Week 10 – The Call Sheet

Farewell, Sweet Prince – In the most unsurprising news of the week, Iowa’s AD announced that OC Brian Ferentz would not be back with the Hawkeyes next season.

In my deepest LeBron James voice: It’s. About. Damn. Time.

For all of the deserved hub-bub about the Drive to 25, I’m going to miss Brian Ferentz. You know, like how you miss having a stomach virus or getting your house tee-peed.

One of these days, we’ll come to realize that Ferentz did a lot of good things in his tenure. But today is not that day. And none of those good things had anything to do with offense. Smell ya later, nepotism baby!

Arizona, eye emoji – On Sunday, CFB Graphs guru Parker Fleming described Arizona as who Texas Tech thought they would be, and maaaaan. If that isn’t the perfect comp, I don’t know what is. What a good run Jedd Fisch and the Wildcats are on right now.

The Okie State Doomsday scenario – Hey, y’all, I’m all for dunking on folks that deserve dunking on…and I’ve done quite a bit of that when it comes to Gundy. But have we seriously considered a B12 Championship game featuring Oklahoma State? It’s not as far-fetched as you might think.

Filled with lots of piss and vinegar, the Cowboys play a very beatable OU on Saturday in perhaps the final Bedlam in quite a long time. And then they face a trio of B12 newcomers in UCF, Houston and BYU. The city of Dallas is known for its Cowboys, but it might be a different-looking hat in that city come December.

Chapped ass in Chapel Hill – Yeah, I’m taking a small victory lap here. I called this collapsable defense coming. I might’ve been a month off, but this defense still ain’t got IT.

Hate it for Drake Maye and lovable Mac Brown, but it is, once again, a Gene Chizik-led defense that appears to be the Tar Heels’ demise.

6-6 Clemson? – In another doomsday-like scenario (a much funnier one, IMO) Clemson has the not-so-far-fetched possibility of going 6-6 this year, fellas. The Tigers have a pretty weird home stretch of the schedule, and despite largely outplaying NC State on Saturday, they just can’t stop turning the ball over in the red zone.

Put Clemson in the Independence Bowl, dang it!

Oregon impresses again – Games are won on the field, not on paper. It’s important to acknowledge that. That said, I think Oregon is better than Washington and if they meet again, I think the Ducks will prove that.

In one last hoorah, nothing would shock me less than some scrappy Pac-12 team toppling Oregon in November…but if the Ducks can win out, I think they have a good shout for the CFP.

Politicking Prime – Shoutout to Coach Prime for doing a similar version to what Pat Narduzzi got dragged for on Saturday, and getting none of the blame or backlash. When you got it, you got it.

In his postgame presser, Coach Prime acknowledged that CU needs new offensive linemen. Gee, ya think? The tough part for Coach Prime is that’s one of the few positions that is incredibly hard to A) find in the portal and B) pay for.

I’m not putting many things past the power of Prime Time, but it’s going to be hard for Coach Prime to just magically rustle up a new offensive line for Shedeur to play behind next season.

Wagons keep on rollin’ – A few weeks ago, I proudly proclaimed Air Force and James Madison as wagons, and I’m here to delightfully report that my previous statement holds true.

Air Force used a strong second half to topple CSU, and the Dukes did juuuust enough through the air to hold on against ODU. Good teams find ways to win, and right now both of these teams are doing just that.

Kansas State-Texas

Just when I’m out…Kansas State pulls me back in.

In a matchup that will have a big say in who’s going to Dallas in December, we’re getting an ass-kicking K-State defense square off against a backup quarterback at Texas. What could go wrong?

From a neutral observer, this K-State team feels like a very K-State-y Kansas State team. Hard-nosed defense. Hard to defend run game. Weird quarterback situation. And look, they’re still in the race come November. This team checks all the boxes.

On the other side, backup Malik Murphy didn’t look amazing against BYU by any means, but he sort of didn’t have to be. That will change on Saturday. I imagine that K-State will try to make him make hard throws. That can only mean Texas will try to rely on their strong offensive line and good run game.

Would it shock any of us if this game is 21-21 heading into the fourth quarter and every fan wearing burnt orange has lemon booty? It wouldn’t shock me, I’ll tell you that.

I really don’t have a great read on the result. Texas should have the better players, better coach, better pretty much everything (in theory) but that’s never stopped the Wildcats before.

LSU-Alabama

For all the talk about how these two teams stink, are wildly overrated and are headed off a cliff…well, how the tables have turned. Here we are in November and both teams are still standing, and the winner of this one still has a chance of heading to Atlanta. Time is a flat circle, man.

