident of that thought.

Appalachian State at Marshall (3:30, CBS) – Let’s be frank here: this is a really bad schedule this week.  But this is when we usually have some of the craziest college football moments.  And how about these two teams getting a spot on CBS!  Crazy!  Only in 2020.  Expect a good game but the Mountaineers, I think, are the best Group of Five team this season and should win this and keep their momentum going as they get close to conference play.

UCF at Georgia Tech (3:30, ABC) – Look the Ramblin’ Wreck were able to come back and beat Florida State last week.  No, UCF is not Florida State.  But maybe Geoff Collins has got them acclimated to more of a pro-style offense already.  You never know.  UCF is UCF and this is the kind of game they need to win to capture the Group of Five spot in the New Year’s Six…if we have a New Year’s Six.

USF at Notre Dame (2:30, USA Network) – So do I think the Bulls can upset the Irish?  Not really.  But I needed to put this here to point out that this game is not on NBC.  It’s on the USA Network.  The USA NETWORK!  Because the U.S. Open has gone back to NBC from FOX, that will be shown on the main network meaning this was relegated.  But not to NBC Sports Network.  Oh no.  All the way to the USA Network.  The same network that shows WWE Monday Night Raw.  Wow.  And no, it is not being shown here anywhere.

Honourable mention: Florida Atlantic at Georgia Southern (3:30, TSN2); Navy at Tulane (Noon, ABC).

Some gambling fun and games

Alright let’s see what I can do with this week’s games:

Baylor over Houston

Pittsburgh over Syracuse

Louisville over Miami (no, not an upset)

UCF over Georgia Tech

Florida Atlantic over Georgia Southern

Appalachian State over Marshall

Notre Dame over USF

Tulane over Navy

As for the specialty packs, I am going to contact the cable companies to see if there is an update.  It sounds like Bell Satellite might have had their specialty pack up.  I don’t know why they would have theirs up for Satellite customers but not Fibe customers but I don’t pretend to know why Bell does the things they do with college sports.  I hope to get better news this time around.  Not like you would miss a ton of games but nine games is nine games and the point is so that Canadian college football fans have options to watch.  Otherwise they try other methods and these cable companies lose out.  Then again, I don’t think they truly understand that.

Anyway, enjoy the games everyone and have a great weekend!

The Coaching Hot Seat Report, My Heisman Ballot and whatever the Big Ten is doing all in one post!

That’s what this is: a god damned dumpster fire.

Alright I am going to leave the Big Ten stuff to the end as I don’t want this to go off the rails so early.  First up will be the HOT SEAT REPORT!  My most accurate predictions of all.  This year, though I have no clue.  Let’s get right to it and as it is every year, this is ordered from most likely to be fired to least likely (NOW with Big Ten coaches!).  Let us begin:

Almost Guaranteed Shitcanning

1. Dana Dimel (UTEP) – Things are looking terrible for UTEP football right now.  All the rest of the teams seem to be leaving the Miners in their dust except for Old Dominion but that’s because they aren’t playing this Fall.  And with most teams having smaller non-conference schedules, this doesn’t look like UTEP’s time to improve.  Needed to keep his job – UTEP to be competitive in most of their conference games.  Prediction – Will be gone before the end of the season as UTEP will struggle to get more than two wins.
2. Derek Mason (Vanderbilt) – Vanderbilt has been an SEC also-ran for most of their time in the conference other than the James Franklin years.  Unfortunately, Mason hasn’t improved things in Nashville in his stint here.  It is tough because he’s a great coach and a great interview but you have to wonder if he is just better as a defensive coordinator somewhere, especially at the Power Five level.  Needed to keep his job – Bowl eligibility at the very least.  Prediction – He will be gone with either one or two games to go and will become a defensive coordinator somewhere at a lower level in the next year or two.
3. Will Muschamp (South Carolina) – At the time, the hiring of Muschamp looked like a good one even though he had been fairly mediocre at Florida.  But he hasn’t been able to make a dent in the SEC and is 2-13 against ranked teams, something that will keep him near the bottom of the division.  Needed to keep his job – Play meaningful football in late November and beat a ranked team or two.  Prediction – He will probably be fired with one or two games left but be the lame duck coach and finish out the string.

