Andy & Ari On3 - The other side of the Kirk Herbstreit/Raiola convo | We LAWYER UP to talk NCAA cases | Dear Andy

Episode Date: February 8, 2024

Tonight’s show is sponsored by Fanduel, America’s No. 1 sportsbook. Sign up at fanduel.com/staples and place a $5 bet. If you win, you’ll receive $200 in bonus bets. Fanduel has some juicy specials for the Super Bowl, and Andy will reveal his favorite picks on tonight’s show.(0:00-12:40) Intro - Kirk Herbstreit and Dylan Raiola Conversation(12:41-19:08) Nick Saban Joining College Gameday(19:09-38:16) Michael McMann Gives us a Legal Analysis of the NCAA(38:17-38:56) Dear Andy Intro(38:57-45:50) Streaming Services and Conference-TV Deals(45:51-48:41) New Committee Selection Process?(48:42-52:36) How big of a domino will it be when FSU leaves ACC?(52:37-1:00:04) A look at Virginia Tech and the ACC(1:00:05-1:03:58) Best Food Spots in Oxford(1:03:59-1:06:00) CW's Coverage of ACC?(1:06:01-1:06:56) Conclusion The Internet was abuzz Wednesday after Dominic Raiola, the father of Nebraska signee Dylan Raiola, told Adam Gorney of rivals.com that a conversation with ESPN’s Kirk Herbstreit helped guide his son’s recruitment. This led to anger at Herbstreit from Georgia fans because Dylan Raiola flipped to Nebraska from Georgia. Andy talked to Herbstreit on Wednesday night and can provide a lot more context for how that phone call went. Needless to say, there is more to the story.Herbstreit also will have a new co-worker on College GameDay. ESPN announced Wednesday that former Alabama coach Nick Saban will join the GameDay cast this season. Next, Sportico legal analyst and Harvard law professor Michael McCann joins Andy to help explain the various legal cases affecting college sports right now. McCann handicaps next week’s hearing in the case involving the Tennessee and Virginia attorneys general suing the NCAA over its NIL rules. McCann also explains what the next steps are after a National Labor Relations Board regional director ruled Dartmouth basketball players to be employees of the university.Then it’s time for Dear Andy, where Andy answers your excellent questions. Is the partnership between ESPN and Fox on a streaming service another sign that a super league could happen down the road?If there is such a league, could there be objective criteria for making the College Football Playoff?How large of a domino would Florida State leaving the ACC be?What is the long-term future for Virginia Tech?Where should a hungry Oklahoma fan eat in Oxford, Miss.?Want to watch the show instead? Head on over to YouTube! https://youtube.com/live/6wSjWKWGD0AMust be 21+ and present in select states. FanDuel is offering online sports wagering in Kansas under an agreement with Kansas StarCasino, LLC. First online real money wager only. $5 pregame moneyline wager required. First online real money wager only. $10 firstdeposit required. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable bonus bets that expire 7 days after receipt. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com.Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG in Colorado, Iowa, Michigan, New Jersey, Ohio, Pennsylvania,Illinois, Kentucky, Tennessee, and Virginia. Call 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 in Arizona, 1-888-789-7777 or visitccpg.org/chat in Connecticut, 1-800-9-WITH-IT in Indiana, 1-800-522-4700 or visit ksgamblinghelp.com in Kansas, 1-877-770-STOP inLouisiana, visit mdgamblinghelp.org in Maryland, visit 1800gambler.net in West Virginia, or call 1-800-522-4700 in Wyoming. Hope ishere. Visit GamblingHelpLineMA.org or call [phone] for 24/7 support in Massachusetts or call 1-877-8HOPE-NY or textHOPENY in New York

Welcome to Andy Staples on three. It is a Dear Andy show. So we got your questions. We'll actually start with some of your questions because I got peppered with some of these on Wednesday as the afternoon wore on. And it was one of those deals where I thought, oh boy, this is, this is gaining steam. I need to answer these questions on the show, but I'm going to have to talk to somebody first. I got several questions. We could put up all the questions, but I got it multiple times. What is the deal with this Kirk Herbstreet, Dylan Raiola thing? And so let's start with that. So we all know who Kirk Herbstreet is, ESPN College Game Day. Dylan Raiola is the quarterback who just signed with Nebraska, the very highly rated quarterback who just signed with Nebraska, flipped from

Georgia. Before that, flipped from Ohio State to Georgia. So here's what happened. Let's start with some background. The background is that Adam Gourney, who is a reporter at Rivals.com, is interviewing Dominic Raiola, who is Dylan's father. Dominic Raiola, all-time great offensive lineman at Nebraska, played for a long time in the NFL. It gets a little confusing. Dominic is Dylan's dad. Donovan is Dominic's brother, who also happens to be the Nebraska offensive line coach right now. But so Dominic Raiola, who is the father of Dylan, is talking to Adam Corny and they're talking about the decision-making process and what led Dylan to eventually sign with Nebraska. And Dominic brings up Kirk Herbstreet. And this is what he said in the video. He said, when he saw the smoke about Dylan entertaining Nebraska, he was like, call me.

Dominic Riella said of Herbstreet. Dude, is this true? He got to do it. He got to do it. This is Dom Riella quoting Kirk Herbstreet. His affinity, and this is now Dom Riella talking again. His affinity for Nebraska, for a guy like that to tell me and get behind me, look, I knew he needed to do it, but I wasn't going to sit here and say, you need to go change

that place or be a part of the change of that place. So that is what Dom Riola said. And this enraged a lot of Georgia fans who were like, how could Kirk Herbstreet tell Dylan Riola where to go to school? How could he say to flip away from our school? That's not what happened. When I saw this interview, my thought was, there's probably another side to this. There's probably some context missing from this.

So I called Kirk Herbstreet and I talked to him on Wednesday night and he didn't want to come on the show because he doesn't really want to make this any bigger than it already is. He got talked about on Feinbaum on Wednesday, and Feinbaum's like, this is kind of a bad look, but Kirk had not really had a chance

to give his side of the story, so I said, Kirk, what is your side of the story on this? And we talked about it, and he explained that he has a relationship with Dominic Raiola. They know each other. They've talked plenty of times before, and that they were having a conversation about Dylan's recruitment. Now, Kirk is quick to point out that he is not someone who follows a lot of the day-to-day of recruiting. So the part I'm not so sure is quite accurate from Dom's retelling of the story is Kirk finds out that Dylan is considering the flip and asks Dom to call right out of the blue to say,

That's not how it happened according to Kirk. Basically, they are talking kind of father to father. You know, Kirk's had a few sons play college football as well. He's got another son who's being looked at right now by some schools. And they're talking about the whole process. And basically, according to Kirk, Dom is asking,

how much should I talk about the possibility of if you go to Nebraska, you could be a program changer, you could be a difference maker, you could be a legend if you wind up helping bring this program back to where it wants to be. And Kirk, who was complimentary of Matt Rule, the Nebraska coach, and Kirby Smart in this whole situation, says, well, yeah, that would be cool. It would be cool if he could do that. And that's pretty much where it was, which is not the same thing as go to Nebraska. And here's the thing. Kirk Herbstreit understands his job.

