The Matt Thomas Show with Ross - SEC Network's Cole Cubelic Joins the Show Discussing A&M/Miami Match Up

Episode Date: December 18, 2025

SEC Network's Cole Cubelic Joins the Show Discussing A&M/Miami Match Up 

Matt Thomas show with Ross here from New Orleans, 133 is our time and a very busy man who is going to be gracious enough to spend a few minutes with us here on ESPN radio will be on the Alabama-Okloma game tomorrow. You've seen him on television. You see him on the SEC network. Also, there's a show in Birmingham, Cole Kubalik with us on the program. Cole, it's Matt. I appreciate you squeezing a few minutes of your time with us. A real big picture question, because you follow that SEC very tightly. give me the group of schools, if there's three or four, among the SEC that are NIO rich, that are really doing well,

and then give me three or four that our audience in Houston would know about, that are, you're worried about the future of the NIL and they may be concerned about the dollars coming in. I mean, obviously you go Texas, Texas A&M are doing really well. I think Missouri is a team that does better than people think. Tennessee does well. I think people would be surprised where Alabama is. I think they're a little behind most other teams in the league. Old Miss probably ahead of schedule.

I don't know if that changes without laying there. And then I think Mississippi State probably a team you're concerned about. Believe it or not, and I know with what we've seen in the public recently, it's not going to appear that way. But from an NIL perspective, Old Miss is not Scrooge McDucking and, you know, swimming in their giant vault of coins every day. So that's an interesting to watch. That's one interesting to watch moving forward.

Cole, you've got a lot of ties to all the Ole Miss connections in the LSU. As you were doing the daily show and talking about the SEC Network, a thought or two about your relationship with Lane Kiffin, the movement, and what do you expect LSU would do right away once he settles in? I mean, my relationship with Lane is pretty much as professional, and it's been great. He's been really good to me when we've needed to interview and we needed to talk. He's never really short for words, always entertaining.

He's great to us in meetings, always good at giving us information, always helpful. I don't really, he and I don't communicate much outside of that, which is fine. Some coaches I've talked to multiple times a week, other coaches I talk to once or twice during football season. So I think it just depends. I think he's going to win at LSU. Is he going to ultimately win to the extent that everyone expects or just thinks that he is? I don't know. Nowadays, I think it's impossible to just say,

Coach A is going to place B, and that equals championship. There are too many things that have to happen nowadays. You mentioned NIL just a little bit earlier, being able to navigate the transfer portal and not so much who you get and how much they help you, but who you lose to the transfer portal. That might not be a starter. That might be somebody who could fill in three, four weeks in the middle of the season or come in and play at a higher level than anticipated for the last four weeks of the season,

and that doesn't allow you to be run out. out of the playoffs. We're seeing guys go out and teams are changing. You go two years ago, Tate Rattlitz gets injured. That entire Georgia team was different, not just the offensive line. So it's not just quarterbacks that are leaving the lineups or getting injured banged up,

that are changing the makeup of teams. It's not just a wide receiver. I mean, it can be a guard. It can be an inside linebacker. It can be one corner and all of a sudden you have to shift the way that you operate, the way that you play and teams know what to take advantage of. So I think all of that is,

is a part of how it's going to happen. You think about what team unity is, chemistry, leadership. Those things are tough nowadays to be able to finger point, put your finger on, develop. Like, we had a long conversation with Clark Lee in the middle of last season. And he talked about how he had reshifted his mindset inside his program. He said, I was developing these young men for later in life to be better husbands and professionals and go on and do great things. And they were spending their last two or three years at Alabama beating us or Kentucky beating us. so he got back to football and he got back to I mean I hate to say this but a little bit more of a mercenary lifestyle you know more of the assassins creed I guess of hey come in here get what you need to get done and you know we're going to probably not have as much of a relationship after that because we're going to focus more on football

Cole Kubelik ESPN SEC Network joining us here on the Matt Thomas show here from New Orleans a couple more minutes uh Cole which Carson Beck's going to show up the one that can throw multiple touchdowns in a game or multiple INTs in a game Saturdays or in college station. Depends on if they live in third down or not. If you see 15 to 17 third down attempts for A&M, it's going to be the bad one because that's been pretty much every quarterback that's played A&M this year.