Probable Shitcanning

4. Philip Montgomery (Tulsa) – Tulsa has struggled for most of Montgomery’s reign here except for one great season.  He was a can’t miss coaching prospect who so far has missed badly.  I think the Golden Hurricane is going to be worse this season so it may signal the end for him in Oklahoma (the state, not the school).  Needed to keep his job – Battling for .500 late in the season.  Prediction – One win and a coaching search to start shortly after the season ends.
5. Lovie Smith (Illinois) – Being successful this past season may have actually been the worst thing for Lovie’s coaching future in Champaign.  Now the expectations will be higher and with Northwestern improving, I can’t see the Illini going bowling once they get back to playing in October.  Needed to keep his job – To be in contention for bowl-eligibility late into the season.  Prediction – I think they end up winning three or four games but won’t be enough to go bowling and will probably cost him his job but who knows with Illinois.

Possible Shitcanning

6. Manny Diaz (Miami) – Let’s just say the Manny Diaz era did not get off to a great start after he left Temple (after a few weeks) for his dream job.  But things are looking up with transfer quarterback D’Eriq King under centre (well, in the shotgun because no one goes under centre these days).  His status will fully depend on the improvement the Canes show on the field.  Needed to keep his job – At least 7 wins but preferably at least 8 and looking at a possible conference championship berth.  Prediction – I see The U at the 8-win mark so that should placate the fans in south Florida.
7. Scott Frost (Nebraska) – Look, I drank the Nebraska Koolaid last year.  I admit it.  But the bloom is off the rose now in Lincoln and anything short of at least .500 and a bowl game could spell the end for the guy that was supposed to lead the Huskers back to prominence.  Needed to keep his job – .500 record.  Prediction – I see them being around that mark so he might not be fired but it will be a huge discussion in the off-season about his future.
8. Steve Campbell (South Alabama) – It was looking like the Jaguars were going to have a 2-0 start and it probably would have kept Campbell off this list.  But their collapse against Tulane makes it so his job is at least in some jeopardy.  With the opening of their brand-new stadium, I am sure the brass were hoping for a team that could maybe even contend in the Sun Belt West.  With Louisiana in the division that won’t happen but maybe a bowl game for them?  The other thing is, if they let Campbell go, who would be up to replace him?  Not like this is a sought-after job.  Needed to keep his job – For USA to win close to five games.  Prediction – I have the Jaguars winning four games so at the very least, Campbell is looking at a hotter seat for next season.

Doubtful Shitcanning (although it still could happen)

9. Dino Babers (Syracuse) – Dino needs to get some slack here.  There were some injuries last year and a lot of underperforming.  Saying that, with only one great season under his belt, this season will have to at least look like an improvement over last year or he may be jettisoned.  Needed to keep his job – Battling for bowl eligibility late in the season.  Prediction – I have the Orange winning 4 so they need an upset to go bowling, if not two.  No bowl game means Babers will have at least a molten lava hot seat going into next season.
10. Matt Viator (ULM) – Things were looking good in Monroe.  Then the Ragin’ Cajuns down in Lafayette burned some rubber and left them in their dust.  Now they will be battling South Alabama and Texas State to stay out of the bottom of the Sun Belt West division.  Needed to keep his job –  Honestly?  Just don’t finish last in the division.  Prediction – Ummmm….well….I do have them finishing last so this could get interesting.
11. Tom Herman (Texas) – Herman hasn’t exactly set the Big XII on fire in Austin.  The fans at UT want to be in the Big XII Championship (OK they want to win the Big XII but baby steps).  Not getting there this year would put Herman on a bit of a hot seat going into 2021.  Needed to keep his job – Like keep his job for sure and maybe get an extension?  A trip to the Big XII Championship game.  Prediction – Losing to Oklahoma State to be left out of the title game and a lot of grumblings in Longhorn land.

