Big Ten Win Totals Part 1: Indiana, Iowa, Michigan & MORE | Preseason AP Poll Reaction! 👀

Welcome back to the Cover 3 Podcast with your host, Chip Patterson, Tom Fernelli, Danny Kennell, and Bob Elliott. It's your call for the best college football coverage from National Signing Day to the National Championship and everything in between. CBS Sports presents the Cover 3 Podcast. And welcome back to the Cover 3 Podcast, here on CBS Sports, that's Tom Fernelli, that's Bud Elliott. I'm Chip Patterson, coming to you live at youtube.com/cover3 and everybody get your podcasts on the man. Thanks for hanging out, smash that subscribe, smash that like and come and join us in the chat, aka the Cover 3 tailgate, where John says we were four minutes late to honor Jane Daniels. Everybody put your fours up for Jane Daniels, no fives in the house, everybody put your fours up. All right, let's go, busy, busy day here on the Cover 3 Podcast. First of all, I want to acknowledge those of you who are asking for the camp buzz and I want to let you know the camp buzz still does exist. We will be telling you about players that are buzzing, but we also have had to rip through a ton of wind totals, including nine of them today from the Big 10. We will be going alphabetical as we have been, that's everyone Illinois through Northwestern, I through in the Big 10 wind totals, then as you can see here from the headline on the stream, we are going to stay live after the conclusion of the show and react live to the new AP Top 25 poll. The preseason rankings just right out the gate, you know, we have got tomorrow's Top 25 today, you know, had to crack my knuckles and get the first one of those out up on the site on Sunday and we'll see how I did, we'll see how the voters did as they stack up those teams at the top of the rankings. Okay, I kind of just want to get going, we've got a lot to get to, is it any pressing business of note? Not really, only camp buzz that I think is like maybe important is South Carolina loss, they're starting slot receiver for the year. And we're down to pass catchers now. Yeah, I'm not sure how much Gibson was going to play, I don't want to make his injury into a bigger deal as far as team impact than I thought it was. If I'm just reading that, I'm sure the chat will, will in the kit. And then South Carolina got some guys they like clearly and harbor still there. But, you know, like that's probably a bit of a loss, Dylan Stewart and Jacquery is peak. Obviously Stewart, awesome defense event and peak, the transfer left tackle from NC State who got hurt early in the off season, not in pads. I think they're both expected back, like first half of the year for sure, I mean, Stewart, I don't think is out for any serious period of time. And South Carolina's early schedule is very easy compared to the back half. So, you know, probably not a big deal. Also Tennessee lost a long starting safety, yeah, that's probably goes down with the torrent batteler. I was just going to say there was one more. The only other one that I think is concerning is UNLV plans to play both quarterbacks. And my read on that is basically like, oh, shit, or shoot. Does this mean that like, Dan Mullin cannot sprinkle his quarterback whisper magic on Jackson Arnold? Cause like, we, or maybe Alex or G has taken some job. What's more likely that Arnold is a player or G can really play? Let's, you could have one at quarterback and one at running back. I'll play both. That's fair. That's fair. Don't give out Dan's plan. Just saying. You could switch it up. I mean, cause they're both running backs, really. So you could switch. You don't know who's getting the snap. I don't know. Wait to find out. Hardy, hard, hard. Okay. We will get to see those UNLV rebels in week zero and are more dynamic week zero previews obviously coming in a little bit. But let's get to the business here. I say to you, gentlemen, you're ready to lock it up. As much as I think that the under is a safe way, like I can't even count them up. I can't, I can't, I can't, I don't see it, but it's not on there. It's not scheduled. I'm looking at. Unless there's another schedule somewhere. We begin with the Illinois fighting a lie and lie where we've got some changes on the defensive side and look, Tom Fernelli spent all that time poking and prodding anyone he could. Brett Beelma, Caden Hauser, anybody on the beat trying to get some details that and Brett Beelma is keeping it, you know, keeping a little tied down, Bobby Hawk, of course, coming over, taking, stepping down from where he was in Alma Mater, long time coach to be able to step into this opportunity to fix that defense offense of line. We're leaning on like grizzled seventh years out there. Caden Hauser steps in as our new quarterback. What about the rest of the skill position players who's going to be catching those passes? I'm feeling pretty good, Tom, about the general state of the roster. But that's not here. This is not this is not the summer school episode. You know, this is looking specifically at this schedule. So as you look at the team and as you look at the schedule, draft Kings, win total set at seven and a half heavily, juiced to the under, where do you start looking at the pressure points where Illinois either needs to answer some questions or you might have some concerns? The lines of scrimmage are where I would start. Yeah. I mean, we were talking about Illinois last year, there was, we were talking about how, you know, they had their entire offensive line back and that was going to be good for that moment. Their entire offensive line has gone now. It's pretty much a brand new offensive line. Some guys that have been in the program, some guys that are coming in from the portal. The entire defensive line is brand new and then they're in a new system like I, I have more faith in the offensive line than I do the defensive line right now. Like defensively, I think this team is probably going to have be like, it's the bottom half of the big 10 overall. The question will be offensively can they keep scoring the same number of points that they have been because they've been one of the better offences in the big 10 the last few years. So I'm not like, I'm on the over, not like way over, but it's mostly schedule based. The schedule is not that tough. All things considered. Like when you look at who they have to play in the big 10, yes, they get Ohio State and Oregon, but outside of those two, not a game on there that I don't think they can win. Noncon, UAB, Duke and Southern Illinois, all at home. This is not the Duke of last year that they beat by 26 at Duke. It's a worse version of that team and they have to come to Champaign this year. So I'm pretty confident they're going to win that game. So I do think they're more likely to get to eight and four than seven and five, but I don't think this is going to be a nine or a 10 win team like we've seen the last couple of years. This is interesting to me. I'm not showing a huge edge here when I look at like what draft Kings has the, you know, conference win total at, which is four and a half and then the obviously overall win total, which is seven and a half. So conference win total is we're plus 100 to the over four and a half and then we're plus a buck 34 to the over seven and a half. I mean, I don't think UAB is much of a threat, right? And then you get two extra days to play Duke, a game in which I think they're, you know, a decent favorite given, you know, Duke's quarterback issues and obviously losing corporate barcade as well. And in Southern Illinois, I don't really show a big edge here. I'm not going to waste everybody's time on, you know, making some strong case for something that I don't feel strongly about. I think at these odds, I'm over. I don't really want to lay $1.60 to the under here. I'm kind of like more trustworthy than the offensive line than the defensive line. I think. And that's probably one of the reasons why, as Tom mentioned, they switched the defensive scheme up, just the ability to get those defensive line to play that four and a half. So give me over slightly, slightly, slightly on the under would not rush to bed. And especially, I know I know I've got this seven and five. I've got this like very firmly seven and five. You mentioned the two games where I would say that this Illinois team is outclass, you know, playing Oregon, playing at Ohio State. And then I think that what you will find as we start to peel back the rest of this conference is I might look at some of those other spots as not as much a layups as possible. I mean, this is to me, a schedule where you've got like on one side, the games that I agree with you three, you know, in the noncon feel pretty good about them winning those. You've got the games on the other side, you know, your Oregon, your Ohio State. And I just think that there's going to be a few more toss ups in between that could get a little tricky. I think going to play at UCLA could get a little bit tricky, you know, the I that run, I mean, after the Oregon game are games where right now I'm saying, yeah, Illinois is going to be favored in a couple of those games, if not most of those games, but if you've taken a couple injuries, if things have or is the depth built out to where you can definitely continue to come up on the right side of coin flips, I've got it seven and five, which hey, for a for what I do think is going to be a reset year, Tom seven and five being your reset year, I would say is the sign of a healthy program. Is that fair? I'm not talking to you for the rest of the show of five, let's say there you go, you know, it's kind of crazy because I understand some of these years were James Madison in the sun belt, but Kurt Signetti is 46 and six as an FBS head coach 16 and O is going to do a lot there in terms of being able to run the numbers up. But 46 and six