Andy & Ari On3 - YOUR Survival Guide to the 2024 College Football Season | Everything You Need to Know for the Season

Episode Date: July 4, 2024

Happy 4th of July! As you enjoy your holiday with friends and family, be sure you are prepared to talk college football. This past weekend, our producer River Bailey had an experience where some of his friends didn't know the grand scheme of college football entering this season, which sparked today's special 4th of July episode.(0:00-1:27) Intro(1:28-5:34) Producer River joins to Explain his Weekend(5:35-7:05) Overall Guide Intro(7:04-10:46) Explaining the Big Ten(10:45-15:16) Explaining the SEC(15:17-18:02) Explaining the Big 12 Conference(18:03-20:50) Explaining the New-Look ACC(20:51-22:51) What happened to the PAC-12?(22:52-23:32) Looking at the Group of 5(23:33-29:38) Explaining the 12-Team CFP(29:39-32:23) Conclusion, Wrapping UpWant to watch the show instead? Head on over to YouTube and join us LIVE, M-F, at 8 am et! https://www.youtube.com/@On3sportsHost: Andy StaplesProducer: River Bailey

Welcome to Andy Staples on three happy birthday America is a very special edition of the show. This is an edition not necessarily meant for the folks who normally watch and or listen to this show. So here's what I want you guys to do. You diehards, you faithful, faithful viewers and listeners, people who are with us every single day. I have an assignment for you. As you traverse the country this holiday weekend, as you go visit friends and family, I need you to pass this episode along. Think of your best friends, your relatives, your in-laws, people who love college football, win college football as being played, but maybe aren't paying as much attention during

the off season. Because for these people, week one is going to come as a massive, massive shock. They need to understand what's coming. I thought with some of the retraining our brain episodes we'd done that probably a good portion of the college football watching public is going to understand what's going on. But then my producer River Bailey was visiting with some friends this past weekend. River, I'm going to bring you on. We're going to understand what's going on. But then my producer, River Bailey, was visiting with some friends this past weekend. River, I'm going to bring you on. We're going to talk about the conversation you had

with some of your friends who are people who watch college football. Yeah, so this past weekend, I was on a bachelor trip. We were on the lake, on the boat, meeting some new people that I had never met before. So naturally, we talk about our jobs, what we do. College football comes up. Of course it does.

And these guys were LSU fans, Tennessee fans. I mean, they were diehard LSU fans. Like the LSU fan knew that, hey, Garrett Nussmeyer is going to be our guy. Lance heard that Tennessee got from LSU. He left because of Emory Jones and Will Campbell. Very excited about Bryce Underwood. Very excited about Blake Baker coming back as the DC. So he knew ball.

And he started saying, yeah, I think we can make the playoffs, even if we go 9-3. And I'm like, potentially. It'd be hard, but yeah yeah and then we start talking about the qualifications for the 12 team playoff didn't know about the group of five and then I was like yeah Washington and Oregon going to the big 10 makes it a little dicey for the big 10 and he's like oh they're joining this year I was like yep yep and then you know the arizona and arizona state colorado utah they're in the big 12 now and that washington state and oregon state are playing a predominantly

mountain west schedule and like they knew ball about their favorite team but they didn't know ball about the grand scheme of things and i was like i can't go to any more of these and be around these casuals we have to do a psa for the people to let them know that, hey, things are changing and you need to know it so you don't look like a buffoon at these events and all the functions. Exactly. Exactly. Now, here's the thing. There are other college football shows where they look down on casual fans.

I do not. We here at Andy Staples on three, we love the casual fans because we know if you start watching, you're not going to be a casual fan anymore. And so we want you to come into our tent. And so here's what I want everyone to do because river, didn't you have a friend this week say that they thought Tennessee had a chance to win the sec East? Yes. One of the guys was like, yeah, I think we got a really to win the SEC East? Yes.

One of the guys is like, yeah, I think we got a really good shot for the East this year. And that's just maybe typical summer talk. But I'm like, whoa, that's not happening. No such thing. That doesn't exist. These people live among you, friends. These people are your relatives. They are your in-laws.

