Man, oh man, were there some overreactions this week…oh and the Week 2 College Football TV Schedule

Posted on September 7, 2023 by guelphbossman

Look, did Colorado surprise a lot of people this past weekend? Absolutely. No doubt about it. Deion Sanders is proving, whether you like him or not, that he can flat-out coach. And overhauling the roster like he did was not a bad idea at all. It does suck for the players that had to transfer out but unfortunately it’s football and the name of the game is winning.

Saying that………the amount of people I saw on Twitter that said Colorado will win 10 or 11 games this season was way too much. It should have been zero. Colorado may be better than advertised but they aren’t all of a sudden a New Year’s Six possibility. But hey, that’s the reactions from Week 1 of college football. Every. Single. Fucking. Year.

So let’s do it again on here! It’s overreaction time! Let’s look at some of the other overreactions you may (or may not) have heard after the Week 1 games were complete:

Ohio State is just an average team. Do we expect more from the Buckeyes against a team like Indiana? Sure. But they are bringing in a new quarterback and their best receiver was not 100%. The defense was amazing. Now the offense does have to be ready since in about a week and a half they get Notre Dame and that could get ugly if they don’t produce more points.
Colorado will have not one, but TWO Heisman finalists. What in the fuck? Who are the morons saying this? They are out there for sure. I saw them. Sure, they did great in their opening week win over TCU but calm the fuck down. TCU isn’t the TCU of last season for one and it’s only WEEK ONE. Anyway, moving on…
Gene Chizik has finally got the defense cooking in Chapel Hill. Again, it’s one game. Do the Heels look improved? Sure. But it’s not like South Carolina played well at all because, for the most part they didn’t. That, and the chain gang wouldn’t eat their hot dogs fast enough. Let’s see how UNC does when a top-notch offense is staring them in the face.
Jalen Milroe is already looking like another Alabama Jalen…that being Hurts. My God where do these people come up with this shit? Milroe looked OK but it was Middle Tennessee and he’s playing for Ala-frickin-Bama. We will see how he handles SEC competition before crowning him anything.
Washington has the best offense in the country. Could that end up being the case? Possibly. Michael Penix Jr. has already started his Heisman campaign in style. But let’s slow our roll here. There are at least four teams who looked better on offense (Colorado, Florida State, Oklahoma, Oregon) during Week 1. And I wouldn’t even say any of those teams will be the best offense in the country so why go ahead and put the Huskies at #1?
Book the Sooners for the Big XII Championship NOW! As I said, their offense was on fire but they were playing Arkansas State. We are all waiting to see if Brent Venables can have a Venables-type defense in Norman. If that happens, this could very well happen. But for now, I wouldn’t book any tickets yet if I were a Sooners fan.
Miami is BACK. Ho boy. Pump the damn brakes.

Let’s just put Week 1 behind us, shall we? Let’s move on to Week 2 which…oh my. Well, it’s better than Week 1. That’s really all I can say. But you know what that usually means. That’s right…chaos!

Thursday

Yep, that’s a new logo you see. TSN+ will be showing college football games this year. It kind of mimics the specialty pack but there are a few differences. But if you want to get TSN+ rather than the specialty pack for your college football fix, you are getting close to the same. Not a bad alternative and a good move by TSN to copy ESPN for the 10,000th time.

Friday

		US	Canada
Indiana State at Indiana	7:00
Illinois at Kansas	7:30

It kind of feels like this could be a relatively important game when the Illini travel to Lawrence to face the Jayhawks. Imagine saying that even two years ago. You’d be laughed out of whatever building you were in.

Saturday Early

Is the quality there? Eh, not really. But there’s choice. A lot of it. Can’t ask for much else. Also…MORNING FOOTBAW! The ACC Network’s weird annual Week 2 quadrupleheader hits again with the odd three hour-and-fifteen-minute windows. This will be a lot easier to do next year when Stanford and California join as you know one of them will host the ACC After Dark Week 2 matchup, guaranteed.

Saturday Afternoon

Is the afternoon slate better than the Noon slate? Sure. Not by much though. Some intriguing matchups though. As per the rules, one of Texas A&M or Miami must win their game against each other. Ties were outlawed almost three decades ago. Will CyHawk feature more than 30 points? Can App State and UNC put up ridiculous numbers like last year? And this will be Tulane’s opportunity to get a huge leg up in the Group of Five. A win over Ole Miss would be massive.

Saturday Primetime

		US	Canada
Ohio at FAU	6:00
Cincinnati at Pittsburgh	6:30
#11 Texas at #3 Alabama	7:00
#13 Oregon at Texas Tech	7:00
Houston at Rice	7:00
#19 Wisconsin at Washington State	7:30
Eastern Michigan at Minnesota	7:30
Temple at Rutgers	7:30
UCLA at San Diego State	7:30
Grambling at #14 LSU	7:30
McNeese State at Florida	7:30
Charlotte at Maryland	7:30
Arizona at Mississippi State	7:30
Air Force vs. Sam Houston (in NRG Stadium)	8:00
Southern Miss at #4 Florida State	8:30

FIFTEEN GAMES! Holy shit! I think this has to be the most in one timeslot ever on this blog. I don’t feel like checking so let’s just say we have a new record! Plenty of games but most people will be watching one game in particular, that being the Longhorns and the Crimson Tide. If Texas can somehow do what they were robbed of last season and upset Bama, this season turns on its head. This game is so big that they are also showing it on ESPN2 in the US and on TSN+ and the specialty packs. But it’s not the same broadcast. It’s the Pat McAfee Show alternate broadcast. So if you like that kind of thing, have at it.

Also, you will notice we have a new network showing college football. That’s right, the CW, with such hits as 7th Heaven, Gilmore Girls, Smallville and LIV Golf (well it was a hit with the golfers who got fucking PAID with that Saudi blood money) will be showing ACC football (and later on, ACC basketball) this year. This replaces Bally which, for all intents and purposes, is flat broke. There will be games most weeks and, it looks like, at odd times. 6:30? Weird.

Saturday Late Night

		US	Canada
UC-Davis at #16 Oregon State	9:00
Auburn at California	10:30
Stanford at #6 USC	10:30

FOX quadrupleheader? Don’t mind if I do. TSN2 quadrupleheader? Yes, please. A good week if you are a Canadian as I don’t remember seeing this much college football being shown up here in a while. Maybe things are turning around. Looks like TSN finally gives a shit about things that aren’t the CFL, NFL, and NHL (which they don’t even have the national broadcasting rights to).