He understands his platform. He's not going to be dumb enough to be telling people, go to this school, don't go to this school. That would get out and trust me, it would get back to the coaches and he's got to deal with all of them. So I just don't, i think people are overreacting to this a little bit but this is this is what happens and you know it's interesting because you're in these jobs and you think oh well i want to be as big as it gets i'm not sure i'd want to be as big as kirk herb street in terms of how much every word i say gets parsed. You guys watch me, so you know how many words come out of my mouth on a daily basis. And I don't think I could handle having every single word

out of my mouth get parsed like this. You saw the Florida State thing with Kirk Herbstreit, where they're convinced that he's part of this grand, massive conspiracy, when he gave an opinion, which is his job, that he thought Alabama was a better candidate for the playoff than Florida State. That is his job, to give that opinion. But everybody thinks that he's moving markets with everything he says. And the thing about it is, it's kind of true. When Kirk says something that is of interest, it gets aggregated by everybody, including us at On3. And it takes on a life of its own. And this is one that he didn't say,

this is Dominic Raiola said it, but it took on a life of its own. But if you're a Georgia fan and you're mad at Kirk Herbstreit because you think that he told Dylan Raiola or told Dylan Raiola should share that piece of his opinion, of Dominic Raiola's opinion with his son. Which I think it's an absolutely legitimate thing. Yes, Dominic Raiola should talk about what it would mean if Dylan goes to Nebraska and what it would mean if Dylan goes to Georgia and how different those situations are because they are different.

Like that's not breaking news. Like the next quarterback who leads Georgia to a national title will be the first one since Stetson Bennett did it twice, three years ago and two years ago. So it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out like the quarterback who leads Nebraska back to national prominence is going to be a legend because that's the situation Nebraska's in that doesn't have anything to do with a value judgment of Nebraska over Georgia

those are just the particular situations that Nebraska is in and Georgia is in. And different players want different things. You know, some players want to be the guy who brought a team back. Some players want to play with the very best competition every day at practice. Like those are the players who are picking Georgia right now. They want to compete every day with the best of the best because Georgia has the most talent right now. Nebraska, if you go there, you are probably dreaming of being part of the group that brings Nebraska back

to being a national name program. So that's the thing you've got to consider, right? This is a very nuanced conversation that two dads are having that gets boiled down to one soundbite from one interview. That's not exactly how it all happens. So Georgia fans, you're killing Kirk Herbstreit. I think you might be going a little too hard on him. Just relax.

He didn't tell Dylan Raiola to pick Nebraska instead of Georgia. He did tell Dylan Raiola's dad to have that conversation. From UGAalum95, so what did Kirk make the call to have that conversation. From UGA alum 95, so what did Kurt make the call in the first place? Remember he didn't say your son stick with UGA because he knows the guy and they're talking. Like you're allowed to talk to people if you're in this business.

I am allowed to call people and give my opinions to them. But I will tell you, there are a lot of situations where I know I cannot give a certain opinion or a definitive opinion. And Kirk Herbstreit is smart enough to know that as well. This is not necessarily the position. He didn't say Dylan should go to Nebraska or flip from Georgia. He just said the dad should talk to him. I mean, the dad providing all the information,

the dad who's a Nebraska grad providing all the information, it's not that controversial. It really isn't. If you guys want to be mad about it, you can be mad about it, but I'm telling you right now, it's not one of those things. But yeah, there are conversations. I have conversations sometimes. Here's an example. This happens not super frequently, but it's happened a few times. Talking to a young coach and their

star is rising. This would be like an assistant coach somewhere. And so suddenly they're trying to decide if they want to hire an agent or who they want to hire as an agent. They'll say, okay, do you know all these guys? Yeah, I know all these guys. Who should I hire? I will never answer that question. Not even once.

Because if it gets back to those guys and I said, hire this guy and not this guy, are they ever going to talk to me again? Of course not. to those guys and I said, hire this guy and not this guy, are they ever gonna talk to me again? Of course not. So I'll just be upfront. I'm like, I am not telling you that. That is a decision you must make on your own. But these are all people I like.

These are all people I have relationships with. So you do your homework and make the best decision for you. And that's the kind of stuff you have to say when you're in situations like that. Chris Callahan in the chat, Pat McAfee is a bigger enemy to Georgia fans than her. How? What did Pat McAfee ever do to Georgia?

Seemed like they liked him quite a bit when he was on campus. Seemed like he was barking with them and they were doing that, the train coming down the tracks thing. Everybody seemed pretty happy what what did pat mcafee do to georgia what can he do to georgia he's a former punter who talks on television everybody's got their conspiracy theories we you guys watch me listen to to me enough, so you know. I love it when you say that I hate your school.

And I'm just going to say, yes, of course, you're right. I hate your school. I hate all of your schools. Every single one of them. It's funny. The Florida people probably say that more than anybody else. I'm like, I got a degree there. I met my wife there.

Like, I don't know Chris says Pat told Georgia fans to go to hell will you tell well I mean Georgia Tech people tell you that all the time and Matt Matt also says Pat told Georgia fans to go to hell did you deserve it did you say something nasty to him? Because you guys have a habit of doing that. Everybody's so sensitive these days. Speaking of Kirk Herbstreit, he is going to have a new castmate on ESPN's College Game Day.

In the least surprising news ever, Nick Saban, fresh off his retirement, is joining the College Game Day cast. We knew this was coming. And I'm very excited because in the times that Nick Saban has done television, where he has explained what is going on on the field, it has been spectacular. Absolutely spectacular. And I always loved when he did his radio show because that was when he would get very in-depth on schematic type stuff that he wouldn't normally do in press conferences. And it felt like when he would go on TV, it was an even more enhanced version of that. So I cannot wait to hear him break stuff down on college game day. That's must-see TV for me just because one thing about Nick Saban, and this is, I think, a reason why he was as good as

he was as a coach, is he's great at taking what is a fairly complex concept or something that you've got to be kind of really deep in the weeds to understand. And he makes it understandable to a very large group of people very quickly. And it's what great teachers do in general. They can take something and boil it down to its essence and tell you in a few sentences and make you understand. Whereas somebody like me is gonna just keep talking and maybe you're never gonna get it.