They are your friends from collegelaws they are your friends from college they are your friends from high school they need your help they need your help so here's what i want everybody to do river uh you you know you already know who you need to send this one to but think of the five people in your life who are definitely going to be watching college football week one who are going to be tuned in who are going to be absolutely flabbergasted by what has happened in this sport. Think of all those people, make a list, and send them this episode. You can send it to them in podcast form. You can send them the YouTube video. You can send it to them from Twitter. However you want to send it to whatever the easiest way for them to digest it is send it to them. And for all of you who've had a friend,

someone in your life, send you this episode first, thank them because they love you and they're looking out for you, but also welcome. We love you too. your money spends just as good on our sponsors as the diehards does so we love you come on in support the sponsors and i think you're going to enjoy this because we talk about college football every day here on this show 8 a.m to 9 a.m eastern time monday through friday in season and out of season so we've been here among the sickos and we've been talking about all this stuff that's going to happen because we're fascinated by what's going to happen, but this is going to, we're going to pull it back. So my regular sickos, you know, all this stuff, your job right now is to pass this along to everybody in your life who may need to hear this information.

And I guarantee you there are people because I see it myself. I see it myself. I go to the kids sporting events or or my daughter's ballet recital and I get the same types of things that River heard this weekend where. Well, what you could Florida's you think Florida's got a chance in the east? No, I don't think anybody has a chance in the East because that's not how the SEC works anymore. So we got to work on this. So here's what we're going to do.

We're going to go conference by conference and explain what has happened. And then we're going to explain the 12-team playoff because all of this stuff is interwoven. All of it matters. And you need to know all of it before the season starts, because it will help you enjoy the season more once the season starts. It's confusing. I get it. Even us sickos sometimes get caught. I say power five. You know, power five is not a thing anymore, right? There are not five power conferences.

There are really only two. Yeah. So River hits the buzzer every time I say Power Five on the show. But there are really only two power conferences. But then there's two other ones that are more powerful than the others, but not as powerful as the other two. It's all going to make sense in the next few minutes. So let us start in the Big Ten. We'll start in the Big Ten because this is going to be an 18-team league. This is going to be the superest of the super conferences right now. It's massive. We knew that USC and UCLA were joining the Big Ten. We found out about that in 2022. We knew that they were coming in 2024.

We did not know until last year that Oregon and Washington were coming too. That happened on the day the Pac-12 fell apart. That was a day last August when the Pac-12 was trying to figure out, are we going to do a TV deal or not? Or school's going to kind of look elsewhere. What happened? Schools looked elsewhere.

The Big Ten picked up Oregon and Washington on a discount, realizing there's nothing to save. Arizona, Arizona State, Utah joined Colorado, which had already decided to go to the Big 12. Now you have an 18-team Big 10. USC, UCLA, Oregon, Washington are Big 10 teams. So like Oregon plays Ohio State this year. They play in Eugene. That is not a Rose Bowl. That is a regular season game. USC plays at Michigan.

The schedules are very different. Divisions are dead. So there's no more Big Ten East, no more Big Ten West. There's no more Penn State is being held back by Ohio State and Michigan. The excuses for Penn State are gone. There's a 12-team playoff. You don't have to worry about playing Ohio State and Michigan and beating them to win the division every year. In fact, they don't even play Michigan this year. Penn State does not play Michigan this year, but both of them do play USC, if that makes sense, which I know it might not. So the number one and number two teams in the Big Ten, the best conference records,

will play for the conference title at the end of the season. It has nothing to do with divisions anymore. So no more of, will Iowa or Purdue or Wisconsin be the tallest oompa loompa in the big 10? That's over. We don't do that anymore. They have to compete with the best teams in the big 10. So Iowa, which will still have a great defense, they've replaced their offensive coordinator. So we can't make, remember, we can't make any more nepotism jokes about Iowa. Brian Ferentz was fired as the offensive coordinator. Kurt Ferentz remains the head coach, but Kirk Ferentz has hired Tim Lester as the offensive coordinator. So we can still make jokes about Iowa having an unfunctional offense, unless Iowa proves it has a functional offense. Once that happens,