as an FBS head coach, those are like Ryan Day numbers, which is why he's being considered Along with Ryan Day as one of the best coaches not just in the big 10 but in the entire country Now it's going to be tested as he does continue to evolve in terms of the roster that they've got not taking quite as many portal additions Trying to rely a little bit more on player retention and player development The schedule itself is going to provide more challenges than they have faced in the first two years a big 10 play That's why drafting sportsbook has this thing at 10 and a Yeah 10 and a half over plus 105 under minus one 25 But we've talked a lot about the Hoosiers as they are one of the best teams in the entire country Now that we're getting into the nitty gritty of the schedule and projecting the way it's going to go What are the spots on the roster where they really have your attention right now? I mean, I think like offensive line and defensive line are just totally stacked, you know receiver I think the addition to made in the portal is really good. You have the continued emergence of becker. I think the secondary is still really damn good This is just a really really well-run organization and I think all the portal fits they got are not only talented But also like truly fits to what they do You know, and I remember doing summer school Obviously with the you know with pigs, which is a tremendous sight for us, and I was like man This just all makes sense Right like that this just that this seems to fit it a lot of it just comes down The Josh Hoover right like We've said this probably early stop said as many times as soft season. Is he closer to Mendoza or is he closer? To Curtis work, you know, if he's anything closer to Mendoza if you kind of split that line That then I like over I'm gonna go over here I like Ohio State at Michigan is challenging. I guess there's some chance that at Nebraska could be tough If they're not quite as good as I think, but if they're not quite as good as I think then you know that that's they're gonna go under At what like this five game stretch Ohio State at Michigan Minnesota by week host USC and at Washington is is challenging for sure And I guess you can put at Nebraska in there, but that's not exactly a huge road trip geographically Either so get get me the over I mean they're They're starting five and oh I don't know if you guys saw the clip from last year Of me on my Indiana win total But I literally predicted everything that happened. I said they were gonna go undefeated I said they were gonna win the national title and I said for random and dose was gonna win the Highsman And I was sincere is all hell when I said every single word So you know what I know and I'm talking about here Mind the under only slightly. I've got him at 10.3 wins So to go over I mean, I won't be shocked at all if they go over like they do have a lot coming back I do think on the grand scheme of things Josh Hoover is closer to Fernando Mendoza than he is to Curtis Rourke I don't know that he is Fernando Mendoza I think the defensive line is one of the deeper units in the conference I think that they've got a great mix of you know young upcoming talent and 35 year old fathers of three on that unit at this point So that's gonna help them I just the schedule to me like they're they're starting six and oh and they're probably winning those games by an average of 30 points You know what I mean? It's gonna be one of those they've outscored opponents 210 to 15 after their first six games kind of starts to the season It's just as we talked about like with Notre Dame You know with their schedule and they get to the playoff after really not being tested all year If you go half the season and then you get Ohio State and you haven't really had to you know get you Haven't really had to have face any kind of adversity that kind of makes that game a little trickier So I think that even though it's at home I would still right now have Ohio State as a slight favorite in that game probably winning that 52 to 55% of the time At Michigan I have Indiana as a slight favorite but it's still coin flippy So when I put it all together, you know, then you've got USC at home I think USC is gonna be good this year. Will they be good enough to beat Indiana? I don't know but I think they're gonna be much more difficult to beat than they have been And then road trips to Washington are always a little difficult And when you do have a quarterback who has been as prone to mistakes as Joshua Verne road trips to Washington Where it is very loud and you can't quite hear everything that's going on could lead to some problems So again, it's 10.3 wins So I'm going under but it's not like I'm you know sitting there thinking this team's gonna fall off the face of the earth This is gonna be one of those Tom where the the social media graphic is gonna read one way and if you actually listen to the show It's gonna be another. I'm smack dab at 10 and a half with my win lost toss-up analysis And here's the reason why I'm gonna go under because this team Could be good enough to win the national championship and go nine and three in the regular season Within the realm of possible college football outcomes They could in the rhythms of a season after not getting tested and dog walking Everyone through middle October all the sudden a couple bad breaks You mentioned like the Husky stadium a little bit tricky USC very good I mean, I've got we got four opponents right there. We're a very good Indiana team capable of winning multiple playoff games and contending for a national title could end up taking losses Ultimately the way I read the schedule again. I'm sitting here between 10 and 2 or 11 and 1 But sitting on the fence ain't what we do here. Okay, you got to take a side one way or the other So I'm gonna ever so slightly lean to the under on this I think that Indiana is only gonna see the kind of regression that naturally is gonna come with the schedule getting tougher and an Absolute X factor being taken away from the roster and Fernando Mendoza's throws in the big 10 championship game Fernando Mendoza put in the team on his back and the national championship game we had Multiple moments where he was absolutely that dude So you lose him and your schedule gets a little bit tougher I could see you picking up a couple losses along the way But I've got Indiana as a playoff team my projected bracket has them as an at-large selection Probably going 10 and 2 and then winning a game or two, but for this one I'll take the under 10 and a half at minus 125 They're also in the playoff at 10 and 2. Yes, like because the because the defending champion thing like they're They're in a 10 and 2. I think 10 and 2 gives them enough quality wins that it they have more I think they would have a better playoff resume than they had the last two years when they made the playoffs If they get to 10 and 2 against this schedule I would agree with that I mean if you look at like You know, they're they're over nine and a half prices minus 300 their playoff prices minus 350 now those are not big evenly, but like still Yeah, I think 10 and 2 there there's some teams where it's like hey mate They're a maybe at this record and they're definitely this record like I think they're a pretty definite 10 and 2 And I think they're a pretty definite no at 9 and 3 given the lack of the non-conference Get them out Turning our attention to the Iowa Hawkeyes buzz of the weekend boy you want to talk about some camp buzz How about some quarterback scrimmage stats coming out of our family day over the weekend in Iowa city Jeremy Hickley ski and Hank Brown Going toe-to-toe Chris Hassel has picked his quarterback of choice But enough on the quarterback position. That's one of several pieces to peel apart for this Iowa team Defense is where you're looking for the Adjusted pieces along the defensive line to just fall in place the way that Phil Parker seems to magically do every single season You've got a couple of the best offensive lineman in the country But some positions that still need to be filled. I like I think I mean again I think it feels a little lazy. I think they're going to play good defense I think they've got NFL bound offensive lineman. They should be able to run the football But I know you are actually higher on some of Iowa's wide receivers And that is something that you've mentioned recently let's get first crack here Our draft King sportsbook over under win total set seven and a half over at minus 140 under at plus 120 Yeah, I'm slightly under here. I don't know that you're stealing on the number I'm not sure that I trust the quarterbacks. If you look at last year A lot of their offensive improvement was kubi run game Especially in the red zone like the I forgot the kid's name now, but he he was a tank man like I think Grandowski excuse me. Thank you I mean they ran him a lot in the red zone and they were very efficient relative to like the number of trips They actually made it to the red zone I'm fairly high on their receivers like the the new tide in they have is just getting rate reviews in camp I can see a little bit of a defensive drop off here actually what which I think you know is challenging also If you're breaking a new quarterback you break it into new pieces that this this schedule They should start for you know I don't think Iowa State will be much of a contest He even if Iowa is like not very good and the The conference win total versus the full win total says that too over four and a half conferences price The exact same is over seven and a half season. So You're you're getting no Like you don't get any value if you think they're gonna sweep those first three like everybody else agrees With that but like at Michigan host Ohio State at Washington Is one of the toughest stretches you'll see on any schedule in the country