Free PDF Issue!
Your Ultimate Source of Timely, In-Depth information on College Football Since 1951

Author Archives: admin

Florida-Georgia Rivalry Among Today’s Matchups

georgia-florida-jax-crowd-ajc-file_Happy Halloween, college football fans! The Kickoff Games of the Week are Florida vs Georgia and Arizona at Washington.

At the start of the season, it would have seemed more likely that the Bulldogs would dominate the Gators, but midway through the year, Florida is 6-1 and our No. 12 ranked team, Georgia is 5-2 and ranked at No. 24. AP has Florida ranked No. 11 while Georgia isn’t even in their Top 25. The Gators’ only loss is to undefeated LSU. That shouldn’t stop this rivalry game from being a slugfest, though, if Georgia’s defense steps up against Florida’s passing game. Nicknamed the “World’s Largest Outdoor Cocktail Party”, this one is always fun to watch. The fact that it is Halloween should make for some great fan theatrics anyway. They meet up at 3:30 pm today at EverBank Field in Jacksonville. The game is on CBS.

Arizona and Washington kickoff at 11 pm Eastern in Husky Stadium in Seattle. The game is televised on FOXS1. A win tonight keeps both the Huskies (3-4) and the Wildcats (5-3) in position for a bowl game. A loss means crunch time down the stretch. Washington leads the series 19-11-1, but we’re picking Arizona to win it.

In The Kickoff Top 25, LSU was our new No. 1 team in the country this week. The Tigers do not play this week.

In this week’s issue, The Kickoff provided a conference breakdown through issue 9 and looked at the past decade of how our pre-season picks performed at the end of each season. We also made our Playoff Predictions with the Top 4 Seeds and First 4 out, analyzed the strength of schedule, included News and Notes, and, of course, offered up our weekly Power Ratings comparing the this week’s matchups.

We’ll have a brand new issue out Monday with a look at how the games went today.

Test your knowledge of college football by participating in our Thursday Throwdown trivia. This week we asked which conference ended the 1989 season with 3 teams ranked in the Top 10 of the AP Poll and listed as conference co-champions. AP-ranked #5 Tennessee, #6 Auburn and #9 Alabama were conference co-champions with conference records of 6-1-0 in 1989. The Vols finished that season 11-1, while the Alabama teams both finished 10-2 (Auburn beating the Tide 30-20 in Bama’s first-ever visit to the Plains). Also that season, Miami (also 11-1) won its third national championship of the decade.

Talk to us this weekend while we watch the games. Which upsets are you expecting? How is your team doing so far this year? Sound off! Use the hashtag #thekickoff on Facebook  and Twitter so we can follow your conversations.

Midseason Reflections on College Football Season

We are midway through the 2015 College Football Season and the stakes of each game are getting higher as we inch closer to the Playoffs!

Tommy Duff, Editor of The Kickoff, reflected on the season thus far and the challenges ahead for teams still in the hunt…

In the Oct. 19th edition of Kickoff Top 25, we had TCU and Ohio State replaced in the top spots by Utah and LSU. There were 14 undefeated teams in our Top 25, with single-loss Alabama ranked at No. 9. Our Strength of Schedule analysis in that issue showed that Ohio State played a schedule with the largest difference between their ranking and their average opponent ranking in 2015. This indicates that the Buckeyes may not have the “easiest” straight schedule, but in regards to their official rating, they have more of a schedule advantage than any other team in the country.

“Ohio State hasn’t looked good against lower rated teams and does not have any quality wins, plus they have two quarterbacks, which means they don’t have a quarterback,” Duff said. “TCU has been inconsistent. They only beat Iowa State (which had a 2-4 record) by 24 points last week. That’s the second time they’ve nearly been knocked off by a lower rated team.”

The Kickoff was high on Utah and LSU based on several factors, including wins against quality opponents in top-rated conferences, including the Tigers’ win over a Florida team that was undefeated until last week. “At this point, Utah has the most quality wins” over teams like Michigan, California, Arizona State and putting up 62 points against Oregon. Utah ended up losing Saturday to USC 42-24. LSU beat Western Kentucky 48-20.

