What is this? Where am I? What year is this? Wait, do I still work here? Is that a squirrel?!
Well, after missing seven straight weeks of doing this, let’s resurrect this thing and see if it still has legs.
Hey, even if NC State isn’t having a season to remember, there’s still plenty of good worthwhile football games out there to watch, and who are we to ignore them?
Going from that statement straight into Tuesday and Wednesday MACtion is a strong move, but I’ll stand by it. Those midweek MAC games are something to behold, and there’s always some good ones in there. Good by quality? Nah. Good by watchability? Of course. That’s mostly thanks to the conference being incredibly middle heavy – only one MAC team (Western Michigan) has fewer than two conference losses on the year. Ten of the conference’s 13 teams are between 2-4 and 4-2 on the year in MAC play.
Thursday night the Fun Belt gets in on the action with a couple teams battling it for bowl eligibility. The Ragin’ Cajuns need a win to keep their hopes alive, while the Red Wolves will clinch bowl eligibility with a win. Arkansas State is also still alive in the Sun Belt West race.
All eyes here will be on Raleigh Friday night with NC State hosting Florida State. Both teams are having underwhelming seasons given their respective starts to the year, but the winner will clinch bowl eligibility. The other game Friday is intriguingly good with Timmy Chang’s Rainbow Warriors having already clinched their first winning season since 2019. The Chang hire was a gamble for Hawaii, but one that’s paying off. Nobody understands the culture of that program better. UNLV, on the other hand, is 8-2 in their first year under Dan Mullen and has a 28-10 record since the start of the 2023 season. Both teams are still alive in the Mountain West race.
There aren’t a ton of super intriguing matchups Saturday, but as we hit the home stretch of the regular season, bowl eligibility is a central theme, as is staying alive in respective conference championship races. I could go into detail on all of those races, but it’s best to just throw out a solid article on the subject from Football Scoop (keep an eye on that site for your coaching carousel news) and hit some other notes.
Missouri and Oklahoma are both out of the SEC race, but that should be a really good game as both are technically still alive for the College Football Playoff. Miami’s chances for the CFP are also still alive after they took the Wolfpack to the woodshed last weekend, and now they square off with a team in Virginia Tech whose players should have a little more motivation with their next head coach watching a little more intently to the play on the field. That James Franklin hire is a solid one for the Hokies.
Louisville-SMU has some real intrigue with the Cards being better than their 7-3 record indicate and the Mustangs still alive in the ACC race. Louisville’s three losses – all in ACC play – have come by a combined 7 points.
I’m starting to get a little upset at how easily Wake Forest seems to nail coaching hires. This Deacs team isn’t a world-beater, but they should handle Delaware on Saturday to move to 8-3 in Jake Dickert’s first year in Winston-Salem. Speaking of Dickert, the program he left will be heading to the Commonwealth to take on a 9-1 James Madison squad. JMU head coach Bob Chesney is going to be a hot name in the coaching carousel.
Speaking of coaching carousel names, while neither will necessarily be a big name in this year’s iteration, Missouri State’s Ryan Beard and Kennesaw State’s Jerry Mack will be names to keep an eye on in the future. Beard is a disciple of Bobby Petrino (he’s actually married to Petrino’s daughter) while Mack is the former head coach at NC Central who has spent time as Rice’s OC, Tennessee’s RBs coach, and the RB coach for the Jacksonville Jaguars since.
USC-Oregon is the big game in the midday time slot, and you can find more on that pretty much everywhere. Definitely tune in for that one.
Back to the coaching carousel front, one person who has not helped themselves this year is Fran Brown at Syracuse. Yeesh. The 3-7 Orange are the next low hurdle for Notre Dame to clear on the way to another CFP appearance.
And speaking of the CFP, is Vanderbilt going to make it? Kinda seems like it, which is wild.
Iowa. 6-4. Ranked #21. Whatever.
Duke can officially end UNC’s bowl hopes this weekend while clinching a bowl game of their own. Would be nice, Blue Devils. Just saying.
Your “big” primetime games are going to be Pitt-GT (meh), Tennessee-Florida (in name only), or BYU-Cincinatti (meh part two). Not to say I won’t be watching any and all of those games – plus some others – but this isn’t exactly the most enticing lineup of must-see TV. It’s football, though! And we’re thankful for that.
Go Pack!
Rankings for SP+ Ratings and Sagarin Ratings listed, respectively, ahead of each team’s name.
Tuesday
120/164 Akron @ 128/149 Bowling Green – 7:00pm – ESPNU
136/242 UMass @ 91/86 Ohio – 7:00pm – CBSSN
97/94 Western Michigan @ 124/145 Northern Illinois – 7:00pm – ESPN2
Wednesday
94/97 Miami (OH) @ 98/138 Buffalo – 7:00pm – ESPN2
99/106 Central Michigan @ 131/180 Kent State – 7:00pm – ESPNU
Thursday
104/101 Louisiana @ 108/103 Arkansas State – 7:30pm – ESPN
Friday
28/31 Florida State @ 68/53 NC State – 8:00pm – ESPN
71/78 Hawaii @ 64/80 UNLV – 10:30pm – FS1
Saturday
16/20 Missouri @ 12/12 Oklahoma – 12:00pm – ABC
10/9 Miami @ 95/74 Virginia Tech – 12:00pm – ESPN
27/29 Louisville @ 26/23 SMU – 12:00pm – ESPN2
61/64 Rutgers @ 1/1 Ohio State – 12:00pm – FOX
65/57 Minnesota @ 66/61 Northwestern – 12:00pm – BTN
110/151 Delaware @ 63/56 Wake Forest – 12:00pm – ACCN
49/60 Kansas @ 41/45 Iowa State – 12:00pm – FS1
69/66 Washington State @ 25/32 James Madison – 1:00pm – ESPN+
55/52 Baylor @ 33/42 Arizona – 1:00pm – TNT
106/117 Missouri State @ 84/121 Kennesaw State – 2:00pm – ESPN+
13/14 USC @ 4/3 Oregon – 3:30pm – CBS
42/59 East Carolina @ 72/81 UTSA – 3:30pm – ESPN+
101/83 Syracuse @ 5/4 Notre Dame – 3:30pm – NBC
40/40 Arkansas @ 21/13 Texas – 3:30pm – ABC
43/34 Kentucky @ 18/16 Vanderbilt – 3:30pm – ESPN
57/49 Duke @ 89/79 North Carolina – 3:30pm – ACCN
45/44 Kansas State @ 8/10 Utah – 4:00pm – ESPN2
46/50 TCU @ 44/51 Houston – 4:00pm – FOX
102/111 Coastal Carolina @ 54/27 South Carolina – 4:15pm – SECN
224/209 Furman @ 39/25 Clemson – 4:30pm – CW
35/30 Pittsburgh @ 36/35 Georgia Tech – 7:00pm – ESPN
30/37 Nebraska @ 19/15 Penn State – 7:00pm – NBC
14/19 Tennessee @ 50/33 Florida – 7:30pm – ABC
75/70 California @ 113/88 Stanford – 7:30pm – ACCN
24/46 North Texas @ 115/148 Rice – 7:30pm – ESPNU
70/102 Western Kentucky @ 31/18 LSU – 7:45pm – SECN
17/21 BYU @ 37/43 Cincinnati – 8:00pm – FOX
20/22 Washington @ 85/67 UCLA – 10:30pm – NBC
79/95 Utah State @ 73/87 Fresno State – 10:30pm – CBSSN
109/134 San Jose State @ 53/69 San Diego State – 10:30pm – FS1