then we lose our jokes. But no more nepotism jokes for Iowa either. That's how the Big Ten is going to work. Remember, new teams, UCLA and USC, we knew they were coming. Washington and Oregon jumped on board. They're there now too. It's going to be a lot of fun. A lot of fun. You could have an Oregon-Ohio State Big Ten Championship game. You could have a USC-Michigan Big Ten Championship game. You could have a Penn State-Oregon Big Ten Championship game.

A lot of different iterations here. A lot of ways to play this. Now, let's move to the SEC. Also, getting some new members. On July 1st, earlier this week, Oklahoma and Texas officially joined the SEC. We've known since 2021 that they were coming. As River's friend said,

he thought maybe this year Tennessee could win the East. Now, there are a lot of reasons why that statement is wrong. It's not necessarily because I think Tennessee is going to be bad, but if the East still existed, Georgia would still be in it. So you wouldn't have a chance to win the East anyway. Georgia was going to win the East if the East still existed, but the East does not exist. So now the teams that were in the SEC East can also no longer say, well, at least we play Vandy every single year. Because you don't. You don't know how often you're going to play Vanderbilt going forward.

In fact, the SEC schedule is kind of up in the air after 2025. But again, we're not going to worry about that. We're only going to worry about 2024. 2024, Oklahoma's in, Texas is in. They, of course, will still play their annual game at the Cotton Bowl, just like Florida and Georgia play their annual game in Jacksonville. So you SEC fans used to seeing Florida and Georgia playing in a neutral site. Texas and Oklahoma also play their rivalry game at a neutral site. No divisions. As we said, this is a big relief for the schools that were in the SEC West. Ole Miss is like, thank God.

We don't have to play Alabama, Auburn, LSU, Texas A&M every single year anymore. For the teams in the East, it's like, oh, crap. Now we have to play Alabama, Auburn, and LSU more? Plus you get Texas, plus you get Oklahoma. Yeah, it's a tough road. But the thing you need to remember, all SEC schedules are not created equal. That is one thing.

Now, they weren't equal before. The teams in the West had it tougher than the teams in the East. If you were Tennessee, which had to play Alabama annually, if you were Auburn, which had to play Georgia across divisions annually, things were tougher for you. But now it's going to be a little more random. Your schedule draw matters quite a bit. Texas got a nice draw coming into the SEC. Oklahoma did not. Oklahoma's final two games

are against Alabama and at LSU. And of course, they still have to play Texas. And Tennessee comes to them. And they've got to go to Auburn and they got to go to Missouri. Missouri's good still, by the way, in case you're wondering, that wasn't just a flash in the pan last year. Missouri still good right now. So Oklahoma, not the easiest path. Missouri, I just mentioned, they got a little more manageable schedule. Ole Miss got a more manageable schedule. Remember we said, well, Lane Kiffin's got to prove he can beat Alabama. No, he doesn't. He doesn't even play them this year. They do get Georgia in Oxford. So you get essentially the same level of talent, same kind of thing. Nick Saban's gone anyway.

You get the new Darth Vader, you get Kirby Smart. But more manageable, not easy, but more manageable for Ole Miss, more manageable for Tennessee. The most brutal schedule handed out by the SEC, well, that goes to the Florida Gators. Now, Florida does not help itself by having Miami and UCF in addition to its annual game against Florida State on this year's schedule. But listen to this Final Four SEC game. Listen to this. Georgia and Jacksonville, Texas and Austin, and then you're back home, but you play LSU and Ole Miss. And then after that, because it's an even numbered year, the Gators go to Tallahassee where they have to play a Florida state team that won 13 games last year, won the ACC, and is probably going to be really good again this year. That is a brutal, brutal schedule

