College Football 2016

[Sprouts Farmers Market ✘]

Today marks two weeks until the start of the 2016 season kicking off with Hawaii and Berkeley facing off in New South Wales, and I am preparing by watching the fabulous 'Last Chance U' documentary, but even that can't satisfy my excitement enough!

While Alabama looks to start its title streak back up, FCS-title favorite North Dakota State kicks off their season two weeks from tomorrow with eyes set on their 6th consecutive championship to tie Georgia Southern for the all-time cumulative record! Here's to hoping both of those happen in a thrilling year!

Use this thread to discuss Big 12 expansion (Houston and Cinci - or Memphis - please!), predictions for the upcoming season, or current news from camps.

My preview with a few darkhorse picks.

American: I view Tulsa as an extremely dangerous team, and I could easily see a 9 win season coming. SMU is a similarly high-powered offense that could finally pull upsets this year as they grow, but they are not at the same level yet. In spite of that, Greg Ward is the top dog and show stealer. The east is highly competitive, and I wouldn't be surprised by most orders. UCF will be much improved, but USF is the most talented with little doubt.
Memphis remains highly overrated by most outlets. Little to be hyped about.
1) USF; 2) Temple (no homer :/); 3) Cincinnati; 4) Connecticut; 5) ECU; 6) UCF
1) Houston; 2) Tulsa; 3) Navy; 4) SMU; 5) Memphis; 6) Tulane
HOUSTON over USF

ACC: I actually have a great deal of respect for FSU this year, but that schedule is mighty, mighty rough - if they survive it, more power to them, but I like Louisville just as much as the two giants too. No idea how to pick the middle of the other side though.
1) Clemson; 1b) Louisville; 3) Florida State; 4) NC State; 5) Wake Forest; 6) Cuse; 7) BC
1) UNC; 2) Miami; 3) Virginia Tech; 4) Pittsburgh; 5) Duke; 6) Georgia Tech; 7) Virginia
CLEMSON over UNC

Big 12: Baylor gets hit even harder than expected :/ - Should be one of the easier conference titles, but could they be starting with 2 OOC losses? OU @ TCU in Week 5 after an OU bye and multiple tests could be a game of the year.
1) Oklahoma; 2) TCU; 3) Texas Tech; 4) Oklahoma State; 5) West Virginia; 6) Baylor; 7) Texas; Kansas State; 9) Iowa State; 100) Kansas

Big Ten: Indiana the big surprise as many pick, Michigan and Northwestern big disappointments though, especially the latter from the get-go.
1) Ohio State; 2) Michigan State; 3) Michigan; 4) Indiana; 5) Penn State; 6) Maryland; 7) Rutgers
1) Iowa; 2) Wisconsin; 3) Nebraska; 4) Minnesota (super-soft schedule); 5) Northwestern; 6) Illinois; 7) Purdue
IOWA led by Dez King - best player in the nation - come in hungry over Ohio State

C-USA:
1) Western Kentucky; 2) Marshall; 3) Middle Tennessee State; 4) Old Dominion; 5) FAU; 6) FIU; 7) Charlotte
1) Southern Miss; 2) Louisiana Tech; 3) UTEP; 4) Rice; 5) UTSA; 6) North Texas
USM over WKU

MACtion: Hard to drop NIU to 4th, but the west has 4 very strong teams and the east has none *shrug*
1) Bowling Green; 2) Ohio; 3) Akron; 4) Buffalo; 5) Kent State; 6) Miami
1) Western Michigan; 2) Toledo; 3) Central Michigan; 4) Northern Illinois; 5) Ball State; 6) Eastern Michigan
WMU handily over BGU

MW: I am really, really waiting on Craig Bohl's Wyoming team to come around, but they play in a tough division where 5th is optimistic. Three easiest conference games are on the road, and winning those still doesn't make them bowl-eligible. Air Force could conceivably end the season undefeated while Boise has a few OOC tests. Could SD State as well? The gap in that division should be huge. I'm definitely watching UNLV's progress as they look to make noise for the city of Las Vegas.
1) Air Force; 2) Boise State; 3) Colorado State; 4) Utah State; 5) Wyoming; 6) New Mexico
1) San Diego State; 2) Nevada; 3) UNLV; 4) San Jose State; 5) Fresno State; 6) Hawaii
Honestly, ehhhh, Air Force over SD State