So I just, I can't wait. I think it's gonna be so much fun to get Nick Saban's takes on teams, schemes, coaching staffs. I can't wait because I don't think he's going to hold back. I don't think he's going to worry about it because he's not trying to get back in the game. Sometimes you get ex-coaches who are trying to get back in and they bite their tongue a little bit.

I don't think Nick Saban's going to do that. I think he's going to be fascinating to watch on game day. Speaking of fascinating, I have a fascinating conversation for you. But first, I'm going to talk about FanDuel. The Super Bowl is on Sunday, guys. FanDuel wants me to give you my picks because I know you're dying to hear my picks in the Super Bowl.

But I got to be honest, my picks are kind of awesome, at least a couple of them. But go to fanduel.com slash staples and sign up. You place a $5 bet. If you win that bet, you get $200 in bonus bets. Fanduel.com slash staples to sign up for that. So they have tons of specials for the Super Bowl, tons of different props.

There's one I've been telling you about over and over. In fact, the line on it has gone down since we started talking about it. I don't think it's because I started talking about it. I think it's just people are looking into the history of the players involved and thinking, all right, this might happen. So I will give you my picks. First of all, right out of the gate, the game itself. Chiefs plus two and a half. I do think the 49ers probably on balance have a better collection of talent. Like Trent Williams is the best offensive tackle in the game. Fred Warner is the best linebacker in the game. Nick Bosa, well, I don't know. Is he the best pass rusher? He probably is the best pass rusher in the game. Nick Bosa, well, I don't know. Is he the best pass rusher? He probably is the best

pass rusher in the game. Christian McCaffrey, probably the best back in the game. Pacheco's pretty damn good too, though. But that said, you're going to give me points and Patrick Mahomes. I do think I'm going to take the points and Patrick Mahomes. So I'll take Chiefs plus two and a half. The other one, any kicker to kick a 60 plus yard field goal. This started out at plus 4,000. This is down to plus 3,500. And as I keep pointing out, Harrison Butker, the Chiefs kicker has hit a 62 yarder off of grass before.

I think in a dome, it is grass. It's a weird one at Allegiant Stadium because like I covered a Pac-12 championship game there, it was turf. And then the Raiders were playing a couple of days later and it was grass so that they have a grass field. It's on the tray, like the one in Phoenix. So it goes out and gets sunlight and then they push it back in for the for the NFL game so it's on a grass field which is not as reliable as of a kicking surface but it's an indoor grass field so I think Harrison but you're if he gets put in that situation and look this is a game where points might be at a premium because both these defenses are really good so I'm gonna say there's a chance

of that one. The other one is one, this is just to kind of enhance your enjoyment of the game. I'm not saying put your life savings on this. I'm saying maybe sprinkle 10 bucks on this. Like any offensive lineman to score a touchdown, plus 6,500. So you put 10 bucks on this thing. And if an offensive lineman scores a touchdown, you get to watch a fat guy TD for one, which we all want to see. And you win 650 bucks. Is there a better night than that? Fat guy, TD and 650 bucks for the 10 you put down? Come on. That's the way you

handle it right there. So those are my picks. Fanduel.com slash staples. Make a $5 bet. Heck, you make a $5 bet. If you win, $200 in bonus bets for you. I can't wait. Cannot wait. But I can't wait for you to see this too because Michael McCann longtime friend this is a guy who is one of my favorite people to read because he helps us understand something that if you did not go to law school you might not understand I certainly didn't and so now especially with all of these cases involving the NCAA involving athletes trying to be declared employees, it takes a legal mind to explain some of this stuff.

So Michael McCann from Sportico, my former coworker at Sports Illustrated, joined me to talk about Tennessee and Virginia versus the NCAA, the Dartmouth National Labor Relations Board case, and all of these other cases going on right now. Here's Michael. We are honored to be joined by someone who's going to make us all a lot smarter. You have heard my amateur, stupid legal analysis. Now we get a man who is the legal expert for Sportico. You can read him there and please do.

He's a professor of law at the University of New Hampshire Law School. He's a visiting professor at Harvard University, which I hear is the Harvard of Cambridge, Massachusetts. Michael McCann, how are we doing? Doing great, Andy. It's great to see you again. I remember our days together working on a bunch of stories, so it's nice to reconnect with you. So for those who don't know, Michael and I worked together at Sports Illustrated, days together working on a bunch of stories. So it's nice to reconnect with you. So for those who don't know, Michael and I worked together at Sports Illustrated and I would just pepper him with questions anytime there was a legal issue involving college sports. And he was getting very tired because he's dealing with the NFL stuff and Major League Baseball legal stuff. And see, I'm just sending you all this Byzantine stuff about the O'Bannon versus the NCAA trial.

So you ended up writing a book about that, right? I did, yeah. And I got to work with Ed on the book. But the trial, you, me, Stuart, I mean, a bunch of us were involved with that coverage. And those were some good days. Oh, yeah, yeah. That was fun in the courthouse watching Mark Emmerich get grilled. But now your life is just being consumed by all this college stuff.

I mean, I don't think there's room for any of the pro sports right now. We've got to ask you about all the things that are going on. I guess I'll just go chronologically, basically. We'll start with the most recent thing, and that is the judge in the Eastern District of Tennessee in federal court denies a temporary restraining order that the Tennessee and Virginia AGs had sought against the NCAA. But this is a case involving the NCAA's NIL rules. But in the order denying this temporary restraining order, the judge basically goes, but the NCAA is going to lose the case.

