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You're gonna have to leave him on for a minute. I'm gonna give him some marital advice. That's amazing. Good for him. Good to talk to you. I know it's been a eventful day for college football today. We'll get into some of that if you want. So we're going to preview Texas A&M and Florida, which I think is a very interesting game. Even it's two unranked teams. There's a great big 12 game on tomorrow night and we're going to preview those make our predictions. And then just a couple of other notes about the weekend, but there's some big news that came out today, Bill. And we're going to talk about that first here. And that is the Pac 12 announced today that they are going to add Boise State, Fresno State, San Diego State, and Colorado State from the Mountain West. This is obviously step one for the Pac 12. You've got to get to eight to be considered a real conference. This gets them to six on top of having Oregon State and Washington State. Bill first thoughts, any particulars about this, that takeaways, things along those lines, I think it's going to start the 26 football season is when it starts, correct? So it won't be next year. It'll be the year after the 26 season, I believe, is when this will start. So what are your initial thoughts about this move by the big 12, or me, excuse me, the Pac 12? Just another example of the Darwinian, is that how you say it Darwinian nature of college football, where when the Pac 12, it floated last summer, I thought, one of the, I actually went back and looked, what did I write? I said, one of the options was a Mountain West merger. Well, now you start to think of it from the Pac 12 angle, and it's like, well, we don't want all of them. We want Boise, sure. That will take the most competitive football program. We'll take the San Diego market. Colorado State's interesting. I mean, they're going to be in the spotlight this weekend against Colorado. And you know, you grab Fresno who traditional, when I think Mountain West football, I mean, the first two, I think of are Fresno and Boise. So of the crop, yeah, of who they have in there now. And then I would say the next school I think of, they didn't get, which is where I think they might kick around next is Air Force, traditional brand, success level. I went back and compared with the Pac 12 would look like against the whack that we grew up with. Not the whack of now, but it knows a whack team back in the day, correct? Yeah. Hawaii, Fresno, BYU, fun, fun games, fun teams, not serious national championship contenders with the exception of BYU in 1984. But yeah, I think they could make it look like that and try to create a conference on that level. So I would go after Air Force and UNLV. And if I don't do that, I either call Stanford and Cal and say, hey, you want to come back instead of the 3000 mile trip every week, or option three Brian. And we explored this as sporting is and one that I'm getting intrigued with. And I know we're going to talk about one of these teams in a bit, Memphis and Tulane. Yeah. Those are probably the next best group of five schools in terms of football and seeding and market. So yeah, the Pac 12 is alive. And I think there are casual college football fans. I hate using the phrase casual because it's demeaning. There are probably some college football fans out there that don't know that the Pac 12 technically still exist. Yes, there's a lot that don't know that. I think the UNLV one makes a ton of sense. I think that that's a no brainer. And I'm actually surprised that this wasn't part of the just speaking. It's not about UNLV's program, although which right now, I mean, strike with the iron's hot because UNLV is pretty football team right now. They were both team last year. And I think they're two and oh, this year. And who did they smack? UTSA, I think they smacked this past weekend. So good football team. And that's a market that clearly NFL is trying to get into. A lot of people trying to get into the Las Vegas. There's been rumblings. I'll play two Pac 12 championship games in Vegas. So major baseballs. How many times have there been rumors about this team may move to Las Vegas, right? If it's clearly a market that people want to get into. And what's interesting is you almost need to recreate the Mountain West as the Pac 12. I mean, honestly, I think that's the move because there's some pretty rabid fan bases there. It's just not big, not always big markets. But I think the Cal Stanford thing is going to be fascinating. Depending on what happens next year with ESPN, do they decide to renew the ACC contract? They look to get out of it because this instability, all that type of stuff. Are there outs? Are there legal outs for Cal and Stanford? Because the other thing too, is the Pac 12 is sitting on the really large chunk of money. That's what they, you want to know why they fought the court settlement to keep the money. It's not so they can have it to give the Oregon State Washington State. It's so they can have this money here to help with schools buying out of the leagues that they're in. And that's part of that. What would you do? Do you think, Brian, I got a question for you then. Do you think it's possible for the ACC and Stanford and Cal just kind of just agree like, hey, it's cool. You guys can go. Or are they so hung up on this Florida State Clemson thing where they've got to protect themselves with their membership numbers? So that's exactly right. So that's the hitch in that argument, I think, unless they are here's here's the way the ACC would have to play that they would have to have something to say to replace Cal and Stanford with. Because there are 17 teams right now you got to be at 14. So let's say they let Cal and Stanford walk that gets them down to 15 for football because Notre Dame doesn't count for football. They have 18 for basketball with Notre Dame, but or other sports for Notre Dame. So you get you down to 15 if Clemson and in Florida State walk. And that's all that walks. You're now below that 14 team threshold, which is what I believe they need to be at. Correct. Correct. Correct. But the thing that you you have to be concerned with is it's not a given that it ends with Florida State and Clemson. So either A the ACC implodes and then it doesn't matter. But if the ACC is not one to just give up, which they're not going to, then it may not end with Florida State and Clemson. So you have to have some protection there to a make sure you keep Cal and Stanford if you can, but then also have a plan to now you may need to say, Hey, we got to go get Memphis. Great. And then that gets interesting. And there's a couple teams in the AC that would make sense for them to go after just to get their numbers right, just to survive as a league. Although I think that is more of a you're slowing down your inevitable death by if you have to go that route where you lose Florida State Clemson, Virginia, North because if North Carolina goes, NC State goes, it's literally the law of the state now. You fall apart in Miami, probably bad. I mean, so that could get interesting. And then the other thing is, does the PAC 12 try to do to the ACC, what the ACC did to the PAC 12, if this starts to fall