They have not been able to survive on third down. That's not something that's going to go well for a lot of guys their age. They're going to get looks with guys that are going to be playing on Sundays. And it's, I mean, that A&M defense on third down is hell on wheels. and there's not many, I don't know there's many pro quarterbacks

that could manage it effectively with what they give you and how they give it to you and who they have to utilize doing it. So if it's a lot of third downs, more than average third downs, you'll get the bad Carson back. But I think that decides this game, honestly. I think the quarterback that makes the least amount of mistakes that plays the cleanest football is going to win this game. And some of that might come down to the coordinators.

Might come down to Shannon Dawson, might come down to Colin Klein. You know, who calls a game that is efficient, enough or has the potential to be efficient enough for them to go out and execute that way and win that game because both these teams have good ground games both these teams have good offensive lines both these teams have enough skill to be able to help around them but there are parts of these two teams i don't think miami has seen a pass rush like this i don't think a and m has played a secondary top to bottom that can run like this one can so those will be interesting factors to watch in that game as well did texas open up any a and m wounds in that game in austin

no i think arts manning just played extremely well he that pass rush and those looks that i mentioned if you go back and dissect it i mean i counted about 110 yards that he saved that offense where it could have been a sack could have been tackle for loss and he was able to escape and either throw the wall away complete the pass or leave the pocket and pick up positive ground so a seven-yard loss would it appear to be turned into a three-yard gain or even an incompletion those are the kind of yards he saved that team consistently with what he was doing and how he was operating. The things, the way that he did it, those things have been there. It's just not a lot of teams had the personnel to be able to take advantage of it.

And you get some of the guys around, and that's one of the better games that Texas offensive line played this year. They have not been great the majority of this season. And they did a nice job sorting some things out, getting a hat on a hat, playing physical football, and picking some things up. Cole Kublich with us here on ESPN on the Matt Thomas showed. Ross, the game that you'll be calling on radio on the sidelines, Oklahoma, Alabama, it feels like to me you've got 100 different opinions about this thing. It's the tightest among the Vegas board at this point. What is the fourth quarter going to look like in that football game, do you think,

if you were to get your crystal ball out? Probably, and this is just like my assumption based on how I think this game's going to go, I think probably middle of the fourth and on, you're going to get a couple, well, at least one, if not two desperate offenses. Now, there's a chance that this thing could be 14, 14, or held three to three, and you know, we're looking at all right, we're just going to settle things down and play for overtime, and both offenses just shut it down, try to take advantage of a better field position, feel like their defense can get a stop, you know, kind of a one-off stop in overtime

and help get a win, or I think you're going to have two offenses that are really pushing and really kind of going past their comfort zones to try to generate yards and points because they haven't been able to do anything the entire game. Very last question. Can Tulane and or James Madison stay competitive on Saturday? Say competitive, yes. I mean, JMU has Alonza Bair to quarterback. He's a mobile kid. Can move around, good on the run, can push the ball down the field. That offensive line plays a more physical brand of football than people give them credit for. Yeah, it's just overall size is what's going to be the difference there.

I mean, this is almost, they're almost the Oregon of 20 years ago. where you know speed athleticism offense scheme had everything and then you get in this setting and it's like okay everybody's 20 pounds heavier and a little bit faster like this doesn't make sense now tulane is a little bit different two lane had three dbs that ended up in NFL camps run NFL rosters um had another one transfer to albert and started this year that weren't there early in the season that secondary wasn't really ready for an old miss passing attack at that point also you go back to Jake retzlaff what he was at that point in the season he he wasn't really a balanced quarterback it was very run heavy he hadn't really found his way through the air didn't have that comfort level in the offense at that point he's gotten there to an extent

and i think because of that that offense being a little bit more balanced could potentially find more yards this time around and i think reds laugh also just his playmaking ability with a defensive line that's better than people give it credit for but i will say can be a little undisciplined at times they can find their way a little too far up field they can find their way out of their gaps. And that's something that Tulane may be able to take advantage of. I just, the secondary's got to be great, not good, great. They got to, they got to bat some passes down. They can't give up free releases. They can't give up a big job after. That's where Ole Miss kills you. This high percentage throws five, eight yards in the air that go for, you

know, 85, 75 yards on the ground. Cole, squeezing 10 minutes from me, man, a lot. Thank you, friend. Safe travels to Oklahoma. And we'll see you, I guess, for the Texas Bowl down the road as well. Thank you for the time as always. Absolutely. Look forward to seeing you. Thank you so much for having you, Matt.