In the Oct. 26 issue, LSU lept to the top of our Top 25 while Clemson jumped from No. 7 to No. 4. FSU, which lost a heartbreaker to Georgia Tech, fell from No. 8 to No. 15. Alabama moved up two spots after beating Tennessee in a close one. 

Duff said he expects the winner of the Alabama-LSU game to be in the Playoffs. “Leonard Fournette is one of the best players we’ve seen since Bo Jackson in terms of pure natural talent, speed and size. He just demolishes people, which is very rare. He hasn’t had less than 150 yards in a game all season. It is possible LSU is going to fall a bit in the ratings as their schedule eases up. When you look at strength of teams played, they benefitted from their opener against McNeese State being cancelled due to weather on Sept. 5th.”

In other words, we still have a lot of football left to play.

The weeks ahead will determine which coaches get pink slips or trophies. We’ve already seen Steve Spurrier and Steve Sarkisian leave their teams after 2-4 and 3-2 starts respectively. “I knew Spurrier wouldn’t last long with the way South Carolina was performing, but I was surprised he quit in the middle of the season,” Duff said.

Ohio State was atop our Preseason Top 25. Our No. 3 pick, Auburn, is perhaps the biggest shocker of the year, now at 4-3 and out of playoff contention after Saturday’s 4-Overtime game at Arkansas. The Tigers still have Ole Miss, Texas A&M, Georgia, Idaho, and Alabama  remaining on their schedule.

“The media, including The Kickoff, bought into a lot of hype about Jeremy Johnson based on the limited amount of work he did last season as a starter, which looked fabulous and suggested he had better skills than Nick Marshall, but the kid lost his confidence after throwing interceptions, plus Auburn lost Carl Lawson, who was supposed to be their leader on defense and an All-American. Gus Malzahn forgot how important a mobile quarterback was in his system,” Duff said.

Comparing the preseason and last week’s Kickoff Top 25s, Oregon, Georgia, Georgia Tech, Arizona State, Boise State, and Tennessee, all have failed to meet their potential in 2015. Teams that haven’t disappointed so far include TCU, Ohio State, Baylor, Michigan State, Clemson, FSU, Oklahoma State, and Arizona.

Our games of the week last week were Clemson at Miami, FL and Tennessee at Alabama.

We went with undefeated Clemson, which enjoyed a 13.6 difference in Power Ratings with the 4-2 Hurricanes. “Clemson could be in the playoffs, as they have done their thing under the radar this season. They’ll need better quarterback play to get past Florida State on Nov. 7th,” Duff said. The Tigers shut them out 58-0, leading to Al Golden being fired this week.

We assigned the Crimson Tide (6-1) a 9 point difference in Power Ratings over the Volunteers. Duff expected the game to be a close one. “Butch Jones has taken the leash off Josh Dobbs and let him play his own game. Statistically, Tennessee ran the ball all over Georgia. Alabama’s defense is set up to stop a classic pro offense and has problems whenever they face a spread offense with a mobile quarterback,” he said. Bama ended up winning 19-14.

It’s not too late to get our Halftime Subscription so you can arm yourself with knowledge when you face off at your family’s Thanksgiving Dinner against your know-it-all uncle who went to that rival school! We have nine issues left to publish this season. Pay just $10.62 to get a Mid-Season Email/PDF Subscription ($19.58 for printed issues sent 1st Class mail to your home or office).  As the season progresses, we’ll lower the price weekly so you only pay for what’s left of the season. Hey, better late than never to get in the game! Email [email protected] to sign up today.

Also, test your knowledge of college football by participating in our Thursday Throwdown trivia on Facebook. We stumped quite a few people this week with our question about the 1985 Fresno State team that was the only unbeaten Division 1-A team in the country, ranked 16th in the Coaches Poll that year.

Talk to us this weekend while we watch the games. Which upsets are you expecting? How is your team doing so far this year? Sound off! Use the hashtag #thekickoff on Facebook and Twitter so we can follow your conversations.

Enjoy this weekend’s games. We’ll be watching alongside you.

Coaching Shakeups Define the Week in College Football

college football news

It’s been an eventful week in college football (and schools with USC as their initials) as one of the great coaches retired from the college ranks and another was fired for personal issues.