Is that normal where a judge just says, here's how I'm probably going to rule? Sometimes judges are more subtle about that. This one was pretty blunt. And maybe I think the judge knows that this is a case that the public is following closely and that he wanted to write it in a way that made it unambiguous how he feels and he's also telling the NCAA look you win this battle but you're gonna lose the war so figure something else out and the sort of bluntness in which he wrote that that is not super rare but uncommon and he left no doubt that he thinks ncaa restrictions on nil in the context of using nil to recruit is illegal under antitrust law he didn't buy any of

the ncaa's arguments the only thing he bought was that money damages can later make up any damage so there's no irreparable harm but the core of the case he he clearly sided with Tennessee. Well and it's interesting because we've seen a lot of these cases and this is not necessarily a case where they have to hold a jury you know hold a trial hold a bench trial or anything like that. So it's not like the O'Bannon case where that took years and years. There's a hearing next week. How how long could it be before this judge says,

okay, as I said before, I'm going to declare these illegal. Now they're illegal. Well, I think he'll probably signal how he feels while on the bench. So he'll probably give some sort of indication, but more likely in terms of the actual order, it will come in a written order that could be written. It's up to him, but it could be written some days or weeks after the hearing. But I think it's going to be tough for him to walk back what he wrote in that order to sort of now suddenly say, oh, but now I see what the NCAA's argument. He really just repudiated the NCAA's arguments. It didn't, to me, leave much room for the NCAA to kind of come back in this game, if you will.

Well, this is not a case where the NCAA can come up with some novel defense because they've been defending these things over and over and over again. If they had that weapon in their holster, they probably would have pulled they had that that weapon in their holster they probably would have pulled it already right yeah i mean this is i think the ncaa look they've had a tough patch right i mean they they have not had a winner uh in a while and uh other than the the bully brothers case in illinois where they actually did get a win involving the twin brothers who played in overtime elite but that's the anomaly the other cases of all have all been

losers for them and you know the andy the big thing if i were the ncaa i'd be worried about it's not as if it's sort of liberal judges are against you conservative judges are with you or vice versa they're all against you yeah this is. I don't know who the audience is anymore. So many things in law you can predict, oh, that's a conservative judge, that's a liberal judge. Not anymore with this stuff. This is just like they're all ganging up. Yeah. And we don't get too political on this show, but in this case, it is germane to the subject. And that was what I found interesting in the Austin decision in the Supreme Court, in that you had Neil Gorsuch, maybe the second most conservative justice, writing the majority opinion. And then Brett Kavanaugh, probably the most conservative justice, writing the just blowtorch concurring opinion. And, you know, I had spent all this time

talking to athletic directors and people, you know, in the business. They thought the conservative folks were going to be the ones on their side. And I always asked them, I'm like, you don't realize you're trying to keep markets closed. Like they don't like that. Right.

Yeah. I mean, I think they thought, what does the conservative mean in this context i think the ncaa thought conservative means keep things the way they are right just kind of romanticize college sports that kind of describe it as from 1945 or whatever you know some sort of the old days of the regatta and you know the sort of romanticizing of college the judge the justices at least in this context are really libertarian like you just said they they find these rules so constraining justice alito i remember the oral argument where he said it looks like he was paraphrasing someone

else but looks like you you take the athlete you use them up they get hurt then you cast them away and i was like once you said that and the justice thomas said why don't why don't you cap a college coach's contracts now they there's actually i would also be illegal but you know you can see where his mind is at and the one justice who was actually sympathetic i actually thought would have voted for the ncaa i didn't expect 9-0 was justice breyer who you know fairly progressive uh and he was actually uh he was the one saying i'm worried about the court getting in here to change rules if that if you got one vote at most that's really tough yeah so and but now since that that case and that's i think it's interesting i went back back and read the Gorsuch opinion the other day

because it felt like for years, the NCAA was hanging on to a line from the television case back in 1984, which they also lost. It was, you know, University of Oklahoma and Georgia sued them to get the TV rights back from the NCAA. But there was a line in there that said that we want to protect amateur sports.

And then Gorsuch just line by line took that out and said, this doesn't apply. You can't use this as a shield anymore. Yeah, he literally, well, it's exactly what you just said. He just said, that's irrelevant here. That case was about TV contracts. It has no bearing on college athletes. And the NCAA would repeatedly use that language. And as you said, in a case that they lost, ironically, it was their best case. And here the court said, really just dismissed it quickly to say, that's irrelevant.

This isn't about TV contracts between schools, conferences in the NCAA and TV networks. This is about compensation for college athletes in the Alston case in the form of reimbursement for education-related expenses. So for the court to just so quickly and swiftly dismiss it, that had to be jarring for the NCAA. I mean, this was kind of a, the last decade has been so rough for their legal team. And I don't know where the window is for them.

I think to Charlie Baker's credit, he's at least proposed something that tries to resolve, tries to separate certain schools from others. I think that's smart. I don't know if it's going to have any traction as the NCAA likes to say, it's a membership organization. We'll see what kind of suasion he has. So let's head to New Hampshire, a place you know very well,

where the National Labor Relations Board Regional Director, I believe in Boston, declared Dartmouth basketball players employees of Dartmouth University, which we have a couple of these going on. There's a USC one going on out in California involving Pac-12 and the NCAA. But I'm fascinated by this one, Michael, because the Ivies don't give athletic scholarships. So how are these guys considered employees? So it's a great question and I know a lot of people have had it. The the regional director Laura Sachs said their employees for several reasons because there's an exchange and the exchange is

basically by going to play basketball at Dartmouth in exchange you get to go to Dartmouth. You you're put into a preferential admissions pool. Well, this is the Aunt Becky. This is we we saw Aunt Becky serve hard time for this. The preferential the preferential admission part of it is is the value. And listen, up in my ad and in my upstairs, I have a an acceptance letter to Princeton that would not exist if they didn't want me to play football there. So getting into this school is the is the compensation, almost. I mean, it's a big, it's a huge part of it, right? Not only that, you mentioned there's no athletic

scholarships, that could actually work in favor of them. Let's say there's a Dartmouth basketball player who decides to quit after the first semester. That player stays at Dartmouth. They don't lose their aid because it's need-based financial aid. So if they're getting a full ride for need reasons, they continue to have their full ride and they graduate from Dartmouth, right? It's an elite. They only take 6% of applicants. So, and also the players noted that they also get various things. They get access to facilities, health training that they wouldn't otherwise get. They get sneakers. They get apparel. They get tickets. There was a long list of things that the players noted. So there is compensation in that form, even if it's not an athletic

scholarship. At least that's what the regional director found. And so you've got the USC case, which I thought was interesting. I was watching the coverage of that, of that hearing. And it was, they bring in USC officials and say, okay, what are the rules governing the basketball players at USC? And they would pretend that there were no rules that they're just guidelines, but how much of the control aspect of it is, is used? Cause you, you, you had a great paper. And if you guys were really want to get into the weeds in the university of Illinois law review, there's a great paper on how all of this came to be but how much of the the control by the entity is part of the test for is this an employee or not yeah and thank you for referencing the paper it was great to work with mark edelman and john

holden on it they were the co-authors. The control is a huge part of it, right? Because compare a college student, and we can all relate to this, when we were in college, we had choice with what courses we're going to take, what we do with our time. And like an employer, a coach has tremendous control over an athlete's time and what courses they can take even what majors they can pursue depending upon the coursework so also traveling with the team I mean that's a big big part of it that in the middle of the semester when your classmates are taking midterms or turning in assignments you've got to travel across country for a game and miss class and and it really looks

like athletics are prioritized over academics. And I think we know that happens. And that's something that judges find very meaningful. So a lot of that paper and a lot of, obviously all of this is kind of leading toward if they're declared employees, would they form a union? Could they get a collective bargaining agreement like the pro sports have with their ownership groups? And I'm curious, what are kind of the hurdles between this, where they are now, and actually having a CBA in college sports?

