Latest news with #UntilSaturdayNewsletter
New York Times
29-07-2025
- Sport
- New York Times
College football's sneakiest favorite, plus a quick history of CFB in Germany
Until Saturday Newsletter 🏈 | This is The Athletic's college football newsletter. Sign up here to receive Until Saturday directly in your inbox. Today in college football news, 'Expedition 33' is my favorite 'Final Fantasy' game ever. To be clear, it is not a 'Final Fantasy' game. If you polled 100 college football fans on which FBS teams are expected to win each conference this year, I'm sure most could name the betting favorites in the ACC (Clemson), Big Ten (Ohio State), Mountain West (Boise State) and SEC (Texas), plus probably CUSA (Liberty) and the Sun Belt (JMU). Maybe the MAC too, where I assume Toledo will again be the favorite in 2099. Advertisement But what about the Big 12? After Arizona State's playoff run, arguably Iowa State's best season ever and a half-year of Texas Tech transfer talk? Plus the usual Colorado rubbernecking? And maybe some assumptions that Oklahoma State or Utah will bounce back, just like TCU did last year? The Big 12's favorite — according to BetMGM, FPI, SP+ and whatever else — is Kansas State, followed by a giant bottleneck. Oh right, Kansas State! Wait, the team that went 5-4 in conference last year, finishing eighth in a 16-team league? At first glance, picking K-State kinda feels like a shrug. (A shrug by the computers? Yes, computers can decline to answer. Haven't you seen '2001'?) But for more, I asked Kellis Robinett, beat writer for the Wichita Eagle/Kansas City Star: Why do you think this under-the-radar team is so widely favored? 'Kansas State is always a safe bet in the Big 12, because the Wildcats have such a high floor. Chris Klieman has averaged nine wins over the past four seasons, and he won a conference title in 2022. Even though K-State lost some high-end talent during the offseason, it brings back big stars at quarterback (Avery Johnson), running back (Dylan Edwards), and wide receiver (Jayce Brown). Austin Romaine also seems poised for a breakout season on defense. Arizona State is the defending champ, and Texas Tech is the biggest spender in the league, but K-State has proven to be consistently better than both.' Honestly, I'm nearly sold on K-State just by Klieman's consistency. Why not pick the team that has been most immune to the Big 12's feared Random Results Generator? (On top of that, picking a team that just finished in the middle is probably a safe bet. As has been frequently noted, last year's Big 12 preseason picks were nearly the opposite of the final standings. Avoid the bookends.) Before we leave the Big 12, yes, I asked David Ubben the obligatory Colorado question (more on Deion Sanders in a sec): Wtf will this team be now that Heisman winner Travis Hunter and school-record-smashing QB Shedeur Sanders are gone? 'The short version is: better than people who aren't paying attention think. Colorado had two of the five most famous players in the country last year, who were also stellar talents. This year, they start with little to no star power, but Sanders and his staff have quietly improved the roster on both sides of the ball, which raises the floor for this team quite a bit. They won't be as explosive in the passing game without Sanders, Hunter and Jimmy Horn Jr., but they'll be good enough, and the running game should improve. I'm not sure I see a contender for the Big 12 title in this roster, but I do see a bowl team.' More Big 12: 🙏 'Deion Sanders had his bladder removed in May after doctors discovered an aggressive cancerous tumor, the Colorado football coach announced at a Monday news conference.' He's back at work now. Many more details here. 🏈 Stewart Mandel on the Week 1 games that will actually impact the CFP. (As in, Texas-Ohio State might not end up meaning much if they both make it anyway.) 👀 That 15-year storyline about the Big Ten and SEC potentially dueling over North Carolina in realignment? Heating back up. 📰 News: 🌀 A tale of two QBs: 📺 Media days, where the big leagues wrapped up last week: 🎤 Take The Athletic's survey on everything you love and hate about CFB right now. (Like me, you should vote to replace the entire CFP with the one true format: a plus-one title game at the Rose Bowl, with its participants to be selected after bowl season.) International college football has been a thing since almost literally the very beginning. (For one thing, the sport was so directly modeled on a version of English rugby, it's actually kinda hard to pinpoint when it actually became American football. For another, Montreal's McGill University was among the Canadian pioneers of the sport in the 1870s.) Since then, American colleges have sent football teams to bowls in the Bahamas, Canada, Cuba and Japan; FBS neutral-siters in Australia and Ireland; and lower-level games in Bermuda, China, Italy, Mexico, Tanzania and the UK, plus (per NCAA records) collegiate-adjacent games among American military installations in Algeria, Iran, New Guinea, the Philippines, Suriname and some Pacific islands. So when you hear Michigan and Western Michigan are planning to open 2026 in Frankfurt as the first FBS teams to play in Germany, know it's not just Modern College Football Chasing Trends And Trying To Be The NFL. It's also College Football Just Being Itself. OK, that's all for today. Email me at untilsaturday@ to tell me which country should host a CFB game next. Last week's most-clicked: Obviously, it was 'Ranking every Power 4 team by how much they'd sell for.' 💰 📫 Love Until Saturday? Check out The Athletic's other newsletters, too.