On Monday of this week, after The Kickoff had published Vol. 65, Issue 7, South Carolina’s Steve Spurrier announced he was resigning in order to help the Gamecocks with recruiting. The team (2-4 overall, 0-4 SEC) take on Vanderbilt in Williams-Brice Stadium on Saturday at 4 pm with Shawn Elliott serving as the Interim coach. At age 70, questions about how long Spurrier would remain arose among recruits. He said he isn’t retiring from coaching but may focus his energy at the high school level. Possible candidates mentioned to replace him include Kirby Smart, Lane Kiffin, and Will Muschamp.

At the other USC, the University of Southern California, Coach Steve Sarkisian was fired on Monday after reports that he had been drunk during a game and at a team meeting. He publicly apologized in August for showing up drunk at a pep rally but claimed he did not have a drinking problem. The Trojans are 3-2 this season with Clay Helton stepping into the interim head coach role as they play Notre Dame.

Last week offered some amazing highlights as Texas played a flawless game to knock off Oklahoma and Georgia not only lost to Tennessee 38-31 but also lost RB Nick Chubb, presumably for the rest of the year. The Bulldogs join Georgia Tech and Oregon as cold on the Kickoff Thermometer this week, while the heat is on for Michigan, Texas and Utah.

Washington upset USC, Va Tech beat NC State, Wake Forest shut out Boston College, South Florida beat Syracuse, and Washington State shut down Oregon.

The Kickoff’s Games of the Week are a couple of SEC matchups as No. 10 Alabama hits the road to play No. 12 Texas A&M and No. 9 Florida travels to No. 5 LSU.

We expect Bama, which won 59-0 last year, to win, although Texas A&M is the one that’s undefeated and the Power Ratings for these teams are closer than we would have expected headed going into the season. Which should make for a pretty good ballgame to watch. Watch the game Saturday at 3:30 ET on CBS.

The Gators lead the series against LSU by 1 game when playing in Death Valley. Both teams go into this undefeated, but we think Les Miles will be the one with the smile after time expires. Watch the game Saturday at 7 pm ET on ESPN.

Speaking of the SEC, the conference is back on top of the Pac-12 in our Conference Breakdown through week 7. Also in this week’s issue, we looked at overall trends through last week with the home favorites winning 83.3% of games so far and road favorites winning 81.4% so far.

Nine of the top 10 teams on the Kickoff Top 25 this week are undefeated: TCU, Ohio State, Michigan State, Utah, LSU, Clemson, Baylor, FSU, and Florida.

When you subscribe to The Kickoff, you get those stats, plus our Kickoff Power Ratings, schedules and results for FBS and select FCS teams, and much more. The Kickoff is your resourceful guide for putting the season’s college football action into context, all delivered in a concise format that lets you find just what you’re looking for when choosing your picks.

To subscribe, visit https://thekickoffstore.com/subscriptions/individual/ . You’ll get all of our issues so far in the season and a new newsletter each Monday (email/PDF subscribers only, during the week for first-class mail subscribers to our printed edition). For a limited time, when you subscribe to our email/PDF version for just $20, you can sign up a friend to receive The Kickoff in his or her email inbox for FREE. What a great buddy that would make you!

If you are a business owner looking for a great way to keep yourself in front of your customers, check out our business subscriptions at https://thekickoffstore.com/subscriptions/business/

Also, test your knowledge of college football by participating in our Thursday Throwdown questions. We’ll see whether you know your stuff!

Talk to us this weekend while we watch the games. Which upsets are you expecting? How is your team doing so far this year? Sound off! Use the hashtag #thekickoff on Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/TheKickoffZone?ref=hl ) and Twitter ( https://twitter.com/TheKickoffZone ) so we can follow your conversations.

Enjoy this weekend’s games. We’ll be watching alongside you.

The Kickoff Games of the Week: Bama at Georgia, Notre Dame at Clemson

Bama vs Georgia
Bama vs Georgia

Weather could be a factor as the edge of Category 4 Hurricane Joaquin threatens to dump a LOT of rain on Georgia.

Alabama and Georgia last met in 2012 (when Bama was on its way to a second consecutive BCS National Championship), but the Tide and Bulldogs are set to play in one of The Kickoff’s Games of the Week, along with Notre Dame playing at Clemson.