apart? Because they've got a couple years to kind of, you know, they don't have to go to 16 right away. They just got to get to 12. Correct. And then you can kind of see, let's see what happens. And maybe they try to go poach a couple of those ACC teams that maybe don't have homes. So it's going to be very fascinating. But I think rating the Mountain West, obviously, it's going to be a big part of that is going to be a big part of what they do. And if the ACC goes away, another phone call that I'm making is to those rich cats down in Fort Worth and the Dallas area that are currently paying for SMU to be part of the ACC without getting any money back. So though, because that's a TV market, you've got to try to get into if you're the PAC 12. I mean, it's not going to be like huge. Like you just went out and got Texas, but it is going to help. So UNLV would be big. I do like the idea of Air Force. I think that gives you a good respected football program to have on top of the teams that you already landed, Bill, because the only other wild scenario, I didn't put it in the article. So we talked about all these pairings. I said, you want to get creative. I mean, and this is that whole, you got to get two siblings to get a long thing. And I have two sisters, and that's very difficult. So could you get BYU in Utah? Yeah, I don't know that they can't. But I mean, that would be the one I would love to have, because then I still feel like the West Coast, like I said, Wackfield BYU. But I think both of those programs would almost look at that like a step back. Like we got what I was going to say. Why would you want to go from the big 12 to. Whereas Stanford and Cal were the very last teams to leave. And nobody wanted them. I mean, it's very obvious. He didn't want them. Right. The way that I mean, soon as the big 12 started looking to expand, it was Colorado, Utah, Arizona. I mean, you needed those markets. And then, of course, BYU was a team that they had added before they went to Utah. So I'm talking about the second expansion after UCF and BYU. Like I said, I went back and looked at, okay, what did I write after all the realignment stuff last year? This was before Stanford and Cal left. Every conference's next move. And my ACC was Explore Revenue Sharing. My SEC was Stay Put. My big 12 was maybe going to take a look at Gonzaga and make it a bath. I did put where I was wrong was I put the big 10 should look at Stanford and Cal. But I don't think they wanted to give them. It's like what you just said. I don't know that anybody really wanted them. They had no value to your league financially. They had great sports programs outside of football, but they had no financial value to your league. They had 50,000 seat stadiums. It's not, you know what I mean? Like it's not. They don't fill except when a couple teams go out to play. That's correct. So I think that's why if I'm the ACC in the PAC 12 and conferences rarely do this, I mean, those would be the two teams I could get ideally. And then so, hey, we felt bad for these schools, but we didn't feel that bad. So you can have them back. And then there would be some sort of regional field of that that I would enjoy. Hey, CFE Nation listeners. It's Matt Liner. 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I do think it's important that they start that they struck as soon as they could. Because if they would have waited and I think that from what I've read, they're going to be a little bit aggressive with next step two. They're not going to just sit back and okay, let's wait till we get to next summer. Because the Big 12 to me is forcing some of these moves in my opinion. Because the Big 12 is talking about we're going to expand. They're the one conference that's openly discussing we're open to expansion. SEC and Big 10 from what I've read are like, now we're comfortable with where they are. Even though we all know that the Big 10 has basically has an open invitation to Notre Dame. They would expand if Notre Dame calls it, hey, we're ready. They would say, all right, cool. Let's make this happen. But Big 12 is the one that said, hey, yeah, we're still looking. That could be something that forces the Pac-12's hand is like, look, if you're going to go get Memphis, you need to do that before the Big 12 goes and gets them. Or before the ACC implodes. Because then the ACC may go try to scoop up some of these teams. So that's going to make a little interesting as well. And what you have to do is if you're going to get some teams from this region, then you need to get multiple teams in that region to make it make sense. So you have enough regional games to play. And so if you're going to get Memphis, then you need to be thoughtful of, okay, who else in this area do we want to go get? So, you know, you mentioned the Tulane. There's some other schools that you have to look at, and that's what's going to make this interesting. But this was a good first move. And I think it was smart to not necessarily jump on adding some of the teams, you know, there's no need to add Hawaii right now. There's no need to add San Jose State or Nevada or Utah State or Wyoming or any of those other Mountain West teams. You don't need to get them all right now. But I would expect them to kind of do something again here in the next several months to add maybe a couple more. I was actually surprised, though, Bill, that UNLV wasn't part of this initial move. And I'd be curious to kind of hear why. Yeah, you know, I think that markets great. You said strike whether the iron's hot. They do have one interesting thing about the state of Nevada. They have one of the premier high school programs in the country, as people know, Bishop Gorman. So I remember distinctly talking to Roman Dunes at the championship game last year. And you could see how much pride he took in being a West Coast kid. You know, a playing in the Pac-12 growing up, like you think he said, he liked USC, you know, and then he stayed on the West Coast. And those guys, if you can create opportunities and create West Coast football, we, I think you and I are generally in agreement that we still like the regional piece of college football and it should. We should. So, you know, Stanford and Cal don't know what to do with that when they start playing ACC games. I'm just not that into it. So I would be more into a conference like this where they they add a UNLV and UNLV. You just make your base out of there, right? That is a great sports market. It's less it's seen as less CD as it used to be. And then I mean, from a sports standpoint, because so much gambling, so widespread and legal and I know you're all over all them, fan dual apps. That's a joke because I know you don't bet. But hey, I'll say this though, Bill, we talk about Stanford and Cal, but you know, the ACC was proud to claim Cal this past weekend. Hey, we got a win over the SEC, another win over the SEC. So with the longstanding tradition of Cal going down there and beating Auburn, that is funny. That's great. And by the one thing I was going to say that, arguably the coolest team in my lifetime, basketball or football, UNLV 1990. Oh, gosh. Yeah. You can make them cool pretty quick. Yeah. And you can make kids want to go there. And I