Pac-12: I do not quite buy this UW hype myself - definitely looking for the Oregon reawakening. Time will tell, but Christian McCaffrey is enough to tell me it doesn't matter.
1) Stanford; 2) Oregon; 3) Washington; 4) Wazzu; 5) Cal; 6) Oregon State
1) USC; 2) UCLA; 3) Utah; 4) Arizona; 5) Arizona State; 6) Colorado
STANFORD over USC

SEC: I have zero belief in Tennessee and especially Dobbs - even those first two games may be tougher than they look on paper, but I do think they edge out UGA leading to a 6-2 first place team. The west remains quite impressive, and I think Arkansas could surprise (@TAMU is rough), but those top 3 are the obvious elite trio.
1) Tennessee; 1b) Georgia; 3) Florida; 4) Kentucky; 5) Mizzou; 6) Vanderbilt; 7) South Carolina
1) Alabama; 2) LSU; 3) Ole Miss; 4) Arkansas; 5) Texas A&M; 6) Auburn; 7) Mississippi State
BAMA over UT in style

Sun Belt: Could be a really, really special season - hoping both the top two go perfect with SEC upsets, but that's a bit of a stretch. App State would have to fight off GA Southern in Statesboro too! Looking for ULL to rise again and Idaho to give it one last hurrah at bowl eligibility.
1) Appalachian State; 1b) Arkansas State; 3) Georgia Southern; 4) ULL; 5) Georgia State; 6) Idaho; 7) Troy; New Mexico State; 9) South Alabama; 10) Texas State; 11) ULM

Independents: Notre Dame (8-4); BYU (7-5); UMass (5-7) [hoping for one more upset for them to shock everyone!]; Army (4-8)

Bama over Houston
Stanford over Clemson
BAMA repeat.

(Iowa held out over loss to FCS team.)
LSU, Ole Miss, USC, Ohio State among the other teams in NY6 bowls. Louisville and Air Force may get consideration too, but I won't say with confidence. MSU, TCU, Oregon and UNC also in the mix for the last spot. Doubt the other conference champs get high enough.

[Sprouts Farmers Market ✘]

I'll do FCS much faster.

Big South: Chuck South
Big Sky: Portland State; At-Large: Montana, North Dakota, Northern Arizona, Southern Utah
CAA: James Madison; At-Large: Richmond, William & Mary, Towson, Villanova
MVFC: North Dakota State; At-Large: Northern Iowa, South Dakota State, Western Illinois
OVC: Jacksonville State; At-Large: Eastern Kentucky
Patriot: Colgate
SoCon: Chattanooga; At-Large: Samford
Southland: Sam Houston State; At-large: McNeese State
NEC: Bryant (pessimist, hopefully Duquesne can repeat)
Pioneer: Jacksonville

North Dakota State defeating Northern Iowa for the repeat!

First Four Out: Eastern Illinois, Illinois State, The Citadel, Eastern Washington
Next Four Out: Fordham, Stephen F. Austin, Youngstown State, New Hampshire

Ivy: Penn Quakers

MEAC: North Carolina A+T
SWAC: Alcorn State
NCAT beats Alcorn State

[7,052,770]

7) Mississippi State

Have you not seen Mississippi State's schedule? East opponents are Kentucky and SC, and the 3 West home games are Arkansas, Texas A&M, and Auburn. Do you honestly think we'll go 1-4 in those games or something? Most MSU fans are expecting 4-1 or 5-0...