Weather could be a factor in both of these games with the edge of Category 4 Hurricane Joaquin threatening to dump a LOT of rain on the East Coast, which is already waterlogged. Ten to 15 inches of rain and wind gusts of 160 mph are expected in the storm’s path. A lot of surprising things can happen when you’re fighting the elements the same time you’re battling a skilled opponent.

On the field, Alabama leads the series with Georgia 37-24-3. They last met at the SEC Championship Game that Bama won 32-28. Mark Richt’s team finished 12-2 that year. Heading into Saturday’s game, Georgia sits at No. 7 and Alabama is No. 12 on our Kickoff Top 25 (AP has the Tide at No. 13, Georgia at No. 8). We’re picking the Bulldogs to win this one by a slim margin, even though Bama leads the series 12-7 while playing in Athens. The outcome of this one will have a big impact, no doubt about it. Tune in to CBS at 3:30 pm.

If you haven’t yet read this week’s issue of The Kickoff newsletter — delivered every Monday to subscriber’s email inbox or sent first class mail – our Kickoff Thermostat has Florida, Mississippi State and Northwestern rising with the heat of success while Tennessee, Oregon and Arizona State are feeling the chill. After last week, the Gators are 4-0 and the Volunteers are still in disbelief that they have had two 4th quarter leads over 10 points vanish.

Last week’s upsets included Memphis 53-48 over Cincinnati, Michigan shutting out BYU 31-0, Duke beating Georgia Tech 34-20, ECU defeating Virginia Tech 35-28, Army slamming Eastern Michigan 58-30, James Madison beating SMU 48-45, Kentucky beating Missouri 21-13, and Utah dominating Oregon 52-20. Georgia Tech, Oregon, Missouri, and BYU fell off our Top 25 completely after being ranked Nos. 19, 14, 22, and 17 last week. Utah jumped five spots.

Our News and Notes also covers last week’s performances by Brett Rypien at Boise State, Christian McCaffrey at Stanford, De’Veon Smith at Michigan, Leonard Fournette at LSU, and Trevone Boykin and Josh Doctson at TCU.

When you subscribe to The Kickoff, you get those stats, plus our Kickoff Power Ratings, charts of winningest programs by percentage and win totals, a conference breakdown through issue 5, the 2015 Out-of-Conference records so far, overall trends through last week, strength of schedule ranking, our Playoff Seeds, a look back to our ranking in September 1998, and schedules and results for FBS and select FCS teams.

The Kickoff is your resourceful guide for putting the season’s college football action into context, all delivered in a concise format that lets you find just what you’re looking for when choosing your picks.

To subscribe, visit https://thekickoffstore.com/subscriptions/individual/ . You’ll get all of our issues so far in the season and a new newsletter each Monday (email/PDF subscribers only, during the week for first-class mail subscribers to our printed edition). For a limited time, when you subscribe to our email/PDF version for just $20, you can sign up a friend to receive The Kickoff in his or her email inbox for FREE. What a great buddy that would make you!

If you are a business owner looking for a great way to keep yourself in front of your customers, check out our business subscriptions at https://thekickoffstore.com/subscriptions/business/

Also, test your knowledge of college football by participating in our Thursday Throwdown questions on Facebook. Talk to us this weekend while we watch the games. Sound off! Use the hashtag #thekickoff on Facebook and Twitter so we can follow your conversations.

Enjoy this weekend’s games. We’ll be watching alongside you.

Week 4 Top 25 Reflects Teams on the Move

2016 college football

olemissAs we enter week 4 of the college football season, we’re seeing major disruption in The Kickoff Top 25.

After being upset last week by Ole Miss, who we had ranked at No. 15, Alabama slipped from No. 3 on the Kickoff Top 25 all the way to No. 12 (The AP poll now has Ole Miss ranked third behind Ohio State and Michigan State, while the Crimson Tide is also ranked No. 12 there).