and proof positive that all SEC schedules not created equal. So if you're a Texas fan, hey, they're welcoming you with open arms. If you're an Oklahoma fan hey they're welcoming you with open arms if you're an Oklahoma fan you're like hey wait you could have cut us the same break but at least you're not a Florida fan because that schedule is rough let us move to the big 12 now the big 12 you if you are a fan of a team that plays in the ACC or the Big 10 or the SEC, and that's who you watch most of the time, your casual college football viewing, your, this game's on, I want to watch it. A lot of it's going to come from the Big 12. I'm telling you that right now. Even if you haven't watched a lot of Big 12 football before. First of all, it's not every team running the air raid anymore. It's not all 67 to 65 games. This has become a more

ground-based league. Everybody's stolen what Iowa State does on defense. So it's a much more diverse league stylistically, schematically. The thing that's going to make it so interesting this year is there are no kind of giant big dogs at the top. Everybody is somewhat equal here. They're not completely equal. We're not expecting Houston or Cincinnati. Oh, by the way, Houston and Cincinnati and BYU and UCF, they're in the Big 12. Remember, they joined last year. You might not remember that, but they're in the big 12 too, but we might not expect huge things out of Houston or Cincinnati, but like some of the newcomers, Utah, Arizona, we think they have a chance to win it. Kansas state has a chance to win it. Oklahoma State, which played for the Big 12 title last year against Texas, has a chance to win it. Colorado, Coach Prime, Deion, they're coming

back to the Big 12. Remember, Colorado was in the Big 12, left for the then Pac-10, which became the Pac-12. Well, now they're back. And Coach Prime and company, they got a puncher's chance. There's a lot of teams that have a puncher's chance. In fact, we can probably name 10 Big 12 teams that it would not be completely surprising if they wound up winning the league. And that's what's going to make their games in October and November so much fun. Now we're going to get to how the playoff works in a minute, but understand that the winner of the Big 12 is more than likely going to be one of the top four seeds in the playoff. They are playing for a very big prize. And with all these teams that have a legitimate chance, it is going to be a bloodbath in October and November in the Big 12,

and it's going to be spectacular to watch. But yes, Arizona, Arizona State, Utah joined. Colorado rejoins. I know what you're saying. What happened to the Pac-12? We will get to that in a minute. First, we've got to go to the ACC. This is the one where if you've not spent much time with the offseason news,

it is going to get very confusing when conference play begins because you're going to say, why are Cal and Stanford playing all these ACC teams? The answer, they are in the ACC. Cal, Stanford, and SMU joined the ACC this year. I'll say it again. Cal and Stanford, which their campuses are within 10 miles each of the Pacific Ocean, are in the Atlantic Coast Conference. SMU basically said, you don't even have to give us any money. You don't even have to give us a split of the TV money. We've got rich donors. We just want to be part of the club. So they get to come too.

It is going to be fascinating to watch. Now the ACC. Ditched divisions last year. So theirs is a number one versus number two. Championship game just like the SEC's will be. Just like the Big Ten's will be. But how this is all going to work. The schedules are very different. They're very weird. Miami got a really nice schedule draw.

Florida State's is eh. It's alright. But it's harder than Miami's. Clemson, NC State, they're going to be contenders for this thing. We'll see what happens with Louisville, which played for the championship last year. SMU's an interesting new entry. Remember, SMU won the American Athletic Conference last year. They opened conference play with a visit from Florida state in September. It's going to be a very odd situation in the ACC, but the ACC is an odd place right now because perhaps you've also missed this other set of news from the ACC. Did you know

the two best football schools in the ACC Clemson and Florida state? Well, they're suing the ACC. Did you know the two best football schools in the ACC, Clemson and Florida State, well, they're suing the ACC. The ACC is suing them back. This is all a big argument about television rights, about money, and basically Clemson and Florida State won out. North Carolina wants out too, but they're not saying the quiet part out loud. Florida State and Clemson are. All of that may come to a head at some point this season. We don't know. We don't know. That's sort of working its way through the court system right now. But the ACC is going to be wild. And yes, Cal and Stanford, ACC teams. The band is on the field game, now a part of ACC history, apparently. So what happened to the Pac-12? Well, I just mentioned where most of the teams went. If you were counting, you realize there are two that I haven't mentioned yet.

