Andy & Ari On3 - USC FIRES DC Alex Grinch | Texas Squeaks By | What's Next at Michigan? | Can Alabama win the SEC?

Episode Date: November 6, 2023

USC coach Lincoln Riley FIRES DC Alex Grinch | What next at Michigan? | Can Alabama win the SEC?Today's show is brought to you by PrizePicks, the easiest way to play daily fantasy. All first time users that deposit and use the promo code ANDY will receive a 100% instant deposit match up to $100. If you deposit $100, PrizePicks will give you $100. If you deposit $50, PrizePicks will give you $50.Visit https://prizepicks.onelink.me/ivHR/ANDY(0:00-11:50) Intro - Mike Grinch Fired at USC(11:51-22:36) Andy Staples Week 11 Resume Ranking(22:37-39:43) Anthony Broome from the Wolverine Joins(39:44-43:42) New Years Six/CFP Predictions(43:43-1:01:19) Tim Watts from BamaOnline Joins(1:01:20-1:04:54) Week 11 Opening Lines(1:04:53-1:16:56) Bobby Burton from InsideTexas Joins(1:16:57-1:29:18) Nick De La Torre from GatorsOnline Joins(1:29:19) Conclusion, Week 11 Picks Tomorrow!Want to watch the show instead? Head on over to YouTube, don't forget to subscribe!https://youtube.com/live/_7vPQyP1HtgA 52-42 loss to Washington was the breaking point for USC with defensive coordinator Alex Grinch, whose unit has been maligned since the Lincoln Riley staff arrived in Los Angeles last year. Grinch was fired Sunday.Andy reveals his resume rankings, which now look suspiciously like the College Football Playoff selection committee ranking.Anthony Broome of On3's The Wolverine joins to explain what might happen next at Michigan. The Big Ten and Michigan's administration continue to discuss allegations of signal-stealing. Will there be any kind of resolution? Also, the Wolverines face their toughest game so far this season at Penn State on Saturday.Next, Andy discusses his projected College Football Playoff and New Year's Six bowls.Tim Watts of On3's Bama Online joins to explain how the Crimson Tide have evolved over the course of this season. What started as a flawed team now looks like a lock to win the SEC West and might be good enough by December to challenge Georgia.Then it's time to talk opening lines, and the Rutgers-Iowa total this week is a doozy.Bobby Burton of On3's Inside Texas joins to talk about a Longhorns win against Kansas State that wasn't pretty but represents a step forward for the program.Finally, Nick De La Torre of On3's Gators Online breaks down what happens next at Florida after a shocking overtime loss to Arkansas that will force the Gators to pull a major upset down the stretch if they want to play in a bowl game.

Welcome to April's on three. It is a Sunday night in November following a bunch of really important games. And I gotta say, not the level of news that I was necessarily expecting this time of year or that we necessarily get this time of year but there was was one big piece of news, and it came out of Los Angeles. USC has parted ways with defensive coordinator Alex Grinch following a 52-42 loss to Washington. When this came out, I had my thoughts immediately and had to just turn on the camera and record them. So here's where I was right at the moment. Lincoln Riley announced that he had fired Alex Grinch. USC coach Lincoln Riley has done what he probably should have done after last year's Pac-12 championship game. He has fired defensive coordinator Alex Grinch,

a relationship that spanned Oklahoma and USC, but never really produced any good defenses outside of 2020, is over. Riley announced it on Sunday, said Grinch has been relieved of his duties. D-line coach Sean Nua and inside linebackers coach Brian Odom will be interim co-defensive coordinators for the rest of the way for the Trojans. And honestly, it can't get much worse than the defense that we've seen so far this year. USC ranked 109th in the nation in yards per play allowed at 6.1, 124th in the nation. There are 133 FBS schools, by the way, in scoring defense with 34.5 points a game. Only one opponent this season has averaged under five yards per play. That was Arizona State,

which averaged 4.97. So gain another yard and they would have crossed that threshold. They were number 128 in the country in plays of 10 plus yards allowed with 150. To put that in perspective, USC plays Oregon this week. Oregon's defense ranks number 13 in the country in that stat with 97. So less than two thirds of the total that USC has given up this season. It was just unbelievable after an offseason where USC did some things to upgrade its talent on defense. They get Bear Alexander, the transfer from Georgia on the D line, get some freshmen in there who could be pretty good. They beefed up up front, but they weren't any better in fact they were probably worse and the same complaints that followed Grinch from Oklahoma followed him to USC it's trying to

use players that are probably too small for their position I was talking to a former player who watched Grinch closely at Oklahoma and has watched from afar at USC who said it feels like Grinch's whole philosophy is to avoid blocks when sometimes you just have to take on blocks and overcome them that's what Georgia does Alabama does Ohio State does Michigan does they try to just bulldoze you at times USC USC never did that. USC also had a pretty complicated scheme with some young players, and that led to a lot of players being out of position. Former USC quarterback, Heisman Trophy winner Matt Leinart pointed that out during the loss to Washington on Saturday, talking about how players are seemingly always out of position,

same problems week after week, and it doesn't ever seem to get fixed. And that's the problem. Now, Lincoln Riley was told by people around him that Alex Grinch and he needed to part ways after last season, not just for Riley's sake, but for Grinch's sake, because Grinch at one time was a hot name as a defensive coordinator. He did a really good job at Washington State working opposite Mike Leach. And if you know the history of Mike Leach in the air raid, there weren't a lot of defensive coordinators who could have a scheme that seemed to mesh well with the air raid. Lincoln Riley, obviously a Mike Leach disciple. Remember Grinch went to Ohio State.

He was going to be Ohio State's DC. Instead, he wanted to be in co-DC with Greg Sciano because Greg Sciano got the Tennessee job. Tennessee fans revolted, then he didn't have the Tennessee job, and so he wound up staying at Ohio State. They had a weird co-DC relationship. That defense was not very good at Ohio State, and then Grinch goes to Oklahoma. The fool's gold was the 2020 season, which as we learn, not much of that season really should count for anything in terms of trying to establish a pattern because they were better. They were much better, especially at the end of that season. They went and destroyed Florida in the cotton bowl. It looked like they were turning a corner defensively.

But then in 2021, right back to the same old, same old 2022 at USC, that defense cost them against Utah in the regular season and just collapsed against Utah in the Pac-12 championship game and then collapsed again against Tulane in the Cotton Bowl. So at this point, USC has now wasted two years with Caleb Williams, the Heisman Trophy winning season last year, where had the defense played even halfway decent against Utah in the Pac-12 championship game, USC probably would have made the college football playoff, would have won a conference title.

This year, even an adequate defense would have USC still in the mix probably for a Pac-12 title. But you saw a shootout against Washington where they just couldn't compete. Now they're going to go play Oregon, a team that actually does play very good defense most of the time, but also has a very explosive offense. And I'll be curious to see what happens because one of the complaints about the Grinch defense is that it's too complex. USC still has really good players. They have very good athletes. Is there a chance that these guys could simplify the defense, just play something somewhat vanilla and get better results? Will it be enough to beat Oregon? I don't know. I doubt it. Oregon's very, very good. They're at home. The Autzen crowd's going to be

crazy. Oregon has no margin for error, has to win this game if it wants to have a chance to win the Pac-12 and make the playoff. But it's an interesting experiment because that was one of the knocks on Grinch, that it's just too complicated. What if they let the athletes just be athletes? It's worth a try. At this point, you've already wasted this season, but at least maybe you can get an idea of how things could get better in the future. So the other piece of this is that Lincoln Riley has to decide

that he wants to run a program that has a good defense. He has to be unwilling to accept mediocrity on defense, or, well, less than mediocrity if you want to talk about the last couple of defenses that they've had. And he has to be willing to practice in a way that will allow the defense to be good. And people ask, what do you mean by that? Basically, you got to be willing to give the defense equal time to the offensive practice. But also, you got to be willing to hit.

Which means your offensive players will get hit. Because the defensive players need to practice tackling so they can tackle on game day. And if anybody doesn't remember how the tackling part goes, go back and watch last year's Pac-12 title game. Watch some of the broken tackles. Well, go watch the Washington game. Watch all the broken tackles. It's a philosophy. It's a whole program philosophy. If you go to a Georgia practice in November, they're still hitting. They still want to make sure they know how to hit.

Ohio State, that was a knock on them. Well, they look more physical. Michigan, they've been physical the whole time. Alabama, physical the whole time. Alabama, physical the whole time. A.B. Bailey asks in the chat, he finally fired Grinch about freaking time. Why did he hang on to him so long? Again, Lincoln Riley has shown a propensity for accepting less than ideal results on defense.

