Andy & Ari On3 - Texas A&M SWAPS QBs and TAKES DOWN LSU | Are we SURE Ohio State is a national title contender?

Episode Date: October 27, 2024

Wendy’s New Saucy Nuggs take the Crispy and Spicy Nuggs you love and turn them up to 11. Choose between flavors like Buffalo. Honey BBQ. Garlic Parm. Or, if you’re a real heat seeker, try Spicy Ghost Pepper, only on Wendy’s signature Spicy Nuggs. I dare ya. That’s seven delicious ways to try the nuggs you already love. Pick a flavor, grab some extra napkins and prepare to nugg like you’ve never nugged before. For a whole new way to Nugg, It’s Gotta Be Wendy’s. This show is also sponsored by PrizePicks, America’s most fun daily fantasy game. Use the code STAPLES to play $5 and get $50 instantly. https://prizepicks.onelink.me/ivHR/STAPLES JLAB is gearing up for college football with some of the top talent in the game – from Travis Hunter to Ohio State’s Will Howard and Quinshon Judkins. These football stars embody JLab’s core values of innovation, performance, and excellence. Just as JLab pushes the boundaries of audio tech, these athletes redefine their sport with skill and dedication. Whether you’re traveling to watch your favorite team, or streaming the game on your mobile device, JLAB has you covered. Find the blue box at retailers near you or visit jlab.com. This show is brought to you by Panini America, makers of the most collectible sports cards on the planet. The Luminance football card series features NIL autographed cards from players including Arch Manning, Quinn Ewers, Cam Ward, Jalen Milroe, Dylan Raiola, DJ Lagway, and Luther Burden. To start collecting, visit PaniniAmerica.net.(0:00-13:10) Texas A&M 38 LSU 23(13:11-15:03) Wendy's Saucy Nuggs(15:04-28:01) Ohio State 21 Nebraska 17(28:02-28:41) Try JLAB Headphones(28:42-36:02) Penn State 28 Wisconsin 13(36:03-38:43) PaniniAmerica(38:44-47:16) Indiana 31 Washington 17(47:18-52:07) Oregon 38 Illinois 9(52:08-53:25) PrizePicks(53:26-57:45) Michigan 24 Michigan State 17(57:46-1:05:31) Revisiting Texas A&M(1:05:32-1:09:46) Notre Dame 51 Navy 14(1:09:47-1:10:46) Pitt 41 Syracuse 13(1:10:47-1:14:27) BYU 34 UCF 24(1:14:28-1:19:25) Texas 27 Vanderbilt 24(1:19:26-1:21:59) Auburn 24 Kentucky 10(1:22:00-1:23:56) Alabama 34 Missouri 0(1:23:57-1:28:17) Miami 36 Florida State 14(1:28:18-1:31:16) Ole Miss 26 Oklahoma 14(1:31:17-1:40:18) Boise State 29 UNLV 24(1:40:19-1:41:26) ConclusionTexas A&M switched quarterbacks and changed its fortunes Saturday against LSU, and now the Aggies look like a College Football Playoff team. Meanwhile, Penn State wasn’t looking like a CFP team at Wisconsin until quarterback Beau Primula replaced an injured Drew Allar. The Nittany Lions then rolled to a win, and now they prepare to face Ohio State. Speaking of the Buckeyes, Andy and Ari need to have a talk about them. Are we sure they’re a national title contender? They certainly didn’t look like one while barely surviving Nebraska at home on Saturday. Andy and Ari also will talk… Washington-Indiana Notre Dame-Navy Texas-Vanderbilt Mizzou-Alabama BYU-UCF Kansas-Kansas State Michigan State-Michigan Florida State-Miami Auburn-Kentucky Oklahoma-Ole Miss Boise State-UNLV Syracuse-Pitt Watch us on YouTube instead! https://youtube.com/live/Vcm_oyVcTaM Hosts: Andy Staples, Ari WassermanProducer: River Bailey

Welcome to Andy and Ari on three presented by Wendy's huge day of college football. Texas A&M has just finished taking knees Ari in College Station. This was basically two games, Texas A&M and LSU. One where LSU dominated and one after Texas A&M switched quarterbacks where Texas A&M looked like not just a playoff team, but like a national title contender. You know, it's unseasonably warm here in Texas, but there was an avalanche in the second half of that game, man.

Like that was something. You know, and we talk a lot about changing quarterbacks on this podcast and holy crap, that's all it took. Wait, wait, I do want to check. I'm a little worried. You're sure that Mike Yelko didn't hurt Connor Wegman's feelings by going to Marcel Reed? You're not worried about that.

You're not worried about if he hurt his feelings. Do you want to derail the Texas A&M conversation and go into a 15-minute discussion about the comparisons between those two things and why it makes me crazy that you keep saying that. It makes me crazy that I had to talk to you for 30 minutes of show about Arch and Quinn when all Steve Sarkeesian was trying to do was get the offense to look better. That's what Mike Elko did tonight. He made the offense look better. Let's get back to the discussion of this game.

Oh my God, did offense look better and let's get back to the discussion of this game oh my god did it look better well this question too is Conor Wegman's probably not gonna play again if I had to guess I I wouldn't guess that at all here you have a running primarily running quarterback in the SEC my guess is he'll get nicked up and Con Wegman's going to have to come in. I mean, by choice, if they have the choice between the two, but okay, let's just talk about the game. So, you know, for the first half there, it looked like LSU was on track to getting a tough road win, cracking the top 10 in the polls. And if they're not there already and putting themselves in a position to be considered as a national championship contender,

certainly a playoff contender. Their offense, Texas A&M's, cannot move the football. They changed to Marcel Reed, who played very well, or pretty well, I should say, in relief of Connor Wegman earlier in the year when Wegman was hurt. And once they put him into the game, Texas A&M turned into a different team on both sides of the football. They were rushing Nussmeier better.

They could not be stopped on offense. And it looked like there wasn't a team in college football that we would say would be able to beat that version of A&M. So the thing that I think is interesting is there were a lot of moving parts in college football today, and there weren't any major upsets, but I think we learned a lot. And one of the most important things I think we learned today, Andy, is that A&M has that gear. Like, it's not just that they're pretty good. They have that, like, that gear. and I could say probably with a straight face and I know people in the chat are saying it but if A&M plays like that and that's who they are like we are have a banger at the end of the

at the right at the end of the regular season when Texas goes to College Station but we might be looking at a top three maybe even top two team in the SEC if that's who they are now I don't know that I'm convinced that that's who they are all the time I think that you know when things get going and like LSU made some pretty bad plays in that game. And you can't take credit away from Texas A&M for putting Nussmeier in a position to throw some of those. But ever since he threw that off-platform throw toward the middle of the field there in the third quarter,

that was kind of a head-scratching decision. That's kind of when things started to slip away. But LSU played a pretty poor game there too, there in the last 20 minutes or so of game clock. when things started to slip away, but you know, LSU played a pretty poor game there too. You know, they're in the last 20 minutes or so a game clock. Well, and just not being able to have any answer for Texas A&M's offense and what Texas A&M switched to offensively is what LSU is bad at stopping. Texas A&M will play teams that are much better against the run that will force

them to throw. And then that'll be a question of whether they're going to be able to move the ball as effective. Who's that on their schedule? The Texas Longhorns? No, I know. But before that. Yeah. Before that? No. I mean, look, Auburn. Auburn's not that easy to run on. They do play them. Yeah, they do. South Carolina is not easy to score on, period. But they are more get after your quarterback in the passing game. That's where you're scared of them.

So it's the at South Carolina is not easy. And especially for a team that has not been winning like this like to win a game like this and then go to South Carolina is not going to be easy but if they win that one yeah then then they've got at Auburn if they if they beat New Mexico State and beat Auburn after beating South Carolina if they do they win all three of those the Texas games for seeding, Ari. I mean, unless Texas drops another one, and then we're talking about something completely different. Completely different. I can't tell you, and if you ever wonder if there's a higher being looking down on us, the fact that we are in line here for a one-loss versus one-loss team

in that Texas-Texas A&M game in College Station is the greatest gift that we could get. The cap off is pretty awesome. The best gift we could get is a two-loss Texas versus a two-loss Texas A&M in College Station. That would be an amazing game. Just the electricity in the air, man. There's no place I'd rather be. So, you know, I guess we have some games that have to end in wins before we get to that point. But like, so I had a crisis too, because we do the top 10.

Yeah. Or I do the top 10 at the end of every Saturday night. And I anticipated that Texas A&M or LSU, the winner of that game would move into the top 10 this week. Fair. Yeah. A&M did not. Okay. And we're talking about A&M because there's another team out there today who beat a ranked team by a million and then beat A&M who I put in

ahead of them in Notre Dame. And I don't know that I think that Notre Dame would beat the Texas A&M that we saw in the second half of that game, but there is a wide open race. Like there are five teams or four teams that are just sitting there with a real case to be ranked in the top 10 that aren't, which means that we're going to be getting into some pretty controversial, exciting times here in the last month of the season. Yeah. Oh,

it's, it's going to be so much fun, by the way, there is fun going on right now. Cause we've got a tight game between Colorado and Cincinnati going on. And, uh, SMU just blocked Duke's walk-off field goal

attempt that is wild it was it was a chip shot field goal blocked so they're going to overtime now in Durham but this is going to be Tyler in the chat beating Navy isn't the same as beating LSU yeah but guess who beat Texas Aas a and m that's the problem you know there's that it's not i didn't put them in there just because of the navy game i put them in there because of the navy game by the way like we can't talk about navy for four weeks and how awesome their offense is the fact that they're unbeaten talk about the playoff and then when notre dame beats them by 50 act like it's nothing okay like you can't we absolutely can't do that so I it's not I don't mean me and you I mean like everybody you know like we we have 30 minute specials on you know and I don't know that I

believe that you know Navy was a team that I thought was going to win the national title by any stretch of the imagination but they're a much better version of Navy than Navy typically is and Notre Dame beating them 51 to 14, you know, in large part, because I think Notre Dame, I mean, Navy fumbled the ball four times and, and turned it over a lot in the first half that allowed that to happen.

