Andy & Ari On3 - Why Kalani Sitake STAYED at BYU over Penn State: Building the Cougars into a Big 12 power

Episode Date: July 10, 2026

As Andy & Ari spent this week at Big 12 Media Days, the guys were able to catch up with BYU head coach Kalani Sitake in Frisco, Texas. Losing to Texas Tech a year ago in the Big 12 Championship, Sitake believes the Cougars are on the verge of a championship. Can BYU really capture a title? Kalani Sitake stayed at BYU because he believes the Cougars can. Watch here as Sitake explains why he wants to be similar to Texas Tech and why he chose to stay in Provo over a blue blood program.   (0:00) On Today’s Episode (0:53) Presenting Sponsor (2:55) Intro: Previewing Kalani (10:08) Kalani Sitake joins (12:40) RB LJ Martin on staying at BYU (13:54) Competition in Big 12 (20:23) Staying at BYU (25:28) Closing out: Dragons and Fullbacks (26:49) Recapping Andy & Ari’s interview with Kalani Sitake (30:17) Dear Andy & Ari: ACC & the 24-team CFP (40:41) Bryce Underwood expectations year two (48:31) Yahoo!’s College Fantasy Football (50:33) Why aren’t goal posts longer? (54:37) Ranking the TOP alternate uniforms (57:07) Alternate Uniforms: #5 (59:21) Alternate Uniforms: #4 (1:02:03) Alternate Uniforms: #3 (1:04:40) Alternate Uniforms: #2 (1:06:38) Alternate Uniforms: #1 (1:11:03) Closing Out - See you next week!   After the Kalani Sitake interview, the guys dive into the mailbag and answers this week’s Dear Andy & Ari questions. They include….   Why is the ACC vocally supporting the 24-team CFP?   Can you predict Michigan’s record based on a potential Bryce Underwood statline?     Thanks for watching! See you tomorrow!   Send your questions to: [e-mail] [e-mail]   Our show is also presented by BetMGM!   If you haven’t signed up for BetMGM yet, use bonus code CFB and you will get up to a $1500 First Bet Offer on your first wager with BetMGM! Here’s how it works:   1. Download the BetMGM app and sign-up using bonus code CFB. 2. Deposit at least $10 and place your first wager on any game. 3. You will receive up to $1500 in bonus bets if your bet loses! Just make sure you use bonus code CFB when you sign up!   Make this college football season one for the history books. Make it legendary.   See BetMGM.com for Terms. 21+ only. This promotional offer is not available in DC, Mississippi, New York, Nevada, Ontario, or Puerto Rico. Gambling problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or 1-800-MY-RESET (Available in the US) . 877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), 1-800-327-5050 (MA), 1-800-BETS-OFF (IA), 1-800-981-0023 (PR). First Bet Offer for new customers only (if applicable). Subject to eligibility requirements. Rewards are non-withdrawable bonus bets that expire in 7 days. In partnership with Kansas Crossing Casino and Hotel   Check out Zen AI here: http://bit.ly/zenAI_bpp_itf   Join On3 today! https://www.on3.com/join   Watch our show on YouTube! https://youtu.be/bmLylQQukQA   Hosts: Andy Staples, Ari Wasserman Producer: River Bailey   Interested in partnering with the show? Email [e-mail] Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

On today's episode of Andy Orion 3 presented by BetMGM, BYU head coach Kalani Sataki joins the show. This is a guy who had a chance to go to Penn State last year, stayed at his alma mater, where he plans to do some very big things. And they're going to probably give him some more resources to do that. Is it going to be everything Texas Tech has? Maybe not.

But the team that finished second in the Big 12 last year has designs on winning the conference title this year. Plus, your questions answered, including a really interesting hypothetical about Bryce Underwood and Michigan. Also, we will rank the top alternate uniforms in college football, all today on Andy and Orion 3, presented by BetMGM.

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days in partnership with Kansas Crossing Casino and Hotel. Welcome to Andy and Arion 3 presented by BetMGM. Got a fun one for everybody today, Ari. Kalani Sataki from BYU. Really fun interview. He is, he's just a good dude. This is the guy who walks the walk. Like these, you hear these coaches talk about all,

loyalty, loyalty, loyalty. And they're like, these players, they have no way. They're like, no, no, no. These coaches, most of them have no loyalty. Kalani Sataki, he's, the guy who stayed. Yeah. Yeah.

A sneaky funny guy, by the way. I don't know if you agree with that, but like, I know people probably don't view him as funny, but like maybe it was just because of the interactions that we were having with him off camera, but it seems like a good hang too. But, you know, I do think that as people will see in the interview here, Andy, that, you know, some teams in the Big 12 are working with more money than others. And, you know, I wouldn't consider BYU as one of the teams that's hopeless in terms of financially compensating people.

No, BYU is doing our right. Right. Like, yeah, they don't, they're not getting funded the way Texas Tech is getting funded, but they're getting funded pretty well. But if you're going to get hit with a sales pitch from somebody that basically is just going for the most amount of money won't fulfill you, you might want to hear it from somebody that could have been Penn State's head coach right now if he cared about money a lot. So, like, I think that like, you know, walking the walk of what you do is important. And obviously he's been a BYU guy through and through his whole life and played there and all those things. and I think that there's something to be said about staying somewhere that you know you're happy and comfortable. And, you know, I can't even remember, Andy, if he said this on the interview or if he said it to us, you know, off camera. But, you know, he might have gone had, you know, BYU not been committed in his eyes to giving him the resources needed to get over the hump and beat Texas Tech and win the Big 12.

And clearly he thinks BYU is committed enough to not only want to be pretty good, but to be great. And that's an exciting thing to hear Because I think that as the one thing That I think that you could say about college football now, Andy, That wasn't true five years ago for a positive Is that there are more places more willing to go all in To be good than there were before. And I think that you put BYU in the willing category.

Yeah, I don't know that they're all the way there yet. They are in basketball. They had A.G. DeBonsa, who was the number one pick in the NBA draft this past draft. And he might have. had the biggest salary. I don't want to call it NIL deal anymore because some of it's coming from the, you know, the reps here. He might have had the biggest salary. Income. College basketball player. Yeah. Yeah. And maybe of any college athlete last year. So it's not like

BYU is not interested in doing this stuff. They are. And I think with Kalani Sataki, the one thing you talk to him, you realize, okay, I'm sure he got a raise when he turned down Penn State. I'm sure it was more important, though, to get. the resources for staff, the resources for players, than his own salary. Yeah. And I think that, like, obviously, you know, resources for things outside of just paying money directly to players is an important thing. There's no question. But, you know, you want to hear from your administration

that they're willing to do it in any way that you see fit, right? Because when you have an offer from Penn State, that's the other thing that you, you know, you have to take into account. not that, you know, they can pay you more money directly. It's that you know if you go there, they're going to do everything they can to win a national championship. And they're all competitors. I mean, that's what they're in this game for. So, you know, I think BYU clearly isn't going to be, you know, head to head with a premier big 10 team in terms of financial investment in totality. But whatever they told him, obviously, was enough for him to believe that he could get over the hump there.

Yeah. No Texas Tech in the regular season for BYU. they do open conference play with a visit from Arizona week two. That's going to be a fun one. They go to TCU. Remember, they add that Notre Dame game. Notre Dame comes to Provo because USC dropped Notre Dame from the schedule. So Notre Dame very quickly had to add the best opponent it could add.