And I think it's an oversimplification to say all he cares about is the offense, but he needs to care more about the defense. He's always going to be good on offense. He's a great play caller, great play designer, great teacher of quarterbacks. That's not going to be the problem, ever. You've got to find somebody

who can instill the right attitude in your defense. Plus, you got to find somebody who can recruit the way you need to recruit going into the league you're going into. Because I still think that Lincoln Riley left Oklahoma because he wanted no part of the SEC. He did want to try to recruit in the SEC. Because to win in the SEC, you have to be great on both lines of scrimmage. You have to recruit top 100 players on both sides of the line of scrimmage. Lincoln Riley doesn't do that. Hasn't done that. Maybe they'll start doing that. You can do that at USC for sure, but you can also do that at Oklahoma as Brent Venables is showing right now.

So they've got to upgrade the talent because the league they're going into, Ohio State, Michigan, Penn State, are going to have monsters up front. Oregon will continue to have monsters up front and will still be in your league. Washington occasionally has monsters up front. So you got to figure that out. And you got to hire somebody and let them do their job and give them enough resources at practice and let them be physical if they want to be physical. Because that's how you win national championships.

If that is your goal, that's how you do it. Now, I'm assuming that Lincoln Riley was briefed when he took the USC job that the Big Ten operation was underway. But I will tell you, you could have won the Pac-12 most years without having that level of defense, without having that level of line play without having that level of line play on both sides of the line of scrimmage. So maybe that's what he thought he was going to get, but it's not going to work where he's going. So he has to be better.

So DCs who interview for this job, ask hard questions. What's practice schedule going to look like? How often are we going to be able to hit? Can we practice tackling tackling can we be live these are legitimate questions if you don't like the answers don't do it because the the result may be something that looks like what we've seen this year that's it's amazing because they're so good offensively

that they just turn a blind eye to the problems on defense. It's shocking. But maybe now there's a chance for a solution. We will see how much Lincoln Riley actually cares about putting together a complete program that can compete for the national title. We will see what he does. This will be a good test for Lincoln Riley. Next up, a list that does not include USC. We thought it would at this point. During the preseason, we figured this USC would be on this list right now, but no. We're going to the resume rankings. This is the ranking that

does not include any preseason hype, no reputation. It's all based on what you've done this year. As we said early in the season, it's going to look weird for a while. It's going to swing wildly. And by the end, it would start to look like the other polls. I predict that this top 10 will be identical to the top 10 in the college football playoff committee's rankings. Not because I want it to be, just because I just think reasonable people are probably going to come to similar conclusions. Number one, still Ohio State. Now, when we get to the CFP projections,

you're going to see something and go, well, why do you have Ohio State number one in the resume rankings? Because right now, best collection of wins, played the best so far, looked the best with good wins. The Notre Dame win a little lost luster with the loss to Clemson by Notre Dame,

but the Penn State win is still very nice. But you've got Michigan going to play Penn State this week, so we'll have a comparison point, and obviously they're going to play each other, Michigan and Ohio State, in three weeks. And then you've got Georgia that just played Missouri and is about to play Ole Miss. Their wins are getting better.

And that's why I've got Georgia number two now. I moved Georgia up because Missouri is their best win of the season so far. This week, they have a chance to get a better win against Ole Miss. If they're impressive against Ole Miss, I may bump them to number one. Of course, they might lose to Ole Miss. Ole Miss is 8-1 right now. But Georgia against Missouri, I was impressed. They went down early, but then they took the lead,

and then they got stops when they needed to. The offense did what it needed to do. They put the game away there at the end and got it to two possessions with about five minutes to go. So I'm fine with where they're at. And we know they have a switch that they can hit and be really good. And also, we're looking at possibly getting Amarius Mims, the right tackle, back from injury.

He had an ankle injury. Looking at getting him back for this game against Ole Miss. Brock Bowers, the idea behind that tightrope ankle surgery was to get him back quickly. So perhaps he's back against Tennessee or maybe, maybe it takes the SEC championship game. But if you have Brock Bowers back in time for the SEC championship game, it changes the math on everything. Number three, Michigan.

Still haven't played anybody, but they play somebody this week, but everybody they've played, they've crushed. Number three, Michigan. Still haven't played anybody, but they play somebody this week. But everybody they've played, they've crushed. Say what you want about what's going on off the field. I don't know that that matters at this point. Whatever will happen will happen. If there's the Big Ten makes a disciplinary decision or doesn't and punts it to the NCAA, it doesn't matter.

This team probably is going to be good no matter what. And this team's going to play. They're not going to come out and say, this team's not playing. So we will see when they play Penn State, what does this offense look like against an elite defense? Now, Penn State's offense is not very good. So I would think that Michigan should keep the score down pretty low

and not have to blow up and score a ton on Penn State's defense. But one never knows. Drew Allard looked pretty good against Maryland. So perhaps we get a really good game in Happy Valley. Remember, if it's in Ann Arbor, Penn State gets blown just, they get blown out in Ann Arbor. I don't, I don't know why, but they do seem to have a chance when they play at home. We'll see if Michigan steamrolls and maybe Michigan's number one next week. Number four, Florida state Seminoles beat Pittsburgh 24 to seven without their two

best receivers, Keon Coleman and Johnny Wilson. Jordan Travis continues to be excellent. Defense did what it needed to do. Pittsburgh's not very good offensively, but that's okay. Florida State is probably going to cruise the ACC championship game. We were looking at this week's game against Miami as the big one, as the one that would be the real test for the Seminoles, but Miami seems to have fallen off pretty badly. They just lost 20 to six to NC State. And I don't think, I don't know that Florida State will beat Miami as badly as they did last year because that was just an utter humiliation.

But Florida State looks considerably better. Number five, Washington. They won their shootout at USC, but it does not get any easier for the Huskies. They're going to have to earn that undefeated spot if they want to have that going into the Pac-12 championship game. They get Utah this week, Oregon State next week. It's going to be very hard for them to stay undefeated.

But the good news is they beat Oregon, which gives them that mulligan, and that allows them to have a loss and still be in playoff contention too. That's the thing. If Washington drops one between now and the Pac-12 championship game, I would think under most circumstances, the winner of a one loss Oregon versus one loss Washington is still going to the college football playoff because there should be some chaos everywhere else. But we'll see.

Number six, Oregon. The Ducks keep smashing people. Since they lost to Washington, that's all they've done is smash people. They killed Cal this weekend. They get USC this weekend. So what USC does defensively against the Ducks will be interesting. We know USC should be able to score a little bit on Oregon. I don't know that they're going to be able to score as much on Oregon as they scored on Washington but Oregon is going to have to put up some points to win this game I do think they will I I think this defense will get after Caleb Williams and we saw with the Notre Dame game where the the pressure on Caleb Williams especially knowing how bad the defense is, he will try to force some

stuff. And so I could see Oregon forcing some turnovers here and maybe gets a little more out of hand than USC Washington did. But that's a, that's an intriguing one because you don't know what the scheme is going to look like defensively. Do they change much? Do they call it the same way Grinch would have called it? We don't know. We saw an example of that this week with Florida and Arkansas, where Arkansas had fired Dan Enos, their offensive coordinator. They had elevated Kenny Guyton, who had been an analyst. And Guyton had worked with Kendall Bryles before.

So they really went back to the offense that they had run the year before. And if you're Florida's defense, that's probably not what you were prepping for most of the time. You probably had to look at some of that just in case, but I don't think you expected it the whole time. So Oregon's going to have to deal with whatever USC throws at them defensively and probably adjust on the fly. Number seven, Texas. Listen, that fourth quarter against Kansas State was ugly, but guess what? They won, and this was a Texas team that needed to show it could win like this. Texas has not won games like this in the last few years. These are the games that they let slip away. They won this one against K-State.

Big step for the program now. They got to go to TCU, to Iowa State, and they get Texas Tech. All of those games are going to be fraught with emotion. Iowa State, remember, they just lost to Kansas. They only had one conference loss. They'll have two. So if they can beat Texas, they can throw things into chaos. Texas is going to have to get everything straight. We're going to talk to Bobby Burton from inside Texas later in the show. He's going to explain when Quinn Ewers is maybe going to come back, what the things look like with Malik

Murphy right now. We'll talk about all that with Bobby. Number eight, Alabama. This team lost to Texas, but it looks like a different team now than the one that lost to Texas. This looks like a team that maybe on the right day can beat Georgia in the SEC championship game. And they've evolved. And we're going to talk later with Tim Watts from Bama Online about the evolution of this Alabama team

because it feels like that very flawed team that we saw in the beginning of this Alabama team, because it, it feels like that very flawed team that we saw in the beginning of the season has started to figure some things out. Number nine, Louisville. Jeff Brahms done a great job of figuring out what his team is. They play great defense. They can run the ball. Yes. They can throw the ball to Jamari thrash, but I just, I think running it with Jafar Jordan and letting that defense just shut teams down. It's a good mix. And Jeff Brom is great at just kind of figuring out what his team is best at and leaning into it. And you saw it at Purdue. You're seeing it now with Louisville. It looks like Louisville and Florida State are on a collision course to the ACC championship game. And that could be a very, very fun game. Yes, Yosef, who's a Louisville fan,

top 10. Absolutely. And I think you're going to be in the top 10 in the college football playoff selection committee rankings too. Number 10, Ole Miss. The Rebels cut a little close against Texas A&M. It looked like they were going to run away with that game, and then A&M made a game out of it. But Ole Miss survives. The field goal misses at the end of the game. Big win for Ole Miss. Now they got to go to Athens.