[Sprouts Farmers Market ✘]

To be honest, Harry, I went into this year extraordinarily pessimistic about a lot of teams I like - save the title favorites. I do absolutely believe you will lose Arkansas and A&M in all honesty. Auburn was a bit tougher. I basically have them eeking it out leading to a tie at 2-6 in conference (with Auburn taking the 'tiebreaker'). I'd be very happy with a Bulldog win there and 3-5 as someone who often cheers for them. With your OOC, I think either result may come with a bowl birth while Auburn wouldn't have one under either situation. I do hope they come in 5th or 6th, but those smaller details weren't the first thing I was trying to iron out.

I'd definitely like to hear your picks, especially for the SEC - you have them 4th I presume?

[Citizen (The) Doctor]

As a Cal fan, this is the perennial "we will finally make it back to the Rose Bowl!" year.

Hey if Iowa can it's possible.

[Dereich]

Honestly I don't know too much outside the ACC and SEC, but it turns out I have a lot to say on the ACC.

ACC:

Atlantic:

Clemson continues to be amazing. They're returning enough on offense, including Watson, to make winning out for them seem almost like a fait accompli. Almost. With what they've lost Clemson this year strikes me as the sort of team that really really can't afford any injuries, especially on their defense. Of course, the risk there is going 11-1 or 10-2 at the worst.

It may be the homer in me talking but I'm buying FSU this year. We return just about as much as Louisville (almost everybody) and getting a year older should improve FSU's biggest offensive sticking points at OL and QB, whether Maguire or Francois end up getting the job. Personally I think Francois is going to end up with the job and while he probably won't be another Jameis he should be much better than what we had last year. Also, I'm going to go out on a limb and say FSU will be the more together team on week 1 and that'll put us over Ole Miss, which should be another great game.

Louisville should do well; with their coach and what they're returning there's no way they wouldn't be good. However, I just don't think they have the raw talent that FSU or Clemson do and won't get their problems sorted out in time to actually have a chance of winning the division.

As for the rest, I think Syracuse is underrated. They played better than their Win/Loss ratio last year and they're returning a lot as well. Plus, their new coach Dino Babers is really good and fun. I never know anything about NC State; they're not interesting to watch and they always seem to go 7-5 though so I think they'll be alright. Boston College is Vandy, but more so. They'll have a top 10 defense, bottom 10 offense. Wake Forest is trash.

1a. Clemson
1b. FSU
3. Louisville
4. Syracuse
5. NC State
6. Boston College
7. Wake Forest

The Atlantic is decided in the FSU-Clemson game (where Clemson is the slightly better team but FSU has home field advantage) and the winner of the Atlantic wins the ACC. I call it now as Clemson winning it all.

Coastal:

The Coastal is a mess, like usual. It feels like every year there's a serious risk that the whole division will go 4-4. UNC was underrated last year, they'll probably stay good enough to win the division this year. Like NC State they're kind of a black hole for me; I don't think I saw any of their games last year besides USC(e) and Clemson. I'm kind of bullish on Miami this year too though; Kaaya is easily the Coastal's best QB and Richt might be able to take advantage of Miami's good recruiting classes in ways Golden couldn't. VT goes in over Pitt because I like VT's coaches and football culture and just don't care for Pitt. Virginia Tech also gets points for having the most redneck game of the year against Tennessee at a NASCAR track. That being said, experts are apparently high on Pitt this year and they DID outperform expectations quite a lot last year. I could see any of these four win the Coastal but will give UNC the benefit of the doubt.

After going from winning the division to winning 3 games (but SOMEHOW beating FSU) I'm terrified of even thinking of Georgia Tech. They might win 2 games or they might go to the playoff. Duke has the advantage of a good coach but they suffer from a bad case of being Duke. Not great recruiting and not great turnover means they'll probably continue to slowly regress towards where they should be as a small, high-standards basketball school. Virginia should improve, but they just start from such a low and with such a crap roster that I think it'll take them a few years to actually show life. At least they're not Wake Forest.

1. UNC
2. Miami
3. VA Tech
4. Pitt
5. Georgia Tech
6. Duke
7. Virginia

[Speed of Sound]

Eh, Texas isn't gonna compete this year for sure, but I'd be pretty surprised if they ended up in 7th in the Big 12. They've improved a good bit and have a young class of new, good talent to work with this year.