Hey, Watch This!

Texas at Alabama (7:00, TSN2/TSN+/specialty pack) – Unequivocally the game of the week and there’s nothing else close. That also means there will be some wild and wacky finishes that might overshadow this game. That is, unless, this is a close one and the Longhorns pull off the upset. Then it will be THE story in college football no matter what else happens.

Ole Miss at Tulane (3:30, TSN+/specialty pack) – As I mentioned above, if the Green Wave pull off a win here in front of what should be a raucous crowd in hot and humid New Orleans, there’s not a whole lot that will prevent them from a perfect regular season and another New Year’s Six spot. Normally I would say this is a lose-lose situation for any Power Five team in this situation but when the Group of Five team is ranked it can count as a big win (as long as that team doesn’t totally shit the bed the rest of the way).

Texas A&M at Miami (3:30, ABC/TSN2) – I made the joke above that one of these teams has to win, as per the rules of college football. We may actually see which one of these teams is back (for the most part) and which team still has some work to do. Now watch it be a 13-10 almost-unwatchable slog.

Nebraska at Colorado (Noon, FOX) – Alright, I’ll bite. Let’s see if the hype matches what ends up happening. Some might have put this higher but that’s crazy. It makes this list because of the talk, not because of the teams involved. And Colorado can’t just win this game by a little. That would prove nothing. If they beat the brakes off the Huskers, then we all have to take notice and maybe think the Buffs could be for real.

Sickos Game of the Week

Temple at Rutgers (7:30, specialty pack) – Look, Rutgers is probably going to start 2-0 which really doesn’t mean a whole lot considering their schedule but still, that’s something right? With everything on at this time, you would have to be a complete psychopath to watch this game. I will make sure to tune in and watch at least a few plays. I feel like I owe it to everyone and myself.

Hubba Bubba Blowout of the Week

Ball State at Georgia (Noon, TSN+/specialty pack) – Time to bring back the blowout of the week segment. And this could be the dictionary definition of blowout. I could see UGA putting up 60 on the poor Cardinals.

Wanna Bet?

Nebraska was actually a good bet. That game ended up exactly how I thought it would (for the most part). Florida, however….well the less said about that one the better. Time for my gambling picks for the second week of the college football season. Use them at your own peril.

Indiana (-30.5) over Indiana State

Purdue (+3) over Virginia Tech (and the outright win)

Ohio State (-41.5) over Youngstown State

Utah (-8) over Baylor

Nebraska (+2.5) over Colorado (and the upset win…definitely going out on a limb with this one)

Michigan (-37.5) over UNLV

Tulane (+7.5) over Ole Miss (but the Rebs will hold on for a close victory)

Texas A&M (-4) over Miami

Alabama (-7) over Texas

Washington State (+6) over Wisconsin (with the Badgers winning a tight affair)

Minnesota (-20.5) over Eastern Michigan

Mississippi State (-9) over Arizona

Stanford (+29.5) over USC (I feel a backdoor cover in this one)

I will be on the Twitter/X machine again this weekend. Even without Tweetdeck I am figuring out how to navigate fairly well. We shall see if I can make it two Saturdays in a row making it all the way to the end. Enjoy the games everyone!

The Week 5 College Football TV Schedule is important…but not as important as this

Posted on September 28, 2022 by guelphbossman

This happens almost every year. It’s hurricane season in Florida (and other parts of the southern United States). Scary times for the residents there. It’s a time where some need to make the decision of staying or leaving for a time, depending on the severity of the hurricane.

Which brings us to Hurricane Ian. It looks like it is going to batter a good part of the state. I hope the residents don’t get hit too hard with it. This does affect the college football schedule. Yes it’s a minor thing but considering the subject matter of this blog, I need to cover it. The following games have had their times and/or dates altered:

SMU at UCF has been moved to Sunday at 1:00
EWU at Florida has been moved to Sunday at Noon
SC State at South Carolina has been moved to Thursday at 7:00

More changes are coming I’m sure. The one interesting thing might be the ABC primetime game. It’s at Clemson. The Gamecocks have already moved their game from Saturday up to Thursday. This could be a very interesting scenario that hasn’t come into play ever for the big timeslot of the week.

UPDATE #3: SMU-UCF has now been moved to Wednesday night. No word if it will be shown here or not.

UPDATE #4: OK it looks like SMU-UCF will be Wednesday at 7:00 PM. The game will be on ESPN2 so there is a good chance it will be on the specialty pack as well.

Alright, let’s get to the schedule and see how this goes.

Thursday

Two games on tonight although originally it was supposed to only be the one. As I mentioned above SC State-USC was moved to Thursday because of Hurricane Ian. I don’t know why some games are being moved up and some are being moved back but I am sure there is a good reason for it. Anyway, both games should be blowouts so you can definitely check out the…wait a second…undefeated Miami Dolphins? OK then.

UPDATE: OK I see that games in Florida are being moved back because the hurricane is hitting there…well, pretty much right now. The hurricane will start moving up the east coast starting Friday night/Saturday early morning so it makes sense to move games in Georgia and South Carolina up to avoid that and allow road teams to leave the area before it hits.

Friday

A heavy Friday schedule with six games. That is quite unusual. One of these games is a rather big one as the somewhat surprising Washington Huskies travel to Los Angeles to face UCLA. Maybe the Bruins will finally get a good crowd for a game as the early attendance has been dismal. The Ivy League has their first game on ESPNU this season and we shall see if Boise State can turn around this season at all or if they will be pining for the return of Bryan Harsin the rest of the season.

Saturday Early

This is…different. It is the first time that the ACC Network has a game on multiple TSN channels. I’d have to look to see how often the ACC Network has been on TSN, period since I am sure I can count that on one hand. CBS has a doubleheader this week that starts with the first leg of the Commander-in-Chief’s Trophy and ends at the normal SEC on CBS time later on. Finally, there is one quite big game that will fall under the radar this weekend and it occurs in Oxford. Kentucky and Ole Miss are both wanting to prove they are for real. A UK win here…that would make things awful interesting in the SEC East where I figured Georgia would easily win the division.