This will be a fun one. I can't wait to see this offense against Georgia's defense. I don't know that Ole Miss's defense, after what we saw Texas A&M do to them, I think Georgia's going to be able to score on them about as much as they want. But they are in a good position. Because if they drop this one but win the rest of their games, you're looking at a New Year's Six Bowl, and that's a pretty good spot. So that is your resume top 10. I think it's going to be almost identical, or maybe exactly identical, to the top 10 of the think it's going to be almost identical or maybe exactly identical to the top 10 of the

selection committee rankings. They might have Louisville and Ole Miss flipped. That's about the only thing I can see that they're going to change. But that's what happens when you get more data. It does tend to coalesce into something similar. So the AP poll, they still got Georgia number one, but I got a feeling that what I do, what the committee does, what some of these other folks do, we may have Georgia number one after next week if they play well against Ole Miss.

So it makes a lot of sense. Now, we got to talk about the team that has been the biggest story in college football the last two weeks. They got back on the field on Saturday with a big rousing win against Purdue. Now we knew they're going to beat Purdue, but Michigan once again thrashed an opponent that was a lesser opponent. They did not mess around. They just jumped on them and then a little, little pause, but then continued to roll. But of course there is everything else looming over Michigan.

Anthony broom of the Wolverine joined us to talk about the off field stuff and that huge, huge game in state college on Saturday. We are joined now by Anthony broom of the Wolverine. And I promise, promise. We're going to talk about Michigan on the Wolverine. And I promise, promise we're going to talk about Michigan on the field. Promise. But first, Anthony, we got to talk about the thing that is just eating everything else. And that is the alleged sign stealing, the Big Ten versus Michigan, however you want to do it. It feels like a very strange situation for everybody involved like the big 10 basically

faced with a choice of you've got all these people on one side saying you got to do something about this right now and then Michigan going um what about due process what about you don't have an investigatory arm the NCAA does that and that's going to take a while like what what do you do if you're if if you're Tony Petitti the big 10 while like what what do you do if you're if if you're tony patiti the big ten commissioner and what do you do anthony if you're santa ono the michigan president well i think if you're santa ono first and foremost i think that yeah you do fight this because it's it's a unique situation where you know an invest as far as we know an investigation was just opened up like whatever it was the two the two weeks ago right so ncaa investigation yeah correct so for this to be um for the information that's

been made available to come via leaks and anonymous sources and not necessarily as the result of an investigation um i do think that michigan is right to be like hey listen like we get there might be a paper trail of things that have gone on and we are going to have to eat some sort of punishment for that. Like that's going to happen. But there needs to be, as you know, the buzzword now, the due process that has to be played out. So for Michigan, I understand that from the Big Ten perspective, the coaches perspective, the league's perspective, given that that information that is out there right now is so damning and the paper trail is so clear and all of these schools have these ticket receipts that go to, you know, that are linked back to Connor Stallions. I get why they could say, what is there to investigate? It's all out there. So, I mean, there's the layers of that.

There's apparently the layer that a, you know a third-party investigative arm is involved here somehow. I mean, from the day that this came out, you're starting to think, wow, this could be a pretty fascinating 30 for 30. Now, it's starting to feel like the six-part docu-series. I was going to say, you're needing multiple parts to this thing because it does have so many legs and tentacles and all various extremities. But so yeah. And then like the Big Ten situation, just reading the tea leaves based on what you guys reported at the Wolverine and talking to people, it feels like the Big Ten was trying to get Michigan to do something itself. Like that would, they considered that the cleanest way because they don't have to put themselves out there at that point. But if you're Michigan, there's no incentive to do that. And if you don't do that,

the Big Ten has to do something or has to decide if it wants to do something. And what Tony Petitti is allowed to do by the bylaws, he can issue maximum two game suspension to someone. They can do more, but that would require the joint executive committee to say yes, which Michigan has representation on. Not sure they'd be cool with that. Yeah, I'm not sure they would be. I'm not sure that anyone would want, again, I know there's been a lot of, you know, put the shoe on their other foot. How would you feel if this was at your school? Well, put the shoe on the other foot in terms of if this was something going on with your school. Again, with all of this information coming out via leaks and, you know,

the rumors about what the origins of the investigation are, which again, I have to make clear, like it, whatever comes out on that side of it does not exonerate Michigan at all. Like it's pretty clear what's out there, you know, you know, what the implications of that could be, but, um, you know, to, to kind of step in and, you know, I, you know, I'm not a big fan of, of hitting the easy button on crying about, you know, the witch hunt or the mob mentality, but everything right now just does feel super emotional. I think everyone involved in this needs to take a step back and take a deep breath. Well, and I think that may be what happens ultimately.

And that's the part. I don't think people understand the dynamics here. And I think that's a bigger part of it too. Like if this were Indiana or if this were the SEC in Vanderbilt, for example, the school owes a lot more to the conference than the conference owes to the school. But because it's Michigan, and it would be the same thing for Ohio State or if it were Alabama or if it were Texas

and, well, the Big 12 before the SEC now, the program does not owe the conference squat because it is a draw. It is a big reason why this multi-billion dollar TV contract exists. So like if I'm Michigan and this is the other part, people don't seem to grasp in this situation because everybody wants something to happen. But if you're Santa Ono, your job is to satisfy the people of Michigan, your constituents, not the Big Ten's constituents. And I think that's the part that people don't get. If I'm Santa Ono, I'm worried about what the people who employ me think about this not what ohio state

purdue and minnesota think about this yeah and i i don't think it's again i've already said this like i don't think it's a crazy ass to just ask for an investigation to play out and for to let that you know again buzzword of the day the due process of it uh and and i saw that you know santa oh no a lot of people obviously michigan people see the letter that comes out and they're yes that's our guy like santa's fighting for us and the rest of the nation will roll their eyes and say well due process what about this and this and and you know x incident and y incident it's like i i don't i don't like that aspect of it either so So yeah, like Michigan's

going to defend itself here and it should. I know, I think that people in that inside of Ann Arbor know that, you know, are taking this seriously. It's not like they're, they're saying that this is, you know, a witch hunt and that, you know, the smear campaign and things like that. Like they want, they just want it to be investigated because I think, you know, even take it outside of sport, anything at a university level that has some sort of accusation like that, you, you take the deep breath, you take a step back and you investigate it and then you determine what your path forward is. But, um, no, it happened. The punishment come before the sentencing seems super weird to me. Or before the adjudication, like the guilty or not guilty. Exactly.

And that is what makes this so confusing is, you know, there's just not the mechanism to do something right now, you know. And we've compared it to other sports, but, you know, there was a situation like this in the NFL. They didn't do anything quickly even then, and they have the power to do it. So it's, it's going to be fascinating to watch what happens, but let's, let's transition to the on-field part of it because that's all, that's part of this too. Their biggest game of the season is this week. So far.

They play Penn State. This is the first good competition that they have faced. This is the best team they've faced, and it's a great measuring stick for them. How is this team handling all of the other stuff heading into that i get the sense that again i know it's cliche but i get the sense that they've kind of rallied around it and internalized it which is something that i think uh again regardless of what people think about how this program has turned things around over the last two years i think that's a big part of it in terms of the culture that's

been built is is their players ability to block up not not even block out the noise they see everything they read everything and they find a way to internalize that and weaponize that and I I get the sense too that again um I think bored isn't the right word but Michigan hasn't been challenged this year but in its toughest spots of the season where you think um you know you think back to the Nebraska game, first game on the road, upstart program, tough pace to play. They came out on fire right off the bat. You see the same thing the next week at Minnesota, Michigan State, a rivalry game, always tough just on that alone. Forget the fact that, you know, 24, 48 hours before that was when, you know, the drip,

drip, drip of this whole, you know, illegal scouting operation accusation has been out there. And, you know, they came out and hammered their rival when that happened, too. So it's a different type of adversity that the other teams have faced. And that's not something you can quantify and punch into a computer in the college football playoff will necessarily take that into account. But to me, this season, I've seen this group play its best football when the questions or the noise has been the loudest. And heading into this game on Saturday night, or Saturday afternoon, I should say, that feels like where things are heading. Now, we take things one day at a time.

I don't know what state the program will be in by the end of this week or what's out there, what response is, but based on everything we know right now, I think that Michigan is ready for that challenge. The fact that you have a game against Purdue where you play your C+, game even and still walk out of there with a blowout, walk out of there with a lot of things to put on film and focus on this week. I think this is a really good spot for Michigan to kind of bounce back from not just everything that's been going on, but cement itself as one of the best teams in the country. Yeah. And you look at that Purdue game, they jump all over them.