Yeah, so there are some hurdles. We don't know what the NLRB board is going to do with this. We know that in Northwestern, the football players initially won at the regional director level, but the board voted 5-0. There's a five-member board at DC that voted 5-0 against them. And they were worried about disrupting labor relations in college sports because the NLRA, the federal law issue only governs private employers. So the question is what about public universities? And they're governed by state laws and state laws are like all over the board on this. And that's a hurdle, just the

complexity of it. Another hurdle will be, this will wind up in court. This will wind up before a US court of appeals and maybe the Supreme court. and that will take years to play out so this is not imminent and another hurdle will be you mentioned a union who's in the union how many units are there are they employees of just the school or also are the are the conferences in the ncaa itself are they joint employers will there be cbas with all of them and you know this is something it was just you the question, this is something we talked about in sports, my sports law class yesterday. You know, if you're the football team, do you want

other athletes at your school in your union? Absolutely not. Absolutely not. I want to keep the value as high as possible. And how are players going to be paid? Does everyone get paid the same? That doesn't, you know, the quarterback, Caleb Williams, shouldn't get paid. So there are these distribution questions. And what is the composition of the bargaining unit? These are her. Now, they're not insurmountable, but I don't think we know the answers. And I suspect there's disagreement when we take a more granular look at this.

I think we'll start to see some daylight that we don't yet see now. Yeah. And that's the thing. And there's so many questions to be answered, but it does feel like there's some clarity coming in terms of they've got to change the system. But just for those of us who are not lawyers, what is the advantage of a cba versus a situation where you have a group unilaterally imposing rules yeah and i know coach rick patino suggested it was a tweet but that that a conference should put in its recap the the the problem with that is that it will be subject to antitrust law and if it's subject to antitrust law a salary cap is price fixing so it would be vulnerable to an antitrust challenge in contrast if there's subject to antitrust law, a salary cap is price fixing. So it would be vulnerable to an antitrust challenge.

In contrast, if there's a collective bargaining agreement, anything they come up with that relates to hours, wages, and other working conditions would be exempt from antitrust scrutiny. There's something called the non-statutory labor exemption. Very basically, it represents a group of Supreme Court cases that say in so many words, look, we want to incentivize management to bargain rules with unions. And as a result, when they do that, we take antitrust law and the risk of treble damages and all of the scary features of antitrust law off the board.

So that's the advantage. All college athletes were employees in a union. College sports would be saved in the sense that they could just negotiate rules with their schools, conferences, and the NCAA. Of course, that's the world the NCAA doesn't want, but yet it's the one that might actually cure its headings. Yeah, it's crazy. I wrote it in SI during the Northwestern case. I was like, there will be a time when you beg them to unionize and i they're still not begging them but i do feel like it's it might be their only shot because yeah like you said if you have a collective bargaining agreement

and someone were to try to sue the court's just going to say well you guys agreed to this yep so go back to the table go to arbitration like no you've agreed to this it's the greatest defense right the other side agreed to this. It's the greatest defense, right? The other side agreed to this contractually. So you can't now argue over it. Look, and I know, so what we just described makes sense for like these top football programs and some top basketball programs. For a lot of schools, it's scary, right?

Because they're not making money or they're, you know if you look at their at least their accounting they're going to suggest we can't we can't have everyone be an employee we're not going to be able to afford it our revenue model is different so for those schools they have to in a way it would be good for the top athletes to be employees at the top schools because then you can distinguish them right you can say okay yeah that kid is clearly an employee but at our school the the you know the swimmer the field hockey player the uh even the baseball player that they're not really an employee in that context but you know it's tough to get there and the ncaa by fighting and fighting and fighting you know this is a problem playing defense all the time right we know prevent defense doesn't work and that's what the NCAA has been playing and it collapses eventually as we

know from sports and probably too late to hire a new offensive coordinator to adjust the system so it's it you know and they're also out of money I think at this point so uh Michael thank you so much this has been very educational and and I truly appreciate it and uh hopefully you can get to you know covering the other sports eventually but uh but thank you for for keeping us educated here well Andy thanks for having me it's great to see you and uh let's do something again soon. Yes, sir. That is Michael McCann. He is awesome. You know who's also awesome?

Johnny Broom, the Auburn big man who is currently playing against Alabama right now. Auburn trying to even that season series up because Alabama beat them in Tuscaloosa. But we're talking a little college hoops every once in a while on this show. And Johnny Broom, if you have not watched him play yet this season, go watch. Enjoy,

because this will be the only one we get to see him in college basketball, and he's really good. But now it is time for Dear Andy. I'll throw it in from the chat, but we're not going to answer it right now because it's coming. 1982 Boomer Sooner says, Andy, I'm making my one main Oklahoma Sooner road trip to Ole Miss. I need restaurant recommendations. Do not worry. Do not worry. You are not alone. We talked with George Stoyer III and Eddie Radosevich from Sooner Scoop yesterday.