Yes a much shorter list.  Blame COVID.

Now I will post my (shorter) Heisman ballot.  This is usually less accurate but at least I am on par with many so-called experts since many frosh and sophomores are in contention and it’s tough to figure them out compared to the juniors and seniors.  Alright here we go:

My Usually Awful Heisman Ballot

1. Trevor Lawrence, Clemson – Alright I had Lawrence winning it last year and he came up well short.  This year he is one of the favourites to win it so I am picking him yet again.  Maybe this time he won’t let me down…and the team.  Most importantly the team.  And the fanbase.  But me too.
2. Justin Fields, Ohio State – I feel a bit hesitant to put Fields this high.  This time it is because the Big Ten is starting later and he will have to be in Heisman form from the beginning.  I haven’t even done Big Ten predictions yet but I assume Ohio State will be favoured in all their games.  So as long as the Buckeyes aren’t upset along the way and Fields has a bad game or two, he should be in the Heisman conversation.
3. Spencer Rattler, Oklahoma – The streak ended last year.  Jalen Hurts had a good season but it wasn’t enough to bag the Sooners their third straight Heisman winner (who was also a transfer quarterback).  Rattler is a Lincoln Riley recruit so this is a little different than what we are used to with OU.  I still predict Oklahoma to get to the College Football Playoff which probably will mean Rattler will have had a great season so that puts him here.
4. D’Eriq King, Miami – This is the big transfer of the off-season and he could be the guy that saves Manny Diaz his job (and may get him an extension).  It was a bit of a shock that he first decided to redshirt at Houston and then transfer to Miami but here we are.  I think the Canes are going to be in New Year’s Six contention all season so the dual threat King will be a big part of that.
5. Chuba Hubbard, Oklahoma State – Hubbard for some reason came back for his senior year.  What it does is sets Hubbard up to become the next big running back to come out of Oklahoma State after Barry Sanders.  It also could make him the first Canadian to win the Heisman.  That would be cool.  He will actually need to run for more yards than he did last year so it may be difficult but if he does it, he will be at least the best running back in college football and a surefire first round pick in the 2021 draft.
6. Ian Book, Notre Dame – I know people will be upset at this.  Slow your roll and check your Notre Dame hate at the door.  The Irish are in a conference for the first time ever and are a contender to make their first-ever conference championship.  And if that does come to fruition, Book will be the biggest reason why.  And he could be a hero in South Bend forever if they somehow get to the College Football Playoff and don’t count them out of that.
7. Sam Ehlinger, Texas – For the second straight year, Ehlinger might be the second best quarterback in the Big XII.  Now if he somehow gets the Longhorns to the conference championship then he might rocket up this list.
8. Bo Nix, Auburn – The son of former Auburn star Patrick Nix plays in the toughest division in college football.  And if the Tigers have any thoughts of going to the New Year’s Six (if not the CFP), it will have to ride on his strong arm.  With a lot of new quarterbacks in the SEC, he could end up getting the lion’s share of the attention at the position which could be good for him to move up this list.

Honourable Mention

• Travis Etienne, Clemson
• Spencer Sanders, Oklahoma State
• Myles Brennan, LSU
• Zamir White, Georgia
• Najee Harris, Alabama
• Adrian Martinez, Nebraska
• Sam Howell, North Carolina

OK now we get to the Big Ten insanity.  Remember when they decided they weren’t going to have a Fall season and there was a huge uproar because three of the five Power Five conferences decided to plow ahead with a season anyway?  Pepperidge Farms (and all of us) remembers.  Now the Big Ten has decided to reverse course.  They plan on having a nine-week conference season.  It will start on October 24th and go through to December 19th when the Big Ten Championship will occur.  But that’s not all!  They will also have a kind of East vs. West challenge that week where the 2nd place team from the East faces the 2nd place team from the West, 3rd place against 3rd place, etc. all the way down to the last place teams in both divisions.  Just crazy.  This conference is a shitshow.  But money and FOMO ruled the day with the announcement.  Now the Pac-12 is the only P5 conference sitting out and that will be, unfortunately, horrible for the conference going into 2021.  College football, everybody!