They let them breathe for about a quarter and then they jump all over them again it seems like that they they've they've got that gear that they can turn on when they need to and I I'm just fascinated to see it again like Penn State's offense is not the best we know that but it's an elite defense so I want to see J.J. McCarthy and company against this defense can they move the ball at will can they can they run the ball well that's the one thing you know reading you guys the you've been you guys have been kind of hard on the michigan run game recently even though they're still averaging what the the number one yards per carry in the big ten yeah it's i mean it's nitpicky right like you get through these first nine games without a ton of resistance i don don't think they've played, you know, an FBI team that's above like 50 or 60.

So like I get their obvious caveats, you know, in that respect, but you know, the Michigan run game, it's, it's almost been flipped. Like last year, the run game was a non-negotiable and you're waiting for that past game to come along to take that next level. This year it's been kind of the flip side of that. And people have been surprised by that given that Blake Corham is back, Donovan Edwards is back, and Blake Corham has the rushing touchdown numbers. But we're not seeing him get 25 carries a game for 100 plus yards.

I think the biggest difference with that is this team's offensive line probably isn't winning a third straight Joe Moore award. Seeing a little more pressure off the tackles than last year. They didn't play very well against Purdue. Again, you go back and watch some of the game film of Michigan's offensive lines these last two years, and some would argue this would even sort of offset the implications of how much of an advantage they would have had scouting but they have they had guys that Michigan's backs were running through these running lanes that you could drive a dodge ram through and that type of push to me hasn't been there yet this year

and maybe maybe it emerges you know in the pressure cooker of the next few weeks but through nine weeks it's it's clearly not the strength of the team right now, but I'm not, I'm not out on the idea that they could have a big stretch run here. Well, there's also the, the, the part where JJ McCarthy can get them out of some issues if he needs to, because he is as dynamic. I mean, he's the most dynamic quarterback they've had in the Harbaugh era. Oh yeah. Without question. And, and I think it's, it's JJ, it's the improvisation. I think that they've had in the Harbaugh era. Oh yeah. Without question. And, and I think it's, it's JJ, it's the improvisation. I think that they've been a lot more creative with some of their run plays

this year too. I mean, you see a guy like Samaj Morgan, a true freshman scoring on a, on a rushing attempt. That was a, that was a beautifully designed play too. And you saw, I mean, you saw that sort of develop slowly and you're like, wow, okay. There, there's nothing anybody can do about this. Yeah, they're doing a lot better job this year. It just seems of creating misdirection, you know, scheming some of those guys open, even just for the kind of the check down throws from McCarthy. So that's where the offense people are off put because the offense doesn't look as dominant on the ground, but I still think when push comes to shove the way that road more has been

calling plays the way that JJ McCarthy has been playing, they're going to buy land, see your air. They're going to find a way to move the ball down the field. So yeah, well push will come to shove probably off and on the field this week. So I will be bothering you and Chris Ballas and Clayton and everybody at the Wolverine all week. So I cannot wait to see you guys at State College.

It would be great to see you, Andy. Thank you so much for having us. Thanks, Anthony. That is Anthony Broome from the Wolverine. And just going to be a big week for Michigan. We don't know what's going to happen. You've got the Big Ten. You've got Michigan.

They're at loggerheads. You also have the biggest game of the year so far for Michigan. It is going to be a wild week for the Wolverines. Before we get to our college football playoff and New Year's Six projections, I got to tell you about PrizePix. PrizePix is the largest independently owned daily fantasy sports platform in North America. It is also the most fun. I had a blast this weekend playing PrizePix.

Not the way I thought I would, though. I thought I had a slam dunk easy one. It's the way you do it. First, you download the app, use the code Andy. It will match your first deposit up to a hundred bucks. You pick two or more squares and a square would say, okay, here's what we think Jaden Daniels going to throw for against Alabama. And in this case, it's 283 and a half yards and you have to pick more or less. And so I said, this thing's going to be a shootout. Jaden Daniels, more than 283 and a half.

Jalen Milrow, more than 237 and a half. They both threw for 219. Nothing, got nothing on that one. But I had another one where I really liked the ones where you can have the quarterbacks combined passing, rushing, receiving TDs, and it's a combo of quarterbacks. So I did Bo Nix and JJ McCarthy more than four and a half. Caleb Williams and Jaden Daniels more than five and a half. And then threw in a receiver one with Roma Dunze from Washington and Malik Navers from LSU more than 2055.5 receiving yards. I also had Marvin Harrison Jr. and Evan Stewart,

but it's interesting how PrizePix does this. So Evan Stewart was a late scratch for the Ole Miss game. He's a Texas A&M receiver. The way they handle that is if he doesn't play, instead of just invalidating you or you just lose, you revert to a three-pick play. Well, I won that one because all the other three hit. So $50 turned into $250.

And that is what you do at PrizePix. In fact, you can make up to 25 times your money if you play it right. So go to PrizePix, download that app, use the code Andy. They will match your first deposit up to a hundred bucks. It's a lot of fun. They've got the NFL, NBA, cricket, League of Legends. They got gaming. If you can play it, you can play it on PrizePix.

So go to the, get the app, use that code Andy, get that deposit match. All right. to the get the app use that code andy get that deposit match all right let us talk about our projections for the college football playoff because we've talked about that resume ranking and so this kind of feeds into it but this is different this is what we think is going to happen with the games that haven't been played yet. So right now, I'm still thinking the Pac-12 cannibalizes itself. We've seen the Big 12 start to cannibalize itself. Now, Texas still has a chance, but they're going to have to get through TCU and Iowa State.

They're going to have to win the Big 12 title game. I still think there's a chance two Big 10 teams make it. So right now I've got in the sugar bowl, number one, Georgia versus number four, Ohio state. And basically that means I think Ohio state is going to keep winning until they lose to Michigan. And that Michigan is going to win out because I got Michigan at number two in the Rose bowl against number three, Florida state. Which means I think Florida state wins the rest of its games, goes in as a 13-0 number three seed. That, of course, means that the Pac-12 gets left out.

The Big 12 gets left out. It's not going to make people happy. But 12-team playoffs coming next year. So this is possible. Now, we could see something crazy happen. 12 team playoffs coming next year. So this is possible. Now we could see something crazy happen. Like if Michigan goes and loses to Penn state this weekend, that changes everything because all of a sudden it's a three team race in the big 10 East and the winner of that's probably still going to win the big 10,

but that would change the math on everything. I don't think if Ohio State beats Michigan that Michigan gets in necessarily over a one loss conference champ because Michigan's non-conference schedule is not that good. Ohio State at least has that Notre Dame win that kind of buoys the Buckeyes.

So how would the rest of it look? I've got Louisville versus Alabama in the Orange Bowl. Remember, you got to have an ACC team in the orange bowl floor state. The champion is already in the playoff. So Louisville gets that spot. Then the next highest rank SEC team is the other team you have to take. So that's where Alabama goes in this one. I had a third SEC team in, so I've got Ole Miss in the peach bowl against Oregon. I think that'd be a fun game. I would really enjoy watching that game. Fiesta Bowl, Washington and Tulane. This is where Air Force had been.

Air Force lost to Army. Now, I don't know that Air Force would have mattered if it had been undefeated because last week when the committee rankings came out, Tulane was ahead of Air Force, even though Air Force was still undefeated. Remember, Tulane lost to Ole Miss. Tulane barely survived East Carolina this week, but I think as long as Tulane keeps winning and they win the American, they're going to get the spot of the highest ranked group of five champ. And in the Cotton Bowl, I got Texas and Penn State. That also would be a very fun game. But I know if you're like me, you'd be more satisfied if these were playoff teams.

And they will be next year. And tomorrow night, we'll do the hypothetical of what if there were a 12-team playoff this year. Because we do need to talk about that. Because this would be a blast. This would be a great 12-team playoff. But alas, it is not time for that yet there are only four spots if you'd asked me about five weeks ago I'd have said Alabama not really in for one of those four spots but now if you ask me oh the Crimson Tide got a shot.

We talked to Tim Watts from Bama Online about how Alabama has evolved over the last few weeks because this team's playing pretty well coming off that LSU game. And a team that didn't look like it had a chance to compete for a national title a while back now might be able to. Tim Watts from Bama Online. He says, I only bring them on after they lose or after they struggle. Well, we're breaking tendencies today because Alabama looked very good against LSU. Nick Saban called it the best team win of the year so far. Tim, I'm curious, this feels different than most Alabama teams where we kind of, we know what they are most of the season.

I don't remember seeing Alabama team evolve like this. Well, 2015, maybe. But this still feels like a less perfect version of that. Yeah, it does. I mean, one of the things I was looking forward to this season, we almost always know what Alabama is when they walk into a season. You know, this team, there was a lot of uncertainty. You had a new offensive coordinator, a new defensive quarter coordinator. You had a new quarterback, you know, after, you know, quite the discussion of that position.