And several Sooner fans mentioned that they were planning to go to Oxford and want some restaurant recommendations. So we will get to those, but first a few, a little bit bigger picture questions. And we'll start with one from Ethan. Is this the move? And this is, he's referring to the news

that came out on Tuesday, that there's going to be a streaming service that is a joint venture between ESPN, Fox, and Warner Brothers Discovery. So he says, is this the move that pushes quote unquote conference realignment into quote unquote super league consolidation? Doesn't this kind of make the SEC, ESPN, and the Big Ten, Fox, NBC, CBS relationships essentially nothing? Not nothing. But I will say,

you caught me slipping, Ethan. My spidey, cynical conspiracy theory senses should have gone off a little harder on Tuesday, and yours did. Because it is fascinating that that news comes out three days after the SEC and Big Ten commissioners say they're going to get together to form an advisory group, which we all know is going to essentially take over and reshape college sports. So, yeah, this does really add some spice to it because ESPN and Fox are now in business together because one of the biggest things that kind of differentiated especially with the sec and the big ten being the power two essentially right now is that the sec is only on espn or disney properties it'll be on abc as well and the Big Ten is split across Fox, NBC, and CBS. Now, Fox is the biggest partner and has a huge stake in the Big Ten because Fox has a stake in the Big Ten network

and essentially is licensing these games to these other networks. So this adds a wrinkle to it. It really does because they're selling this product where it's going to get you all of the SEC and it's going to get you the biggest Big Ten games. It's going to get you the college football playoff, assuming that the plan is still to sell the rest of the next version of the playoff to ESPN. That is the plan right now. to sell the rest of the next version of the playoff to ESPN. That is the plan right now. Again, that doesn't necessarily happen because they're still talking about

what it's gonna be 2026 and beyond. And part of that also has to do with the SEC and the Big Ten teaming up to form their advisory group. So that does really add a layer to this where before you didn't see an easy path for the SEC and the Big Ten to work together in terms of a Super League type situation. Like how would that actually work? Would somebody need to leave? I've said multiple times that if a Super League were to actually form, the most logical way to do it is teams leave their current conferences and coalesce as the super league.

But if the big 10 and the SEC are on the same streaming service, where the two biggest investors in them, which that's what Disney and Fox are, if they are together and all making money from the same pot, well, by all means, there is a way to do that. There is now a path for those guys to really work together. And so I don't want to get super conspiratorial on you, but that does strike me as very interesting that this, I mean, when you think about this product,

and again, I said last night, I need to see the price point because I've got YouTube TV right now. It gives me all the sports that isn't on exclusive to Amazon or Peacock or whatever. But I already have Peacock and Paramount Plus. So I don't really need NBC or CBS Sports for anything. I've already got those things covered.

And if I got rid of YouTube TV and had something that gave me all the other sports channels I want, if I could save significant money, I'm gonna do that. So if the majority of sports fans do this, then yeah, I think it's definitely a path because they're kind of in league with each other

and in business with each other. But I don't know that the majority of sports fans will do this because here's the thing. We're not all alone in our houses. Now, in my particular case, neither my wife nor my kids watch anything else that's on cable. Like they don't care about HGTV. They don't care about Lifetime.

They don't care about Bravo. Nobody in my house cares about any of those channels. Nobody watches the cable news channels. In other houses, it's not like that. You may have somebody who's a CNN fan or a Fox News fan or an MSNBC fan. You may have somebody who loves Bravo shows. You may have somebody who binge watches HGTV all the time. The other piece of this is the rest of the consumer base that doesn't care about sports. Well, sometimes they live with people who care about sports. So it may not be as big of a product and as roaring a success as you might think at the outset, because they do have to win those people over as well. And I don't know if you're going to. If those people want those other products,

then they're probably gonna pay for Sling or for YouTube TV. If they just want the sports, which would be my situation, and the price is right, then I'm feeling pretty good about switching over. So I would watch this one carefully. And it's gonna be pretty interesting. Ferris in the chat says,

something costs me $40 a month and gives me all ESPN networks, then I get streaming services on and off. And that's the thing. Are they going to be able to beat the price? If they can, then yeah, ESPN and Fox have a really strong incentive to work together. But it is going to be very interesting to see how how well that product lands what it's gonna cost and yet does it allow the SEC

and the Big Ten to work together more again this is such a strange situation because when Kevin Warren was running the Big Ten the idea of the SEC and the Big Ten working together seemed very far-fetched Kevin Warren and Greg Sankey did not get along but Tony patiti and Greg Sankey do get along and you know I figure the ACC if you're the Big 12 you're side-eyeing this like crazy because yeah, all of it probably seems scary to you. Next question comes from D Latch. If CFB college football consolidation happens resulting in a super league with a much smaller number of teams, is it possible the day may come where playoff teams are selected based only on one loss records with no human voting, either rankings or committee. And that is a very interesting question. You would have to have a super league for that because the reason the NFL

can do it, the NFL has very clearly defined rules for how you make the playoffs. You know, you, you, you can win your division. And if you win your division, then you get automatically a home game. But if you are one of the non-division winners with the best record and you win the tiebreakers, you get a wildcard spot. And so there are things they do to kind of massage it where if you were one of the best teams last year, they sprinkle in a couple tougher games. If you were one of the worst teams last year, they sprinkle in a couple easier games. But the reason it works is because the divisions are relatively equal, or at least they're attempted to be made equal. And there are years where some divisions are better than others. The NFC North this year was pretty good. But I'm sorry, the AFC North, but the effort is made to make them

as equal as possible. The conferences are not equal as we know. So you can't have objective criteria like that because the schedules are highly unequal. But if you had a 40 team super league say, and you divide it into, into four, 10 team divisions or eight, five team divisions or however you wanted to do it. And the schedules were fairly equal. And you had a wild card system where just in case your division was super tough, you didn't get shut out because you wound up in a tougher division than everywhere else. Then yeah, you could do it. You could definitely do it. It would take that subjectivity out of it. Now, I would argue that the subjectivity in college football is a feature and not a bug, especially with a 12-team playoff,

because the team that gets left out of the 12-team playoff doesn't really have a legitimate claim on the national title. Really, really doesn't. Most years, that's not going to be the case. But I do think if they get to that point, they could do that, but they'd have to divide it that way. And if you do that, you do take some of the regional flavor out of college football. But I would argue that realignment

has already taken much of the regional flavor out of college football. The Big Ten in 2024 will stretch from Piscataway, New Jersey to Los Angeles and up to Seattle and, and, you know, down. Well, they haven't gone to the South yet, but give it time. Give it time. Actually, that brings me to my next question. This one is from Nick. How large of a domino will it be when Florida State leaves the ACC and will there be an Uber three after that? So I think Nick is saying we need to have another poll if that happens and figure out what we're going to call the group. We've agreed on

core four, by the way, for the time being, for as long as it's the SEC and the Big Ten are something different than the ACC and the Big 12, but the four of them are probably the ones that are going to be your top four, like their champs will be your top four seeds in the 12-team playoff. We're going to call them the core four for now. That's what you guys decided on Twitter, and that's where we're going with that. But what would happen if Florida State got out of the ACC? And I think right now we're talking about a question of when and not if. It's going to happen.