[Santander]

Independents: Notre Dame (8-4); BYU (7-5); UMass (5-7) [hoping for one more upset for them to shock everyone!]; Army (4-8)

LOL

[Sprouts Farmers Market ✘]

Eh, Texas isn't gonna compete this year for sure, but I'd be pretty surprised if they ended up in 7th in the Big 12. They've improved a good bit and have a young class of new, good talent to work with this year.

I feel bad, I'm killing everybody's team, so far! I definitely think they've improved, but I also think West Virginia is improved and Tech is a big time sleeper, so I didn't have much choice. Yes, Baylor will be down, but will they be that down that they fall to 7th? Maybe? I just checked the Athlon 128, and they had Texas in 7th as well in a very tight 3-way race (in which I have TTU a tier up and Baylor down with them instead). 5-7 may as well be a tie.

Independents: Notre Dame (8-4); BYU (7-5); UMass (5-7) [hoping for one more upset for them to shock everyone!]; Army (4-8)

LOL

I know they're literally an untalented wasteland, but check that schedule! FIU and Tulane in Amherst give 'em the momentum, Wagner's a gimme, and they're certainly on the same level as a Troy or Hawaii. 3 should really be the over-under.
The Payne simulator (which I am not a huge fan of - previous season too highly weighted for lower teams) has 3-9 as the Boolean predicted (4-8 Probability-based). 2-point dogs vs. Hawaii, 3 point dogs vs. ODU, 9 point dogs vs. Troy. (And in my opinion, I totally flip those last two spreads for this year, but we'll see how the season goes.) I admit 5 is a bit aggressive, but it really could be between 2 and 6 with 4 most likely.

[RINO Tom]

All I know is tailgating for Iowa games will (continue to) be awesome, and I'm excited to see what Lovie can do with the Illini!

[Boris]

All I know is tailgating for Iowa games will (continue to) be awesome, and I'm excited to see what Lovie can do with the Illini!

Come out to Nebraska for the October 1 game, so there can be two Illini fans in the stands

[Mr. Illini]

National Champion prediction: The Fighting Illini

All that really matters. Also, love the Illini presence in the thread.

[Sprouts Farmers Market ✘]

SEC: I have zero belief in Tennessee and especially Dobbs - even those first two games may be tougher than they look on paper

Sun Belt: Could be a really, really special season - hoping both the top two go perfect with SEC upsets, but that's a bit of a stretch.
1) Appalachian State; 1b) Arkansas State

Knock on wood. I really wanted to say this with more confidence, but I was wary of the 21 point underdog. Shame on me for not saying my true feeling even if UT has a come from behind 4th quarter win. Hopefully they pull it out. Seriously, knock on all the wood you can find.


My only other observation would be that Indiana seems to be much more disappointing than I had suspected, but I haven't seen film yet as I'm traveling. But that's a good thing I'd like to be wrong about them ahead of Penn state

[Citizen (The) Doctor]

App State deserved to win that game. That fumble recovery touchdown was incredibly good luck.

[Illiniwek]

All I know is tailgating for Iowa games will (continue to) be awesome, and I'm excited to see what Lovie can do with the Illini!

Come out to Nebraska for the October 1 game, so there can be two Illini fans in the stands

National Champion prediction: The Fighting Illini

All that really matters. Also, love the Illini presence in the thread.

Go Illini!!! #WeWillWin

[Citizen (The) Doctor]

The SEC is falling!!!!1111!!!!!!

[Gass3268]

7) Mississippi State

Have you not seen Mississippi State's schedule? East opponents are Kentucky and SC, and the 3 West home games are Arkansas, Texas A&M, and Auburn. Do you honestly think we'll go 1-4 in those games or something? Most MSU fans are expecting 4-1 or 5-0...

Did most MSU fans except what happened today?