and then you get a buy week Thank God, and then you're at Minnesota you host Wisconsin like they they have winnable games Down the stretch But like at Illinois. I don't think it's a lock to be honest Hosting Wisconsin. I don't think we can say that's a lock like if Wisconsin is actually improved And they're not just a total schedule immersion like that that could be tough Nebraska I mean, I haven't favored in that. I haven't favored over Wisconsin, but like not by So much that that it's a total lock. So get get me the under here. I think seven five is slightly more likely I'm also on the under I But touched on a key point for me, that was, I mean, last year, I will average 4.92 points per red zone possession. That ranked 11th in the country. And that was very heavily due to Mark Grinowski being a runner in the red zone and making it more difficult to stop them. But I looked this up because as I was doing, you know, just pre-season, that 4.92 is more than half a point better than they have been at any season in like the last 20 years. So when you lose Grinowski, who was very clearly, he was not a great passer, but when they were able to get the ball into the red zone, he was a huge factor for them in making sure they were getting touchdowns and not field goals. I don't know if they have that with either of their guys this year. It's hard to imagine if you've had your best season in that aspect in a forever that you're going to be able to do it again this year. Now, I will say they might because the offense has been better under Tim Leicester than it had been under Brian Ferrance. So there's a reason to think it could continue. But if it drops off even slightly, just because they scored when they got to the red zone, doesn't mean they were getting to the red zone frequently enough. And if they keep getting to the red zone at the same rate and the scoring drops off, then we're going to see more of the Iowa that we've seen in prior years where yeah, their defense is going to be fine. Their special team is going to help them win games. But when you look at that schedule, like at Michigan Ohio State, at Washington, there's a very real chance they're starting the season only three in big 10 play. And then you're going on the road to Minnesota, a rival that has been a good team and is a tough team to play, staring at a possible O and four start and conference play. Like it's hard to go over with that schedule and with the questions at the quarterback position. So under. And yet here I am. We do not do these things because they are easy. We do these things because they are hard. Iowa over. I don't feel great about it. Here's what I'm thinking. I went through and I ran it and I came out looking at eight and four and I realized what I would need to ask. I would need to ask them to be road warriors. I would need them to be able to win tough games away from Iowa City because I'll give them Purdue. I know that you mentioned Wisconsin, but look that game Halloween in Kinnick. I'm going to give that one to the Hawkeyes. I think they take care of business there. Are they going to be able to go into champagne? I don't know. But I do think that's point flippy. Are they going to be able to go to Minnesota where Minnesota was awesome at home? I don't know. Can they take care of business in a Braske game? Always a little bit crazy. Probably is going to end up 2118 with a missed field goal one way or the other. If they can take care of some business away from home, then I think they can get up to eight and four. The other piece here is the timing of the buy. You know, we've talked throughout this. We've got some. There's like a weird week two buy in the system. There's like a weird week nine buy in the system. And what you just mentioned, Tom, there is a buy week after you've had Michigan Ohio State, Washington to flush and reset. I think that is a great time, a well timed buy for Iowa to be able to refocus as they head into, as you all mentioned, the stretch of the season where they should be able to stack up some wins. So I've slightly to the over on this one. I've got the hawk eyes that need to in four. Coming up on the other side, we turn our attention to a big season for Mike Loxley and the Maryland Terrapins. Plus, year one Kyle Wittingham, year one Pat Fitzgerald and more. Back here on the cover three podcast, keeping things going and asking the important questions like can I'm asking the important questions like, how many kids are going to win this fall? And dad, go mad, it might be a multimillion dollar question for the University of Maryland. As they stare down the future of their football program, Mike Loxley coming off back to back four and eight seasons, you talk to Mike and he says last year's four and eight was not like the year before four and eight. He's talking about the way it felt on the ground, the way it felt in the locker room, a little bit of camp buzz, probably should have mentioned there is a here mathis out for the season with the leg injury super, super like freshman all American last year. That not great, not great to be able to to be losing him along the way. So now we're spending this thing forward and we're looking at a season with Malik Washington in year two. They've reworked some of the past catching rooms. That's a good thing for Malik. The schedule though still is going to make it very difficult to even get this team to a bowl game and that's why draft King Sportsbook has said it as much. Five and a half is the win total at draft King Sportsbook over plus 105 under minus 125 Tom, which where are you leaning? You know, I don't know how you guys viewed this conference as a whole. Personally, I look at it as there's a top tier with the three teams that we all know. Then there's a second tier of teams that I think are legitimate playoff teams. And then after that outside of maybe the bottom two, I think everybody's kind is very, very similar. I've got eight toss ups Tom on this schedule eight toss up games. Yeah. And when you have a tier like that where everybody's jumbled, somebody's got to rise up. So you try to find the team that you think is going to be that team and you look for the team with a young talented quarterback and a young talented nucleus on both sides of the ball. Although, as you just mentioned, one of those players is now out for the season and that sucks because he was a key part, but it's not completely tanking my feeling on this team. The schedule is not what I would call overly friendly like at Ohio State sucks at USC sucks, but you get Penn State at home, you know, Wisconsin, Illinois Rutgers, UCLA at home. These are all games that you can win, which for Maryland might be very strange seeing as how they're after September and they're not used to winning those games anymore. But I'm on the over. I think Malik's going to take a leap this year. I think this offense is going to be a lot better. I think they will score far more points than they did last year. I think their defense won't be elite, but I think it could be somewhere in that top half kind of range if things click and go right with us. The young guys they do still have and they stay relatively healthy. So I'm over. I like the Terps. I'm turtle boy or something. I don't know. I'm into this team over by October. You know, I didn't want to say it, but I don't think it's completely on though they can't be the totals of what five and a half. Yeah. Yeah. So they can't be over by October, but they can go be over by the end of October. Yeah. No, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. So you're saying by the end of October. And that means with Purdue and Wisconsin kicking off November, you've got this as like a seven. They could be. Yeah, they could be a six and two. I'm not saying it's likely, but I think it's far more within the realm of possibility that people want to understand based off the last two years. Yeah. I think they're more likely to be a seven and five team overall, but yeah, I mean, that they're going to start somewhere between what five and two and two and five. Yeah. I mean, obviously, right. Like you're going to lose that Ohio state. You should start two and oh, pretty easy. Like you con is that that's a big drop off for them. Like I kindly has them one tenth. I'm slightly lower than that. They get PI hate some two. So can you can you start hot? Can you find a way to get two or three with Virginia Tech UCLA at Nebraska? If you get that, then you're feeling pretty good. Take your looking in Columbus. Come home. Can you get Rutgers before the by week? At that point, you need to get one of two out of Illinois or sorry, really one of three at Illinois at Purdue and Wisconsin. You know, like like that's that's possible. And then like at USC feels really tough. I don't think like hosting Penn State if you need that game for a bowl is is a foregone conclusion. Like I like Penn State, but I don't like we mentioned like how do you tear the big 10? You know, I I don't have Penn State from a rating standpoint in that USC Michigan tier. I think they're kind of a like the very top of the next year. Now the schedule certainly like you have to have Penn State up there because they got an absolute get to the schedule, but we need to like like separate out like, okay, they're going to be highly ranked first. What are they rated? I'm over. Yeah. And another way to look at this. I'm sorry, I thought you were done. No, and just believe in the quarterback. Like if you're playing a lot of coin flip games, it's within the realm of possibility. And I don't think I don't think he is, but I think it's if we look back here four months from now, and we're like, okay, especially when you count for like team around him, League Washington's best quarterback in his league. Like I don't think that I don't think he is, but like I think he's one of the guys with the talent, we can