That opponent was BYU. So you got Notre Dame, BYU, and Provo on October 17th. And I've said this a bunch of times on the show. If there had been a BYU Notre Dame game last year, the winner of that game would have made the playoff. Yeah, for sure. And I was about to make a point about how the fact that they don't play Texas Tech could make it a possibility for the Big 12 to be a two-bid league.

I was on Feinbaum on Thursday afternoon, and they asked me about Big 12 and being a too big lead and what would have to happen. And like them missing them, BYU missing Texas Tech in the regular season would have been a potential interesting thought because if BYU never lost a tech in the regular season last year we might have had to have a second conversation about what would have happened if they were both undefeated and yeah i mean the reason b yu got left out is because the the two texas tech games looked exactly the same yes it they got beat in the same way they didn't ever really have a chance in that game so that's what b yu has to do better when we're showing pictures of bear bachmire

who this time last year true freshman hadn't been through spring practice with b yu he'd actually been at Stanford. So they have Notre Dame. So the point I was going to make is moot because if they lose by 100 to Notre Dame and then they lose the Big 12 championship game. I don't know if that changes anything, but being a too lost team. Yeah. But if they're competitive against Notre Dame, then all of a sudden you're having

a different discussion. Yeah. And I do think that there is something to be gained. And I know that we're BYU, certainly Kalani Sataki is not somebody who's going to be taking any moral victories or, you know, doing. Oh, here's another one though, Ari. If they beat Notre Dame. and they do drop another game, you know, in conference play,

they make the conference championship game, but then they lose the conference championship game. If they're sitting there at 11 and 2, having lost the conference championship game, and have a winning against Notre Dame, they're in the playoffs. They're probably in the playoff. Yeah, it's an opportunity.

Two-Bid league. Yeah, no, it's certainly an opportunity, but what I was going to say, Andy, is I do believe, too, that if BYU would have played Notre Dame last year and lost by three, then we would have been having different conversations about them at the end of the year,

even if they lost Texas Tech twice. So, like, I do, like, Kalani Sataki is not a glass, half full moral victory guy after losing, but I think from a college football playoff committee standpoint, playing a very closely contested game against a team that you think is national championship caliber is something to behold for them. So I think it's a great opportunity. And frankly speaking, we talked about this earlier in the off season. It'd be really fun to see BYU and Notre Dame play every year.

I think that would be a great rivalry. It would be. I still want Notre Dame USC back. But if they want also at BYU, Yeah, both. By all means, please do. So let's talk to Kalani Sataki because he's one of the most interesting guys in college football and one of the best coaches in college football here is the BYU coach Kalani Sataki. We are joined out by BYU coach Kalani Sataki. And great year last year. And I'm thinking about when we saw you here last year. This was, your quarterback situation was still very much up in the air. Bear Bachmeier had come to you in the Spring Portal, but, I mean, you had no idea what that was going to look like.

How surprised were you at how well you guys played last season? I thought the, I thought we had a great thing going already, and we had a good nucleus to work with. Just need to know who the quarterback was going to be. It happened to be a true freshman that wasn't there for us in January, but was there in June, so we had to kind of work and work with him along during the season. So I think what you saw at the end of the year, the bowl game was probably what we would like to have, a little bit more stability and a little bit more time. But I was just thankful that our players and everybody bought into just getting him ready.

And, you know, guys had to sacrifice their own personal stats for the team's sake. I think it worked out the way it's supposed to, but there's still a lot of work for us to do and a lot of things for us to accomplish. But I was really proud of the way the guys came together and the connection, the camaraderie that we saw from the boys, but the leadership that we saw as well. As you were sitting here last year before fall camp starts in dealing with that situation, that transition, you know, he was already there, but you hadn't been in fall camp yet. What did you think was, you would have said, would have defined success for you last year? Like what were you, I mean, maybe coaches don't think that way, but it seems like you guys really overachieved in comparison to what we would have thought. Well, I think for me, it's the goal is to get them to play at their best, and can I do it 12 times? That's the goal.

And so I think we, you know, we did it quite a bit, and did we do it for 60 minutes? I don't know if we did that in the game yet. So there's a lot for me to aim at and for me to improve on as a head coach. And so my goal is to try to get that going. And I think if we can get our team to play the best 12 times, I think we have a good chance, you know. But that's, I don't control the other 15 teams in our conference. And I know that it's a huge task, but I'm not really worried about the result as much as I am, the journey of getting them ready and making sure that we take advantage of the work that needs to take place in the buildup for the season.

So L.J. Martin said today that he came back to win a championship, that he feels like the ingredients are there on this team to do that. You mentioned earlier that you wouldn't have returned if you didn't think that BYU was good enough to win. When you do that inventory personally and try to decide, is this team good enough? How do you do that? How do you come to that decision? Yeah, I look at guys like this who are coming back for another year. I like at groups.

I look at our whole lot. You know, everyone else said it's coming back and I'm just like, I don't see why we can't win. What do you have to do now to make sure that those employees? are utilized properly, that people don't lose track of the process and start thinking the results. I guess I just can't mess it up, you know? These guys, they came here for a reason. And so, you know, as long as I keep my focus on what I think we can get done and accomplish, it's going to require a lot of work, but it's everything coming together.

And our staff, myself, and us doing our part, I think the players are ready to do their part. So it really is on us as coaches and on me as a head coach to get them ready. The thing that I've just admired about you and your program is that if you're in a close game, it always feels like you're going to win. And you guys have had a pretty good track record the last few years of winning very close games. How do you think you've been able to do that? I mean, some of them have been thrilling, improbable wins. Like how do you guys find a way to consistently win the coin toss? Well, trust me, I don't want to win close ones.

I mean, I love the close ones, but I like a blowout win, too. So I don't mind having comfortable wins. It just speaks to the competition in our conference and who are going against our schedule. So it's really difficult, but at least our guys are bought into going to the very end, you know, and they don't give up their, they don't give up on the belief that we can have a chance to come back and win games. Even the ones that we lost, we felt like we had a shot. And then what great teams do like Texas Tech is they find ways to put an end to it. So the goal is for us to try to take that next step and be like them, where you can kind of,

you know, kind of impose your will a little bit. And that's hard. That's easier said than done. But my goal is to get them to be at their best. I think we did that enough last year where people could say it was a success. But me and myself as a head coach, I'm like, I don't know if I did that enough to earn those big-time victories and to have secure win early in the game. So there's something that we've got to aim for.

But also, we have to be ready to just, if you're in it at the end, that means you have a shot to play and a shot to win the game. Our goal is to just try to be in it and try to have a chance to win. And it just so happened that a lot of them were close games. You're a coach. I'm a podcaster, but I'll be honest with you. And you said, we want to be more like Texas Tech. The thing that popped into my head was, well, how do you do that financially?

Is there a way to be like Texas Tech if you aren't getting that type of investment? Well, I think for me it's what makes us unique. I meant about Texas Tech about them making the leap and the jump. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And, you know, finishing games, things like that. So there's a way we can be like that and that. But I'm not going to follow the same system that they did. We're going to be the best BYU we can be,

which means that I have to be flexible and I have to be innovative and how to get this team to show up in that championship game again next year or this year and to perform better. So I'm looking at all the little intricacies and things that we can do differently to get us there. And usually it doesn't require just following the same. If I want to try to compete against Texas Tech by trying to be them in every facet of the program, it's not going to work through. They're better themselves than I can be.