think if they were part of the pack 12 as a part as opposed to the Mount West Conference, Barry Odom sticks around, they're going to be all right. They are like right there in terms of if Memphis, I know we're going to talk about Memphis here in a minute, but if Memphis loses this weekend, your top group of five schools are probably Northern Illinois based on the big win. And UNLV, who, by the way, I said UTSA was Houston. They beat Houston by 20. Yeah. In the opener 27, 7, right? No, you're good. But I mean, UNLV is right there as like a top. I think we do our one to one 34. I think I have them at like 38. So yeah, I mean, the opportunity is certainly there. So if you had to predict right now, Bill, who do you think the next round of expansion for the big for the pack 12 will be? I think they'll go easy. And we kind of hinted at it. I think they'll go get UNLV and Air Force. And if they're unless they're super bold, and then the Memphis two lane thing makes sense to me. So we'll see obviously a lot of the unpredictability piece of this is obviously at work. If you'd have told me on a Thursday today, I was going to wake up and you know, all those schools that end in state are going to be in the pack 12 this morning. I probably I did say we have a Colorado state grad in our office, Bob Hilly, long time sporting news editor. He'd been here forever. And he's pretty happy. You know, they got a little bit of a, they got a little bit of a bump. And you got to remember that for the group of five type schools that get there like, I don't want to use a mafia analogy, but they got, you know, they leveled up. You get Dr. Mario, you go to the next level. I still play that game, by the way. Yeah. Yeah, you brought up something interesting. The last thing that's been kind of marinating on since you said it is, does the pack 12 try to make some non football moves in their league? That'll be I'm thinking Gonzaga, St. Mary's, St. Mary's exactly. Like that would be interesting, because those obviously don't have any impact on football, but that'll that would be something to keep an eye on. Yeah. And Mike, the course of our basketball writers going to write about that today. I don't know what his thoughts are. I haven't talked to him. I do know our editor was reaching out to have Mike look at it. Mike's generally, I can speak for him on this. In general, he's not a fan of the realignment shuffle. He never has been. He knows as much about Gonzaga as anybody, because he's been around that program for a while. And I mean, if the big 12s flirted with it, so why wouldn't a pack 12? I'd rather watch Gonzaga play. Well, I mean, Boise State was a tournament team. One down like Washington State's been in the tournament. Oregon State went on around a couple years ago. You go get St. Mary's in Gonzaga. I think more people start to watch those games. I don't know if Gonzaga does it though, because I don't think they need those schools for their basketball profile. Strange as that sounds like they go play all the they get more mileage out of the noncon games against Kansas and you know, all those schools anyway. But I still think it's an increase for Gonzaga. Yeah, I think they thought is that they start they they wouldn't get the same amount of money that the football schools are getting. But I would imagine being in there as a non football member, you're still going to be getting made paid more than you are. No, I'm just saying from their basket ball, yeah, like do they get anything from it's about their pocketbooks, right? Do you get more? Do you get more from playing Oregon State and Washington State than you do from beating up on Portland and San Francisco? I think so. I think so. I think so. A little more miles out of that. Yeah, I mean, I think it also helps them with like, look, let's say you have a rough non conference one year when now you're in the pack 12. And so I think there's some things donor wise and then obviously TV contract wise they wouldn't get what the football schools would be getting, but they'd still get some money. So that's something I would look at as well. So we're going to move on from that bill and we're going to dive into the two games that I want to discuss this weekend. And we're going to start with the Friday night game and then we'll finish up with the big it with the the very I don't say big because only it's a big game. I think it's a very intriguing game that we'll discuss on Saturday. But the game tomorrow night Friday it's going to be Friday night at eight o'clock Eastern on Fox air at number 20 Arizona at number 14 Kansas State both teams are two and L bill it's one of only I believe two or is it the only two? So the other ranked on ranked game is Missouri at Boston College at Missouri. There's one of only two ranked opponents this week and honestly the only one that I'm really overly intrigued by. I don't have a lot of interest in the the Boston College Missouri game. So let's talk about this game bill a little bit. This is a first first big game of the big 12 versus pack 12. So you got two ranked teams but it's one's the newcomer from the pack 12. One is an old school big 12 team in Kansas State and it's 14 versus 20. Let's talk about this one a little bit. Yeah fun Friday night game one that you'll tune into. I mean a couple reasons if you're not up on these teams. I didn't Tetro McMillan's one of them. Receiver that had 300 yards a couple weeks ago, 304 yards. SN preseason all American six five gonna play at the next level. Brilliant receiver. Noah Fafide and him have a really strong connection. I have some feelings about this game that we're going to get into but Arizona was the Super Dog last year six and oh against the spread as an underdog. Chance for them to make a first impression in front of everybody. They didn't look great last week. Just have a feeling we're sitting on a really big Kansas state game here because if you haven't been to Manhattan you can get buried in Manhattan. Manhattan pretty quickly if you're not ready for that especially in prime time. I thought the way that they battled because let's be honest neither team looked very good this past weekend. I think both had a little bit of a looking past the team that they were playing for the next game. Obviously Tulane gave them everything they can handle had a 27 20 lead in the fourth quarter before before they put it away with a Dylan Edward touchdown run and then a fumble return. Northern Arizona gave Arizona a game. It was 22 to 10 and Arizona scored the last nine points of that game. I believe actually sorry a Northern Arizona scored the last 19 points of that game. They were down 10 to three in the second quarter 10 to six and a half time and put the game away obviously late 22 to 10. No if Ted Tarot had two catches for 11 yards. No if Fafidi struggled. I think what this was for both teams honestly Bill was both of them were kind of looking past opponents. They were supposed to smack because of this next week's big game. But I think Kansas State had to grind out it over over what has been a quality program in Tulane in recent years. I think we all kind of expect them to take a little bit of a step back with the losses they had personnel wise Michael Pratt. They're running