But I couldn't in good conscience rank Texas A&M ahead of Notre Dame when Notre Dame went to college station and won. So like that, it doesn't matter. Like if somebody cares that they're not in the top 10 tomorrow, they really need to go touch grass. Who cares? There's a playoff, a 12-team playoff, and if Texas A&M keeps winning, they're going to be in it. It doesn't matter where you rank them right now or where anybody ranks them right now.

No, for sure. Obviously, bracketology and bubble watch are probably more important in terms of what you want to see at the end of the year. But the point wasn't that it was the end all be all. The point is that like there were four or five teams that could have been ranked in the top 10 that weren't this week. And A&M still is one of them on my list. Cause I don't know, like to go back to A&M to try to contextualize

where they are as a program right now um are there teams that you would find in most people's top tens that you believe A&M has a case to be ranked ahead of like I mean there are teams like um that were still there like Clemson dropped out right like who who if A&M isn't in my top 10 who do you think would be in that situation that they wouldn't be? Which means there's probably 12 to 14 teams in this situation that have a case to be in that ranking. Well, and here's the best part about this, because I'm looking at this and you're talking about it, because I can understand all of your talking points about why A&M is not in the top 10. But if you ask me, do I think on the right day Texas A&M can beat any team in the country?

The answer is yes. The way Notre Dame was playing today, can they beat any team in the country? The answer is yes. The playoffs are going to be nuts because there are not two teams that just tower over everybody else. Like these teams can beat each other and they're going to have to play each other multiple games in a row. And it is going to be so much fun. Bo's mad at me because I picked LSU this week because I had picked against them two weeks in a row

and been wrong. Maybe if y'all had done any analysis other than I got it wrong on LSU before, so I'll go with him. Bo, LSU was dominating the game. We were right until Mike Elko made a change. So Brian Kelly, who gets paid like $10 million to coach LSU, didn't adjust to the adjustment at all.

So how the hell do you expect us to? I want to key in, though, on something that you've said now twice, and I think I'm with you on that. But with A&M and this win and what they look like in the last 25 minutes of that football game, do you put them in a competitive game against Georgia playing the way they did? Yes, because the way they get after your quarterback, do you trust Carson Beck in that game?

Skorton's an animal. I mean, we're talking about a first-round pick, too, that just is terrorizing people off the edge there. Their defensive line is the one thing that we knew about A&M coming into the year, right? Like, we knew that they were going to have one of the best defensive lines in the country, and they're a menace. And then you add in this electrifying quarterback who, you know,

is really, really good with his legs and, you know, made a few really good passes in this game, too. He threw a dime, that one down the seam. That one dime down the seam in the middle of the field. It was a dime. The entire Saturday. Yeah. You dime, that one down the seam. That one dime down the seam in the middle of the field. What was he going to do? The entire Saturday. Yeah. You know, this is a team that, and then also too,

like I was like watching towards the end as they were trying to, you know, work clock. And then you see Terry Bussey, you just like, you know, explode off the side there. And it's like, they have a lot of really young explosive players too that aren't necessarily stars yet that I think had come on in the second half of this year and be really, really good too.

So, you know, if you have good defensive line, I think they've got a pretty serviceable offensive line. They've got two really good running backs, a quarterback that can make plays with his legs. I'm some good young receivers. Like they have a lot of ingredients that you would look for,

for a team that could make some noise and maybe an unexpected run. And like they, I'm assuming that they're 100% going to be in your field when you do bracketology. They're 100% going to be in line. Yeah, I was expecting the winner of this game to be in it. The question is, who do I take out of it? And I think...

Because no one lost today, right? Like nobody lost. There's a team that I really am heavily considering dropping out of the field. Let's have the conversation now. I was on the edge of my seat. I don't even know who you're talking about. Let's talk about Spicy Nugs first.

Okay. Because I think this is going to be a lengthy conversation. We're going to talk about Ohio State, and we're going to talk about, are we sure that Ohio State is a national title? Oh, that's where you're going. Okay. Right after these words about Wendy's Nugs. Ari, your official welcome to On 3.

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Okay. The garlic parm is a very full, savory. The honey barbecue's got your sweet. This is your ultimate savory here. Buttery and savory. Nothing better than washing it down with a crisp zero, too. You know what I mean? Oh, yeah.

A little Coke Zero action. That's your spicy buffalo that's tremendous i think that's kind of the perfect that might be my favorite this is the parmesan garlic and this one i haven't tried yet which one it's a little bit hotter parmesan garlic oh this is spicy parmesan yeah yeah okay it's pretty damn good see this i keep changing my favorite I think that's the point of this exercise, right? Yes. That's my favorite one. I could put down 32 ounces of Coke Zero and be like, where's the next 32 ounces of Coke Zero? Well, and hey, we're pre-refills in the restaurant.

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All right, let us talk Ohio State. Actually, before we do that uh smu beat duke duke went for two in overtime did not get the two-point conversion smu wins 28 27 kansas state survives in the sunflower showdown kansas was driving, but K-State gets the stop on fourth down. They survive. So we have all of our results except for Colorado Cincinnati right now, which is going on right now. But let us talk about Ohio State. Very strange game with Nebraska. Ohio State had an open date in which they got to watch Nebraska get destroyed by Indiana. You just watched an entire team's every weakness laid bare by a team that has not as good of players as you have. And they come out and barely survive Nebraska.

Barely survive. I was waiting for your take that I've this is where you talk yes no no but no I don't want to talk I want to hear your take what's the take the take is are we sure they're a national title contender uh it's not a take it's a question I thought that you were implying before the break that we were going to get a ghost pepper nug take that you were going to drop them out of your bracketology. Well, okay. Who do I take out to put Texas A&M in? If that's them, I'm very curious.

I don't hate it. I mean, do I take out Notre Dame? Can't do that. They beat Texas A&M. Do I take out Penn State? Do I take out Miami? Sure as hell not taking out Indiana. Do I take, I can take out Tennessee. I mean, I guess the question here is, do you think Ohio State's going to lose to Penn State next Saturday? And there was probably your answer. If they play the way they did today.

Well, there's another question to be asked too like who's playing quarterback for Penn State because I'm not entirely sure that it's Bo Pribula is playing that Ohio State isn't in more trouble so we'll get to the pretty serious Trace McSorley vibes watching that kid play huh yeah we'll get to the Penn State discussion because we got to talk about Penn State and Wisconsin as well but let's talk about Nebraska and Ohio State because I was just really shocked at Ohio State's inability to run the ball. Now I realize that they are down to left tackles. They lost their starting left tackle against Oregon. The guy who came in for him went out late in this game. So it's a, it's a tough situation on Ohio state's offensive line. And it may be that when they play these five together in these positions, because they had to shuffle people around at the end that they look better against Penn state, but Penn state's defense is as good as Nebraska's or better. Now, maybe the two defensive tackles aren't as good as the vanilla gorilla and the

polar bear but everybody else is just as good or better and overall it's just as good or better so are we sure a lot of states gonna be able to move ball on them so their offensive line is a real issue okay yeah losing josh Josh Simmons in the Oregon game. I think you could make a realistic case that any player on Ohio state's roster, including a receiver or a quarterback would be an easier thing to overcome for Ohio state based on the way that their roster is constructed and losing Simmons. Then Zen Mikulski comes into the game. It doesn't go very well. And then he is helped off the field late in the game before Ohio State's last defensive stand.

So now you have some reshuffling that's going to have to occur this week in order to get the offensive line ready for the Penn State game, but they could not run the football against Penn State, and you watched this Ohio State team that has the best, maybe, running back tandem in college football, certainly the best receivers in college football, go four possessions in a row without getting a first down in that game. And that is concerning.

That's like a real personnel problem. A lot of times when we talk about teams and whether or not they can get it or not, a lot of times it's coaching and motivation and playing together, getting the right scheme in place, all these different things. But when you have a personnel issue, that's not something that we overcome. We've spent so much time, Andy, talking about Auburn's personnel issues at the quarterback position, Oklahoma's offensive line issues. You know how that can derail a football team.

Now, that said, Penn State's got some pretty special pass rushers on their team. Now, Danny Dennis Sutton got injured in this Wisconsin game tonight, which we'll get to. I don't know how severe it is. It looked like he came back into the game, and then they pulled him back out again, so it didn't look like a long-term thing. But between that and Abdul Carter,

like Ohio State's going to have to block some people because if you can't run and you've got your tackles being terrorized, like their offensive, you know, output could really struggle. Now, the thing that I will say, and I wrote a pretty stern column. I don't know if you got a chance to read it, Andy. I sure did. Under Ryan Day's leadership, Ohio State just hasn't been good enough. That is the headline

of Ari's column that came out shortly after that game and I I truly think that like as sternly written as it was that it's all very fair criticism and I think probably criticism that Ryan Day himself would probably acknowledge right like I don't know, you know, if you thought that it was harsh to write after a win, but it's just this team is supposed to be something and it always is supposed to be something. And it never seems to be that thing. And I think that when you watch them play against Nebraska and yes, I understand that this season is filled with clunkers and teams that, you know, are trying to escape with wins. It's happening every five minutes of every window. Like, I get it. But on the tail of losing to Oregon the way that they did two weeks ago, having two weeks to prepare for this game and then coming out and having a legitimate chance, like they literally could have lost that game to a 26 and a half point underdog. You have to ask yourself, like, what is stopping Ohio State's program?

Not just today, but over the course of the past three years from squeezing out and getting the most out of the players that it brings into the program because it does not equate. Ohio State brings in Alabama or pre-this year Alabama talent. It brings in Alabama or pre this year, Alabama talent. It brings in Georgia talent and through assistant coaches who come and go and first round draft picks who come and go and pictures of CJ Stroud on the sideline with Jackson Smith and Jigba, Garrett Wilson and Marvin Harrison. They're not winning anything.