But there's some really cool things that we feel like we can pattern. to see the success. I mean, they have a great culture, too. They thrive on momentum. So if I could take some of those things that we learned, and we learned it from real-life experience. We saw it when games, how they react to some adversity and how they gain momentum,

and they put the game it in. They put it to bed right away, you know. And that's not an easy thing to do, but that's something that we can learn from the experience of it all. You know, a lot of coaches would look at the situation at BYU and say, you're asking these students to live a different type of life than necessarily others and other schools can. It's a recruiting disadvantage.

You've never made that excuse once. It seems like you've found a way to use everything that, every advantage that VYU can create. How did you do that? Well, I can work with guys that want to be there for all the right reasons that. And I played there, so I know exactly what that place can do for you. And so it's staff and players. It can attract the right people, and I just need to put them in a position where they can have success, meaning staff, keep them there, and then find ways to see that they value their livelihood,

and then for the players the same thing, and see that they actually see the growth and the progress they've made. It's usually kind of piggybacking off of what they've already learned at home. And so I'm taking the same path that their parents set them on and saying, hey, you can stay on the same path, and with a little bit more discipline, you can do it even better and have a great college experience because I know I went through it. I did the same exact thing. And you can have some awesome experiences on the field, too. So I think there's a – maybe it's a different way of thinking, but if the only answer to things is like money, then that's kind of boring, you know, then the teams that spend the most money in Major League Baseball

should win the pennant every year. Same thing with basketball. same thing with everything. So there's a little bit, there's a different mix that comes to it when it comes to competitive sports and team sports. And the ultimate team sport, which is when we're looking at it is football.

And so there's a lot of different nuances of the game. I want to highlight those things that can separate us and be a strength for us. How do you handle being the head coach and doing X's and O's and development and being a team guy versus, you know, the financial. aspect of this? How do you separate those two things and how do you approach it in your program?

Yeah, I have a front office and a general manager and they handle the money part of it. I am not good at being a general manager. I am a coach. And so I don't want to look at the players like they're a price tag. That way I change, if you do that, you change the way you make it, you build a team and the way they compete. So I want guys that compete and they earn the spot and they get to be on the field and the money does no factor in all of it. Now, maybe I'm wishing for the best of both worlds, but that's just how it is. If this is all about money, guys, all of us would be somewhere different. All three of us would be somewhere else, you know, so there's a reason why we're sitting

here in this position. It usually can be built around passion and ambition and goals, and so we're trying to build all of this together, and that's what I'm trying to do at BYU. you. And I think it's working so far. It has been perfect. No. And that's where I come in as a head coach and a leader. I've got to figure out a way so that we can highlight our skills and make even more strengths and trying to build a juggernaut. And part of that is highlighting, emulating what other people can do well. And how can that be the same? How can we do something similar? And how can we actually make it our own and have it become part of our identity?

Interesting that you say it the way you did because not nine months ago, there was a blue blood program that was very interested in you, and you elected to stay at BYU. And I guess that's a long way of asking, what's your favorite flavor of crumble cookie? Yeah, I mean, I think crumbull gets a lot of credit for that, but we have a bunch of people that invested a lot of time and money and energy into BYU football. And so I think the key for me was, is BYU going to make football a priority? And do they want me here for the long term? That was a goal. And they stepped up and said, yeah, they do. They want me to retain my staff and do they want me to retain my players?

I mean, we don't have to be, I said it before, we don't have to be the highest bidder. But my job is a show of players where they can see themselves thriving. And it usually doesn't mean that you get the top signing class. I don't know. I mean, that's, value comes in a lot of different shapes and forms. And, you know, I have to show them that the compensation at BYU is a little bit different, but also it's a long withstanding. It's something that can be there for a long, long time. And to have these young men avoid just thinking about the here and now and the instant gratification and think that there's more to it and there's more to the experience of college football.

I think that can, I think it can work. I mean, we're close. Are we there yet? No, but I, I think we're turning the right direction. I feel like a lot of coaches can say something like that, but then the player or the player's mom can do a Google search and figure out that that's not how the coaches really lived professionally. When you say that, it's true. I mean, it feels like that's a little bit of a differentiating factor. Well, yeah, I mean, I understand the appeal for other places

and the money and all that stuff, and it sounds great. But I don't know if I can. can be the best version of myself doing it that way. This is what I love, it's about the passion I have for BYU. But there's also a lot of really cool moments where we haven't been in a conference like this for a long time, ever. And so now we're in the Big 12. Things are moving at a fast rate. And so the discussion is, do you guys want this to fly or do you want to just be happy with being in the conference? And it's football a priority like other sports have been. BYU, you know, so it was pretty simple for me to ask that question and for them to show it.

And I think that, you know, for a long time, BYU football has been something that we've always trying to over, you know, we're overperforming and we're exceeding expectations. At some point, it's like we need a little bit more help. And it just might just be a few players that can get us there and maybe a few of the different resources that allow our players to see themselves in different areas of. whether it's sports science or strength and conditioning or mentoring. There's a lot of really cool things out there that can help our players. You know, one of the biggest off-season discussion points was the deliberations of the

College Football Playoff Committee, how their process goes. And I think that if you were to poll a large portion of the BYU fan base, they would feel as if that BYU was mistreated or mis-evaluated by the committee last year. What was your viewpoint on the college football playoff selection process and how that all played out? with the two losses of the same team as a champion? Yeah, I mean, I'm not in the business of complaining about stuff and whining. So if anyone knows anything about me, I'm not going to campaign or complain. I can just say that the system is asking if they want to add more teams, I'm all for it.

But if the committee has selected those 12, then so be it. That's just the rules, that's how it is. It's got to be hard being in the committee knowing that you're going to make enemies and make some people upset. And so I have a little bit of, you know, sympathy for them. So I know the difficulty it has been in that. But I didn't get here worrying about what I didn't have and what it wasn't given to me and what I felt was justified and owed to me.

I got to where I'm at right now because of hard work and belief and love from others. And so I'm going to lean on that and lean on the chance that these guys want to get better and want to find ways to perform and do it for the fans rather than, You know, it's like all your energy on one thing, and then what happens when you get there? So the journey is just as much fun as the accomplishment, but it's going to require a lot of discipline, require a lot of sacrifice, and we have to see if we're willing to do that. Your running back was asked the same question today. It's been a hot button issue, if you can believe it.

He answered similarly, so it seems like they're running off. Yeah. Hey, these guys are rubbing off on me. I wish I can say that I'm this, great. mentor to them but we work together I'm a better person because I get to coach great young men and so I mean I'm learning from them as much as they're they're learning from me it was a give-and-take and we're doing this together as a partnership and so I'm I just wish I could play with these guys man listen I didn't have a problem playing with the guys that I played with but these guys are in the

big 12 I was in the whack in the mountain west you know and nothing against those comments have you explained to them what a fullback was yeah it's like a dragon they don't don't see it unless they watch a movie once in a while. But, yeah, it's, it's, you know, you ask what a fullback is. It's just the guy that was probably too short to be an O-Liaman. But BYU plays like the whole team's a full-back. Yeah. Yeah.