back Tijay Sharp from the year before and then of course Willie Fritz and his staff. But Kansas State had to battle. I think their defense got worked a little bit more than I expected it to but what we saw in the second half of that game is Kansas State is starting to figure out how to use both D.J. Giddens who's a dude and Dylan Edwards and and and that's going to be big. That's the reason why I really like Kansas State moving forward. It was the reason why they were my preseason big 12 chant prediction because I said when they figure out how to use Avery Johnson D.J. Giddens and Dylan Edwards that run game is going to be hard to stop and we saw that in the second half of that game against Tulane. And I think they're going to lean on that here. You know you mentioned Dylan Edwards got a former Notre Dame recruit I believe. He's average in 10 yards of carry. Giddens, seven yards of carry. Avery Johnson, seven yards of carry. And again if that spirals out and if tetra and no if the feet aren't on and get buried real quick. Avery Johnson also hasn't taken a sack. He hasn't been this like Heisman level player that some were projecting. I had him as a sleeper for the Heisman. He does have a lot of talent, harm talent, running the football, their defenses solid. You know and they're tough at home. They were six and two against the spread. So another thing for the they were on the road last week against Tulane. But yeah that was a tough I think I was just to get out of it once it got testy. It's like all right we got to get out of here and get a win and get get home close game at the end. And the big thing here is I think that I for those of us who pay attention to the line a little bit that line hasn't moved even though you're hearing and reading about Arizona winning the upset. So if that was going to happen that line would probably knock down a point hasn't and that's why. By the way is a seven point favorite right. Right. So if it was really about Arizona they would bump that down to six and a half six points. That tells me that Kansas State to be close but I think they went by about 10 points. And the impact of that is like you said with Plathrace is the big 12 has a huge game every week for the next month. I think next week Oklahoma State and Utah are going to do it and it's Oklahoma State and Kansas State and they play in Manhattan. Kansas State's got you made a good pick because Kansas State's got the tough ones at home. They've got the tough big 12 games at home starting with this one was part of it. Yeah. Yeah I mean like and Manhattan's a tough place to play. Yeah. Here's a concern I have if you're looking at it from theirs. There's two there's one concern on both sides of the ball that are going to impact the game. Number one is can Kansas State's athletes on the perimeter slow down the Arizona pass game. They slip walk through last week's game against Northern Arizona. They're they're much better than that. Right. He's not a 300 yards a game guy. Right. Doesn't happen. He's also not a two for 11 guy. He's a seven for one 10 guy on a normal basis. Can you stop that talking about McMillan from Arizona. Can you put enough pressure on him and then run with their athletes? That's the concern on the other side. Kansas or Arizona gave up over 200 rushing yards in their opener against New Mexico. They gave up they scored 39 points. New Mexico had 24 at halftime and they rushed for 210 yards 5.5 yards per carry. And New Mexico is a team that also in the opener lost to Montana State at home and only rushed for 152 yards against Montana State. So good running team not a great running team and you're going against a team whose entire identity is about running the football to three great athletes. And the thing about this Kansas State team that a lot of people don't maybe appreciate that haven't watched them play a lot like you have built. This is a team that's got dynamic athletes on offense in ways that they haven't a whole they've always had like that one like a deuce Vaughn. One of the lockets you know there's been 37 lock instead of come through there. They've got DJ Gids is a is a good athlete but he's a really big traditional back. Dylan Edwards and Avery Johnson are two of the most explosive players in the country at their positions not best explosive and that gives them a really unique counter for against a team that right now hasn't shown me that they know how to stop the run. And so that's the interesting part to this matchup. It's going to be the the ground game of K-State and the air attack of Arizona which defense does a better job against that is going to be a big part of this matchup. One too you get it on Friday night and you get to figure it out. And I like having I do like having one good game on Friday night between Thursday and Friday. I don't love it when there's like two or three because I just you know kind of want to sit down get ready for Saturday relax a little bit somebody asked me last this week Jason Page I do a segment with him every Monday he asked if I watched anything but football this week and I said no. And I try to I try to watch something else like you know if Netflix or prime has some series but you can lock take minute off and I was like what I didn't I watched between NFL college eighth grade football at St. Catherine I watched that's all I watched over the last week. Also King gets released this weekend on Paramount. Yeah I might have to check I do like having a show Brian like one show during the I tried the new Lord of the Rings thing but it's weird but it's I like having one show that you just kind of take an hour and okay this is you watched Reacher I love Reacher okay I love it okay I got to say if you hadn't watched it that's one day so so yeah like if there's a show wreck out there from your listeners you go ahead and send it my way um but yeah I you know I know we do scores on these games I had 33 24 okay is that about right I know we were close last week on most of our picks yeah the I we were we looked like we had nailed them all until Iowa blue their second half of course game against against Iowa State but I went I went I went 34 to 27 is my score right on the line state right on the line for this game I think it's going to be I do think Arizona's going to look good early and I think K-State's crown game gets going and they run they run it in the second half of that game I almost nailed the Michigan Texas game entirely bill I had 30 I had 30 13 you know my big 10 heart got 31 12 yeah it did it did it did and I will say real quick for it before we move on it could have been worse and it was very striking I've been to a lot of games at the big house where they beat up on somebody and vice versa and this was one you knew kind of early and yeah you know we can get into Texas at some point on this show but like they've got dudes they've got a quarterback they're pretty complete and Michigan is very ordinary on the offensive I think next week we will talk about Michigan USC we'll see if anything's changed they have to they have to do what we talked about last week they have to lean into orgy as a runner got correct they have to that Davis Warren's a nice kid but you're not going to win a lot of games with him at a