Oh you will notice the SEC Network doesn’t have a game in this timeslot. It was the one moved to Thursday night. Will they put another game here to replace it? Probably not.

Saturday Afternoon

		US	Canada
Oregon State at #12 Utah	2:00 PM
#22 Wake Forest at #23 Florida State	3:30 PM
Virginia Tech at North Carolina	3:30 PM
Rutgers at #3 Ohio State	3:30 PM
#2 Alabama at #20 Arkansas	3:30 PM
Fresno State at UConn	3:30 PM
Northwestern at #11 Penn State	3:30 PM
Iowa State at Kansas	3:30 PM
#9 Oklahoma State at #16 Baylor	3:30 PM
Michigan State at Maryland	3:30 PM
Central Michigan at Toledo	3:30 PM
#17 Texas A&M at Mississippi State	4:00 PM
California at Washington State	5:30 PM

OK now we are getting into weeks where some timeslots are loaded with good games. This is one of them. Wake-FSU, Bama-Hogs and Pokes-BU are all big games that could shape how the season pans out. And if you can watch them live and not have to use a PVR, all the better. I am thankful I don’t have to do that anymore.

Not everything makes sense though here. And it has more to do with the specialty packs than anything. There should be four games in this window on the specialty packs. Right now I only see one confirmed: TAMU-MSU. Why? It makes no sense. We know they will end up there. So just do it all at once. Then again, maybe they won’t because things almost seem worse than ever at times with these specialty packs. Just schedule all the games you’re allowed to show. It’s easy. I don’t get why this is so complicated. Christ, I’m getting worked up and I don’t even have cable anymore.

UPDATE #2: If I just waited a few minutes, I could have looked again and saw that the specialty packs were updated and all the games that should appear there, are appearing there.

Saturday Primetime

		US	Canada
LSU at Auburn	7:00 PM
Cincinnati at Tulsa	7:00 PM
#10 NC State at #5 Clemson	7:30 PM
Indiana at Nebraska	7:30 PM
San Jose State at Wyoming	7:30 PM
West Virginia at Texas	7:30 PM
#1 Georgia at Missouri	7:30 PM
Georgia Tech at #24 Pittsburgh	8:00 PM

NC State-Clemson. A huge ACC game. And I have this funny feeling it will be moved, rescheduled, something. I mentioned it above and I will say it again. It really makes no sense for South Carolina to move their home game up two days and Clemson, a mere two hours away, is doing nothing at this point. Just feels like a disaster waiting to happen. Fingers crossed nothing bad occurs.

As for the rest of the primetime schedule, it’s alright. LSU-Auburn get an undeserved ESPN spot, Georgia is yet again on the SEC Network, and we will see if Georgia Tech learned what not to do from the Geoff Collins era.

Saturday Late Night

		US	Canada
Colorado at Arizona	9:30 PM
UC-Davis at Montana State	10:15 PM
Arizona State at #6 USC	10:30 PM
Stanford at #13 Oregon	11:00 PM

Four games in the late night sked and one really stands out like a sore thumb. Yes you are reading that correctly: the game on ESPNU will be UC-Davis against Montana State. ESPN has done this before, putting a Big Sky match on in the late night window because there wasn’t much else to put on there. This is especially the case now with ESPN not having Mountain West games. So it’s Pac-12 or bust and if any other network has Pac-12 games, it really dials back the inventory they can choose from. There’s three Pac-12 games on in this window but one is on the Pac-12 Network and another on FOX Sports One. So yeah, either ESPNU shows the FCS game, a rerun of an HBCU game (which they do from time-to-time) or something that isn’t live sports that won’t get the same ratings.

Big Games O’ The Week

NC State at Clemson (7:30, ABC) – One of the games of the year and, I would say, a pretty easy choice for Game of the Week. Let’s see if D.J. Uiagalelei can keep things going and play well enough to beat a very good Wolfpack team. No offense to Wake Forest but this is the Tigers’ greatest competition of the regular season. Win this and they are a win over Florida State away from going back to the ACC Championship. If the Pack win…ho boy this gets very interesting.

Kentucky at Ole Miss (Noon, TSN2) – Did I fool you there? You thought another SEC game would fall here. Not so fast. This game has a lot on the line and will send the winner into the hype zone, at least for the immediate future. Don’t want to use the terms “College Football Playoff” or “New Year’s Six” here for two teams that aren’t used to that much success (especially Kentucky) but you’ll hear that during the broadcast, I can guarantee that.

Alabama at Arkansas (3:30, CBS) – This is the game that most people would have put at least in the #2 spot and I wholeheartedly disagree. I believe Bama won’t have a ton of trouble with the Hogs. I’d love to see the Razorbacks win; mostly because I love chaos in college football. But until they show they can hang with the Tide, then I can’t believe they will get it done. Now watch them put up a 40-burger against them just to prove me wrong.

Oklahoma State at Baylor (3:30, FOX) – Yeah I’m going to go ahead and call this Okie State’s first true test of the season. No offense to Central Michigan, Arizona State or mighty Arkansas-Pine Bluff but they don’t hold a candle to the Bears. Also, I am waiting to see if Spencer Sanders truly can take this team to new heights since I have never been fully impressed with him.

Wake Forest at Florida State (3:30, ABC) – Look, Wake Forest isn’t completely out of the ACC Atlantic race just yet. To get back in the race, though, they have to win here. The Noles have finally found their footing under Mike Norvell and want the opportunity to at least play for the division later in the season.

Washington at UCLA (Friday, 10:30, TSN2) – I never would have thought I’d have this game on the list when the season started. The Huskies are better than advertised. The Bruins…well at least we can say they are undefeated. They haven’t made it look easy and they haven’t exactly played tough competition. A Friday night test for both teams.

Oklahoma at TCU (Noon, ABC) – The Sooners came crashing down to Earth last week against Kansas State…kind of. I think part of this is the horrendous non-conference schedule they had with no real competition. More teams really have to get away from that kind of thinking as it never prepares them for conference season. At least TCU had SMU last week after beating the worst Power Five team in the land, Colorado, and Tarleton State, who honestly might beat Colorado if they played each other.

Psycho Game of the Week

Colorado at Arizona (9:30, YouTube) – You have to be some kind of sick to want to watch this. Sure, the Wildcats are improved but they couldn’t have been any worse than they were last season. And the Buffs…my God. They are seriously awful. If they lose this one, the Karl Dorrell hot seat talk will be top of the list in that state (at least when it comes to college football).