I mean, if the head coach is going to be a full-back, then we're going to, I have full-backs all over the place. They're just playing different positions right now. But, yeah, it's a, it's a, we'll have to revitalize that position back again. I think I used the full-back this year as an O-Liaman, so. You know, I'm just any way to try to highlight. Colorado's bringing two back back to the Big 12, so why not? Well, we have two backs. I mean, it's, I was a tailback to begin with.

And I remember, you know, Norm Chow's offensive coordinator. I said, I thought you brought me here to play tailback. And they said, yeah, you're the tailback that lines up in front of the other tailback. So you're both tailbacks. There you go. Like, all right, sounds good to me. Kalani, thank you so much. You guys have been here.

Thank you so much. That was awesome. Thank you. I do love that line about the fullback. You may as well be trying to explain a dragon to them. I don't, I mean, like, would you consider Cam Scataboo a fullback? Like, I mean, I don't know, like somebody who runs hard. It doesn't really matter if they're lined up close.

No, because I consider a fullback, a guy who's primarily there to block. He's not really there to carry the ball. Now, you know, you had in the old Nebraska triple O, option, you know, Corey Schlesinger on the dive, that sort of thing. But for the most part, those guys were there to block. So that's when I think of a fullback, I think of someone whose primary job is to do the nasty stuff. And then maybe once in a while they get to touch the ball, but not very frequently.

Yeah, but when they touch the ball, it is electric handy. It is. And I'm telling you, bring back the fullback full time on every team. I'm all for it. It's going to happen eventually. You know, they were talking about it in the room at Big 12 about how. you know, the offensive and defensive. Yeah, defenses got really small to deal with spread out offenses.

And when you have, when you go from having 245-pound middle linebackers to 230-pound middle linebackers, well, what's the best thing to do with that? Run a 240-pound guy at the Mike linebacker as a lead blocker and then run somebody else behind him with the ball. Like that. That's how you saw that. It's a pendulum. I'm just waiting for somebody to come out in 2027 in the wing T.

it'd be hard to defend. I don't know. Well, it depends. It wouldn't be hard for Ohio State or Miami to defend it, but it would be harder if you didn't have superior athletes at every position. That's true. And if you're well coached. Hey, that's why I'm excited about the go-go offense at Colorado.

Two-back offense. The two-back stuff freaks people out now. It used to be the norm. Now it's a change-up to end all change-ups. So I can't wait for that, though. And I want to watch BYU. I want to see how much Bear Bockbriars grown up because he was thrown into a really tough situation last year, and I thought he handled himself very well.

Yeah, it was very tough, too. I think that's the other thing, too, that BYU is just the epitome of tough. And I think that what they lack in athletic ability, maybe from top to bottom of maybe when they play other teams that are just freakier, that they have been able to win those close games because they really are tough. And it was pretty cool to see a true freshman come in there and just like epitomize what BYU football is all about. and LJ Scott, too, back there on the back field. They've got a lot of really, really tough guys on the team. They're a super high floor team because they're well coached and they're tough

and they tend to play really well in the line of scrimmage. And we were talking to Colin Klein, the new Kansas State coach, about how high floor his Kansas state teams were when he was a player, when Bill Snyder was his coach. And that kind of feels like what BYU is now. Yeah, the high floor concept is just an interesting concept. And it was cool to hear a few coaches talk about it. Like, you know, even if you're playing bad, you know that your worst game.

ever you can rely on a few tent pole things that will probably keep you in the game. You know, there are some teams that have pretty high ceilings. And when things are working, things are working really well. But then you also have those games where you lay it done and it's ugly. Like if you are a high floor team, you're, I mean, the high floor team is like the epitome of what being good in the Big 12 is all about. Oh, yeah. That's the thing.

You have allowed us to worry about you are going to be in the mix to make you to the championship game in November. You just have to, when you do play those teams that are as good as you, you've got to come through. Ari, we got some really good questions from the folks. Dear Andy and dear Ari, I'm going to start with one from Ben. And this is a really good question. I had not thought about it before he asked it and he makes a good point, but I do have an answer for him from Ben. Hey, guys, you've mentioned that the Big Ten's position on the playoff is 24 teams and that aligns with what Fox wants. And the SEC's position of 16 teams aligns with what ESPN wants. If that's the case, why is the

ACC being vocal about performing 24 teams? Why are they less worried about being in lockstep with ESPN than the SEC is? This is a really good question because the ACC, like the SEC, has all of its rights owned by ESPN. They are full, full on partners with ESPN. But the reason they don't feel the same way as the SEC about this is the ACC would like to survive. The ACC would like to exist in this current state. in 10 years. And that's why they won a 2014 playoff because that's going to let them

get two, three teams in per year, whereas if it goes to 16, they still might only get one or two. Right. And the bigger, the playoff, the more teams you're going to need to be a part of the puzzle.

I mean, like, it just, it is just simple math. I do think it's interesting, though, that, like, they are somewhat not in lockstep

with their number one revenue stream. But, like, that's just kind of how it is. It's not like ESPN's done them a whole lot of favors. Still the hand that's feeding them, though. Well, and that contracts through 2036, so, which they all, they both wanted it that way, but I don't know how much either one of them likes it now.

Yeah. Yeah, I read that question to you live before we, we recorded, like, when it came in and when we were in Dallas together, and you like snap back with that answer. So I'm happy you answered it. Yeah, it's just that you have to understand, like, they're in an existential crisis. Like they got sued by two of their premier programs. They had to settle with them and basically put an expiration date on the conference if the big tenor the SEC decide they want to do anything. Because if they do, if they would like to add somebody, those teams are probably coming from the ACC.

It's probably Florida State, Clemson, North Carolina. Carolina, Miami, some collection of that. And Virginia is another one that I know the SEC has talked about coveting, not publicly, but people within the SEC. Georgia Tech got the tires kicked on it by the Big Ten at one point. They have to play defense. They have to be as good and relevant as possible. The best way to be relevant is have teams making the playoff.

1,000 percent, more the better. Yeah, yeah. I mean, Miami, and it's funny because the SEC can't, or I mean, the ACC, excuse me, feels like it can't get out of its own way. Last year, they have a team make the national title game, but that's the team that wasn't its champ. Because of their tiebreaker situation, they ended up having a five-loss champ. Their champ missed the playoff. Now, the playoff rules have changed this year. So we've mentioned this multiple times on the show, but I feel like we probably should mention it like 15 or 20 more times before the season starts. so people know Ari. It's not the five highest ranked conference champs anymore. Contractually, the champions of the ACC,

Big 12, Big Ten, and SEC are getting in the playoff next year. So, like, if the rules for this coming season had been in effect last year, Duke would have made the playoff at 7 and 5, having won the ACC. Now, what the ACC talked about, and the coaches and ADs talked about this in their meetings in Amelia Island in May is a different tiebreaker, but they have not come to an agreement on what that's going to be yet.

They want to change up the tiebreaker. I think there's a chance they'll probably use either the college football playoff rankings or something. What is the other possibility that makes more sense? If the whole thing is you want your best teams in the national perspective to succeed in conference championship races, like wouldn't that just be the layup answer? Like I just don't understand.