quarterback I will say this what people saw on Saturday is is what makes me like this Texas team they're not just athletes they have they're good in the trenches they are not great but they're good right and that makes that team dangerous I have a question and I don't want to rehash the Notre Dame loss but here is some color from the big house that I wanted to offer I was talking about this after the game I said okay you go out you know when you're at Michigan Stadium you got to go all the way around to go to your press conference oh yeah it's like all the way right it's a it's a hook so you have to go inside stadium around people you know been to Michigan when they've gotten drilled by Ohio State I was there when the pump foam will happen against Michigan State and it looked like a funeral after this one I said you know there were families posing you know Texas fans posing with Michigan fans there was selfies and smiles and college students and I'm thinking if this were the BCS era these people would be filing out of here like a funeral yeah because your season's over I think they had won a title last year also that too the honeymoon you know of the title and how long does that honeymoon last because I'm going to tell you they didn't act like they just got destroyed the fans Sharon and the players that was a different tone obviously but you know and they're going to face USC at home they're going to face Oregon at home they're going to face Ohio State at home I'm sure Notre Dame the mood walking out of that stadium was a little bit different is brutal I'm sure that was the look that I'm talking about yeah because I want those losses to matter especially in September yeah I think it's uh I think it's a lot of it I think a lot of Michigan fans kind of expect they hoped that they could beat Texas but I think it was kind of expected and they they know and they watch Davis Warren in the first game I think they know they have an eight and fourteen yeah hey college football nation listeners it's Rob Stone this fall the game changes join me three-time national champion head coach Urban Meyer and Heisman Trophy winner Mark Ingram as we bring you a new perspective on football and culture every week we'll be joined by the biggest names in sports and talk about everything inside and outside of the lines let us guide you through a new era of college football watch triple option on YouTube or listen on Apple podcast Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts let's get into the second game of this that we want to talk about Bill and that is Florida that is Texas A&M at Florida this is a very very fascinating game because I keep one of the one of the there's two storylines to talk about in this game bill number one is Texas A&M earlier the Mike Elkel era this is a great opportunity to go out and get a win that's sort of but I wouldn't call it a statement win from the standpoint of like anyone thinks Florida's good but as a it's a statement in that you are beneath us as you look to recruit that region but also to it's it's an establishment win I think it's the is the is the phrase I want to use because their statement wins are hey we played a really good football team and we beat him at their place nobody thinks that Florida's a very good football team it's an establishment win meaning you were saying hey look we are establishing our place in this league under Mike Elko we are going to go on the road we are going to play well we're not a team anymore that just go get their butts kicked on the road and plays well at home we're going to go on the road and and get that win that builds some momentum for our football team and on the flip side because Florida is not good a loss is more damaging for you to go on the road and lose to Florida than it would have been maybe five years ago where it's like dude how do you lose to that team which is how far how hard and fast Florida has fallen on the flip side this is a do you want to keep your job or not game for Billy Napier and that's what's that's so it's not so much Florida's not in it Texas A&M this is a game they need if they actually want to be a team that's you know playing for a big up you know post season opportunity whether it's a playoff game or a a bigger bowl game or something like that but but for Florida it's survival it really is that it's survival and everybody talks about well how when when will you know Billy Napier be fired well this game is going to have a big say in in what when that when that is Bill well yeah and and I've got two stories queued up at sporting news breaking down that hot seat when Paul Finebaum kind of puts him on notice like believe the coil was yeah he has to win this game and you're thinking he has to win against Texas A&M what a couple things well let's do the Florida part first because it's the more urgent um if Billy Napier 2 and 11 against ranked teams and I write all those pieces when guys get hired and you're thinking hey it's a home run it's never oh this is horrible I thought when Billy Napier was hired it would work because I like this experience I like what he did at Louisiana I like that he learned from Dabo and he coached in the SEC right yeah yeah he checked everything and just hasn't and I think that program in particular the toxicity levels run pretty high pretty quick and you know I was talking to Bill Troach as you know we do our podcast and you can go all the way back to the urban Meyerhire when Florida Urban Notre Dame and Florida and there was one of them was gonna get urban he was their last rock star but he wasn't a rock star when he got there he was a he would have been more uh let me ask you this see you're the Notre Dame guy you can answer this better than me had Notre Dame hired urban he would have been more of a rock star at Notre Dame at the time than he was when he stepped foot on the campus at Gainesville yes because of the Midwest highs we knew who he was we knew who he was he coached at Notre Dame he you know he knew Lou he you're gonna look at the success he had at Bowling Green we're gonna have a greater appreciation for the back-to-back 9-1 seasons of Bowling Green than maybe a Florida fan was Florida fan so who cares when undefeated at Utah well Notre Dame fans would have so yeah that would have been a much bigger hire at the moment it was announced if he would have been announced for Notre Dame than it was for Florida because you're also still kind of you're not that far removed from the Spurrier regime and it's like you're you're still kind of replacing the legend although you're not the guy to replace the legend you're the guy replacing the guy that replaced the legend but it was still kind of Spurrier's program absolutely it was it was it was it would have been a much bigger hire for Notre Dame so my way of saying Lane Kiffin would be the next closest thing to that for them I don't know if they can get him I don't know why the rumors are I know why the rumors are happening I don't know if he would leave Old Miss but he's probably the closest thing to that Spurrier type when they hired Will Musk champ it didn't feel like that when they hired Jim McElwain it didn't feel like that Mullen was probably pretty close because you could have sold you