The question is when is it going to happen? And there was an interesting, Michael McCann's employer, Sportico, they had an interesting story last week about Florida State's search for private equity to help them buy their way out of the ACC, I mean, essentially. And I think the way Florida State is approaching this is a little bit different. Clemson and North Carolina would also like out or would like a chance to get a better deal, but they're not as aggressive. And Florida State seems to be operating under the assumption that they are just going to try to make the money or

get the money that they need to buy their way out if it winds up being full price. Now, in real life, usually negotiations happen and you don't end up paying full price at this level of money. But the ACC has a very vested interest in making sure it stays together. And if one gets out, they can all get out. So would it be a huge domino? Yes, it'll be a massive domino whenever it happens. Because if Florida State gets out, Clemson and North Carolina are probably gone too. Miami's probably gone too.

And then you see what happens with the rest of it. Where does the rest fit in to the picture? What happens to the Big 12 as it becomes the last of the middle class? There's a lot going on there. And again, I don't know when it's going to happen. I'm not sure. If you'd asked me this time last year, I would have said, I probably, what? I don't know, maybe 2030.

I think it's going to be sooner than that. And so the date to keep in mind is August 15th. That would be the date for Florida State to announce that they are leaving the ACC and won't be in the ACC in 2025. You know, last year, August 15th, came and went. They did not say they were leaving. So that's the withdrawal date. So keep an eye on that particular date.

But I do think it's a matter of when and not if. And it would be a very big domino because it would change quite a bit for everybody because it would free up. Now, the question is, would the SEC or the Big Ten immediately jump on whoever the big dogs in that league are that want to go? I don't know. I don't know. And it kind of depends on when it is, because I do think the SEC and the Big Ten are looking at this like, okay, we've got a 16-team league in the SEC, 18-team league in the Big Ten. I want to see how running this works, how this all works. But I do think as the business model changes, the idea of consolidating the biggest and best brands becomes a priority.

And if some of those brands happen to be available, then they probably go for it. So we'll see what happens. Related to that, we have a question from Patrick. Dear Andy, what do you see as the long-term future for the Hokies? After a decade of mediocrity on the field, gaffe after gaffe off the field,

can this passionate fan base reasonably believe it can perform as a consistent top 25 program under Brent Prye? Late season results trended in a good direction, though clearly still lacking talent depth, and NIL has kept our more talented players like Strong, Lane, and Tootin in the boat so far. Am I just grasping for any reason to believe again?

That's part one of Patrick's question. We'll answer that and then go to part two. I do think Virginia Tech ended the season on a nice little trajectory. I was very pleasantly surprised with the way Virginia Tech bounced back from a terrifically bad start last season. Let's not forget how things started in Brent Prize year two, where they beat Old Dominion, which was better than losing to Old Dominion the year before. But then they quickly lost to Purdue, Rutgers, and Marshall. And I remember watching that Marshall game and thinking, where's this going here? Well, it got better. They ended the season seven and six, beat up on Tulane in the bowl game,

and I realized that was not the full strength Tulane. But what seemed to get better as the season went on, especially was Tyler Bowen, the offensive coordinator, just understanding how really to use Kyron Drones at quarterback and really kind of finding his way as a play caller. You know, the thing about it is Bowen was not an experienced play caller. He'd worked at Penn State with Pry. He'd been the tight ends coach with Urban Meyer with the Jacksonville Jaguars. So his situation was that he's coming in and doing something that's a little bit new. And it took a while.

But I really did like the way they evolved offensively as the season went on. And if you watch that bowl game, Tyler Bowen, Tebow as they call him, was doing a heavy dose of keep calling the play that works, which you know I'm a huge fan of. So I am very intrigued to see where they go from here because as Patrick pointed out, their NIL did allow them to keep a lot of this roster together.

And so I think it's going to be fun. I'm excited to see where they go from here because I'm not going to lie, I had my doubts in the middle of the season. I thought, oh, this is not going well. This is going to end very badly. And now I think there's a chance now look it's it's one of those 50 of marriages end in divorce kind of things like all these jobs are hard but i do think brent pry is growing as a head

coach you saw tyler bowen grow as an coordinator. So I'm excited to see where they go from here. The rest of Patrick's question is a little more big picture. Finally, regarding the future of the ACC, is it easy to understand the brand, or sorry, excuse me. It is easy to understand the brand power of Clemson, Florida State, and North Carolina and Miami, but where do schools like Virginia Tech and NC State stand?

The passion for football is deep. The fan bases are great. And even the real lean years are few and far between, even compared to much larger programs. While the Big 12 will be a pretty fun eventual landing place, I'd love to have a sliver of hope for these schools to make it to the big time in the next round of realignment shenanigans. I do appreciate you calling it realignment shenanigans.

That's excellent. So the NC State thing's interesting because the North Carolina legislature just basically passed a bill that kind of ties North Carolina and NC State together. And NC State is a very interesting football fan base to me because they're super passionate. They're not what you think about when you think about a typical ACC fan base. And Virginia Tech's kind of the same boat. They're not the biggest fan bases in the world, but they are massively passionate. You look at those stadiums every Saturday, they're rocking, they're wild. I do think they'd be great additions. They culturally, I think, would fit in the SEC very well. I just don't know if they would get the

invite. And now if NC State's tied to North Carolina, we do know that the SEC and the Big Ten do both covet North Carolina. So if it's one of those where you have to take NC State to get North Carolina, I think both those leagues might be open to that conversation. Virginia Tech, they've typically been tied to Virginia, and Virginia helped them get into the ACC a few years ago. Virginia's one that I would imagine the Big Ten feels like fits very well there. But the question is, if you're the people at Fox who help, quote unquote, help make a lot of decisions in the Big Ten now. Are they a big enough football brand to want? Would Virginia Tech be big enough football brands to carry the amount that they would require?

Because in that big Super League, let's say you did it as a 45-team group or something like that, are they going to command that level of money? And I think the question becomes like, where do you draw the line? How big is that league? If that league ever happened, how big would that league be? Would it be 36, 40, 44? Would it be 48? We don't know. We don't know. And it's one of those, I think the TV execs would, would pull the, I know it when I see it situation, like there's the cut line. And that's the tricky part for a team like Virginia tech, a program like NC state it's there. They're right there near the cut line. It's just

a matter of where they decide to put it. That's the hard part. So I am, uh, the big picture in the ACC is really, really wild because if Florida state gets out, it's sort of just opens Pandora's box and with everything else changing, this might be the time to do it before we get to our to our sooner question, and it's a good one, the truth in the chat has a food question. Random question, spicy wings or normal wings? No spice at all. See, here's my, I take issue with this question. Normal to me is spicy. Like, bland wings are not any kind of wings that I would seek out. Now, you could do like the Parmesan sauce or something like that, which is not necessarily spicy, but I am looking for some sort of flavoring on my wings, even if it's a dry. I actually do like dry rub wings quite a bit.