LSU is led by Heisman-caliber (yes, you read that right) quarterback Jayden Daniels and that alone will give them a good chance to pull the “upset” and win this game. Daniels has thrown for over 2500 yards and has a whopping 25:3 TD-INT ratio this season. If LSU didn’t have two early losses, we’d hear a lot about his Heisman candidacy and rightfully so.

Unfortunately for the Tigers, games aren’t just won with offense and their defense still largely stinks. They’ve shown they can score plenty of points on offense, but can their defense get enough stops? Against Ole Miss, the answer was no. Against Missouri, the answer was yes. I guess we’ll see on Saturday evening.

For the Crimson Tide, the Death Star just keeps rolling. After some funky back-and-forth decision-making at the quarterback position, Bama has settled on Jalen Milroe. Milroe has done fine/good enough for the Tide to rattle off six straight wins, despite it being largely against a questionable middle of the schedule.

The real question with this game feels like: What wins out? Is it LSU’s high-powered offense or Alabama’s stout defense? The winner of this battle probably wins the game. Expect a close one, and expect Bama to try and pound LSU’s sorry defense into oblivion.

Missouri-Georgia

If I had told you in August that it’s early November and Missouri still has a chance to make it to Atlanta in December…you’d have asked for me to take a drug test. But here we are. Missouri is extremely fun and good and this has the potential for a fun game.

Led by a largely good Brady Cooke and always-good Luther Burton III, the Tigers put up points in bunches and have an impressive 7-1 record, with their lone loss coming in a shoot-out with LSU. Sure, they barely got by K-State, but a win is a win. Drinkwitz, against my better judgment, has done a helluva job there this season.

And yet, none of that guarantees that they can hang with or beat a 25-straight wins Georgia team. I think they can, but I guess we’ll find out.

Despite no All-World tight end Brock Bowers, Georgia thumped Florida last week and might finally be figuring some things out on offense.

One thing to watch with this game: Last year, Mizzou was the team that pushed Georgia the furthest in the regular season, and the Bulldogs just narrowly escaped Columbia unscathed. I suspect Mizzou will put that film on a loop this week, explain to their team that they can play with the big dogs, and hope to conjure up some extra motivation.

Oklahoma-Oklahoma State

If this game had a song, it would be Thanks for the Memories by Fall Out Boy. Thanks for everything, Bedlam.

You brought us Stoops and Gundy, Baker Mayfield and Brandon Weeden, blow-ups and shootouts and most of all: Good ole fashion hate. You know, the type you can’t fake. It’s the type of stuff that makes the sport great. I speak for all CFB fans when I say we’ll severely miss this game every year. What a shame.

Looking toward Saturday, this game will tell us a lot about Oklahoma. Can they pull themselves off the mat after an upset loss to KU? Time will tell.

After an early-season loss to South Alabama, everyone (myself included) all but wrote off Gundy and the Cowboys. And in traditional fashion, they tossed on their boots, kicked in the saloon door and are shooting up the damn poker game. Led by breakout running back Ollie Gordon, the Cowboys suddenly have a nasty run game and are racking up points and wins in bunches.

On the other side, the vaunted OU defense got a bit exposed by a refreshingly modern and upbeat Kansas offense. The offense was fine, but they just couldn’t get the final step when they needed it most. Can they pull themselves off the mat? Can Brett Venables scheme up some run-stopping stuff on defense? Can’t wait to find out.

UCLA-Arizona

‘Tis the season for some fun Pac-12 After Dark football. This game has a nice polar opposite-type feel and should be an interesting examination in the middle of the conference.

Arizona has a fun offense, led by backup-turned-starting quarterback Noah Fafita. They gave Oregon State fits, and I wonder if they can do the same against the Bruins.

UCLA hangs their hats on defense. Speaking of, their defensive line made absolute mince meat of the Colorado offensive line, and just generally ruined Shedeur Sanders’ night on Saturday. The game plan will surely be to get after Fafita and disrupt that recent rhythm.

After getting a big scalp last week, ordinarily, I’d be hesitant to lean Arizona. But UCLA just hasn’t really clicked on offense and Arizona is on a real tear right now. Bear Down? Guess we’ll find out.

Ball State vs. Bowling Green OVER 40 - Gotta love some weeknight MACtion.

-9.5 Wisconsin vs. Indiana – A week after showing some fight against PSU, I think Indiana gets walloped.

-6 Iowa vs. Northwestern – Brian Ferentz is gonna do something funny and score some damn points against a bad Wildcat team.

USC vs. Washington UNDER 76.5 – That’s a ton of points, man. Gimme the under.