sold them on coached with Urban was the OC on your two title teams got more out of Mississippi State than you know all those things and Napier was group five guy I don't think they're gonna if they fire Billy Napier I don't think they're going group of five guys this time so Lane is probably you got to go all in on Lane probably and there's no guarantees there so I think Florida's in a tough spot as a program well they put themselves in this spot by the way correct if you fired a guy that had been three years in a row to a new year six bowl game I think one two of them and then you fired him because you didn't like him so he was off to a rough start so you put yourself in this hole by the way so the next part is can DJ Lagway save his job right because he's talented I played very well and his opener are they just gonna pitch a side Grant Mertz and say hey we're gonna go with DJ Lagway because the next piece of this is anybody everybody knows we've talked about it all off season I mean Florida's schedule number seven Tennessee to Texas they played Georgia and Texas back to back Ole Miss Florida State maybe they win that one even UCF doesn't look like a win to me so so much is on this game because I don't know how many more dubs they have on the schedule and that makes it really tough what you say about A&M everything's true um an establishment win would be the best way but they this is like the SEC middle class right now so you want to upgrade your neighborhood you want to win games like this and then you get to neither one of these teams is a playoff contender uh but you want to push into that second tier of us the winner of this game would probably be top eight and you don't want to be nine through sixteen in the SEC right now and especially for A&M because it would be a road conference win which means you got one of those conference wins in a road environment whereas Florida it's like to your point if they lose this game I mean they're their their remaining home schedule is uh for conference play is Kentucky which right now looks a little bit better but Kentucky's one of those schizophrenic teams it looks terrible one week and then the next week runs for 350 yards on you right but then it's Georgia and Jacksonville and then LSU and Ole Miss that's the remaining home slate that you have and and so it is a tough spot and you talk about DJ Lagway I mean talk about an incredible intro to your college career as a star in eighteen of twenty five for four hundred fifty six yards three touchdowns if you can pull off a couple wins that maybe people don't think you're going to get with him at quarterback that could be the thing that does potentially salvage his career I I think Billy Napier is pretty much done but you look at you look at the schedule coming up bill and they've got Texas A&M this week at Mississippi State home against UCF if they win this game I think that gives them an opportunity as a team to have the confidence to maybe win your next couple at Mississippi State Mississippi State just got beat by a I don't think a very good Arizona state team right this past weekend and and and honestly it wasn't as close as the final score showed you look at all they beat it by touchdown it was 30 to 3 at one point in time in that game they were down to Arizona State they got run in that game that's a game you can win so now all of a sudden you're sitting here you're four and one and DJ Lagway's your quarterback he's playing well you might be able to get a couple wins the rest of the way with Kentucky at home you know maybe an Ole Miss upset maybe a Florida State and now all of a sudden it's like everybody thought you were done you've got this hot shot new quarterback you got you beat Texas A&M you went on the road you did this and then you're like every team that beat us was ranked in the top 20 you know maybe that's enough but if you lose this game that you never get to that right and that's what I think on the line for Billy Napier this game because to your point the DJ Lagway thing adds some to it not that it adds to it as a player because he's still a true freshman and that was against an FCS team let's see what he does against a real opponent but if he plays well enough for you to win these next couple games that's a hey guys if we can just stay the course we've got really good freshman class we got young receivers freshman quarterback there's a lot of youth on that football team that you could maybe use to convince them into to keeping you especially since there's some upper level you know issues going on been sass left you know to deal some family stuff so the president's not there and you know it could be enough for you to maybe keep your job so and and I got the even if they lose this game you know we talked about this last week where the hot seat doesn't exist I'll just fire you I was thinking October 5th would be that day because they play UCF they if they lose to that one but do you really fire your coach the week before the Tennessee game this is why I think this game matters bill right because it's kind of like quarterback changes if you can you want to make a quarterback change during a buy right same thing with the coaching change thereby this year is between Mississippi State and UCF that's why again this game is important and if they get smacked by Texas A&M which is possible I mean look they could compete and maybe beat Texas A&M Texas A&M's a flawed football team as well right now but if they get smacked by Texas A&M I don't think he makes it to UCF I think the move is made during the buy week and I think you're right so that's why we thought I've been saying that UCF circle that UCF game for a couple weeks and now I start to look at the schedule I think you're exactly right um where yeah you want to have that break um so would they do it after Mississippi State or before I mean that's the other thing is I'm I'm on alert when I'm on alert that means you know you start to hear things you're ready in case it happens you're prepared you've already looked at you know the replacement list he's on that with us yeah because I there's ones when you're not ready for then and it sucks as a writer because you're just not ready for him at Nick Saban last year a great example of that but um I think he did that in the afternoon um but you're just not ready for him and this one I'm we're ready for so that's never a good omen for a coach and you feel for him at the same time you know he'll probably find a coaching job somewhere else he's young and all those things and you learn from those all coaches do but at the same time this is the first power four conference one that you feel like it's going to happen we just don't know when yeah so let's talk let's talk actually about the game and how we see this thing playing out Bill so when you look at this matchup a&m coming off of a you know actually both teams are coming off big wins over FCS opponents obviously Florida last week beat Sanford 45 to 7 and Texas A&M beat McNeese State 52 to 10 it was 38 nothing at halftime uh Florida's game against Sanford ends up being 45 7 and it was a game where Florida took some time to get going they scored 31 points in the second half not a surprise because again you were starting