say, okay, like that that's that's not insane. Yeah, I was about to say like if you look at it from this vantage point, if Malik is if Malik takes a step forward this year, and maybe even if he doesn't take that big a one, they might have the best quarterback in 10 of their 12 games. Like I was out of Ohio State USC, like what quarterback on this schedule? Are you dead certain is better than Malik Washington? Dead certain. No, I'm saying. I think like preseason probably one or two. That that ends up being the biggest factor in most of these games is the years go on. Who has the better quarterback? We'll sit there. We'll go over the depth chart. It's like, oh, they just had the better QB. I mean, listen, sometimes the hair runs out of energy, and it is only with the steadfastness that the tortoise is able to get across the finish line first. I'm on it too. I'm there. I was going to play like Rocco-Bector Malik Washington. Who would you rather have? I was like you played the game because I did it too. If you think that a wide receiver room that was among the leaders in a bad way in drops last season is going to be able to take some steps forward. And you think we're going to see a Maliepe. Then yeah, we are just Maliepe. Oh, we are. We're just in. We have got Marilyn Mania here, fear the turtle. Take me back to the viral video of the young woman who jumps on the table, crushes the beer and then crushes the can on her head. That's the way that I am feeling. This might be a turtle pod now. I mentioned when you were talking earlier, how many games are they out of? The range is huge, because I actually do think that because of their quarterback, because of the talent, they have a chance to be able to stack a lot of wins. Now, they have enough flaws and they have enough inconsistencies to know that they're not going to win all eight of the games that I have labeled officially as a toss up, but they'll win enough of them to be able to get on the right side of this. I'm on the over as well. Over plus over five and a half, the turps go bowling. Now, big picture stuff. I don't even think we need to deal with that right now. Like, would six and six be a season that has everyone fist pumping? Probably gets into the, how does it look? Right? But I mean, if you're a Maryland fan and you go six and six, what's the worst six and six you could have? Okay. Like, you're going to get Howard and Yukon. Which of these four wins are you really dissatisfied with? Like, Votek, UCLA, Nebraska on the road, Rutgers, Illinois at Purdue, Wisconsin, Penn State. I just, I didn't throw out at USC and I don't have a state for, I think, obvious reasons. Like, that's a pretty decent season, man. I would also agree last year's four and eight didn't look like the year before four and eight. Locksley's right about that. Kiana Mo! Turning our attention to year one of the Kyle Wittingham era in Ann Arbor. You want to talk about just biases from your own experience? I think I'm in on something. I think I feel good about that. Bryce Underwood will play better in the 2026 season than he did in the spring game. Are we in on that? Yes. Okay. All right. Cool. I thought that would be both. I think Bryce Underwood is in fact going to be a lot better than the panic coming out of spring practice and the panic coming out of the publicly viewed spring game. I think that Bryce Underwood is very focused on his big picture and very focused on making sure that he's able to stack improvement and be able to take some steps forward. I also think that when you've got a dynamic one, two punch of Jordan Marshall and Savion Heider, you might not even need to put that much on his plate for this Michigan offense to be able to at least be efficient and effective against some of the best teams in the country. And look, with an over-underwind total of eight and a half at Draft King Sports Book with the under heavily juiced at minus 180, there is certainly an expectation that they'll take some losses along the way. Tom, do you see that as well and sort of how do you see this shaking out for Kyle Wittingham and Bryce Underwood? First of all, I would like to say that I am happy that here in August of 2026, the biggest controversy surrounding Michigan football right now is that Kyle Wittingham doesn't hate Ryan Day. Compared to the controversies that have surrounded this program in recent years, we are already clearly on a better path than we had been. That's true. Thank you. Good job Michigan. Second, not sure I agree with him on that. But anyways, so I think as far as this team is concerned this year, my numbers have this as a slight over. So that's what I'm picking. That said, I don't know that I want to be picking the over because I'm not all that confident in them winning that Oklahoma game. And I typically think that Oklahoma game like is a must win if they're going to hit this over because they do have Indiana. They are at Oregon. They are at Ohio State. It is difficult for me to think that they're winning all three of those three games or if they're not, they're probably losing those three games. And there's also the argument that hey, this team went nine and three last year with Bryce Underwood playing like crap and a coaching staff that was an absolute mess. Now that there are adults in the room, they're probably going to be better. True, but I don't know if this team is as talented as the Michigan teams we're used to seeing in recent years. So even if Underwood takes that step forward, like I love Marsh, it receiver, I haven't seen Xavier and Hyder play, but I'm told he's phenomenal. I think that's great. But I don't know about their offensive line. I don't know if it's going to be one of the better offensive lines in the country defensively. I think there's talent on that defensive line. And I think like John Henry daily is a nice transfer kit, but I don't know that he's 100% healthy, is he? So yeah, so I don't know how strong this team is on the lines of scrimmage compared to the Michigan teams that we have seen in recent years. So I am on the over. I do not recommend betting it. I certainly ain't. Yeah, so I thought we were going with, like, so seven and a half and eight and a half are basically juice, just opposite ways, right? Over seven and a half minus $6 under eight and a half minus $1.80, right? I just didn't read the sheet right. So I was going to go over on seven and a half. I actually think this is a fairly important number here. Like, like eight and four comes up a lot in the modeling. So I am going to be slightly under here. If I was going to bet the over, I would pay up for the for the seven and a half minus $1.80, minus $1.06, whatever it is. So I'm slightly under Indiana, Oregon and Ohio State absolutely take business against, like, just take care of business against the rest of this conference. And I do think that everybody's elevated, but I also think those teams are still, you know, really quite good Iowa at Minnesota Penn State is not a lock to be three, you know, right? You know, if you if you go if you go one in three Oklahoma, Indiana, at Oregon and Ohio State, then you have to sweep Iowa at Minnesota Penn State to hit this over. So I see eight and four coming up quite often. And I'm going to be under here, but like Babelow us practicing in a lineup, John Hunter daily, like we've seen clips from this weekend is like already practicing and like in the lineup, but there are a lot of encouraging signs here. Like everybody's talking about how good the cannon is. I think we we are very in like we're we're hider hive for sure. But I still like numbers matter. And so I'll be under here. I don't know like I don't know if I want to be part of a hive with a guy who has that name because it's a little too. Oh, yeah, yeah, that's right. We're doing we're doing some all American ballot, you know, tabulations. And I had to send some tricky text messages. Yeah, why why is your phone auto correcting that ship? What else are you texting the people? Not trying to get an HR complaint. Yeah. It's not just not the World War two group chat. Okay, that's all it's going on. So great question from from Garrett, which I think that bud, you just answered. And so to sort of reiterate for the audience, that we yelled for years about sports books that would set a win total at a round number called them cowards. And they said, all right, we'll learn math nerds. So now you can offer an eight and a half and a seven and a half and win. As bud mentioned, we are minus 186 to the over on seven and a half, meaning you're paying $186 to win 100. And then your minus 180 to the under on eight and a half means the most likely outcome, the coin flip outcome, everything keeps coming back eight and four. And so do I. Like so, yeah, for the official eight and a half, I'm going to go with the under here. I would not consider betting this necessarily, but I see teams that I have in my college football playoff all over the schedule. And I do not have Michigan quite yet on that tier as those teams that I think are college football playoff teams. Very, very good team. And you know what, if they hold serve against everybody else in the big 10, then sure, they get to nine and three. But I I'm looking at as you mentioned, bud, you zeroed in on it. Got too much respect for Penn State Iowa, Minnesota to just automatically chalk those up as W's here. So slightly to the under, I see this as an eight and four. And I had not even considered the I would pay up for over seven and a half as a play. I do kind of like that because I do think the way the team is built. It's a high floor proposition. I just think that the floor is more of a seven and five type floor. Yeah. With health, I think under seven and a half, it would be surprising to me. Yeah. I don't think they're going seven and five, but they could. How many games are going to win this fall? All