And like at a certain point, it becomes an issue. And you can say, and I hear all the time Ryan Day is 62 and 9 I hear all the time that they are a field goal away from beating Georgia and winning the national championship I hear that if they would have held a block last year for one more second at the end of the Michigan game they would have won but at a certain point would have and was close or have a really good record like that's not what he's paid to do. He's paid for results, and the results are not there. So if they go out and smack Penn State next week

and beat Oregon in a rematch and go on to the semifinals this year, then we can revisit the discussion. Are we sure Ohio State's better than Indiana? If they beat Indiana, add it to the list. Because Indiana, that would be a huge win if they, at that point in the season, it's going to be a top 10 win at that point. Yeah, that could be Ohio State against 10-0 Indiana at that point. And also, too, I hate to say it, Andy, but they still have to beat Michigan, a Michigan team that beat Michigan State

on Saturday and is a mental blockage for this team. So, like, there is plenty of runway for Ohio State to win its way back into everybody's heart. But today I got to the point where it's like, you've listened to the show. You've heard me analyze this team, Andy. I always give them the benefit of the doubt. Oh, they've got better players than everybody. Oh, they're going to beat Oregon by 20 because they've got so much talent this year.

They're different. They're the Georgia of this year. And it just does not materialize. And at a certain point, you look like a fool. You know what I mean? Like, so I'm not giving Ohio State the benefit of the doubt anymore until they actually prove that they're not a kick away or a block away. Like, put it together.

You've got the best players on the roster. Don't do it, Andy. They just don't. Yeah, it's something we've talked about with the flattening of the sport, too. It does not matter how many good players you have. If you have a terrible string of luck at one particular position,

you can be screwed. And that can happen. We saw that happen in Georgia in the SEC Championship game last year with its receivers. With Ohio State, it's happening at left tackle right now. Yeah, and this is what you get a lot here like in the chat here Mr. Big Play Bray so who should Ohio State get to

replace Ryan Day I'm not saying the man should be fired Mike Vrabel and I know people like to say Mike Vrabel but like that's like you know it you know, it's great. He's going to coach the Patriots. Two and nine is really, really good. I'm not, I think that there are a lot of qualities that make Ryan day the ideal head coach. He's a great guy. He's a very good recruiter. They assemble rosters better or as good as anybody in the country. And he's a great representative for the program.

I'm not sitting here saying that I think that he should be fired or this, like that this can't ever be fixed or remedied. I don't think that he's a cancer that can't figure it out. I'm pointing out that the last four years or three years have been a disappointment, and I don't understand why that's so offensive to the same people who are angry about it. Like, are you okay with losing to Michigan three years in a row? Is that okay with you? Like, are you okay with losing the only big game on your schedule this year

and almost losing? If you are, if that's the new standard of the program, then that's great. I'm just holding Ohio State to the standard that I know from being there for 10 years, and that standard is beat your rival, win the Big Ten, and compete for a national championship. And they've got a senior class on this team that has never beaten Michigan and has never won the Big Ten championship. Is that good enough to you?

If it is, that's great. But that's not the standard that Ryan Day has. That's not the standard Urban Meyer had. His two predecessors were pretty good at it. So, like, I'm not saying go fire him and I have the replacement right here for you. Like, that's a very difficult thing. But it's a very interesting dynamic because you have a coach that has the he has what it takes in terms of roster assembly he's a likable dude people want to play the games he's supposed to win wins

he's supposed to he has never lost to a team that was not ranked in the top 12 like in the formula of of good coaching like ryan day illustrates a lot of the great things that you need to sustain success over a long period of time. But at a certain point, and I've been somebody who said they were a kick away or a block away a hundred times, you have to look at the actual results of this. And the results are not Ohio State standard. And if you want to hate me or call me an asshole for saying the truth, that's okay. But that's what it is. So, you know, there are a lot of people who are going to be upset if they lose to Michigan or if they don't win the Big Ten again this year.

And frankly speaking, with a $20 million roster, what's the excuse for not playing an Indy this year if you don't? What's the excuse? Your left tackle got hurt? No excuse. And Ryan Day will tell you that. He told us that when we were in columbus after week one there are no excuses when you're ohio state's coach

that's all there is to it and he understands like he understands it better than anybody so he knows he's got to go to state college and win because here's the thing if they don't win in state college they might make the playoff but i will have serious doubts until i see them beat indiana because indiana's a wagon so yeah i mean i i think that first of all i'm not convinced that penn state's some sort of juggernaut that ohio state can't be well so like i'm not gonna go down that road like well let's drop them out let's put a pin in the Ohio State discussion. Because Ari, we're going to talk about Ohio State again on Sunday.

We do these videos on Sunday where we talk to individual fan bases. But I know there's a lot of Ohio State haters who want to hear this discussion too. So I'm telling you right now, the On3, subscribe now to the On3Sports YouTube page. You will get a video on Sunday where Ari and I break down all of these issues with Ohio State and what it means going into the Penn State game. It's coming. We got to talk about Penn State, though, because they're in a very interesting position, too, coming out of the weekend. But first, let me tell you about J-Lab.

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Ari, let's talk Penn State because Penn State, Wisconsin, was a high grab-ass game early on. Drew Aller goes out right before halftime. There's the shot of him getting walked into the locker room just before the half, and you're thinking, okay, they're just trying to get him in there early, get him some extra treatment because they're on defense right now. He's probably coming out to start second half.

He does not come back in. It is the Broke Pribula show from there on out. You see him exit the field when he did on those way out, by the way? Yeah, he was yelling at somebody like in the Wisconsin band. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, he dropped a hard F there, but he's fired up. You love to see a young man fired up.

Yeah. Well, you were fired up watching beau perbula because it's electric they move the ball a lot better with overbula i just know so like i've covered a lot of the ohio state penn state clashes and happy valley and like a lot of times ohio state won but there were times where they didn't and i know the exact type of quarterback that has given ohio state issues in the past and like trace mcsorley is that dude um and i don't know he's the one who beat them yes uh and like i i don't remember this 100 but i also think that like they both wore the same number so maybe that's part of the reason why like did mcsorley wear nine. You'll have to look that up for me while I'm talking.

I believe it just, it was the same exact vibe where it's like a very athletic, quick kid who can get out and make plays with his legs is tough, can make the throws when people are open that they need to make. And it's just kind of like a thorn in your side where it's like, if you make a mistake or you're out of position, this is a guy that will move the sticks on you and do it over and over and over again until you go crazy.

And also, can I point out, we've seen Penn state have a situation with a backup quarterback where they're like, you're the running guy. You don't get to throw. And then he gets himself in a situation where he can throw and turns out he can actually throw except will levis didn't get that situation until he went to kentucky yeah that's funny that

you bring that up um but yeah so i don't know how severe allers injury is uh it looked like while they were zooming in on him on the sideline he had like very positive like funny laughing, like body language. So it didn't strike me as somebody who was devastated that he wasn't going to get the play next week. So I would assume his body language, very different than Connor Wegman's body language.

Yes. His, his body language was like, I'm good. So I think that, you know, my anticipation would be that Aller is the starter next week against Ohio state. But you know, my anticipation would be that Aller is the starter next week against Ohio State.

But, you know, Penn State didn't really do much on offense for the entire second half. And then I felt like Wisconsin had a very hard time stopping them in all facets of the game. Now that pick six in the third quarter, you know, flipped the game. I think it went from 10 to 7 to 14, 10. And that kind of made Wisconsin feel like, hey, maybe this one's slipping away. And then Wisconsin's defense had a harder time containing Penn State's offense. Maybe that's just what good teams do to other good teams. They just wear them down until the dam breaks.

But Bo Pribula was making plays the entire second half. He had a nice touchdown pass in traffic. He was moving the sticks with his legs. It gives you some opportunity to do some creative things with Tyler Warren back there. Like, I don't know that I felt like the offense got worse when he was out there. I think it got better from the production standpoint. I think it definitely did.

Now you bring up a legitimate question, though. Was that a function of him being the one running it or just the dam breaking? Because that's how Penn state operates. And, and I, I would accept either answer at this point. I don't know that there's a correct answer right now based on what we know, but I'm,

I'm very interested to see this game. Steve in the chat says he can throw. We'll see i also think that like sometimes college quarterbacks are held to like nfl standards of how well you have to throw i'm seeing a lot in the chat levis is trash levis can't throw no levis could throw fine at kentucky he can't throw in the nfl neither can trace huge difference. It's okay. But you can be a pretty good thrower in college and that'd be more than enough because people get more open in college than they do in the NFL. The windows and the time that you get is greater. I don't need to explain to people how it's different to play in the league. That's why there are so many great quarterbacks in

college that go to the league and don't turn out to be very good at all. I don't think that the standard of what you need to be as a passer in the college game is nearly as high as what it takes for you to be successful in the NFL. And I think a lot of people make this mistake of, well, Levis isn't having a very good time in Tennessee right now, so he stinks. It's like, no, being a great quarterback in the NFL is just really difficult. In fact, there are 32 starters in the NFL and half of them suck. So that's just the way it is.

So I don't know what the game plan will be for Penn state or whether or not they make a switch there. I wouldn't anticipate they would do that, but I think that prebula from what I saw can throw well enough to beat Ohio state if they get their offense moving and, you know, get themselves into this, a Penn state, Ohio state low scoring affair. I think that that would be more than enough to go out there and win that game yeah if if ohio state is struggling to block in the run game the way they were today this game is going to be a slog and it really probably will come down to who makes fewer mistakes than the other team and that's that's fine i'm'm happy. You give me a nice November Big Ten game like that, I'm in. I'll take it. Yeah.

I mean, this is what it's setting up to what this game had promised at the beginning of the year, and I'm super excited to see that Penn State has gotten here. I think the most irony of ironies here would be that I have always put Penn State in the crosshairs whenever talking about the expansion of the playoff and how they don't have to be better to do it. But wouldn't it be crazy or know, Penn State in the crosshairs whenever talking about the expansion of the playoff and how they don't have to be better to do it. But like, wouldn't it be crazy or something

if Penn State won the Big Ten this year? Like how much better that would feel for them? It would. And it would have made the 14 playoff if it was still 14. Yeah, yeah. Because that's, I don't know that that's impossible. I think that there's a chance of that. So, you know, I do think that we've all kind of just been like, ah, Penn State hasn't played anybody.

You know, their time is coming. You know, every year whenever they play these big games, they end up losing them. You know, the narrative that exists with Ryan Day exists very much so with James Franklin as well. And you're going to have a team, two teams in a game next week where both coaches are going to be desperate to win a game like that. But Penn State, I think, has a very good defense, and they've got some pieces on both sides of the ball that make them a dangerous team. And there were times where it felt like they were going to lose to Wisconsin this afternoon or this evening,

but then there were times where it was like they were never going to lose that game. And Penn State, I think, has been better than everybody they've played by a pretty wide margin. And Ohio State's coming in off of a loss and a pretty terrible game on Saturday. And they're going on the road. And I wish the game was at night. It's at noon next week. But it's going to be an awesome experience for both teams.