Alright a slight change for this week’s posts.  I will be posting the NFL schedule on Thursday and the college sked on Friday since there are no college games on Thursday night.  I will do that for any other weeks this happens but as of this point, I can only see it happening maybe once more.  Anyway, hope you have had a great hump day!

AMERICAN (conference), FUCK YEAH!

The American Athletic Conference.  Still the best Group of Five conference.  More and more this conference looks like it belongs as a power conference.  The whole P6 thing isn’t ridiculous like UCF claiming a national championship a few years back.  The teams at the top are as good, at least, as the middle of any of the Power Five conferences and that’s not hyperbole.  And now with UConn gone, the conference is even stronger.  Now they just have to figure out a way to get through their schedules this year.  We will get to that in a bit.

So let’s get to the those predictions shall we?  And I will follow that with some A Little Less Massive Conference Footprint Musings:

		Conference		Overall
		W	L	W	L
	Memphis	7	1	9	1
	UCF	7	1	8	1
	Cincinnati	6	2	8	2
	SMU	6	2	9	2
	Navy	6	2	7	3
	Tulane	4	4	7	4
	Houston	3	5	4	6
	Temple	2	6	2	6
	USF	2	6	3	8
	Tulsa	1	7	1	9
	East Carolina	0	8	0	9

A Little Less Massive Conference Footprint Musings

• Ho hum, UCF is still really good.  It isn’t a difficult schedule but I honestly don’t see them getting through the conference schedule unscathed.  Memphis, Tulane and Cincinnati are all difficult games and it would be huge if they could win them all.  And losing more than one game could make things difficult with the top-heavy nature of the conference.
• No divisions (WOOHOO!) thanks to UConn being gone.  This is the way it should be.  I know I’ve said this before but I feel like I need to reiterate it.
• Along with the Knights you have a bevy of teams right there challenging them to get to the conference championship.  Memphis, Cincinnati and SMU should be right there nipping at UCF’s heels.  As for Navy, I know I have them at 6-2 in the conference but I am already worried about that after they got slaughtered by BYU.  I mean they should be over .500 this season but anything beyond that could be difficult.  But these are the predictions I made and I have to stick with them.
• Tulane will be right there if they can pull off an upset or two.  The rest of the teams I can’t see being anywhere near bowl eligibility although you never know especially since I have no idea yet what bowl eligibility will look like.
• As you can tell, the non-conference schedules are a mess.  It has already been decided that teams can schedule as many or as few non-conference games as they can get.  Some, like SMU, Tulane and USF, have three games where at this point, Temple doesn’t have a single one although that should change since teams are scheduling games for less than a week from now which is unheard of in college football.  But hey, these are the times we live in.
• I have UCF and Memphis outlasting all the other teams to meet in the AAC Championship.  Who knows how many fans will be allowed to be at the game but they would probably see a doozy with UCF winning a close one.