right, everybody, sit up, music down, hats off. Pat Fitzgeralds in the house, boys, the new regime here. Pat Fitzgerald takes over a Michigan State program that really lost its way over the last two years. A lot of excitement about what Jonathan Smith could have brought as he showed up from Oregon State, including with his quarterback. but the quarterback a little bit disappointing and the team as a whole just could not find any kind of consistency. Now we enter the Pat Fitzgerald era with some questions. I think defensive depth is a question. Are they going to be able to run the ball is a question? Who emerges at the wide receiver room? I think we're all at least like mildly thumbs up on Alessio from the way that we've talked about. Let me see if I can get it. Milavoyavic. I believe that would be the correct pronunciation in Europe. I do not believe that is the way he pronounces it though. Okay, what would it be? I think Milavoyavic is how he pronounces it. I believe that's what they were saying but it is, if you were in Croatia, it would be Milavoyavic. Okay, all right. Well, we're the Croatian sensation and I were both fighting through the adversity on the field out here. Will Michigan state be able to get on the right side of a draft Kingsport's book number that is set at four and a half? This one another heavy juice situation over plus 130 under minus 156. Tom, as you look at year one of the Pat Fitzgerald era in East Lansing, what are some of your burning questions? I mean, this team has to stay healthy to have a fighting chance. I think is the biggest question. So the question will be how healthy can they be? Because they are probably one or two injuries along the offensive and defensive line from being a pretty bad football team. I am on the under. I know I was very big on the higher and I was very big on them going into the offseason. But as I've gotten, you know, I've read studying more, looked at this roster, more looked at the schedule more. I've got them at 4.3 wins. So I can't justify going over here. I do not think the schedule, I don't think the schedule is up bare, but I don't think it does them enough favors. But I don't know if you can do this team enough favors, honestly, because they're not going to be the better team on the schedule, no matter how it shakes out most times. Yeah, I'm under as well. I don't have them like above Purdue and Rutgers from Power Redding standpoint. I mean, look, I think Fitzgerald is a good job with like program organization and with defense. But the last three real seasons, not the COVID year that he coached, like they were just horrible in big 10 play. And, you know, like maybe this is a good hire by Michigan State. Maybe it's not. I think three and nine is in play. They're only favor by 10 at home against Toledo. Like this, this bet could be done week one. You know, like 10 point favorites win games. And I'm not saying Toledo is going to go in there and beat them, but I do think, uh, I mean, you know, the Chats in Bill Connelly has a ninth worst power for two. Yeah, like I, I mean, we're kind of splitting hairs here. They ninth worst. So they 15th worst, but they're, you know, they're they're bottom group in the power for for me. And so I mean, I, I have no other name. I have dogs hosting Nebraska. I have dogs at Wisconsin. I have dogs host Illinois. It's small, but still I got him favorite over the Western dogs at UCLA, dogs at Michigan, dogs hosting Washington, dogs hosting Oregon. And then this is the tough part. You got to go play a final game at Rutgers. And I think best case there, they're four and eight or they're four and seven already. So that game's not for a bowl, right? Like you're probably not real fresh after going, and when to their their buy is one. I mean, their buys after UCLA, right? So at Michigan, Washington, Oregon, then you got to go play a conference row game to finish the year in a game where you're probably not like super psyched, like you're not playing for anything as far as bully eligibility, most likely or maybe you are. I mean, the line implies that you basically are. So I'm, I'm under. I think, I think they're like three and nine, four and eight. I was asked by a Michigan state fan recently. You know, what's the, what is the cell here? And I was like, the cell is not trying to aim to get back to playing in the Rose Bowl. The cell is that you can be outback bowl good. And I think that Michigan State football can be outback bowl good. You know, that they can be right there finishing in that seven and five, eight and four range and, you know, getting to go play in Tampa, great experience for your fan base. And that can be a healthy sign for what Michigan State football can be. I don't think this roster is to a point where they can go seven and five, eight and four. I think the depth concerns are very real. And you are playing some teams that have absolute hammers. I mean, teams that are just like, there could be a real body blow situation to your point about the finale at Piscataway where you've had to play Michigan and Washington and Oregon back to back to back. And if you've got depth concerns, that could get really, really dicey against the physicality that I am expecting all three of those big 10 teams to bring this season. I've got it for an eight. I'm not going to be, I'm not going to be Russian to drop 156 on an under four and a half. But this is a team that I think is sort of rightly lined and rightly rated. And you tailgates going crazy with it. I'm very worried about the bad vibes when we all lock up Toledo as a money line sprinkle for week one. But that does seem very college football, right? That year one, like home opener, new head coach. And I know Toledo's got a new head coach too. But that also could be a reason to jump on the rockets and take it to the moon. So keep your eye on that one. If you're on Michigan State over four and a half, then losing week one with all the sun, make things very, very dicey. I am officially going to be on the under. I've got this thing closer to four and eight. Coming up on the other side, keeping things rolling with Minnesota, Nebraska, Northwestern, and a P top 25 polls set to be released at the top of the hour. We'll react live. And more next. I have to tell you about this game changing product I use before night out with drinks. It's called pre alcohol by Zbiotics and it fits seamlessly into my routine. As someone who loves catching up over dinner and drinks on the weekend, I also refuse to lose my Sunday morning productivity. I was definitely skeptical at first, but having a bottle right before going out gives me the freedom to enjoy myself without the fear of regretting it tomorrow. Zbiotics pre alcohol probiotic drink is the world's first genetically engineered probiotic. It was invented by PhD scientists to break down acetaldehyde, a byproduct of drinking alcohol. Pre alcohol produces an enzyme that is designed to break down this byproduct. Make pre alcohol your first drink of the night, drink responsibly, and enjoy your next day festivities. Zbiotics has sold more than 14 million bottles and earn the trust of thousands, including us. Try for yourself today and if you are unsatisfied, they will refund your entire order. No questions asked. Head to Zbiotics.com/cover, code cover for 15% off your first order. Back here on the Cover 330 podcast. I was talking and rolling as we look at the Minnesota golden gofers. Tommy's all is HD on the ad read. He used up all his HD allotment for the week on his ad read. We'll come power in three. Don't you worry. Golden gofers. Great time at Drake Lindsay at big 10 media days. Be sure to check out that conversation. If you haven't already, PJ Fleck as well, sat down to join us because there are some pieces that you can look at with this Minnesota team and gravitate towards Anthony Smith, one of the best past rushers in the big 10 last season, one of the best past rush rushers in the season. He's going to be benefited by the addition of TJ Bush who comes over from Cal presents another good opportunity on the other side of that defensive line. Darius Taylor, we have long scribed as a dude, but this run game underperformed last season. Offensive line needs to be able to find a little bit more kick if you're going to capitalize on everything that Taylor can give you a defensive front in general. I think plays to the consistency that we've seen, but on the other side of consistency, how about these splits? Seven and O at home and O and five on the road. Minnesota, what can you do to fix that? We got an over under win total at draft King sports book of six and a half wins heavily juiced to the under Tom. I'll let you get first word here. What are you doing with PJ's bunch? First of all, I want to start by saying, I don't know if you guys saw the story that came out today on CBS sports.com with with tall T and Hummer and Zen. It's where they pulled all the power for programs to figure out how much these teams are spending on their payrolls. All right. I have more respect for PJ Fleck after reading it than I already did because PJ is one of the coaches, one of the three teams in the big 10 that is not spending at least 20 million on their roster. He's in that Northwestern Purdue tier as far as the spend. Yet his teams have a winning record in the big 10 each of the last two years, despite spending like those two. And we know how those two are doing in the big 10 with their roster. So ton of respect for PJ and that is reflected here in my win total. It's at six and a half. I think this team can get to seven wins. I like Drake Lindsay. I liked Drake Lindsay last year. I think he's got a very big arm. I think that he's got room to grow, but I think that there is that room is there. So I think he's going to develop if Derry's Taylor can stay healthy again. I think that would be a big boost for their offense. I