The ones that are highest ranked by the committee. Yes, that would be the easiest answer. Yeah. And that's what the Americans done. The American has made it where they want to make sure their highest ranked teams from the committee's perspective are playing in the championship game. So I would suspect you'd see the ACC's do something like that. And what Jim Phillips talked about when he broached this subject in May was that they would

like for every power conference to adopt the same tie-breaking strategy, to which I had friends who were in SEC country, and they texted and they're like, absolutely not. No shot. Nobody in the SEC is interested in this. And the Big Ten is not interested in either. All politics are local, and the ACC needs to do that. The SEC and the Big Ten are in a different boat where the two teams are going to make the championship game in the SEC of the Big Ten, they're going to be in the playoff anyway. Right.

Yeah. It's just it does like the poor old ACC sometimes. It just feels that way. But it's funny because the athletic wrote a story about Florida State and the ACC and what's going on now in the Notre Dame relationship

with the ACC after Pete Babakwa said that it was damaged after the the snub from the playoff and the ACC supporting Miami in that that situation. And one of the things they found was that someone at Florida State had forwarded the conference office a copy of a column I wrote for the athletic on Jim Phillips first day. And it was basically a like a pretend memo to Jim Phillips from the rest of the ACC saying, the only thing you need to do is get Notre Dame to join in football, which, and I explained

why the Notre Dame still wasn't going to join in football. But like that, I said, that is the job you'll have to do. But what I wrote that column, Ari, is like, your tenure as ACC commissioner is going to be pretty boring if you don't do that. It's just going to be kind of, you know, business as usual every day, which was, I could not have been more wrong. He got sued by two of their schools. That did not age one.

He's had a very, very eventful tenure. Yeah. Well, you have a very eventful tenure, too. if it feels like you're fighting for your life, you know, every day. Well, and I'll say this about Jim Phillips, sorry. I think he's done as good of a job as he could have given the circumstances. Yeah, yeah. And I think that goes for Brett Your Mark at the Big 12, too.

Like, I think they've done a pretty good job navigating a pretty dire situation. Yeah. The ACC could have just followed, like, they didn't have a strong legal position in those lawsuits, which is why they settled the way they settled. They didn't really have a choice there. But they did alter the revenue distribution in the conference so that the teams that are better at football make more money. And so Miami, you know, Miami got a lot of money out of that playoff run. And what Miami will get from the ACC for last year will look a lot more like what an SEC team would get from its conference.

And that was the point. For the teams that they feel like can compete for the national title, they want them funded at the highest level. they want them to not feel like they have this massive gap between themselves and the schools from other conferences. I mean, it's just kind of fun to think about, though, like, let's just say that college football playoff committee did something different and just put Notre Dame at 10 and left Miami out. Like they ranked them the entire year. Could you imagine what Miami's sentiment would be toward the ACC right now? Oh, it would be. Like it would be a really bad situation.

Like the college football playoff committee might be catching strays from Notre Dame people, but they would have gotten the same exact. reaction from the other side, and it would have been something that we were, I bet you that would have been the talk of ACC Media Day, even if that would have happened. So, uh, 100%. Jim Phillips is probably pretty happy. They dodged that. Yeah, they're going to have their media days next week. And I think it's, I don't know if it's going to be kumbaya, but listen, it's calm down.

Yeah. Obviously, the schools that sued, and I think Miami and North Carolina for sure, will be interested if one of those other leagues is, looking. But right now, they're not. It doesn't feel like Miami is like, oh, man, our season and our program have been tanked by ACC inclusion. In fact, Miami is probably, you know, financially and competitively. Well, Miami's kind of win the damn ACC. Yeah, they haven't even won it yet. That's the funniest part. But like, they weren't, they could have been hindered badly last year by those tiebreaker

rules. They could have been completely screwed in a way. Think about how much more money Miami has now as a result of the CFP committee's decision. Well, and you know who also, we're looking at the conference standings from the regular season last year. Virginia was the one seat in the championship game. Virginia made a bunch of money off this thing. Like they played in some very big games.

They got watched by a lot of people because they're doing it by how much people watched. And I think it's working the way it's supposed to. It's just not necessarily going to the teams that you thought it would. You thought it was going to go to Fort St. and Clemson. Moral of the story here is be good.

Just be good. Also, remember where I pointed out the rule that is changing for the college football playoff where the ACC champ is guaranteed a spot, also different for this year. If Notre Dame is ranked in the top 12, anywhere in the top 12, which they were last year,

they are in the playoff. Yeah, the bracket would have looked very different with these rules if the same rank. rankings happened. So, yeah, something to monitor. Next question, Ari. This is a fun one. And I agree with Mitch that we should do this for other

players and teams. Dear Ian, I, Nari, a fun potential series to do as a season approaches, if you're given a stat line for a player, you predict the team's record. As a Michigan fan, I have to start with Bryce Underwood. What is Michigan's record if this is his season stat line after 12 games? games. 62% completion rate, 2,400 yards passing, 15 touchdowns and only five interceptions.

And now for the fun part that our Ari will salivate over Mitch says, 900 yards rushing, 12 rushing touchdowns. Curious to hear your thoughts. I think they go 10 and two with that record, including a victory in Columbus. Thanks for the great show. Go blue, Mitch. Okay. So, well, I'd be very interested to know what the two losses are then. Well, let's pull up the schedule because I don't think they would go 10 and 2 because I'm going to throw another quarterback stats at you in a second. So let's remember, Michigan has to play Oklahoma, has to play Iowa, has to play Penn State, has to play Indiana, has to play Oregon has to play Ohio State.

Oregon and Ohio State are on the road. That would be a hell of a resume. And look, Oklahoma is a really good defensive team. Iowa is a really good defensive team. So maybe with these numbers, it actually, it actually, actually makes sense because Mitch, I don't know if he's doing this on purpose. That's a low passing yardage number and a low touchdown passing touchdown number for the kind of success you're talking about.

But I do understand Michigan's going to have a good defense. They're probably going to have a good running game with their backs in addition to Bryce Underwood. Here's the thing about if Bryce Underwood is a 9. 900-yard rusher who, if 10 rushing touchdowns, then we're assuming he's their big goal line threat as well. Then I'm thinking, you know, Jordan Marshall, who averaged 6.3 yards to carry last year,

he's probably sitting over 1,000 yards. He could be sitting at 1,200. Like if Jordan Marshall rushes for 1,200 yards and Bryce Underwood rushes for 900 yards, maybe you don't throw for that many yards because you are controlling games. And you're winning. So I'll tell you.

grind it out low-scoring games. What I read the stats, do you know what I thought in my head? What's that? That means they won't lose games they're not supposed to lose. Correct. That's how I took that. Correct. But how many games?

How many toss-up games do you win at that point? 10 and 2 means that you go 2-2 against Oklahoma, Indiana, Oregon, and Ohio State. And then you also don't even have Penn State or Iowa in the mix of those four big games. Yeah. So I actually was thinking 9-3. would be my guess, where, you know, he has a big game and they have a good, good running game. I think that might be enough to win one of those bigger, bigger ones. But I don't know if the passing output, because like that's the thing.

Michigan's always good at running the ball. What people want is a huge renaissance of passing effectiveness this year. And I get that you have to be conservative of the total yardage output because you know they're going to run the ball well. And if you add 900 rushing yards to the equation that they're not going to have more total offense than anybody in college football. so I appreciate the rationality in the stats that he gave. I also think if Bryce Underwood runs for 900 yards, he's going to throw for more than that because of what that will do to defenses.