Last week’s No. 13 team, Auburn, dropped out of our Top 25 altogether after losing so badly to LSU, 46-21, that Coach Gus Malzahn benched his quarterback (a pre-season Heisman candidate) this week in favor of a freshman who has never played a game at the college level but will have to rise to the challenge as the team that LSU beat by 2 points in week 2, Mississippi State, comes calling. Auburn dropped out of the AP Top 25 completely but hung on to No. 25 in the Coaches’ Poll. A mighty fall for a team that many predicted in the pre-season would earn a spot in the playoffs.

The win in Baton Rouge shot LSU from No. 11 to No. 4. AP has the Tigers ranked at No. 8. They play Syracuse on Saturday. RB Leonard Fournette was one of our superlatives this week, as he had 19 carries for 228 yards and 3 touchdowns versus Auburn, fueling LSU as the hottest team in the SEC.

While Auburn and Alabama fans are in shock, at least they did not fall as hard as USC, which has vanished from the Top 25 after losing 41-31 to then-unranked Stanford (USC was our No. 6 last week; Stanford is No. 21 on AP’s poll, No. 25 on ours). Other shocking upsets last week: UCF lost to Furman, Arkansas fell to Texas Tech, Iowa State lost to Toledo, and Colorado bested Colorado State.

Power ratings aside, Georgia has replaced Alabama and Auburn as the SEC teams most likely to be Top 4 Seeds from the Playoff committee, along with Ohio State, TCU and Notre Dame. Our pick of the first 4 out? Probably UCLA, Michigan State, FSU and LSU.

In terms of conferences, the Big 12 leads with the highest percentage of wins, followed by the Pac-12. The SEC comes in third, then the ACC, Big 10, American, Independent, MAC, C-USA, Sun Belt, and MWC.

TCU and Ohio State swapped places on our Top 25 this week as the Horned Frogs edge the Buckeyes on our Power Ratings. Georgia Tech fell from No. 9 to No. 19 in our Top 25, while Oregon, Oklahoma, FSU, Arizona, Utah, and Wisconsin are all on the upswing.

Our No. 14 team, Oregon, plays our No. 18 team, Utah, is one of our Kickoff Games of the Week. Oregon leads the series 20-8, including last year’s 51-27 rout. We’re picking them to repeat again on Saturday. Our other game of the week features two teams that have struggled in recent years but are rebuilding, Tennessee at Florida. We’re picking the 3-0 Gators to win in what might be a close one. They lead the series 25-19 over the Vols and narrowly edge them in our Power Ratings, so it should be a pretty good game with both teams about even.

In our most recent edition of The Kickoff, published Sept. 21st, we have news and notes, a listing of the 78 most highly paid coaches in college football, complete FBS and select FCS schedules and results thus far in the season, our Kickoff Top 25, information on those games of the week, our Kickoff Playoff Seeds, information about the “targeting” rule (which we’ve seen applied in some games this year), and, of course, our Kickoff Power Ratings with the teams playing this week, along with our picks to win, comparative ratings, and last year’s score so you have the data you need at a glance to make your selections in your office pool.

To subscribe, visit https://thekickoffstore.com/subscriptions/individual/ . You’ll get all of our issues so far in the season and a new newsletter each Monday (email/PDF subscribers only, during the week for first-class mail subscribers to our printed edition). For a limited time, when you subscribe to our email/PDF version for just $20, you can sign up a friend to receive The Kickoff in his or her email inbox for FREE. What a great buddy that would make you!

If you are a business owner looking for a great way to keep yourself in front of your customers, check out our business subscriptions at https://thekickoffstore.com/subscriptions/business/
Also, test your knowledge of college football by participating in our Thursday Throwdown questions. We’ll see whether we can stump you (no cheating).

Talk to us this weekend while we watch the games. Which upsets are you expecting? How is your team doing so far this year? Sound off! Use the hashtag #thekickoff on Facebook and Twitter so we can follow your conversations.

Enjoy this weekend’s games. We’ll be watching alongside you.

Written by Steven Stiefel

Available Subscriptions

The Kickoff provides two types of subscriptions — a weekly subscription for individuals and a sponsorship program/subscription for businesses.

Learn more about these options by clicking a selection to the right:

Individual Subscription
Learn More   
I'd like to be in-the-know on the latest, most in-depth college football info.
Business Subscription
Learn More   
I want my top customers to receive 17 issues of The Kickoff, prominently featuring my company's logo.