liked their offensive line last year. I'd like him to get in this year defensively. Anthony Smith is clearly the star of the show on that side of the ball. I would like to see somebody else step up. But overall, they're defensive lines. Even though they haven't always had like game records. They've typically been solid on that side of the ball. So I have some trust in this defense upfront. Losing, put parrots, and safety, I think hurts. But I also felt like the way they used parrots last year wasn't really what he was fit for. And that kind of affected his play overall. I don't think he was that great for them last year, but I still think he was very talented and if they'd been using him right. So I do worry about them on the back end, but still, if there's a position where I'm willing to lose a guy, I mean, Minnesota has been pretty consistent at the safety position these last few years. So I don't think you're going to see a huge drop off. Then you get to this schedule. There's no reason they can't start 3 and L. And then you get into big 10 play, produce winnable, Iowa's winnable, UCLA's winnable, Northwestern's winnable, at Wisconsin is winnable, even at Penn State could be winnable. So I think 7 and 5 is very much in play here. I'm on the over. Yeah, same. I think I echo everything Tom said. I like some of their pass catchers, too. I think they have real weapons. I think they have a good quarterback. When I look at this, I mean, if they roughly defend home field, right, like you shall annoy Mississippi State, Akron, Michigan, Iowa, UCLA, Northwestern. If you go 5 and 2 in that, I think you're feeling somewhat decent that you can steal 2 on the road and get the 7. I will note, this is one I think I would pay up if I'm betting the over. So a huge edge here, and these lines have been out for a long time. So if you're showing like a lot of huge edges against a market that's been out for six months, you probably may look at your process a little differently. But over 5 and 1/2 price, minus 160, I do think that 6 and 6 comes up a decent amount. I mean, clearly it does. It's around the number that Vegas has that we're using here with 6 and 1/2. So I'm going to go over here. I like getting an Iowa at home, UCLA at home. Now it is after you go to Indiana, but it's a West Coast team traveling to what could be a chili game, for sure. And then they finish with two of the teams that we think could be more scheduled in quality in Penn State and Wisconsin. That's not saying those teams are bad, but they have the real favorable schedule. And you just don't want to double count that as them being both good and high win total, right? High win total is wide, necessarily the same level of team. So go ahead and give me the overview on Minnesota ever so slightly. Under ever so slightly here. Hey, man, I've got to row the boat. Yeah, I think that you could be looking at a scenario where there are three and five going into November with some real work to do. I think that even then, UCLA coming to Minnesota, like, oh, my gosh, Minnesota, so good at home. UCLA has to travel. That's still a game that, you know, if you're not buttoned up, UCLA might be able to come in there and steal one. So I've got Minnesota as a bowl team. I think PJ Fleck will have an opportunity to continue his unbelievably impressive record in bowl games at Minnesota. But and but thank you for bringing up again that if you really want to play this over five and a half sounds great, but you're just making me pick this and I need to fall in line. I need to fall in balance with everything else. And I see that the Mississippi state game, though it is at home, is a game that is absolutely possible to end up as a loss. You know, the Iowa game, though it is at home, the UCLA game, though it is at home, Minnesota is getting a lot of breaks here in terms of games that I think are real toss up games, getting them on your home turf. I'm just not ready to copy and paste that 7-0 record from last season to think that they're going to be able to run it back again. Bowl team, good team, dangerous team, but just one that I think ends up six and six, maybe more often than it ends up seven and five. How many kids are going to win this fall? Turn in our attention now to Matt rule, the Nebraska corn huskers. Six and a half wins as the win total at draft King Sportsbook with the over at plus one 15, the under at minus one thirty six. What a joy it was to be able to inform Nebraska's head coach about the whoopsie, Daisy King. You know, you could tell Matt rule wasn't quite sure. I felt like we had to circle back and remind him that these are things that we say with affection. We're not just trashing him on CBS Sports network, you know, right to his face. No, we, we appreciate what Anthony Kalandrey has been able to bring in terms of production, entertainment and overall football fund to the picture. Dana Holger sent in him working on it. Matt rule who admitted he's more of a defensive guy, kind of hands off on the offense. Here's what I can't figure out, bud. It's a messaging issue, okay? Are they big or are they lean? Have we added muscle or have we added mass? We've got a Nebraska team that Danny's own eyes said at field level looks like they were not as big as a Michigan team that he got to go see out in Lincoln last season. And yet we're talking about trying to become leaner and faster. I, what, what are they trying to signal to fans? What, what should we take in terms of signal from all this noise? What, what's the identity of Nebraska here in 2026? I mean, I, I think we identified pretty early on last year that Nebraska was going to suck on line of scrimmage. Like, like that was like, oh, god, like some of these portal takes were not very good and, you know, like that they were in trouble. They're, I think they're probably better on the lines of scrimmage this year. I'm just not sure that like this line is fully accounting for these step up in difficulty on the schedule. So the striker wants to pull it up like we, we got just, they had a gift schedule the last two years in conference. And now they don't, right? Like now the bill comes due and you kind of squandered that gift schedule. And I think the next two years, like I, they're probably going to have it pretty hard. I think a bowl is certainly possible. Five and seven is also possible, right? Like you should start three and a, for sure, like at Michigan state, I have them favored, not by a ton. You know, hosting Maryland is not a layup. I mean, Indiana Oregon, they're, I don't think they're really competitive in those games, you know, hosting Washington, you know, like that's nice to get at home off the by week. But then like add Illinois, add Rutgers, you know, like, you're not like 14 point favorites in Piscataway. And then host Ohio State and then finish at Iowa. I am under here. I think they're starting to do some right things on the personal side. I think they've got some better coaching changes now. Like, I'd like the DC they brought over from San Diego state. Obviously, like they can hold on to Traitailer, the number one quarterback recruit in the country. I mean, like people said, we've heard this for real, but like, what's the alternative? Like not try, right? So like history says, if you keep getting number one type quarterback prospect, you're probably going to do pretty well. But this schedule is really hard compared to what this team has been through the last two years. I think six and six is pretty firmly in place. So go ahead and give me the under. Yeah, I'm on the under two I, it's funny. I think the offensive line will be the same as last year, but people will think it's better because it won't give up a billion sacks. So that's a step forward. But I do, you know, Rayola took a bunch of sacks through some interceptions and fumbled a lot and had an actual worse whoopsie daisy rate last year than the whoopsie daisy king in Anthony Klangeria at UNLV. That said, now that Klangeria is coming to the big 10 try the best, I do expect that his WDR might spike a bit again. So like Klangeria's turnovers are different than Rayola is in that he just makes terrible decisions when he throws. And then sometimes when he's running, he just has the ball stripped from behind. So I don't know if Nebraska's talented enough to overcome some of that that I expect. Like there will be a lot of high crazy moments with Klangeria, but there will also be plenty of low moments. So that's a problem. I think losing what's his name at, Emmett at running back is Emmett Johnson. Emmett Johnson that running back is not going to help them because he was so huge for them last year. But I do think they will be able to run the ball well because again, I do like their offensive line. And I do think they have decent running back. So I don't expect that, you know, things are going to go off the wall there. It's just I don't know what this passing attack is going to be. And defensively, I'm not that high on this team. Like I think this could be a similar situation. I know they've changed schemes. I know they brought in different players, but I don't think we're going to see that drastically different to results. And it's, but it was hammering. Like if they weren't able to do it against the schedule, they had last year. In this year, they're playing Indiana, Oregon, in Ohio State. The three teams in the Big Ten are all on your schedule. And then you've got an Illinois team. It's one 19 games the last two years. You've got a Washington team. It's been one of the better teams in the league the last two years. You've got Iowa on the road to finish. Yeah, it's really hard to say this team is going over. Yeah, I'm good. Go ahead, Bob. But I'm on the under as well. On the run-in-back room, like everybody I've talked to Nebraska thinks Jamal Rule is a stud. Like they might have really hit on that