Hubba Bubba Blowout of the Week

Rutgers at Ohio State (3:30, BTN) – With all due respect to the Fighting Schianos of Piscataway, this won’t be close. I am almost thinking of praying for Rutgers to keep tOSU under 60 points in this one.

Fun-Time Stats of the Week

BYU and Utah State are actually in a trophy game on Thursday. They play for the Old Wagon Wheel. The Cougs have won it 17 times since 1994.
The only team that Boise State has a losing record against in the Mountain West is San Diego State.
The Crimson Tide have won 15 in a row against Arkansas.

The Degenerate Portion of Our Show

I’m not going to delve into my picks from last week. I just won’t. You shouldn’t either. Let’s just move on to this week’s picks:

Houston (-2.5) over Tulane
UNLV (-14.5) over New Mexico
Illinois (+7) over Wisconsin (Wisky to win game)
Oklahoma (-6.5) over TCU
Oregon State (+10.5) over Utah (Utes to win game)
Fresno State (-24) over UConn
Penn State (-26.5) over Northwestern
Florida State (-7) over Wake Forest
Auburn (+9) over LSU (and the Tigers to win outright in my upset of the week)
NC State (+6.5) over Clemson (Tigers win a close one)
Pittsburgh (-22) over Georgia Tech
Arizona State (+25) over USC (USC will win the game)
Oregon (-17) over Stanford

I will keep watching and keep you up to date on anything that changes the schedule due to Hurricane Ian. It already looks bad along Florida’s west coast and the storm just hit. Hopefully there are no casualties down that way.

So I wonder how he got back from Ireland? Oh, and the Week 1 college football schedule

Posted on August 31, 2022 by guelphbossman

I can’t see the Nebraska team and staff and everyone else who made the trip to Dublin allowing Frosty the Coachman to board the same flight as him. Probably safer for him anyway. He would have been thrown out of the plane over the Atlantic somewhere. All because of a horrible onside kick playcall that was not needed (among other poor coaching decisions). Just a complete fucking disaster for that team and now Frost’s hot seat is basically the surface of the sun.

Finally we have made it! Week One! And a full schedule. Hell, more than a full schedule it feels like. So much football and I will watch as much as I can because come January, it feels bad when it’s all gone. Let’s right to the (true) opening weekend schedule.

Thursday

		US	Canada
West Virginia at #17 Pittsburgh	7:00 PM
Central Michigan at #12 Oklahoma State	7:00 PM
Ball State at Tennessee	7:00 PM
VMI at #22 Wake Forest	7:30 PM
Alabama A&M at UAB	8:00 PM
Louisiana Tech at Missouri	8:00 PM
Penn State at Purdue	8:00 PM
New Mexico State at Minnesota	9:00 PM
Northern Arizona at Arizona State	10:00 PM
Cal Poly at at Fresno State	10:30 PM

As I said during the Week Zero schedule post, I would be including games that most Canadians won’t get up here, even with the specialty packs. I’m doing this because some have switched to an IPTV provider and can get some (or all) of these games. So while the NAU-ASU game might not look exciting (and it probably won’t be), I will still list it.

Nice to see the Backyard Brawl back as WVU and Pitt get a bit of a national spotlight for this one. Also, you have to wonder if Mike Gundy has the last game the Pokes played against CMU in his mind when the Chips won on a Hail Mary play that shouldn’t have even been allowed. Also, FOX will show a Thursday night game on the network to start the season. I wish they did that more often and they honestly could with the NFL’s Thursday Night Football package moving to Amazon Prime.

Friday

		US	Canada
Western Michigan at #15 Michigan State	7:00 PM
Virginia Tech at Old Dominion	7:00 PM
Temple at Duke	7:30 PM
Illinois at Indiana	8:00 PM
TCU at Colorado	10:00 PM

3-hour windows. Good lord. Yes, TSN’s schedule says that the TCU-CU game starts at 10:30 but that’s not true. Stupid ESPN.

UPDATE: If you were planning on watching the WMU-MSU game on ESPN, you will have to move to ESPN2 as ESPN is now showing US Open tennis.

Saturday Early

First full slate of Saturday games. Feels good. Nothing big here. The UNC-App State game could be the most intriguing as you don’t often see Power Five teams travel to Group of Five teams so there is some upset potential there.

Saturday Afternoon

Now we get to the meat of Week One. I am not really a fan of neutral-site games but let’s be honest: we are all watching a good portion of that UGA-UO matchup. Perhaps a College Football Playoff elimination game there (although we know one loss almost never kills a Power Five team’s chances). I’m interested to see what the brand new era of Sooner football will look like with Brent Venables now at the helm. And CBS opens with SDSU’s brand new stadium as they finally left the cavernous Murph for a more intimate viewing arrangement.

Also, you will notice a couple of other things. First, no games on ESPN2. As is usually the case, the U.S. Open tennis tournament is on ESPN2 all Saturday so that’s why there are no games airing there. It’s also why most of the TSNs aren’t available to show games this week. Secondly, the odd timing of the Pac-12 Network games. Well, thanks to the brains of Larry Scott (and others, yes, I know, but he was the commish), the Pac-12 Network has a national feed and regional feeds for all the schools. Each pair of schools shares a region. In this timeslot, the UCD-Cal game is actually only available on the P12N Bay Area feed. The BGSU-UCLA game is the P12N National game. Confused? Yeah it’s dumb.

Saturday Primetime

		US	Canada
Rice at #14 USC	6:00 PM
#7 Utah at Florida	7:00 PM
Illinois State at #18 Wisconsin	7:00 PM
#5 Notre Dame at #2 Ohio State	7:30 PM
SMU at North Texas	7:30 PM
Memphis at Mississippi State	7:30 PM
Utah State at #1 Alabama	7:30 PM
Louisville at Syracuse	8:00 PM
Colgate at Stanford	8:00 PM

Game of the year in the opening weekend? You could argue that. The Irish and the Buckeyes face off in a massive non-conference matchup (I don’t know why I’m even saying that since the Irish will NEVER join a conference, right?). This will hopefully be worth the hype (and boy is ESPN/ABC going to push the hype to the next level for this one). So you could watch that OR you can watch Bama beat the snot out of USU. Your choice. Now watch that game be closer than the ND-tOSU game.