a true freshman quarterback but they rolled in the second half of that game it's 14 nothing at halftime uh so he's got that game undersbell you got to win you've got something going if you're Florida how do you see this game playing out Bill what is your prediction for this contest yeah I got I'm gonna find out of DJ lagway can pitch but now we can throw and I say pitch in terms of the three of seven in the 10 to 20 range that intermediate passing range I always look at pro football that's my favorite tool for pro football focus to like kind of evaluate quarterbacks is okay can they throw down the field I don't really look at 10 yards or less unless they're missing a lot right that should look good uh three of seven given watch the Notre Dame game this has to be able to hit that yeah sorry I knew you were gonna get that in there gotta be able to be good 10 yards or less uh you know uh can you get it 20 yards or more and uh DJ lagway 42 9.9 0.9 in that intermediate pass range which means can you pitch can you hit this the throws you got a pitch through a pick in that range Texas A&M will be able to hop on those if you can't um wigman we we've dissected over and over again I think this is just another big game for him I do think Texas A&M hangs I got Florida winning opportunity to look really dumb here I got 27 20 Florida I think they hold off the Napier Talk at least for another couple weeks if they can beat Mississippi State they get the three in one and it gets real then at that point if we're not going to fire him gets through UCF gets through Tennessee then they have that second bye week before Georgia you really gonna fire your coach before you go and even with the bye week before you play the number one team in the country when did Mullen get fired I'm trying to remember late he was like right before the last game okay I did all this this week so actually it's like fresh in mind remember uh McWink got fired right after Georgia it was a very weird situation there where he uh remember there was the he was at a press conference that players and himself received death threats but he didn't report it to the university and that resulted in his firing about a week later Mullen was fired before the Florida State game after they lost Missouri I'm looking at it now yeah yeah and then must champ similar so yeah I don't know if you do it before Georgia that'd be weird you go out there with an interim coach and in one try to go beat the number one team in the country that's why this game is gonna get a lot of you know Ron either way huge it's huge I'm actually gonna go with Texas A&M in this game and and part of my issue is I just I saw no fight in Florida against Miami and and I didn't necessarily see a whole lot of it against Samford I just think they just out athlete at Samford I like you talked about the stats I mean he DJ went four of six for 198 yards on balls past 20 yards I mean they were just chucking it deep that that's not gonna fly against Texas A&M right to your point I don't know that they necessarily did as much to kind of get that kid comfortable with running a normal offense they just went for some like highlight real stuff against Samford I worry about the offensive line protecting the quarterback in this game I think that's that's a bit of an issue for me now and and I wonder if Florida's gonna be able to get anything going in the run game and have any kind of balance that's that's kind of where I look at this matchup and and and wonder if Florida has the competitive this to play in this game do they have the willingness to battle in the trenches to play in this game because the one thing that I'll give Texas A&M credit for in their matchup against Notre Dame is they competed right they just Notre Dame is just you know the more talented team the more experienced team and just the better team when Notre Dame wants to play well Notre Dame's a pretty good football team it's when they show up and act like they're just gonna roll the ball out and the other team's gonna lay down and die and and so I think I like Texas A&M here I don't I don't love the Florida the body language of the Florida defense to be honest with you right now just I think if A&M comes out early and kind of runs a ball on him and and makes a couple plays that I could see this team kind of kind of laying down and dying and that's kind of what I see happening so I actually have Texas A&M winning this game 27-17 I just I think DJ Lagway is going to be kind of running for his life and they're going to throw a lot of movement post snap movement at him he's going to make some mistakes he'll make some big plays with his legs handled with his arm he's a very talented young man but it's it's this is a really good front seven a quality secondary and a well coached defense against a kid who is not going to get a ton of help outside of a couple good receivers so I think it'll be I think that's how I see it 27-17 in favor of the Aggies and I think that I don't know if that's the kind of win that that Nessar gets him fired but I think it is the or loss I should say but it is the kind of loss that could lead to them losing next week and that's when I think the change happens and that's I think whatever they do Saturday they'll do for the next two weeks afterwards that's my prediction if they win Saturday they'll beat Mississippi State and UCF if they lose Saturday I think they lose the next two or at least the next one before move is made and then potentially the next two and that's kind of how I see it oh yeah that's all that makes sense and you know this this is again when you know it's going to happen at some point it will happen so so we'll be prepared for it and like I said we'll have plenty of content we've written a lot about we've got a lot of things on Billy Napier before the game coming up here uh Saturday it's 40 news believe me everybody that covers the team Nash covers the team or covers college football nationally has to have some Billy Napier's been fired stuff ready to go uh when it happens that's how that works yep uh Bill before we go I did want to kind of talk a little bit about the SEC this weekend because this is a very very interesting weekend for the SEC so far it's actually been it's not being talked about nationally the SEC's off to a really bad start so far outside of two good wins Georgia beating Clemson and then obviously Tennessee smashing uh uh smashing NC State which was even more convincing than than we thought it was going to be but you look so far the SEC has has it has not been it has not been a great start to the season for the SEC you as I mentioned in week one they went one in three against ranked opponents Florida lost to Miami no Texas A&M lost to Notre Dame and then what was the third one you had LSU loses to USC you come out in week two and you get the big win from Tennessee early which is huge win but then after that Bill again it wasn't the greatest weekend for the SEC you had Arkansas blew a big lead against Oklahoma State lost that game Texas obviously got a win I keep forgetting about that but but I think that's a little bit a little bit of a different animal Alabama struggles they needed 28 points in the fourth quarter to put South Florida away uh