So didn't really know what to expect. Has had its bumps along the way, but you kind of feel like they're figuring things out. You see the offensive line's a little bit better from week to week, it seems. And, you know, obviously LSU is a super talented team, and they came in with a lot of confidence. I mean, they had choreographed all their touchdown dances. They were at the end zone, and there was 11 of them involved. And they should be. It's one of the most prolific offenses in the country. So yeah, I mean, just, it's not just one side of the ball

or one position. There's just a lot of improvement. Well, and I've talked about this multiple times over the last few weeks that this, if you were not an Alabama fan, this feels like the most likable Alabama team. And I was trying to imagine like for Alabama fans, because they've had so much success, like would they embrace this team the way they have other teams? Because like, how can you not love Terry on Arnold and Malachi more and those guys, but it didn't seem like they were going to ultimately be as successful as most Alabama teams but now the window feels open for wait maybe these guys could beat Georgia maybe they could make a playoff you know to me I still think you know I said this early on it was a team that was a work in progress we'll know what they are

completely at the end of the season but I do think it's a game by game team you know what I mean you you head to Kentucky you head to Auburn there's still a lot of stuff they've got to deal with. They've had really good run at home. They played some good teams. I mean, Texas is the top 10 team. LSU might be the best offense in the country. They're right up there with Washington. Ole Miss, how good does that win look now? And you look at the adjustments. How many times did you see an Alabama team successful in the first half and struggle in the second half? I feel like we saw that a lot last year. But Kevin Steele, he's given up 10 points.

His defense has given up 10 points in the second half to LSU, Tennessee, and Ole Miss combined. That's crazy. That's crazy. That's amazing. And that's a team that has success in the first half. Adjustments, you know, and kudos to the players. They always seem to make a play like the Dallas, you know, the Dallas Turner tip and the Arnold pick.

They always seem to have that one play they've got to have in these games. Yeah, and it's interesting that you mentioned the Ole Miss win because I think about the circumstances of that. So that's the first game after USF, which i still believe was a let's just show everybody what we're dealing with here yeah with the quarterbacks and so milrow gets you know back in the starting role but they still hadn't quite adjusted like milrow and reese hadn't quite adjusted to each other yet it feels like they're much more comfortable together. Like last night felt like the first time they were really calling stuff that really suits what Jalen does well. Yeah. And I think there was that period of getting to know each other and, you know,

you know, I've made jokes about it, but you don't get many chances to coach an athlete like Jalen Milrow. He's got a big arm. He's an athlete. He does it all. Didn't see a lot of that at Notre Dame. So Tommy Reese kind of had to learn how to call plays for him. And then Milrow had to learn to adjust what Tommy Reese wanted to call. And I think you saw that yesterday. You saw a lot of motions. If you watch that play on the first power run to go on their first touchdown, if you watch Amari Nyblak comes in motion, seals that edge, he walks into the end zone. I mean, there's just a lot of little things. These running backs out of the backfield, you know what I mean? That helps Jalen Milrow when he's under pressure.

He did a terrific job of finding those guys. I also think Milrow has learned that people do fear his arm, and he can take advantage of that. There's one of the touchdowns last night where he had the ball cocked and ready to throw until he got to the line of scrimmage and then he tucks and just takes off like there's a rocket strapped to his butt like that was more more nuanced than you you'd seen from him the whole year like he kept he kept that defense at bay with the threat that he was going to throw and then all of a sudden kaboom and they couldn't like the angles were terrible yeah and that's the thing is like you saw him i know you're talking about the touchdown where he ran to the left he

you know that's another thing the offense does it gives them that option if that linebacker he has to commit that defender has to commit do i take the running back wide receiver in the flat or do I take Milrow? And look, I've said this all along. He looks like Adrian Peterson running to me. And when he ran, it's power. It's power. Ask Harold Perkins. We met him at the goal line on one of his touchdowns. They had to help Harold up and Milrow was just standing there. And Harold's a physical, strong tackler and just basically bounced off Jalen Milrow. That's how big and that's how strong he is. But I agree with you. If you go back and look at that play, I'll tell you one of the plays that shows kind of his progression to me is the short pass to Jace when he was under pressure for the

long run up the left sideline. Go back and watch that play. There's five defenders surrounding him. He has pinned in on the corner. Now, Jace had the great football IQ of leaking out, holding up his hand like a guy wide open, and he found him. But, I mean, that was a great – and he didn't panic. He did a good job. But, you know, you go back to that likability of this team. I think when you look at Alabama's team last year, what did you think of Bryce? You thought's team last year, what'd you think

of Bryce? You thought of Will, you know what I mean? Two superstars, top five guys, great human beings, great prospects and great players. They sure you kind of just got like an even kill. Whoever your favorite player is on that team. I mean, look at Proctor. Proctor has been thrown in the fire and has steadily improved this entire season. So there's so many little mini stories going on with this team that you've got to love. Well, and OK, let's talk about the offensive line, too, because I also think the improvement of Milrow has making those guys look better. Because we tend to blame the offensive line for any sack. It's not always the case and and I felt like early in

the season there were times when Milrow was kind of walking himself into sacks sure it does not feel like he's doing that nearly as often anymore now you know what he's doing he's stepping into that pocket you know the offensive line is often creating that pocket so when that pressure they're pushing pressure to the edge so if you drop back, you're no longer in a safe space, right? If you step into that pocket, you know, and it's not natural, if you think about it, to step in between five defenders. It is natural to step out against that. So, again, that's showing his progression, being more comfortable.

And you saw him do that several times last night. But I agree. Offensive line, it was a lot of guys. I mean, they were dominating the front. You saw saw I mentioned Amari Knoblack's block Robbie Oots had some great blocks especially clearing up that middle but I mean Jaden Roberts Tyler Seth you know Latham and Proctor I thought they did a fantastic job yeah and they're gonna get tested by Kentucky like Deion Walker's one of the best D linemen

in the country JJ Weaver's tough to deal with on the edge that they will probably get a much better test from Kentucky than they got from LSU at that spot. But I also feel like Kentucky is a good warmup for Georgia because they're kind of a Georgia light. Yeah. They don't have the same talent at Georgia, obviously. Hey, Georgia was in a good day, Missouri. I'll tell you what, I mean, I don't want to get on at Georgia, obviously. Hey, Georgia was in a good day. Missouri, I tell you what, I mean, I don't want to get on a tangent. Missouri's a good football team. Missouri's a good football team, and that was a good test for Georgia yesterday,

but yeah, I agree. I mean, you're going against that defense. You're kind of getting a taste of what they're going to, Georgia's going to bring down the road. I think it's going to be similar to what Auburn tries to do as well. I mean, LSU made this simple. We're not letting him beat us deep. And any deep ball he threw was double coverage. Okay? So it was, hey, we're going to see if he can beat us in the middle of the field or with his legs, and he can. And Jalen Milrow might not want to be labeled as a running quarterback,

but I'm definitely calling him a quarterback who can run. There's no doubt. Like, I'm not saying he's just, you know, he's not Tommy Frazier running the option because he can throw the ball too. But, man, when he runs, when he tucks, and a lot of that was just improvised scrambles. I mean, I would not have wanted to have been a defensive coordinator against either of those quarterbacks yesterday.

It was just you couldn't really win. If you brought pressure, you know, you're one-on-one with some great receivers. You're short on the back end. You couldn't really win. If you brought pressure, you know, you're one-on-one with some great receivers. You're short on the back end. If you didn't, you know, I know I saw the reaction and got the text going, spy Daniels, spy Daniels. I'm like, dude, it's not that easy. Yeah, they were trying to spy him. It really depends on whether you get caught inside the tackle box

or outside the tackle box, and daniels just kills you by going the other direction lsu was trying to do the same thing with milro it's hard those are not normal it's not those are not normal athletes they're both hard to tackle uh they're both creative with the way they run um so you know i did get a lot of spy and spy and i'm like they were they're trying yeah the spot's just not as good as this so Tim I'm curious you you cover you know recruiting all through the Southeast and and deal with you know basically National recruiting and so you see the politics of all this I I do want to ask you about another team A&M loses to Ole Miss yesterday it was not a terrible loss like they missed a field goal at the end like they fought they didn't get dominated but as someone who has covered the building of a of a dom of a Dynasty

and that's what A&M wanted they wanted to be competitive in the SEC and for the national title what do you do with Jimbo like what do you do yeah I mean it comes down to simply I I don't think that's working you know I don't think that's a fit I mean Jimbo kind of went out FSU kind of you know was kind of you know limping to the finish line he's had a few moments at Texas A&M, but if I'm a Texas A&M booster, they put a lot of money into that program. They put a lot of money into the NIO and the recruiting. I mean, it wasn't just Nick Saban saying they bought a whole class, and they did. They did. And, hey, it's not illegal.

You know, I still hear people saying they dropped the bag. It's a direct deposit. Right. There's no tip bag on the – There's a 1099 involved. Like, there's paperwork. There's no gym bag on the front porch. It's just eight blue chips.

