2026 College Football Thread

[WhiteTrash]

Ridiculous.

They'll come after the 3 goggles soon.

[The Sultan]

Hopefully they'll do something about the names on the back of the jersey next.

[Uncle Rico]

Hopefully they'll do something about the names on the back of the jersey next.

This never would have happened had Al McGuire not allowed his players to design a jersey and not tuck them in.

[The Sultan]

This never would have happened had Al McGuire not allowed his players to design a jersey and not tuck them in.

CTE didn't exist during Al's coaching days.

[Uncle Rico]

Lolololololololololol

https://bsky.app/profile/jasonkirk.fyi/post/3mucwru44qc2v

[WhiteTrash]

Lolololololololololol

https://bsky.app/profile/jasonkirk.fyi/post/3mucwru44qc2v

Honestly, we live in a bubble of people caring about this segment of entertainment. Millions of people think we are idiots for not knowing the different Kardashians.

[Uncle Rico]

Honestly, we live in a bubble of people caring about this segment of entertainment. Millions of people think we are idiots for not knowing the different Kardashians.

Ted seems to think it's important and self-owned

[BM1090]

Also, he played Lacrosse at Michigan. He definitely knows who Ohio State is.

[JWags85]

Will be another interesting year in the "how long will USC allow Lincoln Riley to continue stealing $12MM a year as a top 5 paid college coach while finishing middle of the B10? saga. They looked INCREDIBLY uninspiring yesterday.  Sure it was Week 0 and incredibly hot, but they gave up 26 points in the second half to a team who was picked in the bottom 3 of the MWC and who they were favored by 40 points over.  At one point, SJSU converted 3 straight 3rd and longs in the 3rd/4th quarter.  I don't care if its later in an already decided game, with the talent USC has, if you can't get off the field that's gonna win maybe 4 games in a G5 conference this year, OSU/IU/Oregon and co are gonna easily drop 40+ on you.

Oh and they had a crowd that looked like a spring game.  The Trojan faithful gonna be really excited for another 8-4 trip to the Sun Bowl.

[Uncle Rico]

Will be another interesting year in the "how long will USC allow Lincoln Riley to continue stealing $12MM a year as a top 5 paid college coach while finishing middle of the B10? saga. They looked INCREDIBLY uninspiring yesterday.  Sure it was Week 0 and incredibly hot, but they gave up 26 points in the second half to a team who was picked in the bottom 3 of the MWC and who they were favored by 40 points over.  At one point, SJSU converted 3 straight 3rd and longs in the 3rd/4th quarter.  I don't care if its later in an already decided game, with the talent USC has, if you can't get off the field that's gonna win maybe 4 games in a G5 conference this year, OSU/IU/Oregon and co are gonna easily drop 40+ on you.

Oh and they had a crowd that looked like a spring game.  The Trojan faithful gonna be really excited for another 8-4 trip to the Sun Bowl.

They're west coast Nebraska now.  No identity and sold their history for sweet Big 18 TV money.

[WhiteTrash]

Looking at the pictures of the LA Coliseum for what USC announced of 51,144 in attendance, I think MU can get 40K into the FF. 

[Pakuni]

USC could be ranked in the top 5, and they're not coming close to filling that dump at noon on a 94-degree August day against San Jose State.

[The Sultan]

USC could be ranked in the top 5, and they're not coming close to filling that dump at noon on a 94-degree August day against San Jose State.

The funniest thing is that they were so bothered by the social media commentary, that they put out a media release about it. Which has caused it to remain in social media for another day or so.

[MU82]

Silly question:

Does the athlete who leaves the NFL to go back to play in college have to work toward something academically?

I'm a realist on this stuff and I know that athletes who don't really care about academics can stay eligible. That's been going on forever.

Just wondering if some athletes even have to pretend about it now.

[WhiteTrash]

Silly question:

Does the athlete who leaves the NFL to go back to play in college have to work toward something academically?

I'm a realist on this stuff and I know that athletes who don't really care about academics can stay eligible. That's been going on forever.

Just wondering if some athletes even have to pretend about it now.

Great question. Seems like if you told a firefighter that terms of his/her employment was to take an econ class, the courts would shut that down fast. So I'd guess the schools wouldn't poke the bear and require any classes.

[Uncle Rico]

Rutgers entered last nights game as a 29.5 favorite against UMass.

They lost by 16 as UMass got its first win against an FBS team since 2023.

Dave Portnoy called it a lock and bet on Rutgers to cover and win by 40

https://www.app.com/story/sports/college/rutgers/2026/09/03/dave-pornoy-apologizes-for-picking-rutgers-vs-umass-pathetic-effort/91601762007/

[MU82]

Rutgers entered last nights game as a 29.5 favorite against UMass.

They lost by 16 as UMass got its first win against an FBS team since 2023.

Dave Portnoy called it a lock and bet on Rutgers to cover and win by 40

https://www.app.com/story/sports/college/rutgers/2026/09/03/dave-pornoy-apologizes-for-picking-rutgers-vs-umass-pathetic-effort/91601762007/

Timing is everything. Rutgers lucked out by having a decent football program just when the Big Ten was in the mood to expand. The athletic program has been a train wreck pretty much ever since the conference let 'em in.