you had Houston who got smacked by UNLV in the first game almost beats Oklahoma in in in that game LSU struggles for a while with Nichols Cal goes on the road goes down south and beats Auburn in that game and then Mississippi State gets let's be honest it was a blowout they scored a couple times late but that game was 30 to 3 in the second half it has been a rough start for the SEC so far Bill this is a chance for them to kind of write the ship a little bit this week I think this is from a how your league gets perceived first two weeks you could chalk a couple of them up this week could be a little bit of a different deal you got Bama playing at Wisconsin you've got Boston College going out Missouri you got Oklahoma playing against Tulane Ole Miss at Wake Forest there's some opportunities this week for them to get things right against opponent I mean Toledo at Mississippi State is not a it's not a walking apart for the old Bulldogs now these are those middle class games that I'm glad you point that out because we only with all the SEC teams in the top 10 you tend to gravitate toward you know like you said Texas did hammer Michigan and that from a perception standpoint we do pay attention to because it's that game much like I think we will maybe treat Alabama beating Wisconsin that like that this weekend where same game Wisconsin might be able to hang around with their D for a little bit I just think the offensive deficiencies are gonna catch up when you're playing Alabama guys by the way Wisconsin you want to talk about a program that how about you prove that home field advantage right now watch the Ohio State rule in there and win by two scores last year it was tight at half time I watch Michigan go in there and win by three scores the year before that you know go show me that you're they haven't looked good at home the first two games of the year so far I mean they were losing to Western Michigan in the fourth quarter of that right Northwestern week one two scores last year at home so show me something against an Alabama that'd be and we'll see I mean I love Luke Fickel I think he's done a nice job overall he's trying to transform some things there that's a hard place to coach because it's a hard place to recruit and uh you know so that's one you mentioned Missouri Boston College I have no idea why that spread so high I think that's going to be a really entertaining competitive game and Boston College's run game will wow them to hang in that game uh Tennessee plays my wife's Alma Mater Kent State that's gonna be ugly uh they may score 70 points in that game uh and and you know so we're getting in LSU's but they the SEC what they do to cover that up is they market they good marketing man like this exact because we're even seeing it in the channel well SEC's the best league look at this look at recruit that's none of that stuff has anything to do with substance the SEC this year is proving to be so far it's early yet so far right what I think has been true a lot of years over the last 10 15 years which is they absolutely have two or three of the best teams in the country but this notion that the entire league is good it's just never been proven out by actual results there's been a couple years here and there but when you look at it this is this isn't they need this week even though they should win all these games they need this because they've been getting their butts handed to them in non-conference games against the power five so far this year and I think but when I say marketing where's game to add it's South Carolina right for a no one lost LSU team coming in there right I mean exactly and South Carolina looked horrible in week one um so yeah I think oh oh my Kentucky good lord right so so yeah I think all of those things are true and uh it's going to be really interesting to see how I think the Alabama will will roll in Georgia it's funny we always say you know this isn't the greatest college football weekend but watch us be in the fourth quarter in Kentucky somehow have Georgia at least within striking distance and in Lexington something like that will happen in a week like this but you're you're right there is a little bit let's have middle class we talk about we don't talk about the middle class college football because but we're going to have two more because we're letting more playoff teams in exactly and that's why this matters more than it has in the past because if your fourth fifth six and seventh best teams are getting smacked you can't say well hey we we play the toughest schedule well that's only true if you played Tennessee Georgia Bama or Ole Miss you know or LSU for example say well we had to play an SEC schedule yeah but look what all the teams you beat did non-conference you know heck northern Illinois looked better against against Notre Dame than the SEC team did at home against me there's just all these things and so uh they're going to need to start having a couple good like they need Missouri to blow up Austin College that like you know what I mean like they need they need Alabama to smack Wisconsin and even though you and I both know this is not a very good Wisconsin team it's perception wise it matters and and that's going to be a big a big piece so it's going to be a very fascinating weekend if not for Texas you know Tennessee and Georgia it's been a pretty rough start to the year so far for the USC for the for the SEC but it's going to make for an interesting thing so we'll wrap it up with that LSU South Carolina will be fascinating I really thought Kentucky was a really game to watch for Georgia and then they went out just late in absolute egg last week right against Kentucky I mean Oregon South Carolina one reason to watch that game oh Dylan Stewart, Ed Drescher for South Carolina five-star nasty he's like a clowny so if you can get after it against the minute if you for those offensive line types out there LSU's tackles both N.F. supposed first round picks will Campbell Emory um they're gonna get a you'll get to see Dylan Stewart against the potential first round tackle that would be a lot of fun I just love it people say well Vandy Vandy beating Virginia Tech hurt the ACC only from a a spin standpoint from the world ride leader because that does not trump all the other that does not trump Auburn getting beat by cow right so so let's not go anyway Bill that's going to do it for today's show we'll be back next week we'll definitely have some some better games to talk about next week Tennessee Oklahoma Notre Dame or USC Michigan yeah next week's gonna be fun I can't wait and I was always to your listeners thanks you so much um for having me this is tell them where they can find you Bill yeah I'm at bill vendor 92 at sportingnews.com and I'm watching football we establish that we watch football it's that's what we do this time of year and uh looking forward to it so I thank yeah thanks again man it's been a good week it's been a long week pack 12 through a wrinkle on me this morning but uh well plenty of content up there if you want to read our pack 12 content it's up that's gonna do it for today's show everybody thanks for joining me hit that like hit that subscribe hit the 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