New York Times
08-07-2025
- Entertainment
- New York Times
Initial reacts to College Football 26, plus CFB's hardest rivalry to rank
Until Saturday Newsletter 🏈 | This is The Athletic's college football newsletter. Sign up here to receive Until Saturday directly in your inbox. Today in college football news, this week's audio fixation is 'To Someone Else' by Kacy Hill. Last night at 1 a.m., my daughter was semi-sarcastically cheering her heart out for a two-star center from Hawaii to finally agree to take his talents to the University of Delaware for the next 10 months or so. Why was she so invested? Because his name is 'Junior Mama.' We simply couldn't miss on a guy with that name. Advertisement And why just 10 months or so? Because on default settings, College Football 26's transfer portal is absolutely merciless toward small schools — making Dynasty mode feel like a Dark Souls-ass challenge for the first time in series history, pleasing those of us who want roster management to deliver fighting-for-my-life panic sweats. (You can tone down the max number of players who can leave each school per season.) My other favorite stuff so far in the game that releases on Thursday: And the stuff I hope can be fixed, in this life or the next: Overall, this game made a thousand little improvements, and for now, I'd end this mini-review by giving it a A-. Oh right, that includes the gameplay itself. The actual football parts are noticeably better in just about every way, from having much fuller control over substitutions to RECEIVERS ACTUALLY COMING BACK TO THE BALL 🍾🙌📈. Almost forgot about those parts. This week, Scott Dochterman took on the difficult challenge — both in terms of the studying required beforehand and the inevitable internet hollering afterward — of ranking college football's 100 best rivalries. I think Scott's top five is as close to indisputable as can be, with the only potential disputes in this opening cluster being the order of its middle three: It might seem odd to include that No. 5 game among the other no-doubters, considering it's been mostly skippable for a while now. But the OG interregional rivalry has altered so much CFB lore. On that note: One of the coolest things about Scott's list is how it mixes history (former Game of the Year machine Nebraska-Oklahoma at No. 6 even though they've barely met since 2010) with recency (Alabama-LSU at No. 13 despite that series being nothing special until Nick Saban coached each side). It's after that obvious top five when the fun really begins. That's when all the quibbles happen! Everybody's gonna have a few! In a followup explainer, Scott addressed both his detailed research process — and the hardest snubs, led by the frequently lopsided Michigan State-Ohio State. As for the feuds that made the cut, I had one question for him: What was the hardest rivalry to rank? 'No. 25 Bedlam, by far. Oklahoma and Oklahoma State were ranked in 19 of their matchups and three times battled in the top 10. They played for 114 consecutive years. Those numbers are almost identical to Michigan-Michigan State. But Bedlam's win-loss disparity was shocking. Oklahoma owns a 71-win advantage (91-20-7) and has gone 55-10 when at least one side has been ranked.' It's true. For a long time, all Bedlam had to offer as a supposed top-shelf rivalry was a cool name (more on that name below). But then in 2023, the Cowboys won what might be the final edition, so now it's retroactively a great rivalry. Regardless, here's Scott's full list again. Now it's your turn. Proclaim your No. 1 rivalry, and list your top 10. Here's my top 10 as of today — and I think I'm mostly good with this order, too: 😡 More rivalry! Chris Vannini explains his 25 picks for the best rivalry names in all of college football. 