So I'm not judging them for that. But they went out and they got a ton of kids, best class ever. Most of them left. You know, there's just a lot of problems dealing with that. But I will say I don't think – now, Texas A&M is not a bad football team to me. I think they're a good football team. I think, like you said, they're competitive. They were competitive with Alabama, competitive with Ole Miss,

who's a top-ten team. But I just don't think that what they want, their investment, I don't think the juice is worth a squeeze at this point. So I think you, you know, you follow Mark Davis with the Raiders, right? You pay $85 million to do a coaching change and you go try to get your guy. I had an agent in the coaching world who represents coaches tell me that,

this was a few weeks ago, Josh McDaniels won't get fired with the Raiders. They would owe him $51 million. And then when he got fired, my mind immediately shifted to Texas A&M. I was like, oh, well, somebody will do it. Well, I think if you get your coach, I don't think Mike Shula was doing a terrible job at Alabama. But when you look at the fact you thought you could get a Nick Saban, you have to make that upgrade.

Texas A&M, I mean, when you're talking strictly football, and I know the SEC fans aren't used to a lot of the stuff that goes with the program, but when you look at them strictly talking football, they've got everything that Texas has. They've got everything that Alabama has and LSU has and Georgia has. They could be that. They've probably got a little bit more when it comes to the NIL. I think they've got some guys that desperately, desperately want to win. When you look at Alabama, you look at the SEC, Alabama, Auburn, all these teams have won in

the last decade or so. They've all got a national championship. They've all had success. Texas A&M has been a while. So I think they're extremely hungry. I think it's similar to Texas, but there's got to be some frustrations there. You brought in Petrino. You thought he had all the answers. And again, they did lose their starting quarterback, but they just can't get over whatever hump. They just can't really get over that hump right now. It's amazing.

So, yeah, I feel like I've got to ask everybody that because I know it sounds crazy in my mind the idea of paying 76 million dollars but it's a lot of money next year the year after that the year after that and the year after that so it's gonna be a lot of money no matter what they might feel he's close to flipping this thing around I mean it's hard to know what a you know I know that rich powerful people usually are rich and powerful for a reason and they're used to getting their way and um again texas indium is not a terrible team they've had some moments of a couple of flips here and there they've won a couple of big ball games but college football is just not for the meek i swear i'm gonna send that man i'm gonna say this yeah they can sit here and there's

not going to be many easy wins you can i looked up yesterday in the early games there's like five game winning or game tying field goals going on at once yes or tv's pulled out i'm like what the heck is going on i mean yeah all those gangs texas we got a coach going for a fourth and four you know we had a we had a bananas game so, so enjoy every win your team gets, man. Enjoy them all. And maybe that's why Nick Saban is enjoying these so much. He may be blowing blood vessels yelling, but he seems to be smiling and laughing after games a lot more often now.

I think he likes his team. I think the recruiting's done well for Alabama. I felt that with last year's class. You know, it's always, you know, Nick Saban's career from a media standpoint is when is he leaving, when is he leaving, when is he leaving, when is he retiring, when is he retiring, when is he retiring. You know, that's what we've dealt with. One rumor after another.

Judging by his actions, I would say he's enjoying life and having success. I mean, there was a lot of talk with Alabama fans that, like, he was starting Milrow. He had lost the team, and they were doing what they were doing. I mean, seriously, there was discussions all over. This is as close, like, because they all say they're tight-knit, but this feels very tight-knit. You see them on the sideline.

If Milrow makes a mistake, if the defense makes a mistake, you can see them coming off the sideline, and bench catches them. High five, head up, coaches get them, all that kind of stuff. It is a close-knit group. And the last Alabama team I remember like that was 2015. Jonathan Allen, Dalvin Tomlinson, A'shaun Robb, they kind of rode herd on everybody else. But this is one, I feel like the DBs kind of set the tone and Milrow on this one. We got, we got,

we can't leave the show without talking about Caleb downs. I mean, come on, man. That's for, I mean, we knew how great he was. I mean, there was no doubt. This guy, first of all, was credible athlete, incredible kid. He had all the tools, but then mentally he was at a different level coaches. I don't know how many times I heard a coach say, incredible kid. He had all the tools, but then mentally he was at a different level. Coaches, I don't know how many times I heard a coach say Caleb was asking about this scheme or Caleb was asking about this or Caleb knew the Bama defense as well as the secondary guys probably did last year while he was in high school. I mean, he was drilling like Charles Kelly and those guys,

he was drilling the DB coaches, but just unbelievable. I think he should be consideration for an All-American, first-team All-American myself, not just freshman. He's been phenomenal. One of my board posters just said he's the first freshman in Alabama history to have 10 tackles in three games. So, hey, that's a mouthful with the defense that's been at Alabama under Saban. Oh, yeah. Well, I'm excited to see what this's been at Alabama under Saban. Oh, yeah. Well, I'm excited to see what this team can be the rest of the way

because they are evolving before our eyes, and it's been fun to watch. Tim, thank you so much. Always, man. Appreciate it. Anytime, Andy. Tim Watts from Bama Online, and that is a fascinating story because, like he said, we're used to seeing Alabama kind of fully formed at the beginning of the season,

but that's just not how it's been. And another thing, it's not fully formed when it comes out, the lines each week. So our friends at FanDuel put out the lines on Sunday for this week's games and already some interesting moves and an epic, epic Rutgers-Iowa total. We'll start with some of the more interesting point spreads. Michigan and Penn State, obviously biggest game of the week. Michigan is favored by five and a half on the road. This feels about right.

They've had kind of a preliminary line on this for the last few weeks. This is about what we expected. Alabama, team we just talked about going to Kentucky. They are a 10 and a half point favorite on the road. This is one where, you know, does Alabama get tripped up between now and the SEC championship game. They only need to win one more to clinch a spot in the SEC championship game, but obviously they would need to beat Kentucky and Auburn and Chattanooga to then get to the SEC championship game with a chance to make the playoff if they win it. So another one, Utah at Washington. Washington's got a tough couple of weeks they get Utah they get Oregon State they're a nine and a half point favorite against Utah at home this started out at 10 dropped a little bit but I you know I think this one will be interesting to see because Oregon

blew out Utah I don't know that Washington defensively is going to hold Utah down as much as Oregon did, but I do think Washington should be able to score plenty on Utah, even though Utah has a very good defense. Ole Miss going to Georgia. Georgia's an 11 and a half point favorite in this game. We saw Missouri cover this past weekend. This feels like another one where the visitor could cover, but Georgia could still wind up with a very good win. So we'll keep an eye on that one. Another one in the SEC that's really interesting, Tennessee at Missouri. This started out as Missouri being favored by a point and a half.

Now Tennessee is favored by a point and a half. So within the last, say, eight or nine hours, it has flipped over, and now Tennessee is a road favorite going to Columbia. That's going to be a fun game. That's going to be a really good game. There's a little history there, and not in a bad way. Josh Heupel's career basically resurrected at Missouri. He'd gotten fired at Oklahoma.

He went to Utah State and did some good things, and then he got to Missouri, and that's where the UCF folks found him, Danny White, the AD who's now his AD at Tennessee. That'll be a fun one. USC at Oregon. Now, this line came out before Alex Grinch got fired, but it hadn't changed much. It's 14 and a half. Oregon's favored. that one feels about right. The one that feels amazing though, the Rutgers Iowa total, I was favored by two and a half points. Who cares about that? 28 and a half is your total. They finally opened it. They opened one under 30. How low can it go? 28 and a half. And of course, I'm going to take the under because the under is seven and two in Iowa games this year.

28 and a half. Unbelievable. Texas and TCU. I believe Texas is a nine point favorite on the road at TCU. This is going to be a big one. We talked to Bobby Burton from Inside Texas about that Longhorns win against K-State on Saturday and how big it is for the program. Going now by Bobby Burton of Inside Texas.

And, Bobby, what a game for Texas. That was a near collapse collapse but they held on and i just i feel like this is a game that we wanted to see texas win for a long time that they have not been able to win for a long time i andy you're not wrong i think myself and you know 100 000 other people in uh dkr on saturday needed a defibrillator by the end of that one. It was back and forth. Texas jumped out to a huge lead, 27-7 at one point. And Kansas State came roaring back, scored a touchdown.