It is going to be so much fun. Now, we got to talk about the other two undefeated teams in the Big Ten because they had very interesting games today as well. Well, interesting results. One game was interesting results what one game was interesting the other one was not in the least but before we do that let's talk about panini america makers the most collectible sports cards on the planet the luminance football card series features nil autograph cards from players including arch manning quinn ewers cam ward

jayla milrow dylan raiola dj Lagway, and Luther Burden III to start collecting. Visit paniniamerica.net. I got a box of the Luminance series right here. We're going to rip some packs this week, see what we get. Ari has an autographed Caleb Downs card already. I ripped another one of them, and I got this here. It's a Michael Penix autograph. That's not an NIL player.

I'm trying my best to get this to zoom in, but it's a crack. I got it. I'm looking. I see it right now. Very nice. Uh, autograph here,

a number to 75. It's very, very cool. Um, and just the potential of hitting a lot of the stars that are still in the sport too, is like kind of fun prospecting in the NFL that, you know,

you typically see with baseball cards that you're able to go get these guys before they're drafted in the NFL and earn their college uniforms and get your auto and get them in the sleeve and i saw panini just signed uh but he just signed vernell brown the third who is a five-star player committed to florida right now so they're they're getting a bunch of the future stars that haven't even gotten to college yet like like we said that they've got younger players like arch manning like dylan raiola like dj lagway like it it's it's pretty cool to be able to get those cards now yeah no absolutely uh and just being able to you know sleeve them up put them away and collect them and wait to see

how these kids turn out and you know when they become nfl draft picks and stuff they're super awesome collectibles and honestly andy i don't know how many boxes you've opened or if you have opened any of them yet. But like the whole feeling of just ripping wax is just a really awesome experience. And I used to do it when I was a kid with the wax packs that had the gum in them. So, man, just yeah, I don't know that there was any gum by the time I was a kid. But, you know, the fact that, too, when you open these cards, Andy, like there's a chance that you can hit something that's worth a lot of money, too. Like, it's just a really exhilarating experience. And, you know, if you love football, you love investing in the future and holding on to things and collecting stuff.

It's the perfect like all my interests are all met when I'm opening sports cards. And that's the reason it is. It is the nexus of all of your hobbies. Think about it once. Like all my interests are all met when I'm opening sports cards. And that's the reason why it is. It is the nexus of, of all of your hobbies. Think about it once. Yeah. Literally all of them. Except he has a wax finish and we love it.

It's more of a foil fetish now. No, it's these are, these are, these are foil packs rather than wax packs. But yeah, Ari, let's go to bloomington

because for a second there i was a little i was a little worried that indiana was gonna have a letdown game after nebraska after college game day showed up and then the pick six happened i'm like nope they're not letting down. Not going to be a letdown game. Yeah, well, I kind of feel like that's the theme of Saturday in general, of all these places where you think a team could be subject to a letdown and nobody actually letting down. Like the Indiana-Washington game is an example of it. I think people thought that Penn State-Wisconsin was a letdown potential, maybe not letdown look ahead.

You know, there were a lot of trap spots. You know, I think that BYU and UCF was one. I mean, UCF was actually favored in that game. I don't want to give away our entire show here, but there were a lot of situations where, you know, even Miami with Florida State in a rivalry game, you know, if you take your eye off the ball, you could trip. And all these teams not only avoided the letdowns,

but won pretty convincingly, which makes doing the future projections a little bit harder. But Indiana is just good. And I don't know how many games they have to win for people to catch on. I think most people are now. But I watched the majority of that game and they looked like the much better team. Like this isn't a fluke. This isn't, uh, you know, they had a backup quarterback in there and Taven Jackson did really well. Like, you know, didn't light up the

score sheet by any stretch of the imagination, but was efficient and protected the ball for the most part. And it did a really good job. Like they've got really good running backs they've got really good receivers their defense gets after you and like you don't get to eight no by fluke it's the best um start since 1967 and i think only the third time in indiana school history that they made it to eight no which is pretty crazy uh and you know the big joke among the indiana fans over the years has been nine windiana when when do we get to see nine windiana well uh probably next week you know they they're at michigan state they should beat michigan state they might not but uh that that is probably when you're going to see nine windiana and but the thing is now you you can legitimately talk about 12 Indiana, 12 Indiana, because I think they're going to be favored against Michigan.

And again, watching Ohio State today, had Ohio State played Indiana today and played the same way they played against Nebraska, Indiana would have won that game. Yeah. So this is kind of an interesting, maybe on-topic veer, but a veer nonetheless. When you and I were doing the pod a few years ago, I remember we were theorizing with the conference expansion. Do you remember this conversation we talked about? Will a job like Purdue ever be a more interesting or more desirable job than a job like Florida State? If you're in the Big Ten versus the ACC right or a job yeah a job like Kansas State where they've traditionally won I guess you know not the 80s but traditionally won in their conference yeah just going to a

place that wasn't viewed as a destination job in a power conference like the Big Ten or the SEC, do the lower tier teams in perception outweigh the higher tier teams and other conferences that are on the outside looking into this expansion? And I think that this is going to be an interesting situation to see if that Big Ten money puts Indiana in a position to extend Coach Cignetti for a long time. Like, pay him those money and keep him there. Because I do think, and we joked, it's like, oh, there's

a certain team in Gainesville that is super interesting and needs a coach. Maybe they can go after him. And I saw a bunch of memes even. Maybe they were funny or joking. Yeah, but like you said, there's no reason Indiana shouldn't be able to match or beat whatever it is they would offer. And I think in this world, when you have an employee that has exceeded expectations,

you don't always have to wait for somebody else to want somebody in order to try to get the... I mean, if I were Indiana, I'd be getting the paperwork ready right now. They've got the money to do it. Get this guy a five to seven, eight-year deal. Pay him a lot of money, maybe more than you're even comfortable with. And let's see if he can actually build something. like the cool thing is, is like, we're in the moment. We're loving Indiana's, um, you know, runway here. Like what, hell, what if Indiana beats Ohio state? You know, I would've thought that was impossible a month ago. I don't anymore.

Um, what could the actual ceiling of this program be long-term? Not just how far can they take this Cinderella run? What could Indiana be? And actually having a coach. And remember, he's already going after five-star recruits. Like he's not already around on that front. Yeah. So if you're Indiana and you're in a position where you have a coach that's going to be sought after by big time programs,

use the big 10 money that you have right now in order to solidify this man being the leader of your program for, for a longer stretch of time. Cause the thing that stinks too, and I saw it happen to Arizona last year. It's like when these lower level teams that, you know, you know, have blips every five to 10 years of one good year, whenever they have that coach, they get taken so quickly. There's never any staying power or ability to build off of anything. There's no momentum. And I think that's part of the reason why some of these teams have these like peak seasons where it's like, okay, remember that time that Indiana was good in 2024 and 2021 or

2031. And then it's just like a joke. No, like, you know, this guy's got it. I think, you know, if Brent Venables can get an extension last year, then why can't this guy's got it uh i i think you know if brent venables can get an extension last year then why can't this guy get one now like i think you get ahead of it you put yourself in a position where you you keep him you you shut down the noise of all the other people that are going to want them and and and let him try to build something long term at a place that people think is a stepping stone job and i actually think that he's the type of personality that'll want to do it.

Well, and the other part of it is you don't have the pressure. Like somebody's going to get, if Florida makes a change, somebody's going to get that job and they'll immediately be under intense pressure. Like go in the national title right now. You know, Kalen DeBoer got the Alabama job. Congratulations. Now better win every game. And now they've lost two games and it's like the world is ending. Coach Siggs doesn't have to deal with that.

It's sort of the same thing we talk about with Mark Stoops. Although if we have the conversation, we'll have to have a conversation about Mark Stoops a little later in the show. But you don't have that pressure to win the national title. If you follow this year up with an eight or nine win season, nobody's going to be too upset about that. Yeah. And you're still going to get paid like everybody else.

And do you think that Indiana would have a better chance of getting Juju Lewis if he was signed to a six-year extension? Like that's the other thing that like, I don't know that they're going to get him either way. I think it's amazing that they've gotten this far. But, you know, part of me too is like if you're a five-star recruit and I think about this too with the five stars that, you know, have been visiting Colorado. It's like, that's cool. But are you sure the coaches that you're going to play for are going to be there in two years. Like if you know they are, then, you know, selling somebody on being the

foundational piece of a rebuild or a construction of a program is a hell of a lot more compelling than somebody who can get hired away in a year or two years. Juju Lewis, by the way, this Julian Lewis, the five-star quarterback recruit who is committed to USC. And I still think he may wind up at USC because the job may be open at USC. The quarterback job may be open. And Lincoln Riley has a pretty good history with quarterbacks. But he is on a visit to Colorado tonight. Colorado, by the way, up 24-14 at the beginning of the second half on Cincinnati. Who's got a better chance of being their head coach of their current program in three years?

Kurt Cignetti at Indiana or Deion Sanders at Colorado? I need to see Indiana re-sign Kurt Cignetti to a giant contract right now, because until I see that, I'm not going to assume he's going to be there because everybody else is going to want him to. But if this is a podcast, we're fun. I always got to preface it like that because I like to take things off the rails. But do you think he's going to be the head coach of Indiana next year? If Indiana will pay him, because I think there should be some schools that offer him a lot of money, so they better pay him. Pay me and his money. Exactly. Thank you, John Malkovich.