[Sprouts Farmers Market ✘]

I love when my favorite team makes me stay up until 4:40 AM. So long as it ends with a win. There is great reason for hope in Laramie! Wyoming can be rebuilt into an elite G5 program. I do believe. I have undying faith in Craig Bohl to do all it takes. Thus concludes 21 hours of football. If I have any, commentary to come tomorrow

[7,052,770]

7) Mississippi State

Have you not seen Mississippi State's schedule? East opponents are Kentucky and SC, and the 3 West home games are Arkansas, Texas A&M, and Auburn. Do you honestly think we'll go 1-4 in those games or something? Most MSU fans are expecting 4-1 or 5-0...

Did most MSU fans except what happened today?

I think half the state is on suicide watch, myself included. I have no words.

[gespb19]

Southern Miss goes on the road and takes down Kentucky. Very pleased!

[Bojack Horseman]

I'd said to much skepticism that Michigan State's little good streak is over this year, as half their starting lineup on both sides of the ball have graduated. Friday night's scare for the Sparties against Furman had a few friends of mine calling me just to say, "You were right!" Now they have a bye week next week, but after that they travel to South Bend and I think they're going to get absolutely murdered by Notre Dame.

As for my Wolverines, the quarterback controversy continues. I think Speight will be all right as the season goes on. He has two weeks of practice and a glorified scrimmage against Central Florida to improve, and just like Rudock last year, I think he'll continually improve.

While I appreciate the compliment from Hawaii's head coach, Nick Rolovich, who said "If I were a Michigan fan, I'd be excited right now," I still maintain that we didn't really learn much about the talent of the team, except that our defense is probably just as good or better than it was last season. Until Harbaugh pulled the starters in the second quarter, Hawaii had more points than yards and was still going backwards, at one point having a total offensive output of -27 yards. The 63-3 bludgeoning was fun to watch, and there's nowhere I'd rather be on a Saturday than Michigan Stadium.

Looking forward to UCF, their defense is better than Hawaii's, that's for sure, however their offensive line needs a lot of work. Just in the first half of their 38-0 win over South Carolina State, they gave up 3 or 4 sacks, I can't remember which. While SC State did get shut out, they were able to throw on UCF, and it seemed like the secondary was their Achilles Heel. The Knights are sporting a true freshman defensive end who's over 400 pounds. Based on how awful they played in what I saw of their game yesterday and the general fact that they're Central Florida, Michigan should roll, but probably won't end up scoring 63 points again. We'll find out soon enough.

[Joe Biden 2020]

I was very disappointed in the performance of my Oklahoma Sooners.  We've got a lot of work to do and now have to run the table the rest of the way to have any shot at returning to the CFP.  Call me skeptical, but with Ohio State coming to town, plus TCU and an improved Texas squad, I just don't see it.  A lot of the Big 12 had a pretty lackluster day with the only real good game coming from Oklahoma State, but that coming against a JV team in SE Louisiana in Stillwater.  That's hardly an indicator of how things will go for them this season.  The only teams in the Top 10 that really did their job like they were supposed to were 1 Alabama, 6 Ohio State, and 7 Michigan.  Clemson had all they could handle from Auburn, Florida State goes tomorrow night against 11 Ole Miss, 5 LSU succumbed to an unranked Wisconsin team.  8 Stanford didn't exactly blow Kansas State out of the water and App State almost upset 9 Tennessee on Thursday.  10 Notre Dame is in a dog fight with Texas tonight and just gave up a touchdown as I type this late in the first half to trail 21-14.

It was hardly a weekend of impressive wins by the big dogs unless if you were from Tuscaloosa, Alabama.

[Speed of Sound]

Hook 'em horns! An instant classic! Thank god we don't have classes tomorrow, because none of my students would be showing up to my 9:00 AM.

[Green Line]

Next weeks schedule is disappointing after the great opening weekend that this was.  Not a single top-25 match up next week.

[Sprouts Farmers Market ✘]

Next weeks schedule is disappointing after the great opening weekend that this was.  Not a single top-25 match up next week.

FCS will gladly take the spotlight with North Dakota State/Eastern Washington, Northern Iowa/Montana, and Western Illinois/Northern Arizona all being among the top 10 most interesting games next week on my list. Thank you MVFC/Big Sky for making actually interesting match-ups!