And then on consecutive possessions, Texas turned it over inside their own 30-yard line. Immediate scores by the Wildcats, and all of a sudden, it's a tie ball game thanks to a missed extra point. And it looked like a game that was well in hand for the Longhorns, and then the fourth quarter happened and crazy stuff. Yeah, it was interesting because Malik Murphy, who's the backup quarterback who's playing in place of Quinn Ewers, looked amazing for a quarter. And then K-State takes that extra player out of the box, says,

we'll let you run for whatever you want to run for. But this dude's got to beat us with his arm. And boy, it changed everything. It absolutely did. That's a great description of what exactly happened. He was seven and nine out of the gate, 150 or so. The rest of the way, he averaged roughly three yards per pass, which as you and I know, that's just not winning football. But K-State, credit them. They hung around there. Texas also got a punt

blocked. So it wasn't just Malik Murphy. Jonathan Brooks, who is having a potential All-American season at Texas right now, the running back, he put the ball on the carpet for the first time really in a long time too. So it wasn't just a Malik Murphy situation. It looked like the whole team was imploding. But back to your initial point, Andy, you mentioned this. You said this is a team, a game that Texas normally might lose, right? Because they haven't been there. They're turning the corner a little bit. They're eight and one. Steve Sarkeesian's 14 and four in his last 18 games they're they're becoming a winning team and a winning program a lot of that

has to do with personnel of course but it's it's interesting yeah well it's very interesting because it's it's what they needed to to get past you know you've got to be able to win the games you're supposed to win and this is one that they were favored but only slightly kansas state came in as one of the hottest teams in the country and you knew you'd get the counter punch at some point from k-state and texas did not play its best game like if you look at what the score should have been i mean it's 27-7 it probably should have been 41-7 at that point texas didn't play its best and it still beat a good team and i feel like that is a a big step that they've needed to take for a little while with its backup quarterback yeah i mean texas won this game with its backup quarterback and you're

right at case day we talked about was hot they their last two games in the big 12 they had won 82 to 3 a combined score. They were super hot. You know what, though? I think Texas right now has the best defensive line in the Big 12, Andy. They shut down the K-State run game. They suffocated it. Listening to Will Howard post-game, he's like,

we gave up trying to run. Tavondre's sweat was unstoppable yesterday. Just absolutely unstoppable. Absolutely. I mean, he's, he's earning money. I mean, I talked to somebody inside the building yesterday about that. And you know, he is, he is literally at this point in time pushing himself into a potential first round grade. And this is a guy that probably would have been a fifth to seventh round pick a year ago. Right. And so he's moving that direction. They also a fifth to seventh round pick a year ago right um

and so he's moving that direction they also have Byron Murphy's having a great year as well that defensive front uh really made the Wildcats pay on Saturday and didn't allow a top five rushing offense in Kansas State to even get off get started I think they had 39 yards rushing total yeah yeah it was the first game without 100 all all season. So it was, it was interesting. And now you look at Texas's situation and obviously it was a scoreboard watching day in the big 12 because you had Kansas beat Iowa state, which knocked Iowa state out of that first place tie. And then whoever won Bedlam was going to be tied with Texas. And it was Oklahoma State, which I'm sure makes all the Texas fans very, very happy. So now they're in a situation where if they hold serve,

they're playing for the Big 12 title, a potential playoff berth, all of that good stuff. But we saw what can happen at the end of that game. They've got to avoid that. So how do they avoid that against TCU and against Iowa state and Texas tech turnovers? I mean, really Texas, Texas turned the ball over three times. A couple of really bad ones. The Malik Murphy interception gave,

gave K state the ball at the 12 yard line. I also think they need to start finishing drives, Texas. The there they've had some issues in the red zone that are well-documented. They tried to go for it again inside, I think it was the 11-yard line this time, instead of inside the 10. It came up, had a play malfunction on them and didn't score. And so Steve Sarkeesian's got to start getting in the end zone on some of these drives. But I'm telling you you now and sark has been talking

about this not only is the team resilient um andy they've all been also been versatile they've won games with defense they've won it with offense they've won it with special teams and they're starting to show off some depth they they started a redshirt freshman offensive lineman on Saturday. It was his first extended action of the year. He came in for a guy that's going to be all Big 12, and no sacks, right? Texas gave up no sacks in that game. And so their depth is being tested right now. And, you know, the coming flu are pretty good, pretty flying colors, I would say.

I mean, it's just my thought on the Big 12 as a whole right now, to your greater point is, look, Oklahoma State, what a tremendous coaching job by Mike Gundy. I'm not so sure he didn't self-sabotage early in the year, trying three different quarterbacks. Once he's gone to Allen and Bowman, he's been terrific. Colin Oliver's been a revelation of sorts for them. But, I mean, I will say this.

The non-pass interference call on Drake Stoops was, look, you could be a Texas fan and say, my God, that's pass. Yeah. It happened to Texas, too, with Xavier Worthy twice. The Big 12 leaves a lot to be desired in officiating, in my personal opinion. But I look at it and Oklahoma State has a, I don't want to say a cakewalk, but if you look at their schedule. It's about as easy as it can be.

Yeah. You and I are on the same page. You and I, we're of one mind there texas is a little bit different at tcu at iowa state back to back finish with texas tech those are three quasi-talented quasi-good teams you don't know what you're necessarily going to get that given saturday from them from those opponents but add in the fact that Malik Murphy's turning the ball over like he is and we don't know when Quinn yours is coming back or what the timeline might be that it's uh there's a little uh I don't want to say um trepidate I guess trepidation is the

right word uh about it yeah fans so that Oklahoma State, for those who don't know, at UCF, at Houston, BYU, all new to the Big 12 teams. None of the new to the Big 12 teams have been good in Big 12 play this year. Basically, most of their wins are against one another. They're not beating the established Big 12 teams. So we'll see what happens with that. But you mentioned Quinn Ewers. He's got the AC joint injury. That's one of those that is a weird one in terms of healing time

and everybody's different. When do you think he might be back? I think it's possible he's back against TCU. Okay. I think it's possible. He was throwing in practice last week. Now, what does that really mean, right? I mean, was he throwing 10-yard know, was he throwing 10-yard passes

or was he throwing 25-yard passes? Was he stepping into it or was he just flicking? I mean, you know exactly what I'm talking about there. We don't know. And I will say this. I would not be surprised if someone like Arch Manning, if Quinn Uris can't go, if Steve Sarkeesian doesn't look at Arch Manning at some point during that game against DCU, because Malik Murphy had two interceptions

on Saturday, probably should have had four. I mean, they were in and out of K-State defenders and two other times. And so it's a precarious situation for Texas right now. Yeah. Although the Arch situation, if if you had to you could still red shirt him because probably get yours back before like even if you make Arch the starter you're gonna get yours back at some point and you can keep Arch under four games but at Iowa State seems to be the the trickiest one that location that team that you know, it's been a problem for Texas over the years. So that's the one I would circle as, hey, you probably want to have him back if you can by then. I would agree with you. And if you remember correctly, in Steve Sarkeesian's first year,

it was the game at Iowa State where Texas defensive line coach Bo Davis. Oh, yeah. State where Texas defensive line coach Bo Davis, he let it rip on how he felt about some guys and how they weren't necessarily buying into team. That's a return trip to Ames, and Ames at night, not easy. I think Texas knows that. We'll see if it's a night game after all, but Andy, you're not wrong about what you're saying the idea though that this is TCU's last shot at Texas I would say it doesn't necessarily have that that uh kind of thought process but Texas Tech with all of what went on in the preseason with Brett Yormark and the associate commissioner of the Big 12 as well.

You know, I can't tell you that there's not some animosity there. I know for a fact, Kirby Hokut would, you know, probably give Joey McGuire a raise if he just beat Texas, because all the wolves would be off of his back, that's for sure. Well, the target will be on the Longhorns' back because if Oklahoma State can rally through, then one of the remaining teams is going to play in the Big 12 championship game. I'm sure they would like it to be two, but Texas would like it to be them winning on the way out.

So we will see what happens. Bobby, thank you so much. Andy, always a pleasure, dude. Best of luck to you. That's Bobby Burton from inside Texas. Longhorns in very good shape. We now move to a program that is not in very good shape at all. The Florida Gators lost a game they could not afford to lose at home in overtime to Arkansas, which snapped the sixth game losing streak. Sam Pittman coming up big after firing his offensive coordinator during the

bye week, elevating Kenny Guyton. Big win for Arkansas. Horrible loss for Florida, which now faces an uphill climb to be bowl eligible. We talked to Nick Del Torre from Gators Online about what the Gators do now, what Billy Napier does now. How do they deal with a situation where the negativity is starting to get overwhelming?

Joined now by Nick Delatore of Gators Online. And Nick, this was pretty much the worst case scenario that we laid out for Florida losing to Arkansas and now needing a win against one of at LSU at Missouri or Florida state at home to become bowl eligible. Yeah. Well, they played really well on the road, uh, over Billy Napier's 22 games. So you probably feel good about LSU or Missouri.

And then there's a playoff team coming in. So, yeah, it's tough for me to say, you know, not say that a bowl game is important because, you know, I'm a proponent of, listen, when it's June, I would love for there to be some bowl games going on. But I get that fans won't get excited for the Duke's Mayo bowl. Please don't come for us. That's a social.