one. Charlotte Christian kid, actually, he's a freshman, right? Yeah, but it'll be, I mean, the official like company line is still committee, though, right? I think so. Yeah. But if you're like a fantasy player and you're taking like a flyer that this kid takes over the room eventually. Yeah. Hey, listen, this is why you tune in. This is why you tune in. All right, here we go. We got the long horns are being hated on already. We got one more win total before we can react to to the AP top 25. I haven't seen him yet. So I'm going to really try to react live on the show. Well, you were calling for striker to bring up a schedule and you know he's furiously building a graphic with the top 25 right now. So he's a producer. Do your job. Can't I'm off? David Braun. and Northwestern get to move into a awesome looking stadium. I mean, seriously, like the stadium looks fantastic. Looks like a brand new, like, Premier League stadium, right fit, good amenities, but are they going to be able to win all their games? How many games are they going to win? Why tell you what was a nice, a nice win that was picked up already, won't count in the standings, but going to the courthouse and getting yourself a big win. How about Senator Jackson, Carcella winning an injection for a sixth year, being able to move some pieces around and solidify an offensive line that we'll be protecting. We think Aiden Chiles, who takes over their new offensive coordinator, Chip Kelly, leading the way. I love this running back room. It allows me to maybe even tamper some of my concerns about Aiden Chiles and turnovers if they just stick to their bread and butter, meat and potatoes and run that dag on football. Defensively, I will admit that there's not something that is pushing me towards saying. And Northwestern will win a bunch of games because of the defense, but I'm also not marking it as a concern quite yet. That can be proven in time. The Draft King Sportsbook has an over-under-wind total for the Wildcat set at five and a half time. What's a, how do you start look at, you know, this David Braun team? Well, as I mentioned earlier, when I was talking about Minnesota, there are three programs in the Big Ten, not spending 20 million on their roster. This is one of them. And when everybody else is, that makes it pretty difficult to compete on a weekly basis. I don't like what they did at quarterback in the off season, addressing the position. I'm not big on Charles. I'm not big on Markio. I mean, whoever wins that job, I don't have a ton of faith in. I do agree with you. Markio from West Virginia, by the way, do you think he could end up being the starter there? I don't think it's likely, but I'm not going to rule it out entirely. Got it. Kamaloffe and Sawchuck, I think are a decent one to punch at running back. So that's cool. The receiver position, who's the playmaker, like, I don't know, Chip Kelly, like it's one thing when you're running the offense at Ohio State, and you've got all that talent. That's not, like, I think Chip Kelly's not, you know, I'm not going to sit here and say he's not a very good offensive mind. But when you've got Northwestern talent, I don't know what you're truly going to be able to do. That's going to be a sub-difference maker for you, because even at UCLA, when his teams weren't great, he still had talent as a team player is on that roster compared to what he's dealing with here. You look at the schedule. Let's be honest. They could lose the South Dakota State right off the jump. They could lose to Colorado. This is a team that could be 0 and 2 going on the road to play Indiana. And they've got Penn State the week after that. I don't think they're going bowling this schedule. Again, another one of those teams that has to play Indiana, Oregon, and Ohio State. Oh, and by the way, they're all on the road, like you don't even get one of them coming to your cool new stadium to like sell out for you. So yeah, under just not high hopes for this team at all. I'm under as well. I'm willing to buy the child's will will be good under Chip Kelly's offense. And I think David Braun has done a pretty good job. This is a weird one though. Have you guys looked at when they're bi-weeks? Two. Week two. Bro. Yeah. They'll be dead. Yeah. Like this is kind of the big 10 saying, hey, here's your check. Somebody's got to lose ball games and that's somebody this year is you. So give me the other. Actually, what I think it is is the big 10 saying or Northwestern saying we would like to have as many games in our stadium as possible and it's not going to be open about the time the season starts. Get that by week. A little early to squeeze more that big 10 team into the air. That'd be great. Thank you. How do you feel? I think it'd be feeling because like if they're going to win this, they almost certainly need to steal one of that Minnesota or at Illinois. And looking at this, they'll be coming off at Oregon, hosting Iowa at at Ohio State before you go at Minnesota and then it's not like Minnesota is playing like a soft version of football. They're playing like three yards at a cloud of dust stuff too. And you're going to be beat to hell. Or you need to update or you need to upset Penn State and start six and one. What? I'm saying like like the routes you get there, like if you don't steal one of that Minnesota and Illinois, like you probably would include Indiana. No, no, that would be the one. That'd be the one. Oh, upset Penn State and go six and one. Yeah. Correct. Yeah. I'm on the under as well. I think that there's a there's a real, I think Indiana's got the week nine by right? The really, really late one, it'll be interesting to watch those two teams and see how that ends up playing out. See if that ends up providing any any fodder for us to decide one way or another, whether we should be having you know, one week to one or two by weeks during a season because congratulations. You get to hit reset after what I'm assuming was a spring game type playbook against South Dakota State before you get ready to host Colorado and then just go through that brutality. I don't like the way it shapes up. I think that ultimately like as I ran, I came out at 4.5 as sort of my first go at it. And then if you feed to the fire, got to make a call here on the show, the way that it falls with all of those heavy blow by blow games, I echo y'all sentiment toss ups don't look like toss ups after having to go through that with no breaks. That's rough. Question in the chat from dirty dog, will I be going to the game against Illinois? No, because that's on a rivalry weekend. So there's other big games that I'll probably need to be home watching. But I will. I have applied for a credential for the home opener against Penn State. That's on a Friday night. So yeah, I will be there now be for history to witness it all home open. No, no, the big 10 home opener, you mean? Yeah. Big 10 home opener. And in town, this one could be a big one could be the could be a moment of a rival. Here we go. Be in the press box in my line, I gear. Being completely unbiased. Hey, listen, nerds. They said no cheering in the press box. They didn't say anything about no booing more booing in the press box. All right, coming up on the other side. The AP Top 25 poll is out. So it's time for a very first edition for 2026 of the poll assassin. We'll do it live and more next. Back here on the cover three podcast. Yes, the AP Top 25 poll has been released, though our friend and enemy Ralph Russo no longer works for the AP. I can tell he has still gotten all of his all of his spyware is still logged in because my computer just sounds like an absolute jet engine trying to load up these rankings. I guess they're being overloaded. Number one, in your hearts and mind, Ohio State, the Ohio State Buckeyes collected 40 of the available first place votes followed by Oregon at number two, Georgia at three, Notre Dame at four. And this one was the big surprise in the CBS sports newsroom as the rankings came out. The Texas Longhorns down at number five Indiana checks in at six Miami at seven. For those of you who have been following our conversations around the top teams in the country, especially our conversation on during the cover three takeover on CBS sports network. Those are the seven teams. And if you look at the voting points, which are also right here, youtube.com/cover3, there's a tier. There's a drop off right after you get to Miami. Now all the sudden we start to talk about those teams that I would consider, you know, the teams that are expected to be contending for at large bids in the college football playoff. Again, so Texas A&M at eight, Ole Miss at nine, Oklahoma at 10, then right on their heels before we really start to dip into the next tier, we get LSU at 11, Texas Tech at 12, then it drops a little bit to Alabama 13, BYU 14, USC at 15, followed by Michigan at 16 and now it's kind of a grab bag, Washington, Penn State, SMU, Tennessee, round out the top Winnie, Utah, Iowa, Houston, Louisville and Missouri, round out the top 25. The Clemson Tigers finish outside the top 25, remember that was the somewhat controversial inclusion. Oh God, Missouri, Missouri has won us right now in the Memorial, Missouri spot. It's just, you know, that we save it for them every single year. The Florida Gators, lower than I thought, checking in at 27th and with a good bit behind. So really you got 26 teams that were mostly in the mix for 25 spots, the rest of those voting points you see, the teams that with a voting points that low, you basically were occupying a single, you know, a couple of 23, 24, 25 spots on the ballot. Tom Quickmath or Quick Glance at what we've seen one through 25. And we, what stands out to you? I mean, first of all, thank you for not ranking Clemson. I got pretty mad at the coaches for doing it. So I'm happy to see that my, my fellow media