Let us move to the other undefeated team in the Big Ten. Oregon beat the snot out of Illinois. Illinois is a good, well-coached team and Oregon demolished the Illini like that's that's what we were thinking we're going to see from Ohio State against Nebraska that's what we got from Oregon against Illinois they they treated Illinois the same way they treated Purdue last week yeah and I think kind of, it's just, this is the ascension of a team that's hitting on all cylinders right now. And funny enough, next weekend, they're going to Ann Arbor for the Michigan game. And that before the year was supposed to be one of the three or four best

matchups in the entire big 10. And now it's like, Michigan's going to get destroyed. You know, like they are in a position where they're clearly or feel like they're clearly the best team in the big 10 it seems all but a certainty they're going to be in Indianapolis in year one to represent the Ducks in the big 10 championship game and you know what looked to be like a pretty difficult schedule before the season started turned out to be quite easy for them after the win over Ohio State. Now, obviously, they haven't done it yet and they still have to go to Washington. That game gets weird.

You know, maybe things are different with the body clock going to Michigan. I'm not going to talk myself into that. They get Maryland at home and Wisconsin is just not good enough to play with them. So I don't anticipate they will lose it this year in the regular season. Yeah, I not if they're playing the way they play now. And then there's talk that Jordan Burch may be able to come back from his injury. Not that they've really missed a beat in terms of pass rush.

Mateo Uyungle has been great. I mean, it's been interesting to watch them evolve because after the first couple weeks, we were worried about them. They were in a fourth quarter game against idaho and they were really in a game a four-quarter game against boise state and they shuffled their offensive line around a little bit they finally found the five they like and it seems like since then everything has just taken off for them yep and i said after the ohio state game that they were my new favorite to win the national championship and nothing at all has changed

well one thing changed georgia did what they did at texas and that scares the hell out of me but uh still think that oregon's probably you know worthy of being number one and viewed in the way that you know people are viewing them right now yeah i i was i thought that they would this would be a bad stylistic matchup for illinois but i was shocked at how quickly oregon came out of the gate and just tore them apart and i thought i thought it might take a minute to get rolling and then you'd have like a 31-10 final or something like that. But, you know, Oregon was up, what, 35-3 at halftime? Like, it was crazy.

So, yeah, I'm excited to see what Oregon does the rest of the way because they are now, yeah, odds on favorite to win the Big Ten. Odds on favorite to be the number one seed in the playoff. Like, all of that is in front of them. There's not going to be an undefeated sec champ. They could still be an undefeated big 10 champion and they would be the odds on favorite to be that one. So, and I wanted to, I wanted to mention this stat because I thought it was interesting and I kind of lost track of it, but I guess Dylan Gabriel, who threw for 291 yards in the Oregon win Saturday, surpassed former Hawaii quarterback Timmy Chang for NCAA career passing yards. He now has 17,236, Gabriel does, and the record for most career passing yards

during a college career is Case Keenum, who holds the record with 19,217. And there is a chance that Gabriel will become this year, especially if they play a lot of games in the playoff, the record holder for most passing yards in a a career yeah yeah i think i think that yeah i think it is it is amazing and you know he found the right situation for him obviously oklahoma was not i think like we know he made the right choice there and the marriage of dylan gabriel who remember organsregon's where he always wanted to play

but they didn't give him the time of day coming out of high school so the fact that he's getting to kind of live out his dream marcus mariotta was always his idol and he's wearing number eight at oregon like it's really cool to watch all right before we get to oregon's opponent next week because we need to talk about michigan who made a quarterback change going into the michigan state game and and wound up winning the game we're gonna talk about prize picks so i made a prize picks play a five way prize five square prize picks play this week it did not go well for me uh it was but it was a five dollar play to potentially win 70 and i i felt good about it but you know sometimes it doesn't always work out for you but here's the thing i want to tell you if you're not already playing prize picks which is the most fun daily fantasy game in america

if you use the code staples you can play five dollars and get fifty dollars instantly so if you did this play that i did which was uh jake retzliff the byu quarterback more than 215 and a half passing yards. That worked out for me. I said Henry Parrish Jr., the Ole Miss running back, would have more than one and a half touchdowns. He did not. Blake Craig, the Missouri kicker.

I'm just going to stop playing kickers at this point because it doesn't work for me. Every time I do it, it goes badly. But if you had played this $5 play and lost as a new user using the code staples you would have gotten 50 bucks to play with so you could have put 10 more of those in and i bet you would have won one or two or three so give it a shot use the code staples play five dollars get 50 instantly with prize picks all right all right let let's talk Michigan because now we're back to the beginning. Like Davis Warren started the season as the quarterback.

Then they went to Alex Orji. Then they went to Jack Tuttle. And now we're back to Davis Warren. And he comes in and like it wasn't the prettiest thing in the world, but they did beat Michigan State. You know, I thought they were going to complete the circle I thought maybe we'd get Jaden Davis action this year at some point you know he was a pretty you know yeah they didn't go all the way around the world they they I think they cut off you know part of the world there um

they won they won a rivalry game at. And they might make a bowl this year. Maybe. Considering what this team has looked like the last two, three weeks, I think this is just like the analysis here is good job. You won a rivalry game, right? I don't know how much there is to take away from this or how relevant it is in the grand scheme of things. But I think that when you have a first year head coach that is struggling

with personnel and trying to figure out who this team is, and they kind of felt, Andy, you were onto something a few weeks ago when you said that they should just go with orgy and become a running, you know, team that leans on what it is. And then, you know, they changed the quarterback two more times. And it's just a just a dysfunctional situation there uh to come out and beat a rival at your home uh field and and keep a rivalry true i mean that's a pretty bitter rivalry now so like you know i good on sharon moore and michigan for getting it done but i don't know that this changes anything in terms of like my long-term view of what this program looks like at the

beginning or for the remainder of this year it's a very important offseason coming up for him in Michigan. Yeah. Well, and so what they've done is I think they've married the two concepts that they went with at the beginning. So they've married the Davis Warren and the Alex Orji offenses because Davis Warren, and I think this was originally the plan, but they never could quite pull it off. And maybe it was just because Michigan State couldn't stop it. But Alex Orji actually led them in rushing today.

And they would bring him in and they would be a bigger threat with the quarterback run game. And then you don't know if he's handing it to Khalil Mullings or to Donovan Edwards, neither of whom had a very good game. But if you can do that, then I guess it gives you a chance going forward. So that's what I say. I also will say happy to see this game be competitive. Like Jonathan Smith brought Aiden Childs with him from Oregon State. I think Aiden Childs is going to be a good quarterback. He had a great game against Iowa last week.

So I think going forward, this is going to be a good game. And I'm glad of that because some of the more fun games in the last 15 years of college football have been Michigan, Michigan state games. Yeah. And you know, in terms of just like hatred and fighting and tunnel stuff,

like there's been a lot going on here. Yeah. Yeah. In this game, there's a fight at the end of this game. Yeah. It's heated, man.

They care. They care there, you know? And, you know, both of these teams have had their runs at the top of it. And, you know,

both of these teams are kind of struggling to find their way. It kind of felt like Michigan state was waking up a little bit the last few weeks. Coming into the game, probably feeling a lot better about Aiden Childs and, you know, what they could bring to the table after beating Iowa the previous week, 33-20. And, you know, they didn't get it done. But, you know, I guess Michigan, if you look at their schedule here, it's kind of just like, you know, one way or light at the end of the tunnel is a train here, right? Like, I mean, they got Indiana coming up or Oregon coming up next.

Then they have Indiana the following week, then they play Northwestern, and then they're going on the road to Ohio State. So I think we're probably looking at three losses out of the last four games, which would put them at six loss season. And then they got to go into the offseason and regroup. Though, I do think it's possible maybe they sneak up and beat somebody they're not supposed to beat there. One never knows.

One never knows. I think the Oregon-Michigan game is a great helmet game. We'll see if it's an actual great game. Before we get to Notre Dame, because we did need to talk about the Notre Dame Navy game and how well Notre's an actual great game. Before we get to Notre Dame, because we do need to talk about the Notre Dame-Navy game and how well Notre Dame played in that game. Because this podcast also, like Michigan's quarterback situation, is a flat circle.

That's right. But we need to circle back to Texas A&M because Mike Yelko, doing his post-game press conference after the LSU game, he said this. So Carter Corral is one of the beat writers covering Texas A&M reports this. Mike Elko in his press conference said, this is a real program.

It is not fake. It is not a politician running this program, talking fast and BSing everybody. Wow. He just dropped a nuke on Jimbo Fisher. Is he talking about Jimbo or is he talking about Brian kelly i don't even know who he's talking about i you're right i didn't even put those two together holy crap it could have been brian i think it's jimbo fisher but which one's i don't know this wow uh because they both kind of fit that description a little bit

right like you don't know exactly who he's talking about um if it wow well brian kelly did actually work in politics at one point in his life so brian you're right it could be a face is a political face like he looks like somebody that you would see on Fox News or CNN talking about something that's way more important than football doesn't he doesn't he kind of have that look about him yes but the talking fast part is Jimbo. Like Brian Kelly does not talk fast. Jimbo does talk very fast. Um, but Holy shit.

That would be, that would be something if he was talking about the coach he replaced. I think he probably is. And by the way, also the coach he worked for, because he wasn't DC there under Jimbo. Yeah. But I mean,

I mean like this is kind of like A&M is kind of becoming, um, the program that's supposed to mirror what it has, you know, and for so many years, the output never matched the input. Um, and the thing that we always questioned and, you know, before we left the athletic, they, they wrote a really, really good in-depth piece about, you know, how things started going off the rails at A&M. Yeah, that was me and Sam. Yeah, I didn't I didn't know if it was you. I forgot. Yeah, I don't I don't I like to block out when you team up with other people because we're friends now.

You get jealous. Yeah, there's a there's a lot of people I thought that contributed to the reporting of that, and I didn't want to leave anybody out or whatever, but take the credit, Andy. Mirroring what they had on the roster from a talent perspective with relentless competence, this was going to be the outcome, right? Now, I didn't know that it was going to happen in year one, but this is exactly why going out and hiring the flashiest, most known name imaginable isn't always the right recipe. Mike Elko in five years could legitimately be considered a top four coach in America if things go well, right? Like that's how this stuff happens. You don't always know who people are. You don't always, you know, hit the

grand slam on press conference day, but if you get the right fit, and I think that, you know, another coach that kind of fits this mold too, is Josh Heupel at Tennessee. You know, there are people who, who don't win the press conference or don't come in as a home run hire or somebody that people are super excited about. And then it turns out that they are the perfect marriage between what your place is about, the resources that you have and how to tie it all together. And I think both of these guys in terms of fit, location, timing, all of it, like might be the two best hires of the last five years am i forgetting anyone yeah i i am uh i don't think so and i think also the way elko's team plays fits the vibe that the a&m people want right they play hard supposed

to be the tough you know they're the ag school like that in all of these ag school, fancy liberal arts, state school rivalries, the ag school wants to be like the harder edge team, whether it's Texas A&M or Auburn or NC State. They all want that. What's Clemson? White collar versus blue collar, right? Exactly. That's all it is.