So that would be Oregon State and Washington State. These are the two that got royally screwed by conference realignment. They did not have a landing spot. So did they go join another conference? No, they did not. They went to court with the other members of the Pac-12 before they left the Pac-12, and they won. So they keep the name, they keep the logo, they keep a lot of the money and so they are, at least for the next two years, the Pac-12 officially,

but of course we're going to call them the 2-PAC because there's only two teams. So will it be all eyes on the two pack? Will they have to run Hail Marys every play? I'd say they ain't mad at you, but they are pretty mad at Oregon and Washington and Arizona and Arizona state.

I'm running out of Tupac songs here, but you get the point. That's it. That's the league. Now, what does that mean? Well, their champion, such as it is like the winner of the game between the two teams is not declared. The champion does not get an automatic spot in the playoff. They will play a schedule that looks an awful lot like a mountain West schedule. They basically made a scheduling agreement with the Mountain West to give their football teams a schedule. So Oregon State, Washington State will play a lot

of Mountain West teams. That probably tells you the future. More than likely, they're all going to come together into some kind of league, but they don't have to do that right now. They have two years to figure all this out. And that's what they're going to do. They're going to take their time. So that's what's going on with them. The group of five, it's still the same conferences. It's still Conference USA, the MAC, the Sunbelt, the American Athletic Conference in the Mountain West. We'll get into who among them might represent the group of five in the playoff. There is one addition to the FBS this year. Welcome Kennesaw State.

If you don't know where Kennesaw State is, it's suburban Atlanta, essentially. 134 teams in the FBS right now, all vying for a national championship. Most of them don't have an actual chance to win the national championship, but more of them do than ever before because there is now a 12 team playoff. So let's talk about how the 12 team playoff works because it's college football. You know, it can't possibly be as simple as you pick the best 12 teams and you seed them one through 12. No, that is not how this is going to work.

Would it make sense if they work that way? Yeah, but what fun would that be? College football is all about not making sense. College football is all about being difficult. This is why you get your friends texting you this episode. Because your friends still struggle with some of this stuff. Guaranteed.

Even though they've been paying attention to it all year. I still struggle with some of this stuff and it's my job. So here's how the 12 team playoff is going to work. The top four seeds are reserved for conference champs and conference champs only. So what does that mean? It means if the two best teams in the country are in the SEC, the SEC champion is going to be the number one seed and the second best team in the SEC, which might be the second best team in the country, is going to be the number five seed. This also applies to Notre Dame, which cannot play for a conference championship because it is not in a conference in football. So the highest Notre Dame can finish seeded is five.

I'll say it again because it doesn't make total sense when you first say it. The highest Notre Dame can be seeded is five. So if Notre Dame goes 12-0, they do not play a conference championship game. They're not in a conference. They cannot win a conference to get one of the top four seeds. They're number five.

Now, what's important about those top four seeds? You get a buy. You do not have to play in the first round. The first round involves teams five through 12, teams seated five through eight host on campus, teams seated nine through 12 are the visiting teams in those games. The next round will be played at Bowles. The semifinals will then be played at Bowles, and then the national title game will be played at a neutral site. I know what you're saying. This is incredibly incredibly stupid why don't they just play on campus

until they get to the championship game that would be the smart thing to do but they expanded before the first contract ended they've been getting greased by the bowl people for decades they can't quite figure out that college football is better on campus they will once that first week of college football play is better on campus. They will. Once that first week of college football playoff games on campus happens, they're going to go, oh God, we were so stupid to put these in bowl games. They'll understand that, but it'll be too late. And it'll take more years for them to get it right.