literati followed my lead and looked at reality compared to what football is now and at what was 10 years ago. But again, Mizzou being ranked, we've, we're doing win totals, right? Mizzou has a win total of six and a half. Yeah. Why are you putting them on your ballot? I think this is a good illustration of like some people are probably doing more of like a power rating and some people are trying to predict the final. record of the season. Yeah, I just, it's, but the power, by the way, the power rating argument would have Missouri, maybe at 35. And if you think the difference between 25 and 35 is negligible, that's your argument for putting Missouri at 25. I mean, I think there's some people who would have Missouri higher on a power rating standpoint, you know, predicting how they finish, Missouri should not be in the top 25. That's correct. Power rankings have cleansing in the top 20. They're really, there's nothing in this poll that really pisses me off. I mean, I think, when I look at the top 10, I'll be surprised if either Texas A&M or Ole Miss finished the season in the top 10, but I completely understand why they're there now. I think the A&M over Ole Miss Oklahoma LSU, Texas Tech Bama is surprising to me. I'm like, they lost a lot of really good players out that offense and their play collar. So there's so much genetic hype that I, I understand it, even if I don't agree with it. Yeah, I mean, but again, everything from I would say Texas A&M through Texas Tech, everything eight through 12. That, I mean, the a couple ballots change, and those could be in a different order. I wouldn't read too much into that. Is this vote total stuff on this graphic? Correct. Texas did not receive a single first place vote. That shocked me. That's kind of surprising to me, because I think if you believe in Sark, I think there's a real big case you put Texas number one. I think that the, I think the voters answered, they don't believe in Sark. I think the voters don't believe in Arch. I think they were clearly number two on a lot of ballots. For them to get more points in Indiana who got eight first place votes. Yeah, that would make sense. I think you also have some people that are all the way just like non-believing on Indiana, because we saw that Indiana and the coaches poll got the second most first place votes, and yet they finished outside of the top five. That's an interesting point from Ryan and the chat there. When it was the last time we had a pre-season AP top 25 in which not a single SEC team got a first place vote. Wow. 2000 and four probably something like that. Yeah. 2005, I would think. It's got to be like a 20 year window. Where was Texas pre-season 2005? They weren't SEC. Right. That's what I'm saying, but it would have been USC getting a, so USC got 60 Texas got four. Okay, so that may be the year, I don't know. I think that it probably is another. Tennessee got 13 that year. I think it's probably another layer in that everyone thinks the SEC has a lot of good, and we're waiting to see if there's great. Tennessee got 13 first place, so I say here. According to the. Yeah, look. 2005. Oh, that's the final, my bet. I need to click the Go button, I'm pre-season. I'm showing 2005 pre-season AP USC 60 Texas four. I'm showing Tennessee 13 in third. Interesting. Okay. Yeah, I'm showing the third as well. Does this college pull archive maybe wrong here? If the ESPN site might be wrong too. Somebody in the chat will probably have this. Hey, news, much. Let's check out that 11-320. If you're Georgia or Texas, you're probably happy not to be getting a number of one vote, because you know, the good die-un, and you don't want to be afraid to be great, right? That's facts. 65 years since the Big Ten started 1-2. Wow. According to Striker. Like that. Fake news? No. No, we believe our in-house research department. CBS Sports Research does a fantastic job, and I wouldn't doubt that one. Do you agree with the tier? We were. But we've been talking about Big Ten win totals. You were talking about the tiers. We got a couple of Big Ten teams there. USC at 14, Michigan at 16, Washington at, I guess that would be 15. We're a little bit off on our numbers here. But when you're seeing the way that those Big Ten teams all stack up against each other, do you agree with the way the drop-off is where USC and Michigan are operating on a little bit of a different. Oh, we got to tie for 14. I see it now. Do you agree the drop-off though, Michigan to Washington? There's a little bit of a gulf there. I do. Yeah. And the vote, like the point totals show it, right? 718 to 501, and then Washington pretty closely clustered with Penn State 501 to 42. That feels right? Yeah, I think so. Tom, anything in this 11 through 20 section that stands out? A lot of faith in LSU, which is understandable, so I'm not really gonna rail against it. We think LSU's 11 is a lot of faith? Yeah. I mean, I was thinking I was kind of disrespectful, like not to have them top 10 with a $50 million roster. But outside of Notre Dame and Texas, who are title contenders this year, every single team in the top 10 was in the playoff last year. And I think that when it comes to the AP poll in the preseason, there is a lot of just who was good last year. They're gonna put them in the top 10 this year. So I think LSU being the top team that wasn't in the playoff last year outside of Irish and Texas is respect. I think, listen, I'm not huge on tend to see this year. So for them, to me at 20, I'm just kind of like, but again, this is also a thing where in the preseason, none of us really know who's going to be all that good, especially once you get outside the top team. So it's like, there's really nothing to be super angry about here. It's just like the only reason I was angry about Clemson was because that's a team that had been trending the wrong direction for like four years now and people are still clinging. The coaches were still propping them up for dabbo, but from based on what I'm seeing in this top 25, I don't think Missouri will finish the year in the top 25, but at least kind of understand why they're there. And the gap between like 20 and 35 is like somewhere between like a fuel going to touchdown, right? Like it's really close, man. And also for me, just feel softly like, but said, you're either just doing a power rating or you're predicting how things are going to finish. I'm more of a predict how it's going to finish guy. When it comes to my preseason pole, so I know that there's going to be a G six or team two in there. So for me, when I'm putting mine together, I would have a Boise State or UNLV in there before I would put in a Missouri. Yeah, I the chat saying BYU looks underranked. I don't agree with that passing game. I have them outside the top 20 from a power rating standpoint, but like in a very narrow range. Like I, you know, they do a lot of things well, just the passing game scared me. Well, yeah. I mean, I think BYU is, you know, great stadium partner. Are you on a neutral? Who are you taking? Who? Like Penn State BYU, Tennessee BYU. Like I'm not taking BYU in that game. I might take them over Penn State. I don't know if I would, I don't know. I think that's, I think they're very equal. Yeah. Like, I think BYU. No cyclone striker. I think BYU is a really good partner with USC and Michigan for that tier before you get to the next group. I would, I would take USC and Michigan. Yeah, you would bet your house if that game was a pick them. Yeah. What if Michigan BYU was? Yeah. Yeah. I bet I'm Michigan. No doubt. Okay. Okay. We'll see. I, I, listen, I told you weeks ago, if BYU plays every single game on their terms, they could go 12 and 0. And they can do that because there's only really one team that they might play this year, which is not even on their schedule. They have to make it to the conference. Well, no, no, no, they won't be able to take their terms probably in that one. But the rest of it can just be beach up at the line and subscribe. Run the football and get just enough out of Bearbock Mire to be able to get it done. And that Lee, absolutely. Yeah. We will, of course, every Monday be having our regular weekly poll assassin segment as part of a pun further review, which will be reacting to Sundays, new AP top 25 poll schedule for the rest of the week. Tuesday, we are going to be on CBS Sports Network noon Eastern time. Make sure to check that out. And remember, series record cover three. It'll be there in your guide. So you make sure you get every single time that we're on. And so you can check it out if you were not able to watch live. But noon Eastern time will make it on demand as well on YouTube and wherever you get your podcasts Wednesday. We are back with part two of the big 10 win totals that'll begin with Ohio State. And of course, carry us all the way through Washington back half of the alphabet. Then Thursday, Thursday, lock season officially arrives as we will have our win totals locks. You've been hearing us give our best bets from all across the power conferences. But what about the group of six? What about our very best bets from the power conferences? All of that is going to be in the win totals locks on Thursday, 11 a.m. Eastern time. So Tuesday, noon Eastern time, CBS Sports Network, Wednesday, 11 a.m. right here at youtube.com/cover3. Thursday, 11 a.m. for win totals locks. So come and hang out and you can follow him on Twitter, Tom Pranilly. You can follow him at platoe3. You can follow me at chip underscore Patterson. Gentlemen, thank you very much. Thank you. - And so much peril, laser knives, ordinary dwarves, bad brothers, sentience killings and sword scorpions, death armor fire, in this thing, that thing, whatever that is, so much peril and heroes. - This is just the beginning of the story of Hampton Square. - Golden Axe, new series streaming September 16th on Paramount Plus.