But let me throw some numbers at you from a quarterback in 2025. And I think you're going to find it really interesting. 63.5% completion percentage, 2,490 yards passing, 24 passing touchdowns and only 5%. interceptions, 835 rushing yards with 10 rushing touchdowns.

Is this a big 10 player? Not a big 10 player. But connect the dots. I suck at this. Who coaches Michigan now? Are you talking about Devin Danpere? Those are Devin Danpierre stats at Utah last year. So Jason Beck, the offensive coordinator from Utah,

went with Kyle Whittingham to Michigan. If Bryce Underwood puts up Devin Dampeer's stats, And remember, this would be nine more passing touchdowns than what Mitch pitched to us. Yeah. 10 and 2 might be the number. Yeah. I mean, the question really is if you took 500 rushing yards off the top and six of the rushing touchdowns off the top and then added them to the passing total, doesn't that change your perspective a little bit?

I guess, but like, Dampere had nine more touchdown passes and only two fewer rushing touchdowns than what Mitch pitched at us. Yeah. No, I mean, I thought actually, was a threat to score with his legs, too. Yeah. Yeah, I think nine and three is a good answer. I think that you're with me on that, right? I think with what Mitch gave to us eight and four or nine and three is what we're talking about. I think if he has Devin Dampere numbers, I think they're 10 and two. Yeah.

I mean, here's the deal. They also have an incredibly hard schedule. So, like, you know, you don't, you need to get eye-popping numbers to go 10 and two against that schedule. So, you know, I do think that Bryce Underwood is a very interesting, lightning rod. I ranked him number seven in my big 10 quarterbacks list that ran earlier in the week. And some people, I was afraid that people were going to get mad that he's too low. And the actual reaction was that he was way too high for most people.

People thought he was too high. Yes. So, and then I've been accused of like protecting our recruiting rankings and things like that. But I don't think it's that. I think it is that he has some tools and coaches agree that he has some tools that not a lot of people have. Whether that can be unlocked or not is the major question mark. But like, think about this. Because I just gave you Devin Dampier's numbers. Jason Beck coached Devin Dempier at New Mexico and coached him at Utah.

Don't you think if they didn't think Bryce Underwood was any good, they would have just gotten Devin Dampere to come with them? Yeah, I mean, isn't the assumption that Bryce Underwood's just a better passer in general? Like, I know that people are like he can't throw right now, but I don't know if that's a mechanics issue. He's got a pretty big arm. So we'll see, you know, what happens here. Right. He's also a true freshman they got thrown in that, remember, they did not plan to play right away as a true freshman.

They got Mikey Keene because the thought was, Mikey Keen's going to be the guy who, you know, eases them in, that gives Bryce Underwood a chance to not have to be in game two playing a Brent Venable's defense on the road. I mean, now that we're talking about it, I actually think that Seven's kind of conservative, because you know how I get excited about five-star prospects, but like I don't think he's far enough into his career yet,

Not to mention that his entire coaching, or his head coach last year was involved in some pretty heavy stuff off the field. So yeah. So producer River points out his stats from this past year. So 60% completion rate, 2,428 yards. The same yard. See, that's why I think the yardage goes up here. But he had 11 touchdowns and 9 interceptions. So you can't have that.

That ratio cannot happen. Yeah. I mean, I don't know how much like you, we come. the Michigan, Ohio State game together. Like, it came pretty clear in the second half that they weren't scoring in the second half. And it looked like they had a hard time moving the ball once Ohio State settled down. It's like, do you think that Bryce Underwood was the reason for that?

Because, like, I don't perceive that to be the case. No, I think there were lots of reasons for that. Yeah. So I'm excited to watch them, though. Michigan's a very intriguing team. And we should do this like once a week, just a random quarterback and we'll assign random stats and try to project a record. Each one of us comes up with the stats.

Oh, speaking of players and social. stats. I meant to mention this on the show yesterday. Our friends at Yahoo have come up with a college football fantasy feature on their website. And so I'm sure a lot of you play NFL fantasy at Yahoo already. This is going to be college football fantasy works in a very similar way, though. They've got a couple different things. You can now draft an offense as well as a defense. So if you wanted to handcuff, you could say draft Jeremiah Smith and the Ohio State offense. And the scoring would be more like a defense, you know, like what the scoring is when you draft an entire defense. But it's a lot of fun.

It's going to be all the power four conferences and Notre Dame. So, Ari, we probably, we've talked about this in our internal on three group chat that we're probably going to have an on three league for everybody who works at the company. But we might need to start a show league. Yeah. Yeah. fantasy football is really, really fun, and it's cool to see that, I mean, I know that it kind of stinks. Some people like being able to, like, draft random G4 players. Yeah.

But the fact that you can just take team, you know, more recognizable players. And because that's the problem of college fantasy football forever has just been there's too many players that play at different levels. So if you kind of level the playing field a little bit and bring it into, you know, more recognizable players who are playing in the same general league or level, that would be fun. I think we should do it. Yeah, no, so this is power four only plus Notre Dame. So that's the players that you can draft. And it'll, I think it's going to be fun. I imagine I'm going to have a couple teams in that league or a couple teams in various leagues once that thing gets started.

And it will start, you can start signing up for leagues toward the end of this month. The drafts will begin in August. And so, yeah, I have feeling, well, we'll. We'll probably be talking about that a little bit during the season because I think our league is going to be at on three fairly competitive. Our next question and our final question comes from our friend Stephen San Antonio. Fellas, you were talking about the most controversial calls by rest of the end of games the other day. And yes, Colorado, Missouri in 1990 was my answer as number one as well.

You mentioned another one involving the goal post. That would be the 2011 Iowa State, Oklahoma State game in Ames with a disputed field goal. Now this seems to happen every year with kickball going right above one of the posts, and at that point the refs have to basically guess. Question, why aren't all goalposts made longer so this dumb stuff never happens again? What is it? Is it some dumb arbitrary rule about how long the posts could be, or are all schools too cheap to install longer ones?

Is it an engineering issue? Well, there is an engineering issue because of the last time the goalpost got lengthened, and that was in 2014 when the NFL voted to lengthen the goalposts from, They were 30 feet above the ground to 35 feet above. So the crossbar is 10 feet. And then the post go up another 25 now. So 35 feet above the ground. And when they had to do it, it was not as simple as, yeah, just weld another piece of metal on there.

They had to engineer them so that they were strong enough to stay up. And if there was wind, they weren't moving around. Yeah. There is that part of it, too. It's not that simple. But yeah, they probably could if they went with a little bit stronger, the thicker metal probably could go even higher up in the air. And it might be as the kickers get better and have stronger legs,

you might have to add another five feet. Yeah, I mean, I don't know. Yeah, I guess if you added five more feet, that would be great. I'm happy that you knew it was an engineering issue because I was like, is it just going to tip over? But how many times does a kicker really kick? It's so rare. I don't think you really need to do it.

It sucked that it happened when it did. And that was actually, that was back in the 30-foot days. but I don't I just don't know that there's it happens so rarely I don't know if it's worth redoing every goal post in the NFL in college football watch the World Cup on Thursday you know been watching the World Cup don't they have microchips in the ball can they put some sort of laser at the top of it just so it shoots up they do but the microchips in the ball have been somewhat controversial too oh they are some guys hair made them off sides in a game a couple

week or last week so it is uh yeah it's a little little tricky but and i can't they just put space lasers at the top that just shoot up the luxor and then they could but what's interesting is the nfl rule and the college rule are different as we were pointing out in the discussion of that oklahoma state iowa state game in the NFL if it goes over the top it is a good in college it has to go inside so uh the goalpost extending into the to infinity, you have to imagine whether the ball went inside or not. Okay. Well, good answer.

