Category
🥇
SportsTranscript
00:00Newswire here on SportsGrid. Bill Bender has been covering college football for decades.
00:07I've been watching, and by the way, covering college football for decades too, let's be
00:10honest, University of Miami, Florida Gators. And I wonder if Bill and I had to write a
00:16diary to our old self, and we would have told each other, hey Bill, the National Football
00:22League in week one is going to open up in Brazil, and the college football season is
00:26going to open up in Dublin, Ireland. Bill, I wonder what you would have told me 20 years
00:30ago if I would have told you that was going to happen.
00:32Yeah, my college self wouldn't have believed it. I think this year in particular, it's
00:37everything's new. Have something next to your remotes where it tells you what teams and
00:42what conference, and that there's a two minute warning now, and that this game has playoff
00:46implications. There are so many changes to the game, but it's almost here, and it's a
00:51very exciting time.
00:53Yeah, definitely so. I can't wait. Honestly, once Monday comes up next week, we're here.
00:58So let's get started off. Florida State playing with the chip on their shoulder all season.
01:03There's no question that this is going to be a very pivotal season as far as attitude
01:08for them. They're going to want to show the college football world that not only should
01:11they have been in the college football playoff, maybe that they would have won it. They're
01:14ranked 10th coming into the season. They take on a Georgia Tech team that once again, Bill,
01:19it feels like the Yellow Jackets once every four years are good, and then the other three,
01:24they're not very good. Knowles, 11.5 point favorites, neutral site, total of 56.5. So
01:31I guess we're not going to have a shortage of offense in this game, are we?
01:34No, and there's a fascination obviously with Florida State and DJ Uyengilele. Got it right.
01:42It takes many years of practice with that. Coming over from Oregon State, coming over
01:46from Clemson, how does he look in this offense? That's one piece of the puzzle. Patrick Payton,
01:52the edge rusher on the other side for the Seminoles, really good player as well. And
01:56you mentioned that chip on the shoulder after last year. Playing a really good Georgia Tech
02:00team though. Hayes King led the ACC in touchdown passes last year. They have a strong running
02:05game. Their defense was terrible against the run though, 128. So I think Florida State's
02:10going to test the running game early, let DJ Uyengilelele settle in and go from there.
02:15That spread though, looks a little high to me knowing that Georgia Tech was 7-2 against
02:21the spread under Brent Key last year. I don't know if they're an ACC championship contender,
02:26but I think they can hang around while both these teams get their footing in a, let's
02:30just say unfamiliar setting.
02:32Yeah, that's definitely a fair assessment. And you know, the other part of this too,
02:37that may tell a bigger story about who Florida State is. They're ranked 10th going into the
02:41season, Bill, but let the controversy already begin because their no to make the college
02:47football playoff is minus 200. So try to make sense of that one, Bill. They're ranked 10th
02:51in the country, which puts them at least at the start of the season, what would be in
02:55the playoff with 12 teams. But the odds makers are basically saying that they're not going
03:00to make it here. So what am I missing?
03:04I think there's some faith in Clemson and their roster and their defense. I think there's
03:10a lot of faith in Miami. I know you're closer to that. There is a lot of hype around the
03:13Hurricanes right now and Cam Ward and Damian Martinez, the Oregon State transfer running
03:18back as talented as team as Miami has had in a while and able to compete. They do play
03:24Florida State this year. I still think Florida State's the favorite in the ACC though. The
03:28depth that they have on the defensive side of the ball, the availability that Mike Norvell
03:33has been able to capitalize on in the transfer portal and add guys on that defense. And DJ,
03:39you will be the key to that. I think a guy in this Georgia Tech game to keep an eye on
03:43is Hykeem Williams, sophomore receiver, bit of a role player last year, but Florida State
03:48always has those guys. And Craig, you've been around it down there long enough to know.
03:52I think Mike Norvell has Florida State in a spot, maybe a little bit like Bobby Bowden
03:57and Jimbo where they're good for 10 wins a year. As long as they're playing in the ACC
04:03against those teams and they're playing at this level, they should be good for double
04:07digit wins every season. Maybe not a national title, maybe not the playoff every year,
04:11but they're going to be in the hunt. Yeah. And Norvell, I thought was criticized extremely
04:15unfairly after his second year at Florida State. It was like, I mean, he basically said
04:19that you got to give me, you know, a couple of years to get my kids in. He did. And look
04:23at what the results have been since then. So I agree. Meanwhile, let's talk about Georgia
04:27Tech here. You think they're a little bit better maybe than they show here. Their win
04:30total is four and a half though. I mean, this is like the bottom of the conference. 142
04:36is the money line on the over there. Is that the way you would lean? I'm a little surprised
04:41at that number given how they closed last season. Brent Key, I trust guys that are alum
04:47of the place they coach and you can tell they care. And Georgia Tech and Brent Key was able
04:52to do that last year. They played well in their bowl game. They have Jamal Haynes back.
04:56Jamal Haynes averaged 6.1 yards per carry last year for the Yellow Jackets. Excellent
05:00in the backfield. They did need to fix that run defense, which gets you in trouble. If
05:04you can't stop the run, you can't win more than four or five games anyway. So Kyle Efford's
05:09back there, linebacker. They got a couple guys in the transfer portal. I think they're
05:13going to compete. Haynes King, the thing with him, enjoyable to watch, but he turns the
05:18ball over a little bit. So they're going to have to play clean, more clean this year if
05:22they want to get to a bowl game. All right. 8 o'clock p.m. Eastern. My buddy, Rich Waltz,
05:26who we're going to have on the show next week, he's calling the game for CBS Sports Network.
05:30I mean, Bill, if this was, you know, if there were 10 games on a Saturday night, we wouldn't
05:35pay any attention to it. But this is like the premium game here. SMU taking on Nevada.
05:39I'm shocked here. Twenty-seven and a half point favorites to open up the season. Fifty-six
05:43and a half is the total. So this tells me that Nevada must be awful. I mean, I can't
05:47see this any other way. First year for SMU in the ACC, but I don't remember SMU being
05:53this big a favorite against any Division I team in a long time. Well, Nevada, new coach
05:57to Jeff Choate. They were two and ten last year. They are at home. So I look for them
06:02to be loose, maybe throw an onside kick in there, try to do some things to get the crowd
06:05fired up in Jeff Choate's first game. But SMU is pretty strong. Preston Stone's back.
06:11He can throw it around. Elijah Roberts had 10 sacks for them last season. Pretty good.
06:16They weren't great against the spread. Two and two against the spread as a road favorite
06:20last year. But I like the Mustangs. They could be an ACC sleeper. The spread and the over
06:26are right about where I think this game is going to be. I think it'll be about 42-14
06:29SMU. You're right on the line. It's risky. I like SMU to cover and maybe a slight under
06:36depending on if Nevada can punch it in a few times. Yeah, they're going to have to do that
06:41several times for this to go over, at least from what I'm looking at here in the total
06:44here. Okay. Well, Bill, get your rest this weekend. It all begins next week. And I look
06:48forward to making the final predictions for the season when we see you next week. Thanks
06:52for coming on. Hey, no problem. Thanks for having me.
06:56Thanks for having me.