💰 Texas Tech's lengthy NIL splurge has gone from fodder for 'yeehaw oil money' jokes to 'OK, hang on, everybody pay attention to this.' 🐏 'Travis Burgess, the 17-year-old son of a retired U.S. Army captain.' As soon as I saw those words in Bruce Feldman's profile of Bill Belichick's QB prospect, I felt pretty good about the young man's chances. 🍀 Speaking of sons, prepare to feel old: Notre Dame's list of a million sons of former players now includes a commitment from three-star WR Devin Fitzgerald, son of Larry. Oh, and there's more: 🅾️ 'Oklahoma athletic director Joe Castiglione will retire this upcoming school year, he announced Monday, ending the longest active tenure for an AD in major college sports. It will also end the run for one of the most successful and respected administrative voices in college sports.' That's it. Email me at untilsaturday@ to tell me which new rivalry has the most potential to become great in this (currently) post-realignment era. Last week, your emails informed me Billy Napier will be this season's first head coach to be fired, and reader Lance argued the Big Ten is actually a somewhat accurate conference name, since it is indeed 'Big.' Last week's most-clicked: Seth Emerson on why Georgia Tech is good again. 📫 Love Until Saturday? Check out The Athletic's other newsletters, too.
New York Times
01-05-2025
- Entertainment
- New York Times
Bill Belichick's secretive past at odds with messy present, plus Florida QB recruits
Until Saturday Newsletter 🏈 | This is The Athletic's college football newsletter. Sign up here to receive Until Saturday directly in your inbox. Today in college football news, Chvrches is on pace for generational numbers in my Spotify Wrapped this year. To be clear, I still don't exactly care about the details of Bill Belichick's personal life. But I am fascinated that the personal details being broadcasted all over the place for months are his, of all people's. There are at least three Belichicks. You tell me whether these are all the same person: I guess I can imagine a way to tie those things together. When he has control, he wields it thoroughly by punishing and rewarding inquiries based on how they suit his goals. But once his control gets wobbly, gosh, does it wobble. Most recently on One Tree Chapel Hill: Also, I keep thinking about this: Belichick and Nick Saban have often been compared to each other, and for a lot of obvious reasons. They're decades-long friends who were on the same Cleveland Browns staff, they've won a combined 4 million championships and they're both brilliant at explaining football, despite being gruffly dismissive at least half the time. The past few months have presented a blatant distinction, though. The idea of Saban's off-field dealings somehow becoming the heart of rampant internet gossip among even people who don't care about sports at all? Totally unfathomable. 💰 Remember all the headlines last year about eventual national champ Ohio State's $20 million roster? Is Texas really doubling that this year? Let's come back to Sam Khan Jr.'s exploration another day, after you read it today. 🌲 Kinda got used to that Stanford-being-good-at-literally-everything stuff, right? That makes it easy to forget the Cardinal were bad at football for a long time. 'The level of arrogance at Stanford is unique,' one admin said in this story by Stewart Mandel and Lindsay Schnell on whether these nerds can hang in this era. 