Those are, I don't want my wings dripping in sauce. I like them nicely tossed if the sauce is good, but I do enjoy a dry rub one. If you are ever in the state of Alabama, Moe's Original Barbecue is a chain in Alabama. They make great, they do, so they are brined, smoked, and fried wings, and they are awesome, and you get them with the dry rub on them and it's that's a hell of a meal so i i think i always go with spicy or some sort of flavor but probably spicy i like i like spicy food i i i don't necessarily go you know full-on habanero but i want it on the spicier end of the scale all right next question comes from Harry. I am one of those sooner die hearts planning a trip to Ole Miss. What are some good food options in Oxford, Mississippi? Well,

you've got your chicken on a stick at the gas station. Ed Orgeron was a big proponent of that. I'm not kidding. It's delicious. You should have it, but we'll give you some, some other ideas. There's a chef named John Currence who has built an empire in Oxford. He's got several restaurants there. City Groceries is the most famous. That's your white tablecloth. The shrimp and grits are probably the best thing on the menu. It's great. I would say go to Snack Bar though of the Currence dinner spots. Snack Bar is a little more laid back, but the food is fantastic. River, my producer, has a picture of my lamb shank from Snack. No, no, that's Big Bad Breakfast, also a current occurrence place. It's a lamb shank, River. It's not biscuits. So we got the lamb shank there,

but they have a great bar, great cocktail menu. So that's a really cool place for a nice chill dinner. It's harder if you're there. There's the lamb shank. It's harder if you're there on a Friday night because everything is just mobbed. But snack bar is off the square, so it could be less mobbed. Now, right next to snack bar, now you bring up the biscuits now, River. Right next to snack bar is Big Bad Breakfast, which is another Currents place bring up the biscuits now, River. Right next to Snack Bar is Big Bad Breakfast, which is another Currents place.

Those are biscuits and tomato gravy. I highly recommend those. That's just a great breakfast spot. They have one in Birmingham as well, but the original is in Oxford, and it's a spectacular way to start your day. Outside of that group, Ajax Diner. Ajax Diner is on the square. It is probably the best example of a meat in three. If you're Southern, you know exactly what a meat in three is. You get one meat and then three vegetables. So the photo that River's showing is the last

time I went to Ajax Diner, I was with my buddy Ari Wasserman. We both the, we both got the country fried steak sandwich. And so it comes with mashed potatoes on the sandwich, big old hunk country fried steak. And I got, I think it was, I think I had turnip greens that day. So turnip greens, black eyed peas and butter beans. And it was awesome. Just awesome. And I, I'm a, I'm a big fan of the meat in three. I sometimes I'll even go veggie plate of the meat in three. Sometimes I'll even go veggie plate at the meat in three where you just pick out four different sides. And look, we use the term vegetable loosely because all the vegetables have meat in them too. But Ajax diner's spectacular. Also, if you want to go to a little out of town, Taylor Grocery for some fish. So lots of great

options in Oxford. If you're going to Oxford, you're probably going through Memphis. If you want to make a side trip to Mason, Tennessee, the original Gus's fried chicken is in Mason, Tennessee. It is awesome. The first time I went there, the guy said, listen, we're only selling eight pieces right now. I said, then I will take an eight piece. And I housed that eight piece. It was tremendous. So do that too. But I like this. We probably need to throw one of these in

pretty much every week. We got fans that are coming to new leagues. So you got fans that are, Big Ten is expanding by four teams. So you're gonna be going to LA. You. You're going to be going to LA. You're going to be going to Eugene, to Seattle. Obviously, those people are going to be going to Columbus and State College and Ann Arbor, and they're going to want to know where to go.

Same thing in the SEC. Texas fans, Oklahoma fans want to know where to go in their new places. Obviously, the old line SEC people want to go to Norman and Austin. Where do we go there? I haven't been to most of these places. I have a list. I have a list. So this may become a regular weekly feature.

Last question though from Mitch. Is the CW planning to expand ACC coverage in the future? No. So the CW, if you read the most recent Florida State versus the ACC salvo, and this is the one where Florida State is suing the ACC in Florida, not the one where the ACC is suing Florida State in North Carolina, they mentioned the, the Raycom deal. Raycom was the, the service that televised a lot of the ACC's games for years and years and years and years. It was a sweetheart deal. John Swofford, the former commissioner, his son worked there and Florida state accuses it of just being like a carve out

sweetheart thing that, that actually cost ACC schools money. But what the CW thing is, is the remnants of that, where there were these games that were sub-licensed off of, you know, by ESPN. And a lot of it is ESPN doesn't have bandwidth to show every single one. So they sub-licensed this package of games now. And so they sub-license these to the CW starting last year, which really expanded the reach of those particular games. And there's some really interesting, like it was a bad deal to be a touchdown favorite in some of those games. My guy, James Bates on the call, he got some crazy games. So Pitt was a six and a half point favorite and lost in Cincinnati. Louisville was a six and a half point favorite lost in Cincinnati

Louisville was a touchdown favorite remember right after they beat Notre Dame they went and lost to Pitt Clemson was a nine and a half point favorite when it lost to NC State on the CW and the biggie was North Carolina was a 24 point favorite when it lost to Virginia on the CW. So it's a limited menu on the old CW, but man, they got some interesting games. I don't know what it is, but when you get thrown to the CW, my guy James Bates, anything can happen. We do love your questions. They are tremendous. So we'll get those restaurant guides going. Keep asking about that. Obviously the sport is changing faster than we can even keep track. So keep asking those great questions. Programming note, we've mentioned this earlier this week,

but in case you missed it, starting next week, we will begin broadcasting Monday through Friday, 8 to 9 a.m. Eastern time. So we're switching from, we were Sunday through Thursday, 8 to 9 p.m. Eastern time. We are now Monday through Friday, 8 to 9 a.m. Eastern time. The podcast version, if you're a podcast listener, will be up immediately after that. So come join us with your coffee in the morning. If you're on the West Coast, watch Sunrise with us. Love it.

Thanks so much. We'll talk to you tomorrow.