But yeah, probably eventually they will. So here's how it works. So again, your top four seeds conference champions. So it's probably going to be the sec of the big 10 champ in some order at one and two. And then the ACC of the big 12 champ at three and four, probably now look, let's say Florida state runs the table and they've just been awesome all season. they could be one or two. Certainly possible. But they aren't getting left out like they were last year. Remember, 13-0 last year, ACC champ left out of the college football playoff because it was only four teams.

Florida State would be guaranteed one of the top four seeds at 13-0 and the champion of the ACC. So you're going to be looking at a couple different points. Like, does my team win the conference championship game? If your team loses in the conference championship game, they're in worse shape probably than a team that missed the conference championship game because they might wind up being seeded lower.

They might have to go on the road. They definitely would have to play one more game to win the national title. If you lose your conference championship game, you're going to have to play one more game to win the national title. If you lose your conference championship game, you're going to have to play 17 games to win the national title. So that's not great. That's not a great situation. The number five team probably has the biggest advantage the way this playoff works because remember I said the top four seeds are guaranteed to be conference champs, but there are five automatic bids. The highest ranked group of five team also gets an automatic bid into the playoff. Now it could be a top four seed if it's good enough, but if it's not good

enough, and if it's not one of the four highest ranked conference champs, then it's going to be that wherever it winds up or number 12. Last year, Liberty was the highest ranked group of five champ. They would be number 12 this year. They finished, I believe, number 22 in the final college football playoff rankings. They would be number 12. So remember, I said number five gets the most advantageous position because number five plays number 12 and number five is at home.

Number 12 is on the road. So you're going to get probably the highest ranked group of five champ. If you're the five seat, the winner of the five 12 game then plays number four, which is a team that probably also finished lower in the college football playoff rankings than number five did. But they were conference champ, so they are ranked higher, or they're seeded higher. So the five seed is probably a favorite

its first two games in the playoff. Once you get to the semifinals, all bets are kind of off at that point. but five C is not a bad place to be, which is a lot of the reason why Notre Dame went for this plan, even though it meant Notre Dame could never have a buy because they're like, you know what? We have a great season where the five C we get a home game. We're probably going to slide into the semis.

Nothing wrong with that. It's going to slide into the semis nothing wrong with that it's going to be confusing for everyone i promise there espn is going to have to spend so much time educating people on this as we get into october november but here's the other thing about october and november there'll be a lot more games that are meaningful in terms of the playoff and the 14 playoff, really about six or seven teams were still in contention in November. There's going to be about 20 teams in contention for the 12 spots, maybe even more depending on how the group of five situations play out, depending on how many teams are kind of clustered between 10 and 17 in the last few weeks of the season, it's going to be very interesting. It's going to create games that we normally wouldn't have paid much attention to that now will be big time circumstances for the teams playing in them,

but also for other teams around the country, there'll be a lot of scoreboard watching. So it'll be very interesting to see how much this changes those games. And does it make people want to watch them? I think it will. I think it will. But it's going to be confusing at first. So let's, hey, it's all right. We're all going to get through this together any questions come watch this show we talk about it every single day you can just we have a dear andy segment every week where you just ask me questions and i answer them so you can find me at andy underscore staples on x you can find me at any underscore Staples on X. You can find me at Andy underscore Staples on Instagram. Andy Staples on three at gmail.com. If you'd like to email me your question, happy to answer.

If you came to this show because your friend sent it to you, thank that friend. I hope you liked it. Hope you want to keep coming because we have a lot of fun on this show. College football is the most fun sport in America. It's also the most ridiculous because you notice I just spent 30 minutes explaining how this season is going to work. Like the NFL doesn't have to do that.

The NBA doesn't have to do that. But college football is its very own unique special thing. And sometimes it's a little confusing, but I think that's part of its charm. So everybody have a happy, healthy, safe holiday weekend. Please pass this to your friends. If you got this episode now, hopefully you know what to say when you get on the lake, when you gather around the grill, when you're at the pool, when you're at the beach.

Season's coming before we know it. Be ready. Cannot wait. And I hope you'll join us for the whole ride. Thanks for watching. Oh, Dave! What the, what you doing, Dave? Dave!