The person who's just going to kick the crap out of you physically. And the fact that A&M comes into year one with Elko, with the defensive lineman that they have, allows them to kind of build out from that personality. You've got two very hard runners at running back. You've got a defensive line that can stop the running, get after the quarterback. Like you have the elements in place to play the way that you want to play.

And in a stadium like that, that gets as loud as it does. Like that's a football team that should be taken very seriously. And, you know, the whole discourse about A&M coming into the year was we do not know what this team is or who they're going to be. We knew they had some pieces, but we didn't know how long it was going to take. And then they lose to Notre Dame in the opener. And it's like, OK, well, maybe this might be a two-year deal and it's like if they win two more games like they've already matched like what was jimbo's best season at a&m did they

win 10 games in 2020 or was it nine no they didn't because remember they only played a 10 game regular season oh that's right that's right i don't think they won so they never won 10 games under uh under jimbo right? Yeah. So it's possible. I mean, their schedule sets up really nicely. I know that you think. It does. It does.

I still think at South Carolina is going to be tough just because it's a talented team. But their ability after the quarterback, I think, probably will make it possible to, to manage that one. But yeah, I mean, listen, if they win the next three and go into the Texas game with just one loss, it is going to be an Epic, Epic Thanksgiving weekend in the whole state of Texas.

I mean, it's going to be incredible. So yeah, it's like to like, can we kind of put a, I mean, I don't know, I guess like South Carolina's played teams close this year

right like they they played lsu down to the wire should have beaten alabama yeah down to the wire they got beaten up pretty good by ole miss but i i guess you're right like i i just i don't want to assign too much credit like we we can't go from what's also a letdown it's going on the road. It's a classic letdown spot. Like that's the only reason why. Yeah. But. No, I mean, if A&M plays the way they did in the second half, the LSU game. Beatdown. I don't know that anybody on their schedule is beating them, including the fellas in burn orange. I mean, we'll get to Texas in a second, but we got to talk about notre dame we talk about environments all the time and i actually kind of roll my eyes into the back of my head half

the time it's like team is going to loud stadium and then like we talk about it for a few minutes and just like every week the stadium is loud i actually think like in terms of home field advantage of what we're gonna see see at Kyle field that day, that like, that is the time that you should talk about it the most. Yeah. Now it was pretty off the, off the hook when they played the last time.

And when Texas played there the last time in Texas one, so it's not. Yeah. It's always loud there, but did that Texas team that won 10 years ago have a quarterback with hurt feelings? That's the key question. One quarterback whose feelings are not hurt, Riley Leonard of Notre Dame. I almost said of Duke.

He doesn't play for Duke anymore. Notre Dame played Navy. This is one where Navy came in undefeated. Navy's offense was flummoxing everybody they played. Notre Dame forced three turnovers very quickly. I believe cashed them all in for points. And this game was over. This game was over before it started.

And Notre Dame just cruised to a win. Like, Ari, I think I'm on board with you now. I mean, we were talking about how this was like their biggest landmine left on their schedule and it was like they won 51 to 14 yeah and like we did when we were breaking down this game was like well maybe he's got a really good offense and you know actually watching the game in the first half like maybe he did hit some big plays oh yeah when their offense was, was not making mistakes. It was moving the ball a little bit, but Notre Dame forced them into mistakes that they hadn't made all year

because Notre Dame just has better players, but it was easy to analyze and say, yeah, well, Notre Dame, you know, they're not going to, they're not the most explosive team all the time.

Navy's offense will really eat you alive and burn a clock. We can see this being a two-possession game in the fourth quarter. But the other side of the coin was, or Notre Dame would just go out there and out-athlete them. And I just thought that Navy's mistakes were, you know, a lot of them were like fumbles. And I don't know how much you attribute, like, just putting the ball on the ground. I think a few of them, if I remember watching correctly, like we're just drops. How much that plays into a, you know, into account there, but like I don't think Navy played its sharpest game, but I also think that they probably didn't play their sharpest game because the athletes that Notre Dame was putting out onto the field were at a higher level than anything they had seen this year. And, you know, I think that there's a certain class in college football and as heartwarming as it is to have the United States military having two

undefeated teams, I think that we probably should have not lost sight of the fact that they're playing against like really, really talented, deep, fast, strong football players that like were put on earth to play football. And this is the result of that. And especially if you turn the ball over a ton in the first half and don't even give yourself a chance to make it a game or to put your opponent on the heels. Notre Dame was up by three scores so fast and never even had to sweat.

Yeah. No, this was a statement performance by them. Now, look, I still think they need to win out to make the playoff because they have a horrific loss and not a very strong schedule. But the other thing they have going for them is Texas A&M. The more Texas A&M wins, the better that win looks. Also, too, I don't know that just because Navy lost to Notre Dame by 37, they're not going to go win the American.

They certainly can just still go win the American. They've been beating up on everybody. I'm not saying that their season's over, but if A&M goes into the Texas game as a one-loss team, and I think you might even be able to make the case depending. I don't know. There's a lot of teams stacked up right now, but could you make the case that two loss Notre Dame still gets in?

There's a chance. And I think that the A&M when buoying them is, is a reason why that didn't happen. And I would say probably zero, but like the fact that that win is just sitting out there now, you know, really changes the way we, you know,

we view them but i will say that we've been on i've been on this this podcast since the day they lost saying that they're still very much in the picture people went nuts and we're going into november now and they're in the top 10 that i released on saturday night and are going to be in the field when i get around doing bubble watch when the show's over so i'm sure you're going to have them in your field too, I assume, right? Yes. They were in it last week. They'll stay in it. I did say during the week on Wendy's Saucy Dog Wednesday

my sauciest take was that two or more undefeated teams would go down this weekend. I thought Pittsburgh would be one of them. Pittsburgh was not. Pittsburgh crushed Syracuse. There were three pick sixes in the first half of Kyle McCord. It was incredible. But Liberty came through on Wednesday night for me.

By losing, that is. They lost to Kennesaw State. Navy was the other one. Navy was the other undefeated team that lost this weekend. So I got my, at least two Vegas thought by the end, not when we picked this game, but by the time the game kicked off that UCF would knock BYU from the

ranks of the unbeatens. That could not have been more laughable. BYU hammered UCF would knock BYU from the ranks of the unbeatens. That could not have been more laughable. BYU hammered UCF. This score was not nearly as, as close as, or the game was not as close as the score looks. Yeah. You,

you got close, right? You hit, you started off. Oh, a one and oh, and then did anybody else lose? I don't think they did, right?

Navy. Navy lost. Oh, Navy. Oh, you were right. But BYU did not. I didn't understand. Like, this line flipped during the week. I don't understand Vegas' fascination with UCF. Like, they're not good. Yeah.

It really just didn't make any sense and it went from wow byu's minus two that doesn't make sense to wow byu plus three that really doesn't make sense it like swung five points um and i guess maybe you just kind of put yourself in a thought where it's like well byu's going from provo uh all the way out to Orlando. It's a far trip. They played on Friday night, the last time out, and almost lost to Oklahoma State. The Big 12 is weird. You could probably talk yourself into this being a letdown spot. This is another one of the letdown Saturdays that didn't come to fruition. And I think that the one thing that we're all going to have to start

to come around to understanding is that Patrick patrick shalomes is on this team and uh this guy is electric that's my favorite nickname ever for jay grasslip that that one came out today i don't know i don't know who to give credit to that i don't know what or two for that one but patrick shalom's is an incredible nickname patrick shalom's is uh a um if you don't understand a play on the fact that byu's quarterback is jewish um and is very very good and he sells byu byYU T-shirts. Jake Ratzliff is his name. And he's really good. Yeah, he was great. So they had a fairly easy time. They're still undefeated. Iowa State didn't play today, so they're still undefeated.

The Big 12 is a fascinating set of circumstances right now. Because remember, BYU and Iowa State do not play. Iowa State plays Texas tech next week texas tech took a huge lead on tcu and tcu came back and beat him by one uh as we stand now shadur sanders just got hurt in the the colorado cincinnati game he's getting treated by the trainers right now but it looks like like he's probably going to try to come back. But they're out 31-14. Colorado is in control of the game. They're winning 31-14 right now.

So they're still very much in the Big 12 race because they only have one conference loss. That's the Kansas State. Kansas State did survive Kansas. Let's see. Am I missing anybody else who's actually in the Big 12 hunt right now? Well, Cincinnati is going to have to go. They're losing to Colorado, so you've got to knock them out.

They're losing, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So Texas Tech drops to 3-2. Cincinnati, if they lose this game, will drop to 3-2. So that will leave BYU and Iowa State with no losses in conference play, Kansas State and Colorado with one loss in conference play if Colorado ends up winning this thing.

And everybody else has two losses. So, man, it's going to be a fun next few weeks because, oh, so Baylor might wind up saving Dave Aranda's job. They beat Oklahoma State today, which is now 0-5 in Big 12 play. Wow. This is nuts. I did not see that coming because Oklahoma State was very trendy. Watch out. They're going to do it. Old offensive line, Ollie Gordon Jr. coming back or Ollie Gordon II coming back. It doesn't make any sense.