Saturday Late Night

		US	Canada
Idaho at Washington State	9:30 PM
Boise State at Oregon State	10:30 PM
Kent State at Washington	10:30 PM

One of the more interesting matchups of the weekend goes down in Corvallis. I would normally say Boise is the favorite here but the Beavs have been a much improved team as of late. Also, there’s a true Hawaii Test if you can find a way to stream it (it starts at midnight).

Sunday

		US	Canada
Florida A&M vs. Jackson State (in Miami)	3:00 PM
Tuskegee vs. Fort Valley State (in Montgomery)	7:00 PM
LSU vs. Florida State (in New Orleans)	7:30 PM

Speaking of interesting matchups, LSU-FSU is a juicy one down at the Superdome. Both teams are popular picks to improve this year. Let’s see how definitely Southern Brian Kelly fares in his opening contest in the SEC.

I am not sure about the two non-FBS games appearing on the specialty pack. Over the years, these opening Sunday games have been hit or miss so stay tuned.

Monday

		US	Canada
#4 Clemson at Georgia Tech	8:00 PM

Geoff Collins wouldn’t be fired after Week 1 would he?

Big Games O’ The Week

Notre Dame at Ohio State (7:30, ABC/TSN2) – Sure there is another game that’s huge but this is THE big game of the week. I don’t remember the Irish starting with a game like this in recent memory and no, Texas doesn’t count. Now we have to hope ND doesn’t play like shit and makes the game unwatchable in the second half.

Georgia vs. Oregon (in Atlanta) (3:30, ABC/TSN2) – A new head coach for the Ducks up against a team trying to do the toughest thing in sports: repeat as champs. If you want, you can call this Game 1A of the Week (especially if you are a whiny SEC fan). A few questions will definitely be asked here, chief among them being can Bo Nix thrive outside the SEC, because last season he certainly didn’t thrive inside it.

Cincinnati at Arkansas (3:30, specialty pack) – If you had said three years ago that this would be the third best game of opening weekend, I would have drove you to the nearest AA or NA meeting. It’s a new college football world, though, and the Bearcats are still the Group of Five’s signature team until they are beaten. And Arkansas is slowly moving up the SEC ranks under possibly the most underrated head coach in the land, Sam Pittman. The Cats lost a lot of talent so this will give everyone a good idea as to what we can expect from them this season.

West Virginia at Pittsburgh (Thursday, 7:00, TSN2) – The Backyard Brawl is BACK! I am sure we will see references to 13-9 up until and throughout the game. Let’s see if the ‘Eers can put a bit of hurt on a Pitt team that believes they can repeat as ACC champs.

Psycho Game of the Week

Temple at Duke (Friday, 7:30, specialty pack) – Every week now instead of listing honourable mentions in the games of the week section, I will list a game that we all can get here but you would have to be a complete psycho to watch the entirety of (or you are a fan of one of the teams and even then). This week we have Temple travelling to the Carolinas to face Duke. Ugh. This feels like it could be a torture device used by the military. Anyway, unless it’s close, just avoid it.

The Degenerate Portion of Our Show

This section is the section for all you gambling degenerates out there and you KNOW WHO YOU ARE! I do bet on the NFL from time to time but I stopped gambling on college games. I think it took the fun out of it to be honest. Also, I sucked at it.

Alright, this season I am going to do something different. I am going to pick AGAINST THE SPREAD. That’s right! Make things a bit more difficult for me and gives all the more reason for you to not use these picks for your own gambling. I’ve warned you. Let’s begin.

Pittsburgh (-7.5) over West Virginia

Missouri (-19.5) over Louisiana Tech

Purdue (+3.5) over Penn State (with the Boilermakers winning outright)

Duke (-7.5) over Temple

TCU (-14) over Colorado

Appalachian State (+1.5) over North Carolina (with the Mountaineers winning outright)

San Diego State (-6) over Arizona

Oregon (+17) over Georgia (with the Bulldogs winning the game)

Florida (+3) over Utah (Gators win outright in upset)

Notre Dame (+17.5) over Ohio State (tOSU wins but game will be close)

Oregon State (-3) over Boise State

LSU (-3) over Florida State

And there you go! We are at Week 1 so rejoice, college football fans! I am so happy we have made it to this point. I will try to keep things updated over the next couple of days (if need be). I will be on Twitter (@TheBauceman) for a good portion of the action so check me there if you wish. And everyone enjoy the games!

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

Posted on September 20, 2021 by guelphbossman

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

Posted on September 13, 2021 by guelphbossman

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!

It doesn’t feel like Fall yet – Week 4 College Football TV Schedule

Posted on September 20, 2018 by guelphbossman

It’s still hot out. Stinkin’ hot at times. I shouldn’t really complain because I know what some of the Winter months bring but still. Alright, enough bitching about the weather.

Understand this: we have just come off of what had looked like two of the worst weeks of the season on paper (Week 2 was the worst; Week 3 was the 5th-worst). This is supposed to be a bit better. And arguably the best week before conference play really kicks into gear (which looks like next week). So it should be good, right? Perhaps. Let’s just get to the schedule and find out if that statement is factual or not.

Thursday

		US	Canada
Tulsa at Temple	7:30 PM

Let’s be honest: there’s two ways to look at this really. One, it’s Tulsa and Temple so is it an important game? Probably not. The other way to look at it is that it’s mid-week college football and that is good. I choose the latter.

Friday

		US	Canada
Florida Atlantic at #16 UCF	7:00 PM
Harvard at Brown	7:00 PM
Washington State at USC	10:30 PM

Three games on Friday evening (that we can see…Penn State goes to face Illinois on FS1). FAU-UCF should be very interesting because if UCF wins they are EASILY the front runner once again for the Group of Five New Year’s Six spot. If FAU wins, a bunch of teams are back in the mix early. USC better be careful with Wazzu. They’ve struggled with them before on a Friday night. Nice to see TSN picking this one up.