It would be cool if they went all the way up higher than the stadium, but, you know. It would be like 150 feet in the air. It would be incredible. Yeah. Also, I wonder, too, if there's a safety issue when people storm the field and get on the goalposts, the longer and heavier they are, the more dangerous. Producer River just texted both of us and said the only goalposts I like her at the bottom of the Tennessee River.

Yeah, after you, River. Hopefully there's more will be added in your near future. but like yeah I wonder if that is a safety issue too were the vanity ones when they were going down Broadway dude where were we we were those two years ago we were old myths when they beat George and they stormed the field and those people were going crazy on the field like there were a bunch of people standing directly

under the goalpost while the psychopass hung off the top of them and I was like anxious like my mother would be at the blackjack table like just like I was like can somebody just get these people away if this thing tips over like you could really hurt somebody I saw somebody fall off the crossbar after Tennessee beat Florida in 1998 and jacked up their ankle bad bad.

Yeah. So yeah. Yeah, it's not the safest thing in the world. All right, Ari. It is time to do some ranking, a random ranking, if you will. We've been doing these as drafts

because when it's a situation where Ari and I are going to want a lot of the same things, we do it as a draft so we don't have the same list. But in this one, a pretty broad palette from which to choose. And so we figured, let's just do a straight ranking. This is an, the discussion came up on Thursday show. We were talking about Wisconsin's alternate uniforms they're going to wear at Lambeau Field

when they play Notre Dame. And I liked them. Ari thought they looked more like Rutgers uniforms. And I think with these, with the alternates, it is like, is totally subjective. Your taste may differ completely from. my taste and I am I'm fascinated to see what Ari's top five are I love my top five it was kind of difficult too because like there is a difference between alternate and throwback and I don't know if you can't throwback is I mean back are alternates also yeah they're alternates also as long as it's

not the uniform that they wear every day um but like for instance like pits best uniforms were one's throwbacks and then they were so good that they actually made them their uniforms so like be why you did that too yeah okay first of all if you have a really beautiful royal blue. Don't change your color to navy. Don't do what I do at menus and overthink it. Just go with the beautiful royal blue. BYU and Pitt both did that where they had

this beautiful blue. They switched to navy, which I love Navy. It's very versatile. It goes with everything. But everybody uses Navy. And so, yeah, Pitt was doing it as a throwback. BYU would occasionally do it as a throwback. And then finally, everybody's like, why don't we just go back to that? Yeah.

I think that there are a lot of people who should go back to a lot of things in uniforms and all of sports. But this will be fun. I know we did a uniform. The other caveat. Yeah. Oregon and Oklahoma State are not eligible because there's no, like we don't know, what's an alternate for them?

Yeah. We have so many different combinations. Right. If you don't have a regular uniform, you don't have a regular, you don't have an alternate. So, okay. And also just to point out, because I have one double up, we did a uniform draft a month ago, and I had an alternate. it on there at the end of the show saying I really like those even though I didn't pick them.

And this is going to be in my draft now. So just because it's, I'm not going to change how I feel because of that. So I had one of those two and it's, it's from a rivalry and I went with the other side of the rivalries. I want to honor the other side of the rivalry on this one. Okay. All right. So I'll go first and I'll start at five.

Okay. Mm-hmm. The Hawaii rainbow warrior alternate throwbacks that are white and have the actual rainbow on it and then the U.H with the rainbow coming out of them. It's just badass. I actually saw somebody wearing like a streetwear version of it like last week. And I was like, that's a pretty cool, you know, it had Hawaii across the chest.

I mean, I like it when they do the green home jersey with that. Yeah, yeah. I just think that it's a unique uniform. You don't really see the rainbow combination, really, in any other walk of college football space. Yeah, because they switched it to that block H that, you know, it looks very studly and manly, manly. It's like, yeah, just be, because Hawaii is the rainbow.

area. Like, I mean, when you think about a beautiful rainbow, you are the rainbow warriors. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's the other one looks more like, like, manly. And it's just like, that does not to be manly. It looks like, you know, they're always in the truck commercials. They're dropping a giant rock in the bed of the truck. Like, that's what it looks like. Yeah. Drop that eight in the bed of the truck. Just so appropriate for like where they're located too. It's a very appropriate uniform. I really like them. Yeah. All right. So I had to pick one of the Army Navy special uniforms. for this. I went with the Army 82nd Airborne tributes that they wore in 2016, which that was like this game was special for Army in general because they had this huge

long losing streak to Navy. They broke the losing streak. The 82nd Airborne, absolutely badass. You know, one of the most important parts of our military. The webbing, like they had the parachute webbing on the helmet, the color, which is like a muted gray is because of all the night jumps that the 82nd Airborne has had to do over the years. And it just, the patches for the different battalions, it was so perfect. It's just beautiful uniform. You know, Andy, I think that you and I are very lockstep on this because I have two military academies on my top five. All right.

And I feel like if you're not the greatest football teams, like the tradition and the excellence of just our U.S. military, there's something like very special. about it, which leads me into my number four. I have the Air Force Academy's shark tooth helmet combination. Have you seen these, Andy, where the helmet actually reminiscent of some of the noses of the planes from. Yes, we're going to have a little, we don't have any team overlap, but we may have some theme overlap here.

Yeah, but I don't care. I'm laughing. We tried to do a ranking because we wouldn't have any overlap. But like, if you are a college football fan, and the cool thing about these academies is that they have so many different things from our history to honor that there's so many different routes you can take. Every time they come up with one of these, I end up learning something because I'll go read up on what they're honoring.

So I want to make sure that I say what this honors because I think that's what the respectful thing to do is. And it pays homage to the legendary World War II era flying tigers and the nose art that's still used on some modern U.S. aircrafts like the A10 Warthog. So, like, it just, it's very badass. There's nothing more badass, really, to think about than like a military outfit. And World War II era stuff can really rev someone's engine. And football in the cross-section of those things is pretty cool.

I would agree with you on that. My number four is going to be very controversial because you either love these or you despise these. I personally love them. They are the Illinois Red Grange throwbacks from the 2004. 24 Michigan game. These are so cool. What they had to do to get the helmet to look like a leather helmet was just incredible. That is hilarious to me, and you are right.

It is controversial. I would have ranked this in the bottom five. Like the ones that didn't work. My son said the same thing. He's like, those are horrible. I would you put the, I love them. I love them. That's fine, Andy.

You can have what you have. I think that's also part of the experimentation of it is that some of them are going to hit people differently. But the thing that is interesting about it is that you don't really, you would never know what team it is. Like it's like the alternate is so unique that like you, if you just showed that person. But that looks like Red Grange's uniform.

No, I know. I know. I understand. But like there's no identifying markers other than if you're a historian for Illinois football to know what team that is. and it's kind of ugly. But I also understand

why you it's funny because if we did the five biggest misses in alternate history, like I would consider that uniform. So we are like on opposite ends. Yeah, the Florida one that looked like an actual alligator.

That's the biggest miss in alternate uniform history. Yeah. I mean, no, that Michigan state neon green one. Oh, I did hate that one. Remember that one?