I don't think they rate the Duke's Mayo bowl at six and six. So I think we're talking Birmingham. We're talking tree port, you know, actually, I can't remember if the, I don't even remember if the independence bowl is an sec bowl anymore. So I think they're not,

but, but I can't sit here and tell you that, like, okay, it's not important when I'm also telling you all season long, hey, Florida's really young. They need practice. They need time. Florida needs bowl practices. Last year, because you were in such a bad bowl game,

you didn't even get a chance to use all 15 practices. But you have a five-star quarterback in DJ Lagway that will be able to enroll early in practice. You have a bunch of Eugene Wilson, Jordan Castell, a bunch of freshmen, sophomores who could use the practice. This was your opportunity to secure bowl eligibility and get those games. Now Florida will not be and should not be favored to win any of their next three games. So you had an interesting question to Billy Napier yesterday

because special teams, obviously a huge part of the loss to Arkansas, multiple times, 10 guys lining up on field goal block again. The field goal team running onto the field, causing an illegal substitution penalty, a missed field goal at the end of regulation that would have won the game, a missed extra point that would have probably caused them to win the game had they made it. And here's what you asked Billy Napier about special teams and his answer. Billy, the special teams unit has pretty much consistently had issues, whether it's been

procedural or otherwise. What can you do this late in the season to help them or fix that? And at the end of the season, do you have to look at changing the operation completely there? Well, specifically, what are you talking about? Today there was 10 guys for a field goal block, the bad snap, and then the procedural penalty running the guys on, then they've had issues pretty much the entire season. Yeah, I mean, I think that, you know,

we had a few young people today that had opportunities. That's what I would say, you know. We also had some great punt returns today. We had some great kickoff returns today. We covered kicks and punts well today. You know, I think it's important here, and one of the things that I respect about our team, there's a lot of blame to be spread out.

You know, and in this game in particular, I think we're going to look back at all parts of our team. Every single thing that we do gets evaluated. We make mistakes that have nothing to do with the opponent. Those are the things that we specifically try to correct. So there's no question what you're talking about is part of our process. And ultimately it comes down to doing the best you can do for the players. We have a responsibility to do the best we can do for the players.

So there are things on offense and defense that we can do well today as well. So it's all under evaluation. And I think in particular for me, things that have nothing to do with the opponent, those are the things that you need to get fixed. If this were an episode of Seinfeld, that would be the big word salad, Nick. Because he keeps talking about stuff

that has nothing to do with the opponent and that's what you need to fix. That's what you were asking. You were asking why haven't you fixed this yet and they haven't yeah he caught me off guard uh with you know what specifically i was like today or the entire season how much time do we have yeah the list you gave was pretty pretty thorough and then you're like well would you like me to go back through the other games? Yeah, I was just like, I can come better prepared on Monday. You know, you have to help the players. Is hiring an on-field coach helping the players?

When you're saying, and I don't think this was Billy Naber's intention, but when you're saying, we had a player think he heard a word, and that signaled him to run on the field and they ran on the field. Well, then my question follow up to that would be the play before you had a timeout and then you ran. So who's your coach for special teams to be in the offensive huddle to say, hey, if we get a first down, the clock stops. And then this is what we're going to do. You don't have a coach. You have a graduate assistant and an analyst who can't.

By the letter of the law coach on the yeah i was gonna say can i can i add can i make a cynical point here yeah the cynical part of me says the whole plot that there's a player in charge of that signal and and all that well you have to say that because you can't say there's an analyst in charge of it yes um but it's to put the players in the best position. Are you doing that? And listen, you should have good punt coverage. You should have good kick coverage. You should also have 11 people on the field goal block team.

That would help every time. That would help. What about 11 different jersey numbers on the field at the same time they seem to have gotten that part i think most peewee teams do as well um it was perplexing to me his response of you know clutching my pearls whatever do you mean special teams problems so well and that's that's the issue he seems to have he seems to have lost the, uh, the PR battle here, which like, if you're not winning, you're going to lose the PR battle. But at a certain point, you just gotta be like, our young players are playing pretty well. Like Eugene Wilson was

great yesterday, but they, they seem to not understand that they're not inspiring any confidence. But I am wondering, what can he say? Because that's part of what I think is the issue is he can't come out and say, I'm going to hire an offensive coordinator to call the plays next year. I'm going to hire a special teams coach. We're probably not going to have two offensive line coaches. He can't say any of that right now. Yeah, you can say, of that right now. Yeah.

You can say, yes, we are evaluating it. We think it's been a rough patch and that kind of leads you down the direction. We think this has been a weakness and we will evaluate that. Yeah. You're not saying, Hey, we're firing people. Heads are rolling, but you're saying, yes, I acknowledge what the fans, it lets, it lets the fans know fans know hey we hear you we also agree

with you and we will make those changes and instead i think you know if i'm the pr if i'm billy's pr guy um we're leaving that press conference and i'm saying hey man we we did not do well there we talked about what what we learned from having people speak to us in practice after losing to a team that was 2-6. That's not what people wanted to hear at that moment. Whether it's true or not, I think it is true. You hope that they learn something from that. But I'm not talking about that at a podium to a group of angry fans

minutes after losing a game. So I don't think it was a great press conference in terms of answers. He doesn't really give great press conferences, but like you said, it doesn't matter if you're winning games. They're just not winning games. 11-11 after 22, it's just not cutting it. So he can't say, and like you said, he won't say, I'm firing myself as play caller and we'll figure it out.

But those are moves that you have to make and you have to be critical after the season. I was reading your message board, Gators, online, and I will say it seems like the fan base is pretty understanding of the situation because there's not a lot of just fire Billy stuff out there because they realistically can't. So $32 million buyout, 50% of it due upfront.

So unless you've got $16 million in cash laying around, and then you've got the added part of, at what point do you stop just running on the treadmill of fire the coach, fire the coach, fire the coach, fire the coach, fire the coach. Well, firing him this year would be super cool because then you'd be paying Dan Mullen and Billy and your new coach. So you'd be paying three coaches at the same time, two of them not to coach your team. I don't think Billy is in danger of being fired. And I think credit to our message board, we've been championing all year, whether Billy liked

my question or not, we've been championing all year, whether Billy liked my question or not, we've been championing all year. The best players on this team have been brought in by this coaching staff. And it's time. And you're going to have to be patient. There's going to be growing pains. And like I said on the show the last time I was here, knowing that there's growing pains doesn't make the growing pains feel good in real time.

And I don't think losing to Arkansas is one of the expected growing pains feel good real time. And I don't think losing to Arkansas is one of the expected growing pains. No, fans were ready for no an Arkansas team that just lost seven three to Mississippi State. Now granted, they made an offensive coordinator change. And it worked out better for them. But right, this this was the one they were supposed to win. This is the one we kind of circled as if they lose this one, uh-oh, that's a big problem. And there are some excuses, which people will call them. As a defensive coordinator looking for tendencies and patterns, Kenny Guyton had never called plays, had never ran an offense. There are no tendencies. There are no patterns.

I said before the game, you're going to have to adjust in game, maybe even come out with just a base defense and have to adjust and figure things out. They did not. Arkansas had 481 yards. If you're looking for a pattern from the guy who doesn't have a history, perhaps he'll try to do what his players do best, and that's kind of what he did.

He's like, oh, KJ Jefferson is very big and runs fast. Maybe I'll let him run the ball. Yeah, and I guess you could have gone back to Bryles, and he coached under Bryles. What did Arkansas's offense look like under that? To me, you know, it was like Herman Boone and remember the titans it was like hey we've got six plays we're just gonna run them give them time they work like novacane and it was like hey we have a gigantic quarterback who's big strong and fast let's run him oh and by the way we get

an all-american level running back yes that that rocket sanders return was was the other thing and then florida had injuries on the d-line. Like, the perfect storm was brewing. You could feel it. But it doesn't make it any less frustrating. But I just wonder, you know, what can Florida do? What can Billy Napier and company do these next few weeks? Because they're going to LSU. Now, they might not see Jaden Daniels.

We don't know about that. If Doug Nussmeier's son beats the Florida Gators, if Doug Nussmeier's son beats the Florida Gators, it might break the fan base. You might, you might actually hope for Jaden Daniels to play. Hadn't thought about that. Garrett Nussmeier, son of former offensive coordinator at Florida, Doug Nussmeier under Jim McElwain. Wow. Boy, the psychic hits just keep coming. There's never a dull moment covering the Florida Gators, Andy. Nick, we'll talk again soon.

That's Nick Delatore from Gators Online. Yeah, a lot of what Ron Zook liked to call noise in the system with Florida they are heading to LSU we'll see if they do wind up facing a Garrett Nussmeier led LSU team what does that mean for LSU what does that mean for Jaden Daniels

Heisman candidacy we'll find all that out it is going to be another action packedpacked week. Who knows what Monday will bring? But I suspect there's going to be some news, and we've got some picks. Our friend Max Olson from The Athletic will join us as our special guest picker.

Got that juicy, juicy 28 and a half. Rutgers, Iowa, baby. I can't wait. What a week. This is going to be.