Rodrigues was really fast, but yah, don’t really want you QB running all the time and being subjected to punishment.

The weather forecast for the kickoff at 7 pm is 82 degrees with 76% humidity and a "feels like" temperature of 85 with a 15% chance of a thunderstorm.

Translates to a dewpoint of 72 degrees. Sultry but it could be worse in Alabama this time of year. Living in the south it’s all about dewpoint that doesn’t change with the temperature but lets you know how much water vapor is on the air.

We’re going to go with the cheap $23 tickets in the stands versus the climate controlled ESPN zone at $104 that does include food and access to stands. Rain is of more concern I think.

My wife and I will be going to the game (we’re in the Raleigh area), and will fly to Atlanta). PM me if you’d like and maybe we can meet up at the game.

From another one living in the mid-south to south, yes definitely the humidity is the killer. Yesterday the dewpoint was up to 79. Free wet sauna.

Great episode with Miles. I am pretty impressed with the effort and professionalism especially with you two having full time jobs and kids. From my perspective I would not be disappointed if you needed to spend a little less time on the podcast but know that we love what you are doing.

Gametime is 6:00 pm local (Central Daylight) and with it being on ESPN it likely won’t be over till nearly 10:00 pm local (11:00 pm Eastern for Mercer who are from Georgia). I guess they could bus back, but it would be late.

I like the focus on (and I hope Plough is correct in his assessment of) the O&D lines for this year. I think that has been one of the impediments in the goal of getting into the top echelon come playoff time. Depth will be important.

Enjoyed the Bronson and Fibich interviews. Quite a contrast with Gogo TV.

Agreed, especially in football and basketball. Use them and forget them.

I’m not sure about where week 1 lands. The brackets aren’t released until the Sunday prior to Thanksgiving (not Saturday historically to allow for the dust to clear on Saturday’s game. 13 weeks inclusive of the Saturday prior to Thanksgiving in 2026 is Aug 29 which is the same week as Aug. 27 the stated date when a game is allowed to be played. So it seems to me to be 13 weeks inclusive is the Saturday prior to Thanksgiving.

re:the video, I noticed Marion telling players to “trust the program …. “ and that “some of you guys have gone sideways”. Seems that it would be difficult to trust a program that is less than a year old (with no games played yet) and where many (or all) claims have not eventuated and are ringing hollow. It is good that he stated that success doesn’t come without hard work, but then later in the recruiting clip has all of those very expensive cars lined up as eye candy (I noted that the editor missed a recruit dropping a MF bomb in that segment. Maybe that is a feature and not a bug).

He quite poignantly says now football was a way out for him - yet 95% or more of his players won’t make the NFL. An occasional “study hard” or “attend to your coursework and get a degree for your future” would be nice. Maybe he does communicate that but it is sure not evident in the tenor of the video.

The language is a bit inexact in that 12 game schedules are not new in FCS. All big sky teams had a 12 game schedule in 2024 with the only exception being Cal Ploy (Portland State cancelled one scheduled game so only played 11). The exact situation is that 12 games schedules can be “permanent” instead of rotating between 11 and 12 game cycles although using the word permanent in college football these days is a bit comical.

take away 1 (Sac State) and add 2 (SUU and Utah Tech) makes 9 league games up from 8.

Montana is overrated as per usual, but the fact is that they have 8 home games and probably the easiest schedule of any other big sky team.

I the issue that hasn’t been brought up with Sac is their defense. The supposedly had a lot of injuries last year, but in watching a few of their games, their tackling was absolutely atrocious. Marion is an offensive guy, and good defensive teams seem to always be at the top. Look at the tacking NDSU exhibited in the championship game - stellar. NAU is still a bit of an unknown to me - they did not have a difficult schedule last year and they laid an egg is the playoffs. 0 points and only 237 yards total offense.

interesting about UNCG. Our son graduated for there a dozen years ago or so and he never once mentioned fight songs, etc. The school was originally a teachers college - and our son was a physics major so do t think he attended any basketball games. Maybe they have focused on that aspect more recently.

As far as UCD, the band-uh was the place where are the fight songs and yells were inculcated. Not sure all of the traditions have carried through after the rebranding of the band.

We live in the Raleigh area and after checking flights to Montgomery and to Atlanta figured we could rent a car in Atlanta using the cost differential between flying to Montgomery and Atlanta. Southwest had the best fare from RDU to ATL but Delta has their hub in Atlanta so probably has the most options from the west coast. ATL is southwest of the city so should avoid the worst traffic.

Great place to see a game. Caveats would be potentially dicey weather in November this year and ticket availability unless you have a connection to the UCD allotment. I had to go the third party re-sale route - was not at all happy with vivid seats as they didn’t release them till about hours or so prior to game after purchasing airfare, rental car, air b&b. Had someone on the Bobcat board offer me 2 free tickets but didn’t use them as our purchased tickets came through.

Great atmosphere and Bozeman is nice. Land of Magic steakhouse northwest of Bozeman is great. Very good computer museum (American Computer and Robotics museum) and Jam is a good breakfast place. We stayed in Manhattan (l guess the littlest apple) on 90 NW of Bozeman. Hot springs in the area too.

yah, can increase the number of scholarships but cannot exceed 105 on the roster. So sort of a shell game in the scholarship department. The big schools, like SEC will pour money up to the limit (the direct payment part of the settlement) into the revenue generating sports, I.e., football and men’s basketball.

Some leagues have not imposed roster limits on their teams even for those who have opted-in, and from what I understand there was a change in the settlement to allow grandfathering of players. As for direct payments for most of Big Sky there is not much to go around when you start dividing it up across large rosters. So it seems not opting in at this point in non-bigtime football programs is not a huge issue. But a lot of moving parts. The NIL “constraints” with regard to review of deals over $600 is probably gonna be a joke and the old days of money under the table will return - at least for the P4 teams.

Just bought airline tickets to Atlanta for Mercer game. Looks to be about a 2 hour drive to Montgomery from the airport. Was initially thinking of driving with travel trailer (Cramton Bowl has hookups) but too much time involved even from east coast. Aggie side is western stands so late sun will be on opponents side. Tickets are cheap ($23 for GA) Even thought of “ESPN zone “ for $103 which gives you AC, some food (no host bar) and a general admission seat if you want to slum in the real stands for a while. Probably will go cheap route.