💰 Missed this late last week: 'The NCAA announced the renewal of an agreement with Genius Sports that will require bookmakers to drop wagering on individual performances if they want access to real-time statistics from March Madness.' 🫡 Jordan Travis, the former Florida State quarterback whose injury somehow resulted in the undefeated Noles missing the 2023 Playoff (still working my mind around that one), has retired from the NFL due to the effects of that same injury. ⛽️ The latest big-name 'general manager' in college sports: Dr. Shaquille O'Neal, volunteering to help Mike Bibby's hoops staff at Sacramento State. (Shaq's son Shaqir is on the roster.) Since the state of Florida is always so clearly loaded with high school football talent, how come it rarely generates top-end quarterback recruits? As a longtime member of the recruiting map's Big 3 states (or Big 4, depending on whether you place Georgia alongside California, Florida and Texas, as you should), the nation's dangly appendage should have a steady share of top QBs. However, as Manny Navarro wrote yesterday: 'From 2010 through 2025, Florida produced only three quarterbacks who ranked among the top 100 prospects nationally — Jeff Driskel (No. 17 in 2011), Feleipe Franks (No. 54 in 2016) and Deondre Francois (No. 66 in 2015). Eight states have produced more top-100 quarterbacks during this stretch.' Advertisement Elsewhere in Manny's story, former Miami high school QB Teddy Bridgewater 'said his mother couldn't afford private coaching,' a common experience in a state where one QB coach 'blames the developmental issues on the lack of financial support in Florida's public school system.' To some extent, that's also a self-perpetuating stigma. Remember the years of debate about the Miami area's Lamar Jackson, a Heisman winner and two-time NFL MVP, allegedly being better suited to play wide receiver? 'I never took quarterback seriously,' says Bridgewater, an 11-year NFL veteran and championship coach at his old high school, 'because you knew your chance of making the league at quarterback was scarce.' More here in Manny's story. Next, it's mailbag time, and then I'll see you next week! Of the CFP hopefuls, does any team have a more glaring hole at a position than wide receiver for the Nittany Lions? Do you think this will hurt Drew Allar's draft stock? — Zachary S. The news got lost over draft weekend, but Penn State did finally land a proven receiver: Syracuse's Trebor Pena, aka the guy coach Fran Brown suggested may have asked for $2 million to stay there. Pena is a sixth-year senior who broke out last season in Brown's pass-heavy offense to the tune of 84 catches for 941 yards. He's not exactly a home-run threat, but he finds ways to get open, and Syracuse used him in a variety of ways. Pena completes a near-total makeover of a position group that infamously caught zero passes in the CFP semifinal against Notre Dame. Pena joins 1,000-yard receiver Devonte Ross out of Troy and USC veteran Kyron Hudson as transfers, plus three incoming freshmen. I wouldn't say 'problem solved' yet, but it's certainly a more promising group than last year's. Among other CFP contenders, a lot of teams addressed the biggest concerns I had for them in January. Georgia added Illinois running back Josh McCray, coming off a 114-yard performance in the Citrus Bowl against South Carolina, for some much-needed depth behind Nate Frazier. Texas added two pass-catchers in Stanford's Emmett Mosley V and Cal tight end Jack Endries. Everyone has question marks, but none I'd consider glaring. More here from Stewart's mailbag. 📫 Love Until Saturday? Check out The Athletic's other newsletters.