That one was pretty. Okay. So I'm going to stick in the military. for my number three. And Navy in 2014, when they played Ohio State, I believe it was in Baltimore, released a summer white uniform. And the helmet has the iconic just Navy logo, like for the U.S. military.

And then it had like half white. There was a gold stripe that goes behind it and then the blue underneath it. It's one of the most beautiful helmets uniforms I've ever seen in my entire life. And I'm not, and I'm not 100% sure of this. I covered that game in real life. I don't know if it means something specific. to some sort of, you know, battalion or something, but I do know that it's gorgeous

and there's nothing more iconic than a military level on a helmet. You know, Connor Stallions claimed that his single stealing career began during his first game as a student volunteer coach at Navy against Ohio State in 2014. Is that the game?

I'm surprised he was able to look at signs and it wasn't staring at Navy's uniforms the entire day. well he'd probably seen them all week so yeah they're gorgeous but it's funny i covered that game because i was on the beat and if i would have known historically what was happening on the field that day uh that would have been funny it's funny how life works out times it is it is crazy so my number three the homer pick the florida hundred year throwbacks that they were in 2006 against alabama there there have been in more

more recent version of these where they have the F with the circle around it on the helmet. This was the, and this was not like a copy of any one particular uniform. They took some elements from the 60s, some elements from the 70s, but the block F on the helmet is like when Steve Spurrier played in the, in

the mid-60s. And these were beautiful uniforms. They just looked so freaking cool. And they played Alabama and obviously, so the other team on the field is wearing an iconic uniform. And it looked like an old school slob-knocker and it kind of was that day.

This would have been, you know, Chris Leak starting, but Tim Tebow coming in on the gold line, that sort of thing. And it was a, it was a gorgeous uniform. I almost put the one with the circle on my list, but I knew you were probably going to take it because it's so pretty. So I didn't want to double up. My number two here, Andy, as I go back to my list with River, is the double up from before Utah's Rose Bowl,

alternate uniforms with the rose that goes through the helmet. I mean, I just Googled Rose Bowl uniforms because there are a few like Arizona State in the 90s had Rose Bowls on the shoulder pads. Michigan did that. And there was a TCU one where there was a rose in the in the frog.

You can take any of them. But Utah I think just like worked really, really well and they had the longest, most pronounced rose in the uniform versus the UU and then the rose stem went all the way behind the earhole and over the face mask. Yeah, I knew you were taking Matt, I know how much you love that helmet.

Yeah. I love those uniforms. I was like in awe when they unveiled them. Yeah, that one was cool. My number two came up on the show the other day. And I had almost forgotten about it. And I went back and looked at it and I was like, oh, yeah, I remember how awesome that was. So remember we were talking to Ryan Silverfield, the new Arkansas coach.

And he talked about going into Jerry Jones office and that Jerry Jones, the owner of the Cowboys, has one football helmet in his office. And it's not a Cowboys helmet. It is the silver Arkansas helmet from the 2017 Texas A&M game where they played at Jerry World and Arkansas wore essentially Cowboys Arkansas uniforms. So it was a Jerry Jones tribute basically. So a silver helmet, red jersey, silver pants. And the slobbering hog logo on the silver helmet with the red and white and silver striping. beautiful, just absolutely beautiful.

I don't even remember them wearing those. Those are pretty. It's so cool. And I don't think they've ever worn them again, but that was awesome. Like I wish they would roll those out once a year. Yeah. All right. My number one, and I don't know if this counts as a home or pick, because the school's a mile away from my road or for my house. I'm obviously not Methodist and I never went there. But Dallas is or Southern Methodist, University's Dallas uniforms, the one that still has the iconic Mustang on the helmet. But it's got the D.

And it's got the triple D around it. Which version? Because I actually like the road one better than the home one. I think they're both beautiful. I picked the road one. The white one that says Dallas read and script across the chest. Yeah. I don't know if I don't know enough about SMU history to know how married they are to like

their current uniforms to just say SMU on the chest. I understand that the whole Dallas initiative is basically. basically to just kind of recruit the city. And then is Dallas's team. Yeah, yeah. I get why they do it. They should wear these every time they play, in my opinion. Well, I love the Mustang.

So I don't think they should wear it every time they play because I think the Mustang helmet sticker is one of the best helmet stickers there is. But you don't lose it with the big full. It's still there. It's still there. Full size one is really cool too. Yeah. But I just thought that it was like, like really, really cool to just have.

And there were a few other like, and I don't know who your number one pick is, so I hope I don't like clip you here, but there are other places that I've done, like Houston did like Houston Oilers throwbacks. Yeah, I thought about that one, but considered.

Yeah, I thought those were really cool. I just, they weren't school colors. So I, that one was a little, but yeah, I don't know.

My number one isn't necessarily school color either. So. Yeah. Yeah. Just like anything that honors the heritage of the place you're in, I think is cool. So what's your number one, Andy?

Louisiana, row, the P-40 Warhawk uniform they wore in 2021 against Arkansas State. They've brought these helmets back out. When I play as ULM on the video game, I wear these uniforms every time. And it's the same, you mentioned the Flying Tigers. So this is the same nose design that is on those Air Force Flying Tigers ones. But yeah, it's the Curtis P-40 plane. that was used extensively in World War II. And they say hawk, yeah, on the back. So Louisiana Monroe is the Warhawks.

And so, yeah, these are the Warhawk uniforms. Yeah, we have the same uniform, basically. Yours is a little bit louder. I think that like just that in, I mean, when I think about like American history, and I'm no American history buffed by any stretch of the imagination, but like when you think about like some of the most pivotal moments in our country's history like this reminds me of that um i don't know i think it's really really cool and i'm happy that we were if we were ever going to double up or be similar on something i don't think that we could

that's a pretty cool yeah i'm kind of glad we were on we were sympathetic on that one yeah but there were so many uh there are so many and i'm sure i missed 15 that i would have maybe put on my list but um i feel pretty good about the five and i i like four out of your five picks andy yeah so the the reason that ULM claims these is the general who led the Flying Tigers is from northeast Louisiana. Yeah.

So he was a reason that ULM selected Warhawks as its nickname. Yep. That's why. But yeah, that's when. Well, we're heading into the weekend now here, Andy, and there's not that many football list

weekends left. No. Well, we'll have to go non-football for once we once we have all football to talk about like actual games yeah we throw a little non-football in there yeah yeah we have the random ranking and we can do the random draft too yeah exactly best best coca cola flavors or best soda flavors have we done that one before maybe uh we have not uh yeah we could we could we could hit up the cocacacacaca freestyle machine and uh i don't find a steakhouse desserts i think would be a good one considering that you and i were

just at a steakhouse and you ordered the last thing I would have ordered. Carrar cake is the last thing you would have ordered? I mean, carrot cake's delicious. Don't get me wrong, but there were some other bangers on that menu. Steve's saving his favorite cake. Yeah. Yeah. But let's save it for the podcast.

I don't want to get into the debate now. We can have it another time to write that one down. Hey, Ari. Yo. We still have some really good interviews that the people. So next week, you're going to hear from Arizona State head coach. Kenny Dillingham. And that's going to be a fun one too because he's going to teach everyone a valuable lesson. How do you ask for $10 million and get the person to write the check?

We'll talk to you next week.