Saturday Early

		US	Canada
#8 Notre Dame at Wake Forest	Noon
Nevada at Toledo	Noon
#2 Georgia at Missouri	Noon
#23 Boston College at Purdue	Noon
Minnesota at Maryland	Noon
Buffalo at Rutgers	Noon
Ohio at Cincinnati	Noon
Kent State at Ole Miss	Noon
Pittsburgh at North Carolina	12:30 PM
Louisville at Virginia	12:30 PM

We are now at the beginning of the annual TSN step-up when it comes to airing college football games. At least for early Saturday games since the CFL is still in full swing. I say this every year but it will be interesting to see what happens next season. Maybe more so since the ACC Network starts up. It’s a bit of a slow start to the day but don’t sleep on UGA-Mizzou or ND-WF. They could go a long way towards determining the College Football Playoff and the New Year’s Six if either Georgia or Notre Dame falters.

UPDATE #2: It looks like UL-UVA is not appearing on the specialty pack after all.

UPDATE #3: And now UL-UVA IS appearing on the specialty pack.

UPDATE #4: Kent State-Ole Miss is on TSN2, not the specialty pack.

Saturday Afternoon

		US	Canada
#3 Clemson at Georgia Tech	3:30 PM
#22 Texas A&M at #1 Alabama	3:30 PM
#13 Virginia Tech at Old Dominion	3:30 PM
Tulane at #4 Ohio State	3:30 PM
Kansas State at #12 West Virginia	3:30 PM
FIU at #21 Miami	3:30 PM
Northern Illinois at Florida State	3:30 PM
South Carolina at Vanderbilt	4:00 PM
#17 TCU at Texas	4:30 PM

A lot of ranked teams in this timeslot. Very nice. If it wasn’t for South Carolina’s loss to Georgia a couple weeks ago and Florida State being inexplicably bad, we could have had the unprecedented every game has a ranked team involved timeslot. This still ends up being good with Clemson-GT, TAMU-Bama, KSU-WVU and TCU-UT all good games to watch.

Saturday Primetime

		US	Canada
Clark-Atlanta at Kennesaw State	6:00 PM
NC State at Marshall	7:00 PM
Florida at Tennessee	7:00 PM
#14 Mississippi State at Kentucky	7:00 PM
Louisiana Tech at #6 LSU	7:00 PM
#24 Michigan State at Indiana	7:30 PM
Arkansas at #9 Auburn	7:30 PM
#7 Stanford at #20 Oregon	8:00 PM
#18 Wisconsin at Iowa	8:00 PM

There are a few good games here but it kind of pales in comparison to the afternoon timeslot which happens from time to time. I’m just glad these are spaced out inside the timeslot, meaning there won’t be three or four finishes around the same time with the chance of some of them being fantastic finishes.

Saturday Late Night

		US	Canada
Air Force at Utah State	10:15 PM
Eastern Michigan at San Diego State	10:30 PM
Arizona State at #10 Washington	10:30 PM

Pac-12 After Dark is back! Despite Chris Petersen’s protestations, the Pac-12 has to have a late night game. I don’t get why not. I mean yes, I would draw the line if there was like three of them but one or two is fine. Can’t always be in primetime Chris. Anyway, let’s hope one of these games is good because all three look relatively non-competitive on paper.

Games to set your eyeballs on

Texas A&M at Alabama (3:30, CBS) – Still a big game and arguably the game of the week although I will put this as 1A to the next game’s 1B. Only because this game may not end up being close. But if the Aggies can muster up the same kind of game they played against Clemson, you never know. Bama hasn’t been spooked yet this season so it would be interesting to see what they do if it happens.

Stanford at Oregon (8:00, ABC) – Pac-12 in primetime! Stanford is Stanford. We know what they bring. Oregon is interesting. They started getting better under Willie Taggart last year and have continued it with Mario Cristobal (who Florida International might regret ever firing). I wonder if the Ducks are secretly smiling over Willie’s struggles in Tallahassee. Anywho, this is the game that will show if Oregon is truly back to the Bellotti/Kelly/Helfrich days or if they are still a second-tier Pac-12 team until further notice.

Georgia at Missouri (Noon, TSN1) – This could be the sneaky good game of the week if the Tigers can put up a pile of points on the Dawgs. Missouri not being ranked is kind of weird but a win (or even being close) should do the trick. This may now end up being Georgia’s last hurdle for a division title. Staying in the top four is a different story since they still have LSU and Auburn on their schedule to play.

Notre Dame at Wake Forest (Noon, ABC/TSN4) – Yes the Deacs got beat by Boston College last week. Saying that, BC could end up being really good this season; much better than I thought they would be at least. This is another one of Notre Dame’s landmine games. The thing is, Notre Dame doesn’t have many of those left. And we are only in Week 4. Could we see a repeat of Notre Dame in 2012? Part of me hopes not.

Wisconsin at Iowa (8:30, FOX) – Has there even been a time when I have done this section and not one of these games is on the specialty pack? This feels weird. Anyway, after Wisky’s gaffe last week against BYU they almost have to win this game against Iowa (and their awesome Iowa Wave) or else the Big Ten West is in serious trouble. And by serious trouble I mean not even a sniff of a New Year’s Six bowl.

Honourable mention: Kansas State at West Virginia (3:30, specialty pack); TCU at Texas (4:30, FOX); Arizona State at Washington (10:30, specialty pack)

Some gambling fun and games

Not so good last week for the ol’ Bossman. I did get my upset picks of Texas and San Diego State right but I also included Stanford winning over San Diego State. They played UC-Davis last week so I don’t know what the hell I was thinking there. Anyway, maybe I will be lucid enough to do the picks properly this week. Not saying they will be good, more like they will actually all include games from Week 4 and Week 4 only. Here we go:

Notre Dame over Wake Forest

West Virginia over Kansas State

Texas over TCU

Georgia over Missouri

Alabama over Texas A&M

Wisconsin over Iowa

Oregon over Stanford (upset of the week)

Washington over Arizona State

Utah State over Air Force

Florida over Tennessee

Clemson over Georgia Tech

Last I checked, tonight’s game was up on the specialty pack and nothing else. Same old same old. This really makes no sense since last week was a week with hurricane implications and Bell and Rogers got it pretty much spot on. I will check again tonight to see if they have finally updated things.

UPDATE: The specialty packs look like they are all updated and the games scheduled.

Also, there’s a Thursday Night Football game tonight. And it’s……………….the Jets and Browns. Well I wish Joe Buck and Troy Aikman luck tonight. They will need it. Maybe they will drink on air. Enjoy the games everyone.