You know what else doesn't make sense sorry vanderbilt vanderbilt's just good like texas 27 vanderbilt 24 looks like a mistake it's not and for a second it looked like tex like this is a game where i actually criticized clark lee for for going forward on fourth down because Vanderbilt was stopping Texas defensively so much that punting seemed like the better move. You know, I watched this whole game, and I don't know if you're going to come with me on this trip here, but I thought that Texas was just better than them everywhere. Like, it didn't, this did not feel like the alabama game to me at all um and i know that the uh the score was just decided by three i know vandy scored a late touchdown there to get within the three points but like i never felt like texas was going to lose this game did you

the only time i felt like it was like remember i said don't don't go forward on fourth day they they went forward on fourth down texas got a bunch of pressure and pavia threw a lollipop that got picked off yeah returned deep into vandy territory and they cashed in a touchdown on that one that should have never been scored if vandy punts now maybe texas would have scored but vandy had been stuffing texas's offense at that point so the thing that that caught my eye about this game though was that if you go back and remember how Vanderbilt beat Alabama they had very good play designs they were getting people open in space you know a lot of short routes to the sideline that they turned up field to move the chains like nobody on

Vanderbilt's team was open the entire game. No. They could not get separation anywhere. Texas's defense was mauling them. And it's just like every time Vanderbilt hit a big play, there was a penalty it felt like, or every time it felt like they were about to take control of the game. Even the touchdown that they threw where Pavia threw it through four defenders. Did you see that one throw that went right on the middle? Yeah, it was like a radar ball.

You had to have a radar ball just to get a contested catch in the end zone like there was nothing given to them in this game and i think that like even though it's easy to say that texas was sleepwalking or that they didn't get the job done like the class between like if you wanted to use vanderbilt as a lens of who's truly elite in the sec and who isn't because of the alabama texas games like yeah this game was close but i don't think that texas was ever in a position to lose i don't know see i look at i look at texas's performance in the first half against georgia and i look at this vandy game and i'm like texas might be able to win the national title, but it's no sure thing.

Like it's there. They're just as apt to be upset in the first, first playoff game they play in. Yeah. Well, and I know Quinn, didn't he throw a pick on their first possession too? He did.

It was, it was deflected and he went on and I believe, I don't know if he had like 19 in a row. I think it was like 19. Yeah. I just had torched him after that. And it looked like in the first half there that it was going to become a blowout. And then Vanderbilt kicked the field goal before halftime, I think, to get within 21-10.

And then played a pretty hard-nosed half of football with Texas. So maybe I'm not giving Vanderbilt enough credit. They certainly do. Yeah, I don't think you are. This was a close. Like, if Vanderbilt gets the onside kick there's a really good chance they're going to overtime after a field goal so banner vanderbilt played really well texas is not perfect like that the thing the last two

weeks have shown me is that texas offensive line is probably not as good as i initially thought it was because i thought it might wind up being one of the better like the best one in the country and I don't know it's crazy because they have a bunch of pieces that are going to be in uh in the NFL yeah but so like all of Georgia's offensive line are going to play in the NFL too like all of Alabama's offensive line are going to play all of Ohio State's offensive line are going to play in the NFL all of Oregon's offensive line are going to play in the NFL too. Like all of Alabama's offensive line are going to play. All of Ohio State's offensive line are going to play in the NFL. All of Oregon's offensive line are going to play in the NFL. So it's not.

They're not all Kelvin Banks though. No, they're not. But he also played against another guy who's going to get drafted in the first round. You can Mike Williams. I saw that worked out. Yeah. I did see how that worked out.

It's going to be fun though. And that's the thing. Like, can, can you believe we're gonna see kelvin banks in an escorting yeah it's gonna be awesome electric so pure fever pure fever yep yeah exactly i we're heading toward all of this like this november is gonna be really fun i mean it's gonna start off with, you've got the games of next week and then Alabama LSU will be an elimination game. Like Alabama LSU will be a true elimination game, not a pre-elimination game. Like the loser of that's not making the playoff and that's going

to be fun. But we got to talk about a few of these other games. While we're in the SEC, let's move to one more SEC game, and that is Auburn and Kentucky. One of my Wendy's saucy takes of this week was that Auburn would get its first SEC win. I didn't think it was that saucy a take, and it turned out it wasn't. Kentucky jumps to a 10-0 lead, and then Auburn scores the next 24 points, wins the game, just mauls them on the ground. Jarquez Hunter ran for over 200 yards uh you knew or you thought auburn would break through eventually and yeah they finally do but it's

like kentucky can't do anything at this point the beginning of the second quarter to win auburn took a 17 10 leads when they were down 10 nothing to 17 nothing sorry when they were down 10 nothing to when they took the lead 1710 um Auburn out gained Kentucky 233 to 30 like they absolutely destroyed them during that stretch um and there was no like fight after that like Kentucky just laid down and there was nothing left and I guess like that's kind of you know you talking about how Auburn needs to you know win this game or to show something for Hugh Freeze I think that getting a win where it was convincing and like that Auburn was just better than the other team was probably a nice sight for sore eyes for Auburn fans

yeah I think it was and And the fourth quarter of that game probably felt great because you didn't have any doubt at that point. Auburn was going to win the game. It wasn't going to fall out. The rug wasn't going to be pulled out from under you like in the Missouri game last week. It was going to be a win, an SEC win. Now they got to play Vandy. Diego Pavi has already beaten Auburn at Auburn. So next week is not a given. But at least you know you're not going 0 for the SEC. Did you see the picture from the Auburn game?

Because our boy Remzi here in the chat reminded me. I saw it. There was a field goal attempt in the Auburn game where there were 14 men on the field and two snappers. Where one snapper was in front of the other snapper. I have to go back and research this stuff for the show because I didn't hear anything about it, but how is that possible? When the first snapper saw the other snapper on the field, why did he still line up? I do have a lot of questions about that one.

We'll have to unpack that during the show this week. That's definitely something that we're going to have to revisit because it was the thing about Alabama. Yeah. So I did say one more SEC. There's another SEC game we do need to mention. Alabama beat Missouri 34 to nothing. This was the entire show without talking about Alabama.

And it would have been fine. Yeah, I mean, Alabama did not have to play. Well, Brady Cook tried to play. And while Brady Cook was playing, this was a fairly close game. Drew Pine comes in, starts throwing the ball to Alabama, and then it's not close anymore and alabama just steamrolled them 34 to nothing it's great for those of us in the viewing public because now we're going to get an alabama lsu elimination game which is what we wanted and it's

and it's on the road right it's an l in LSU. It is at LSU. Yes. So, you know, I do wonder if Alabama has a chance next week to creep back into things if they win. I mean, they're going to probably be right back in two weeks. Oh, two weeks. Sorry. When they play their next game. Like, I don't know, like Alabama was a little bit left for dead. I just made a joke that it would have been fine if we didn't talk about them today. But, you know, we're going to probably didn't talk about them today, but you know,

we're going to probably have to talk about them again in the future if they win that next game. Yeah, we, we definitely will because at that point I think they can win out because it's Oklahoma, it's Auburn, you know,

they can, they can win those games, but this was what they were hoping we'd finally see and now we can we can go a week without hearing them talk about tucking in their shirts or touch it you know running and touching the takes no talent sign because that's just weird to hear alabama players talk about that stuff i will tell you one thing if alabama does make the playoff somehow caiten DeBoer would be the best troll ever if he just came out in a suit for the game. It would be amazing.

Show everybody that he was serious business. Yeah. So one more undefeated team we've got to talk about. It's not their fault that we're talking about in this late in the show. It's their opponent's fault. Miami beat the crap out of Florida State, 36-14. Really disgusting backdoor cover for those. My thoughts and prayers are with you if you had

Miami in that game. Yeah, and it was a strange game because Florida State started out with Brock Glenn at quarterback. They put Luke Cromanhawk in, the freshman. He gained like 42 yards on a quarterback sneak. I've never seen anything like that before. They score a touchdown, but then they just can't really move the rest of the game. They bring Glenn back in. Miami played as well as it should have, took care of business.

We kind of needed to see Miami take care of business after the previous weeks. I mean, if you have a leaky defense that everybody thinks is going to cost you a game, the chicken soup for the soul on that one is playing Florida State. They did a really good job of making sure that this game didn't turn into the grab-ass game of the year. I know that this is a pretty personal game for a lot of Miami people. Somebody sent me a tweet, a buddy of mine today, of going back a few years when Florida State beat Miami

and they ran up a score that, you know, they asked Mario Cristobal for the game if it bothered him. And he said, you know, one day the tables will turn. I think a lot of people expected that they would blow it out and try to, you know, run it up. It wasn't obscene, but, you know, Miami did keep trying to score when the game was pretty much locked away in the last four minutes there. The thing here is with Miami, and we just have to acknowledge it,

is that this team has been criticized and I don't know is being taken seriously enough for where it is because I think that there is this notion or this thought that people just automatically assume, and I've even been guilty of it at times, that Miami is just going to do what Miami has done in the recent past, which is drop games to teams in the ACC that they should not lose to. And the last two weeks coming into this Florida State game, Andy, they had that thrilling comeback against Cal on the road, and then the shootout with Louisville,

the Virginia Tech game that had a Hail Mary overturn Cal on the road and then the shootout with Louisville on the Virginia Tech game that you know had a Hail Mary overturned in the last minute like they had three games in a row there that old Miami would have lost and this Miami isn't losing them so I don't know if you want to take them seriously as a national championship contender or not I know it's hard to you know get out of the big 10 SEC blacks and really think that an ACC or a big 12 team is going to, you know, actually do it. But we're talking about a team that has found ways to win when previous editions of teams coached by this coach have, you know, thrown in the towel. And they also legitimately have one of the best

offenses in college football. So, you know, we are looking down the pike here at probably a, I mean, I don't know what the tiebreakers are, how it's going to play out because we have SMU. Yeah, I would say Duke did him no favors because if Duke could have handed SMU its first ACC loss, it would have taken that off the board. Now you still have the possibility of three undefeated ACC teams. So we're going to have to check our tiebreakers. Yeah. I don't know 100% off the top of my head.

I think we talked about it. I just don't remember. Does SMU and Clemson play? They don't, right? They don't. They don't play. So we do have that possibility. Pittsburgh's still undefeated, but Pittsburgh and Clemson play.

So one of them is going to lose in the ACC. Yeah, and Pitt plays SMU this weekend, so that might be a good idea. Oh, that's right, Pitt and SMU. But we have four undefeated teams in the ACC. It does kind of feel like Clemson and Miami are on a collision course. And, you know, we'll see how it goes. But if you go look at Miami's remaining schedule, there's no team that pops off that just goes, know they are going to lose they should they should finish 12 and 0 like they

should finish the regular season you never know maybe florida you know florida already played florida they already beat them yeah duke georgia tech wake forest syracuse so unless kyle mccord has the opposite of the game he had at Pitt. In my brain, Syracuse was their opener for some reason, and Florida was a rivalry game at the end of the year, and it's midnight. Just cut me some slack. It's been a long day.