As for seeing the AAC on television this year, expect to see a lot.  With the SEC and ACC trying to at least fill two of their conference network timeslots every week and no Big Ten and Pac-12 (for now), the AAC will get a lot of ABC/ESPN spots this season.  We may even see them in the ABC primetime game again once or even twice, especially if there are a lot of teams in the Top 25.  And with the Mountain West not playing in the Fall, the American is the premier G-5 conference as I stated before.  Don’t get me wrong, the Sun Belt did a fantastic job on the weekend but are still a ways away from challenging the AAC.  Now it will be interesting to see if the American tries to replace UConn with a football only school.  I am sure they have had at least one conversation with Army about that.  Army has a contract with CBS Sports Network so they could keep that and appear on ESPN networks more often.  Yes they would have a tougher schedule as they are used to getting two FCS schools and at least 6 Group of Five teams and wouldn’t have that with a move.  But more people would watch Army, meaning more football recruits, meaning a better program overall.  This isn’t like when Army joined Conference USA years ago and it was a disaster.  The Black Knights are much more prepared this time around.

That is the final conference prediction post.  We made it!  Better late than never I guess.  Next up will be my bowl predictions and I will have to do some explaining to help you out.  Also, some expertise in advanced physics might be required.

Have a great start to your week everyone!

And then there were three: the Independents

Yep, there are only three Independent teams this season, the crazy pandemic 2020 college football season.  Here is how we got here:

• UMass decided not to play in the Fall.  New Mexico State and UConn joined them.
• Notre Dame took a one-year-only invite into the ACC for football.

So there you go.  That leaves three teams: Army, BYU and Liberty.  Honestly we should expect to see a lot of these teams on television because who else from college football will be on there other than exciting Sun Belt teams?  Most of Army’s games are on CBS Sports Network and BYU is the only team west of Texas playing so they should get pretty much all their home games on late on an ESPN channel because there’s nothing else to show.   Who knows about Liberty but I assume we will see them at least a few times right smack dab in the middle of a Saturday.

Anyway, why don’t I just get to the very short Independent predictions followed by a few short thoughts (see what I did there…OK I’ll stop):

		Overall
		W	L
	BYU	8	0
	Army	7	5
	Liberty	4	6

A Few Short Thoughts

• • With Army having to rejig most of their schedule, you figured they would have things a lot better.  They do not and I still see them losing a few games although they are almost assured of a bowl game this season…if they have them.  Now I will be honest: I made these predictions before the season started.  And I won’t change them.  But to be honest, the difference between 7-5 and 9-3 for Army is nothing.  They get nothing extra by winning more games, unless they go 12-0 which…well, nope not going to happen.  That makes Army, Larry.
  • BYU, on the other hand, has a MUCH easier schedule than they had originally.  There schedule is usually full of good Mountain West teams and a few Pac-12 teams.  They have none of that this year obviously.  Instead, their most difficult game might end up being against Houston unless their game against Army gets rescheduled.  This is why I have them running the table since they should be favoured in every game with some by a good margin.  Honestly this could be the easiest schedule in the past few decades in FBS football and it’s all thanks to the stupid Coronavirus.  So BYU is Moe.
  • Hey no doubleheader this season!  With a few teams trying that, Liberty doesn’t have to as they were able to fill a ten-game schedule.  It also means they had to add teams to the schedule and the ACC was all too willing to do so.  I guess it will be great for the Flames as they will bring in plenty of money.  Whether they can be competitive in any of those is a different story.  I see them falling one game short of my current bowl-eligibility threshold of five wins.  Unfortunately, this makes Liberty, Curly.

Alright that’s the second last conference.  The last one is coming up in the American and we already have changes to the games in that conference.  What a mess.

Now we come to something more disturbing for Canadian college football fans.  So I talked about the fact that FloSports is not showing college football games as far as I can tell.  Yesterday I got answers from a few cable providers about their specialty packs and they weren’t answers I, or you, would want to hear.  I have been told by both Bell and Eastlink that because of COVID-19, they will not have their specialty pack for college football for now.  That is why you wouldn’t have seen any games on the specialty pack and it looks like this coming week will be more of the same.  Hopefully that changes once the SEC season starts but no guarantees.  This is bad and will just push people away from cable.  Then again, Bell, Rogers and the others seem to do that all the time anyway so this is no difference.  I will keep you updated every week as to if this changes and fingers crossed it does.