Where we are headed in college football: Part 4

Posted on June 13, 2016 by guelphbossman

We are at the end of the scenarios. The last one. And arguably the most extreme. The most predicated on what I believe should happen in a mostly ideal scenario. I will be honest here: all this will not happen. Saying that, some of these occurrences may happen but the idea that all of them could is probably a no-go. I’ve seen many “fantasy” conference realignments in the past and many of them are not just improbable (like this one) but also completely dumb and may make no semblance of sense (unlike this one). So let’s jump in, shall we? Spoiler alert: this will be a long post.

Now we all know that there is a distinct divide between the Power Five and Group of Five conferences. Some teams are wanting to sneak into the P5 whereas others are holding on for their Go5 lives. Issues with the Big XII and ACC are going on almost every day.

Because of all this, I am implementing something fairly drastic. First off, the top conferences will be on their own. Their own bowls and they will be the only ones with access to the College Football Playoff. The amount of teams in this “new” Power Five will increase so no real worries there. It allows for more elite-on-elite games throughout the season than there is at this moment. The amount of conferences in the top tier will be eight. The biggest change will be the complete blow-up of the Big XII. Welcome back the Big Eight and the Southwest Conference (golf clap). As much as we hope Texas and Oklahoma want to play and get along and share the sandbox, they really don’t. They want their own sandboxes or bigger portions of a conference sandbox. So might as well split them up. Yes they love their Red River Rivalry matchup but that’s where it ends really.

Here’s the new conference lineup, followed by the steps I took to get there:

SEC	Big Ten	Pac-10	ACC
Alabama	Ohio State	USC	Florida State
Florida	Wisconsin	Oregon	Miami
LSU	Michigan	Stanford	Clemson
Georgia	Notre Dame	UCLA	Georgia Tech
Auburn	Penn State	Oregon State	NC State
Tennessee	Michigan State	Arizona State	North Carolina
Texas A&M	Iowa	Washington	Wake Forest
South Carolina	Minnesota	California	East Carolina
Ole Miss	Purdue	Arizona	USF
Mississippi State	Northwestern	Washington State	UCF
Kentucky	Illinois		Duke
Vanderbilt	Indiana		Memphis


Big 8	SWC	American	Mountain West
Oklahoma	Texas	Virginia Tech	Boise State
Nebraska	TCU	West Virginia	Utah
Kansas State	Arkansas	Louisville	BYU
Oklahoma State	Texas Tech	Boston College	Air Force
Missouri	Baylor	Pittsburgh	Fresno State
Colorado	Houston	Virginia	North Dakota State
Iowa State	Tulsa	Maryland	Colorado State
Kansas	New Mexico	Cincinnati	San Diego State
	Rice	Syracuse	Nevada
	SMU	Marshall	Montana
	UTEP	Navy	Wyoming
	UTSA	Rutgers	Utah State
		Connecticut	San Jose State
		Temple	UNLV

Step-by-Step

I kind of wish I had those terrible IKEA characters to put in here…you know the ones that say lift in pairs, don’t lean certain things against a wall, and don’t stab yourself with the Allen key (or hex key for you people who just want to be insufferable cocks).

Split the Big XII into the Big 8 and the SWC. Oklahoma and Texas each get their own conferences now.
Re-create the Big Eight as it was before becoming the Big XII. I think it wouldn’t be a major issue to get Nebraska out of the Big Ten and Missouri out of the SEC if there wouldn’t be as much of a hit to their per-team revenue.
As for the SWC, all the old members are back except one: Texas A&M. I’m sure they’d rather crawl on broken glass while naked than go back into a conference with the Longhorns. To fill out the conference (but keep the southwest feel), they invite New Mexico, UTEP, and UTSA.
The SEC loses Arkansas and Missouri but does not add replacements for them. Texas A&M isn’t as much of an outlier with LSU next door and now TV revenue is split only twelve ways. The conference is not really hurt by this at all.
To replace Nebraska, the Big Ten grabs Notre Dame. As I’ve said before, Independent Football is probably all but dead with the next major round of realignment.
The Mountain West, now a “major” conference, gets Utah back from the Pac-12. Despite recent success, the Utes (along with Colorado) don’t seem like a program that will ever fully fit in with the Pac-whatever number it is. The only way this would change is if they went on a sustained run of success.
The Pac-12, losing Utah and Colorado, go back to being called the Pac-10. All we need now is Keith Jackson calling their games on ABC and all will be right with the world.
The ACC and American also do a bit of a shuffle. The American becomes more of the northeast conference (think old Big East minus Miami) whereas the ACC goes south of Virginia. Makes sense geographically. So the ACC gets East Carolina, USF, UCF, and Memphis in exchange for Virginia Tech, Virginia, Boston College, Louisville, and Syracuse.
Maryland and Rutgers leave to go to the American. They were never a good fit in the B1G, markets be damned.
Also, the American picks up West Virginia who doesn’t belong in Big 8/SWC world anymore (and rightfully so).
To even things out, The American Conference takes the top team from Conference USA, Marshall who should get an instant boost by moving to a better conference.
Hey the Mountain West (along with The American) are joining the big boys! They get Utah back from the Pac, invite BYU, North Dakota State, and Montana and hopefully cash in at some point.

There you go, the top division (Power Eight?) are set. Now we get to the CFP and bowl setup. Here’s how it would look:

Bowl	Bowl Tie-In #1	Bowl Tie-In #2
CFP Championship	Orange Winner	Cotton Winner
Cotton Bowl	Fiesta Winner	Rose Winner
Orange Bowl	Peach Winner	Sugar Winner
Fiesta Bowl	CFP Poll #1	CFP Poll #8
Peach Bowl	CFP Poll #2	CFP Poll #7
Sugar Bowl	CFP Poll #3	CFP Poll #6
Rose Bowl	CFP Poll #4	CFP Poll #5
Outback Bowl	SEC #2	Big Ten #2
TaxSlayer Bowl	SEC #6	Big Ten #6
Citrus Bowl	SEC #4	Big Ten #4
Music City Bowl	SEC #3	ACC #3
Sun Bowl	Pac-10 #3	SWC #3
Liberty Bowl	SEC #5	ACC #4
Alamo Bowl	SWC #2	Big Eight #2
Belk Bowl	ACC #2	American #2
Texas Bowl	SWC #4	MWC #2
Pinstripe Bowl	Big Ten #5	American #3
Cactus Bowl	Pac-10 #4	MWC #3
Holiday Bowl	Big Ten #3	Pac-10 #2
Armed Forces Bowl	Big Eight #3	American #4
Las Vegas Bowl	Big Eight #4	MWC #4