[Hards Alumni]

Timing is everything. Rutgers lucked out by having a decent football program just when the Big Ten was in the mood to expand. The athletic program has been a train wreck pretty much ever since the conference let 'em in.

No.  They were brought into the B1G simply due to their media market.  That's it.

[JWags85]

I saw a tweet last night that said its the biggest upset in the modern betting era, in terms of what the spread was compared to how much the underdog won by (46 points).  There are a few bigger upsets in terms of the spread, but the underdog won by a far narrower margin.  Even crazier considering Rutgers scored a 78 yard TD midway through the 4th on 4th and 13 from their 22, while down 23.  They don't convert there, UMASS gets at least 3 points, and we're likely talking a final margin comfortably in the mid 20s.

Very real argument to be made that Rutgers is the worst athletic department in the country right now.  Football is a dumpster fire paying Schiano $6MM a year after extending him despite not winning more than 3 games a year in the B10.  Basketball is a crapshow after a decent stretch cause Pikiell cant figure out how to turn lottery picks into wins.  Not a single one of their other major sports (WBB, MLAX/WLAX, M/W Soccer) has made an NCAA tourney in almost 5 years. Oh and the athletic department is losing more money than you could imagine on a yearly basis.

[The Sultan]

Timing is everything. Rutgers lucked out by having a decent football program just when the Big Ten was in the mood to expand. The athletic program has been a train wreck pretty much ever since the conference let 'em in.

Rutgers and Maryland were all about getting the Big Ten Network onto cable systems out east.

While that made sense at the time, just over a decade later that reason sounds completely anachronistic AND the conference is saddled with two very poor athletic programs.

Knowing then what they do now, there is zero chance either is invited to the conference IMO.

[Uncle Rico]

No.  They were brought into the B1G simply due to their media market.  That's it.

I loved Stewart Mandel defending the decision to bring them in talking about the NY market.  It's one of the worst college football markets out there but I guess those alumni in the greater NY area of Big Ten schools weren't enough for carriers to bring on the network.  They needed Rutgers fan base, too.

It was laughable then and laughable now.  But they have that commercial with a flag planted in NYC (why not Piscataway).

[MU82]

I loved Stewart Mandel defending the decision to bring them in talking about the NY market.  It's one of the worst college football markets out there but I guess those alumni in the greater NY area of Big Ten schools weren't enough for carriers to bring on the network.  They needed Rutgers fan base, too.

It was laughable then and laughable now.  But they have that commercial with a flag planted in NYC (why not Piscataway).

This.

They might have brought Rutgers in for the TV market, but it was a poorly conceived plan. Rutgers added little to nothing then in that regard, and it adds even less now.

I thought that the football program's ascent under Schiano and his successor (9-4 in 2011 and 2012) helped grease the wheel for the invitation, but it's certainly possible that I'm misremembering.

[Hards Alumni]

Yeah, I don't disagree.

[JWags85]

I loved Stewart Mandel defending the decision to bring them in talking about the NY market.  It's one of the worst college football markets out there but I guess those alumni in the greater NY area of Big Ten schools weren't enough for carriers to bring on the network.  They needed Rutgers fan base, too.

It was laughable then and laughable now.  But they have that commercial with a flag planted in NYC (why not Piscataway).

I get the media centric self-centered view on NYC, but the increasingly outdated view on college football in the Northeast was ridiculous then, and even more so now.  Forget the Southeast or the West Coast, the comparative fanship profiles of college football in NYC and Chicago couldn't be more different.  Every major B10 school has multiple affiliated bars in Chicago, there is 1 at most in Manhattan (forget about the other boroughs) and that's usually just a fun association, not a core part of the bars identity from August-December like in Chicago.  I know multiple people who revolved their weekends around watching their alma mater/hometown NCAA team at bars/watch parties in Chicago.  When they moved to NYC for work, it was usually just a couple friends watching at an apartment instead.

I think it was like 15 years ago, in the midst of the start of the seismic conference changes, people talking about how incredibly IMPORTANT the Pitt-Penn St rivalry still was.  Not just in the history of college football (which it admittedly was decades ago), but moving forward.  At that point, they hadn't played since 2000, the previous history of it was a complete bloodbath (like 16-4 PSU), and that was even before the recent 4 year restart...which then ended with no plan to continue moving forward and still hasn't.

[JWags85]

This.

They might have brought Rutgers in for the TV market, but it was a poorly conceived plan. Rutgers added little to nothing then in that regard, and it adds even less now.

I thought that the football program's ascent under Schiano and his successor (9-4 in 2011 and 2012) helped grease the wheel for the invitation, but it's certainly possible that I'm misremembering.

I think it just helped market the move a bit better (in a VERY generous remembering), nothing more.  Schiano's heydey, which got him the eventual Bucs job, was 5-6 years before the B10 move (2006 where they were a top 10 for awhile and then 2007 where they were preseason top 15).  His last 3 years were pretty pedestrian, middle of a watered down BE football conference.  The final BE year, after Schiano left, they were 9-4 but beat absolutely nobody, lost at home to Kent State, and then lost their final 3.  They weren't 2-3 win team like many Rutgers teams pre-Schiano, but they certainly weren't tempting any conferences based on onfield results in the early 2010s.