It's all right. That's all right. We do have two more games to talk about. One is Ole Miss beating Oklahoma in Oxford. I don't know that we need to say much about this game. Oklahoma struggled to block. One of their offensive linemen, one of their starting guards, went down early in the third quarter, and that's where this game really turned.

That's when Ole Miss just started sacking Oklahoma like crazy because it was actually – I believe Oklahoma was winning at halftime. I read a lot of stuff on Twitter. And I read this today that last week when Oklahoma gave up nine sacks, that was a program record. And this week they gave up 10. Right. And they are on pace to shatter the program record for sacks allowed in a season.

Yeah. And yeah, it's, there there's no there's nothing to do i thought joe john finley the the new play caller did a better job than seth latrell was doing because he did simplify some things uh he was dressing some things up with with different formations but as far as the blocking schemes went they were fairly simple uh jackson arnold was getting the ball out quickly ish or as quickly as he could and it looked like they had a somewhat functional offense but unfortunately they've also still got to play alabama and lsu and what they were doing today

is not going to get it done against them either so just oklahoma fans buckle in maybe go to the pumpkin patch pick some apples. There's got to be something else to do. Yeah, it's just more of the same. We've discussed this, and you can't block anybody you can't play. Yeah, it's tough. It's a tough watch. Now, Ole Miss, I thought, should have been better in this game,

but you take it if you're them. They're still, I think, somewhat alive for a playoff berth because they have two losses. Now, they have to play Georgia. They have to beat Georgia. That's really all it comes down to. They have to win all of the rest of their games, and one of those is against Georgia. I think they're going to have trouble with Arkansas

because remember Arkansas shut down Tennessee and beat them? They run the exact same offense. It's the Art Riles-Baylor offense. Yeah, I mean, the Arkansas is... I hope that Trey Harris comes back and helps out a little bit too because he didn't play today, right? Right, right. Trey Harris would be very helpful.

No Trey Harrisris this offense does not although it was it was nice to see them find some other receivers find some other targets because trey harris carries a lot of the load for that team but yeah i i think they're gonna have a problem with arkansas especially if harris isn't there so if he plays that that probably helps a lot but again arkansas shut down, Arkansas shut down Tennessee when Tennessee was fully healthy. So it's the same offense. Yep. And then they've got the Georgia game.

One more. And it's the one Friday night that we were waiting for. We stayed up real, real late to watch Boise state, Boise state and UNLV. This was a fun game. and Ashton Gentry did not have the best game he only averaged 3.9 yards of carry you know this is Maddox Maddox Madson bailing them out a few times and and you know we realize Boise State is more than just Ashton

Gentry this is a huge win because this puts them in the driver's seat in the Mountain West. Yeah, I don't think that was the score, but it was 29-24. Okay, yeah. And don't ask me why I know that. So I actually thought that Ashton Gentry was amazing. Like, I don't know if I'm the only one here, Andy. Well, he actually wasn't amazing last night or Friday night. I thought he was.

I don't think that you have to rush for an 80-yard touchdown to be amazing at what you're doing. I think that UNLV spent the entire game doing everything it could to anticipate and shut down the run. The man rushed for 128 yards and a touchdown and was an absolute menace uh whenever people arrived at the football and the last thing um i wrote about this actually at like two in the morning last night so i'm very uh you know up to speed on this when they got the ball back with eight minutes and nine seconds left in the game, they ran a 14-play drive that iced the entire rest of the clock.

And Ashton Jenty touched the ball on eight of those 14 plays, and he didn't have the freak show 13 yards a game or carry or five-touchdown game. But when the game was on the line, and they were on the road, and they needed to shut the play. Like, this is the man that carried this team to the win so that UNLV didn't touch the ball again. So, like, for me, like, I think that when you watch the game, you know, you want to see explosive you watch the game, you know,

you want to see explosive plays. You know, the over was an exciting play because you thought he was going to break off 80-yard touchdown runs. That didn't happen because UNLV is a very good team too. But I still think that Ashton Denty was incredible in the game. And you know what? He had a down game for 128 yards rushing. What a terrible night it must have been for him. Well, that's the thing.

That's how good he is. He has 128 yards rushing what a terrible night it must have been for him all right well that's the thing that's how good he is he has 128 touchdowns we're like in the chat that's his worst game is he a top five receiver i mean sorry running back of the playoff era oh yeah like who are you taking over him like i don't even know like derrick henry that's probably it and and and only because I already, I know that Derrick Henry just keeps being that person again and again. It's like hard with the pro stuff to like get your, Oh, Derrick Henry,

Derrick Henry. If you think back to the 2015 Alabama season, he carried them in a couple of games at the end. Like they're the ones that came up with, Andy. Okay. Christian McCaffrey, Saquon Barkley, Derek Henry, Ezekiel Elliott, Travis Etienne, Najee Harris, Nick Chubb, Jonathan Taylor, and Bijan Robinson and Melvin Gordon.

Those are all really good backs, but the season Ashton's having, and also a lot of those guys benefited from not getting touched until they were three yards past the line of scrimmage. Ashton Gentry is running into nine man boxes every time and having to break multiple tackles to gain a yard at this point. Yeah. So, oh,

and one other thing too, I do want to say, and I don't know if I was just like two 30 AM delirious last night and I like felt like I thought something and I felt like I did something, but when you think of group of five excellence over the course of the past 10, 15 years, I think Boise is probably one of the first programs that jump in your mind, right? Yep. So I think it's super appropriate as we sit here recording, you know, on Saturday, October 26th into the morning of the 27th, that Boise is in pole position to make the playoff in the first year of this. Because when you think about appropriate representatives of the group of five in the programs that have, you know, not only illustrated an ability to play with anybody, but I've also had a pretty rough history in this system. When you go back in time to the 2006 season,

when they went undefeated and were not allowed or not permitted to play in the, in the BCS championship game, like this year with having the best player potentially in college football on your team and a really gritty team. Like, not only is this team going to make the field, but actually have a chance to prove it on the field when their history showed that they have been undefeated and didn't have the opportunity to play for it.

So I think it's an appropriate thing, you know, to put a bow on the pod here, Andy, that Boise State seems to be the team that's going to do it this year. Also very much enjoy that game, and I'm looking forward to seeing it again but on the blue in december yeah so the one thing i wanted to ask you and i know we're an hour and 36 minutes and we've got writing to do one last question unlv wins out beats boise state in on the blue is unlv going to be in in the playoff well it's going to depend on what Army does.

Yeah. And probably what Navy does too. But Army and Navy obviously would see each other in that scenario. Who's the fifth group of five team that we haven't talked about that enters into the picture now that Liberty lost and Navy lost? And Navy still has not won. There's not one. There's not one in the Sun Belt and there's not one in the MAAC.

It's going to be the American champ or the Mountain West champ, which puts UNLV in a because UNLV has gotten kind of they got kind of jobbed here. The last two, not that Boise wasn't the better team on Friday night, but that unsportsmanlike penalty at the end of the on their final drive was just horseshit. Like in like that's the second time they've lost on a Friday night on a on a questionable call and like I thought that UNLV played toe-to-toe with Boise for four quarters and um you know I don't like being the refs messed it up guy and you know boy Boise ran the ball down their throat for eight and a half minutes to end the game so UNLV had plenty of opportunity to get the ball back and try to do something. But I don't want to close the chapter on this team. And I don't know what it is, but I really enjoy watching them.

I think they're gritty. I think they're fun. And I still think they have a chance to play Boise and get another crack at it and potentially be the highest ranked. They're not done yet, but they need to keep winning. That's all there is to it. The highest ranked G5 champion that makes the playoff could theoretically be a two loss team yes oh yeah because well think about it tulane i believe is still undefeated in the american so they could wind up winning

yeah so they could wind up being the the representative in the we're not talking about them because they lost a k-state in oklahoma right off the bat but if they keep winning and they win the american and for some reason boise state loses a couple or unlv loses a call like i think it's probably going to be boise state if they keep winning and there's a it's a very easy path to see a a 12 and one boise state that wins the mountain west or if army just keeps winning because if army keeps winning it would mean they beat notre dame and it would mean they yeah they won the american parade but i think army's fate with notre dame is coming right down the pike here too i think we're gonna get it's probably gonna be very similar to navy notre dame yeah but they're just fortunate enough to not have had to play them first right right so that's obviously the x factor in all of this that's the thing that

would would vault them above where boise state is otherwise boise state just has to keep winning i think as long as notre dame beats army if boise State just keeps winning, then Boise State will get in. Now, this is a question in the chat, and I actually was wondering this too. Like Washington State's only loss is on the road at Boise State three weeks ago. They can't win a conference because they're in the Pac-12 still. Right, they can't win a conference. They can't be a conference champion. Now, they could be.

The only way they get in is if they aren't at large. Right, they'd have to be ranked. So you really have probably have to be ranked 11th or higher to get in which is going to be tough because their loss to boise was a blowout loss so they're in a tough spot yeah yep no because they're they're going to be behind boise state so yeah it's they'll get back to it in two years when the Pac-12 actually reforms as a conference. Or I guess next year, because they've already gotten rid of the scheduling alliance with the Mountain West. So next year, they'll have enough teams to have an actual conference. And if you're the champion of that conference, then you'll be considered.

But they're not there yet. So what a day, what a day didn't have any of the earth shattering results. Uh, as we conclude here, there are nine minutes and 20 seconds left in Colorado, Cincinnati, Colorado is up 31, 17. And, uh, I think they're trying to run clock here. So Ari, it has been a wonderful week of college football. We have another huge week coming up. Obviously, Ohio State, Penn State is the headline game, but quite a bit to talk about this coming week.

We will see the coaching carousel might start to heat up. We're getting into November. Halloween is Thursday. It's going to be a lot of fun. Cannot wait to talk about it with you. We have videos on the Entry Sports YouTube channel, so subscribe to that coming out Sunday

and Monday morning, 9.30 a.m. Eastern Time. We are picking the games. Talk to you then. ...