The bowl tie-ins are pretty easy to figure out. Tried to go as regional as I possibly could. The SEC and Big Ten received five actual tie-ins, the rest of the conferences got three. As for the CFP, it has to be expanded to eight. It’s going to be expanded anyway so why fight it. They can’t go to sixteen since that would be ridiculous but eight probably will work (until the 8-seed wins the title and then all hell will break loose). I bet you think “Oh, eight conferences, eight champions, right?” WRONG! Considering the strength of the conferences now, I have gone this route:

The SEC, Big Ten, and Pac-10 champions get automatic berths.
From the other five conferences, the top 2 conference champions also get automatic berths. This will be settled by the CFP ranking.
The other three spots will be at-large choices.

This makes it so that if one conference (cough*SEC*cough) has two teams in the top four, the worst of the two won’t be penalized.

What does this all mean for our friends in Conference USA, the MAC, and the Sun Belt? Well, they would form the new Tier Two (Group of Seven? Wait, no that’s been used before…) that would look like so:

Conference USA	MAC	Sun Belt	Missouri Valley
Southern Miss	Toledo	Appalachian State	South Dakota State
Louisiana Tech	Northern Illinois	Troy	Youngstown State
UAB	Bowling Green	Arkansas State	Illinois State
Middle Tennessee	Northern Iowa	UL-Lafayette	Southern Illinois
Western Kentucky	Western Michigan	South Alabama	Western Illinois
Tulane	Miami-Ohio	ULM	South Dakota
North Texas	Ohio	Texas State	Missouri State
Florida Atlantic	Central Michigan	Georgia State	North Dakota
Old Dominion	Ball State	Furman	Indiana State
FIU	Army	Wofford
Charlotte	Akron	Coastal Carolina
Georgia Southern	Kent State	Jacksonville State
	Buffalo
	Eastern Michigan

Colonial	Big Sky	Southland
Villanova	Hawaii	McNeese State
James Madison	Eastern Washington	Central Arkansas
Massachusetts	Idaho	Sam Houston State
Richmond	New Mexico State	Stephen F. Austin
New Hampshire	Cal Poly	Northwestern State
Delaware	Northern Arizona	SE Louisiana
William & Mary	Montana State	Abilene Christian
Maine	Portland State	Lamar
Elon	UC-Davis	Nicholls State
Towson	Weber State	Incarnate Word
Rhode Island	Southern Utah	Houston Baptist
Albany	Sacramento State
Stony Brook	Idaho State
	Northern Colorado

Tulane and Hawaii move down from previous conferences since, well, they just wouldn’t fit in with the new money maker conferences. Army is invited into the MAC and there are a few changes to the rest of the conferences (call-ups if you will). This new tier will not have bowl games but will inherit the FCS Playoffs. 16 teams instead of 24. I think it would work well with some better programs than they currently have now in the FCS (no five-in-a-row dynasty stuff then).

As for the new bottom tier of D-1, it consists of eight conferences where half of them don’t even compete in the playoffs. The Ivy League doesn’t do the playoffs at all and the MEAC and SWAC do their own fun-time HBCU championship. The other five conferences might as well join D-2 at this point. To be honest, they are probably so low on the food chain that myself (along with a lot of others) wouldn’t care unless you were an alumnus of that school.

Alright, now to broadcasting info since this breaks into what my blog is all about (for the most part):

CBS would still get the SEC game of the week.
FOX would get either the Big Ten or Pac-10 game of the week.
NBC, with Notre Dame going to the Big Ten, would probably get the ACC or American game of the week.
ABC would get the Big Eight, SWC, or Mountain West game of the week.
CBS would most likely show a doubleheader. With ESPN’s hold on the rest of SEC football, I see them picking up another conference, most likely the Big Eight or SWC.
FOX would probably move to tripleheaders on the main network as long as they didn’t interfere with Major League Baseball. My best guess is they would have one Big Ten and one Pac-10 game and then one more from either conference.
NBC would show a doubleheader I’m sure, with one game each from the ACC and American.
ABC would get their normal tripleheader with the best game from the three conferences above getting the primetime 8:00 pm slot.
ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNU, ESPNEWS, FOX Sports One, and FOX Sports Net would pick up most of the rest of the games (anywhere from 18-24 each week).

Again, this renders the conference networks moot at this point. The only other way they could possibly survive is if they overpay to get their selection of games past the game of the week in their respective conferences. So basically it would be like Tier Two rights. I can’t see that happening, especially with ESPN having a finger in the pie with the SEC Network.

Saying all this, live sports on TV might cease to exist like it is now a decade later. We may be watching all college football games through the various conference networks online by then. This would affect my media prediction here as well as the previous three scenarios. But until that starts to take shape, we have to assume the networks (and ESPN) would have some semblance of control over live broadcasts.

So there you have it. All four scenarios. Guaranteed none of them are correct but you never know what insanity will befall us over the next few years. No one, back in the late 80s, would have ever thought the Southwest Conference would be dissolved around the middle of the next decade. This despite the fact that we had the SMU death penalty and almost every team mired in some sort of controversy. So my predictions are always with the idea that none of this at all may happen and it may be steady as she goes as we head into 2026.

Next up is the biggest games of the college football season. No CFL post this season since I have less knowledge than ever about the CFL. I was shocked to see how much tickets were going for for Ti-Cats games. I think that’s absurd but that’s just me I guess. Following the biggest games posts will be the various network predictions and then we get into conference predictions. Finally getting back into posting on a regular basis so I better get myself organized. That’s always a fun exercise. And by always I mean never.

		US	Canada
Charleston Southern at #25 Clemson	2:15
#23 Texas A&M at Miami	3:30
UTEP at Northwestern	3:30
Richmond at Michigan State	3:30
UNLV at #2 Michigan	3:30
Wagner at Navy	3:30
#20 Ole Miss at #24 Tulane	3:30
Iowa at Iowa State	3:30
Marshall at East Carolina	4:00
Kent State at Arkansas	4:00
Tulsa at #8 Washington	5:00
Appalachian State at #17 North Carolina	5:15

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