New York Times
29-04-2025
- Sport
- New York Times
Arch Manning and Quinn Ewers have very different NFL paths, plus Bill Belichick drama
Until Saturday Newsletter 🏈 | This is The Athletic's college football newsletter. Sign up here to receive Until Saturday directly in your inbox. Today in college football news, I finished a large order of Five Guys fries. I feel so fortified for the coming winter. Summer's next, you say? Yeah, that's how fortifying it was. In 2021, Texas high schooler Quinn Ewers was one of the highest-rated quarterback recruits ever. Right now, 247Sports still lists his teenage self as tied with Vince Young and others at No. 13 on the all-time prospects list, right ahead of names like Travis Hunter, Adrian Peterson and … Arch Manning. Advertisement Ewers transferred to Texas (after first becoming a bit of an NIL pioneer at Ohio State), where the younger Manning mostly sat on the bench. Their storylines were publicly intertwined during their two years in the Longhorns' QB room, where Ewers even played along with jokes in commercials about having a Manning nephew as a backup, one of the most tantalizing backups ever. Imagine being possibly the most-hyped QB recruit ever (at the time), but then being immediately overshadowed by the guy right behind you. I bet that sucks! After last weekend's NFL Draft, their trajectories are about as different as could be. In some ways, this feels like a fresh reset, even if Ewers' path has gotten more treacherous: Elsewhere in draft stuff: Since I know you mostly just wanna see that 2026 mock draft, here it is again. I won't tell anybody you clicked on a forecast for an entire year from now. 🌀 That's a wrap for the spring portal window. Sam Khan Jr. runs through the three biggest things to know, including a QB carousel recap. 📺 The Pac-2 has a new broadcast deal with CBS, ESPN and — most prestigiously, in my opinion — The CW, home of numerous shows about Batman's children, if I recall correctly. 💰 Still no big resolutions in either House v. NCAA or the College Football Playoff v. itself. Bill Belichick is the 73-year-old head coach of the University of North Carolina Tar Heels football team. Jordon Hudson is a 24-year-old college grad who seemingly works as his professional manager in some capacity — emails reveal she takes an active role in the Belichick brand at UNC — and also is his girlfriend. I would be completely fine with knowing no more information about their relationship beyond that. It doesn't even rise to the level of Trying To Respect Their Privacy. I would simply give a thumbs up to the idea of having ignorance about them. I didn't spend a lot of time prying for personal details about Nick Saban and Miss Terry when she was a widely beloved football celebrity, for instance. Except Belichick-Hudson continues to be a storyline that is constantly asking me both to ignore it (acceptable) and to care about it (no thank you). She was in a Super Bowl commercial with him, and, this past weekend, she appeared in a 'CBS Sunday Morning' interview as something like his PR handler. (If Belichick didn't want her to be a public figure, he could ask her to be less visible on the field during UNC's spring football, right? He's the head coach!) The awkward moment: When Belichick was asked how he met Hudson, the person who publicly oversees parts of his work life and was literally on camera at that moment, she shut the question down, saying, 'We're not talking about this.' Great! I don't care either! Except this has been known for a while now. They met on a flight a few years ago, something she's even posted about. Great! Case closed! Right? Please? I hope this goes great for everyone, and I will not complain if we indeed are 'not talking about this.' But yes, the most surreal part of the whole thing is that Bill freaking Belichick, the NFL's bluntest and most football-obsessed coach, has elected to take part in one of the most chattered-about off-field dramas in all of sports. (I gotta be honest, though. Belichick aligning himself with somebody who has even less patience than he does for media questions? That part's really impressive.) OK, that's all for today. Email me at untilsaturday@ with any thoughts! Last week's most-clicked: Why are so many former top-100 recruits hitting the transfer portal so quickly? 📫 Love Until Saturday? Check out The Athletic's other newsletters.
New York Times
22-04-2025
- Sport
- New York Times
NIL holdout turning into QB trade, plus what's ‘GameDay' without Corso?
Until Saturday Newsletter 🏈 | This is The Athletic's college football newsletter. Sign up here to receive Until Saturday directly in your inbox. Today in college football news, this past weekend's WrestleMania gets a C+. Remember a couple weeks ago, when it looked like this April portal window would be a chill one? Anyway, a couple Big Ten and SEC teams are in the process trading quarterbacks. Unofficially trading, but still. Days after Tennessee's one-time College Football Playoff starter Nico Iamaleava left for UCLA via an NIL caper gone awry, former potential UCLA starter Joey Aguilar is likely headed to the Vols. It gets even more involved: I guess this is our makeshift version of the Detroit Lions and Los Angeles Rams swapping quarterbacks a few years ago. That worked out for everybody. Two other consequential pieces of QB news from this transfer window, which closes later this week: Bill Belichick's North Carolina added South Alabama's Gio Lopez, who has a shot to win the job, and Notre Dame's Steve Angeli is transferring out, meaning the Irish will have a first-time starter this season. Advertisement 🌀 More portal: 📋 Whenever someone asks you what this whole college sports general manager thing is all about, just send them this decades-encompassing history by Sam Khan Jr. 😬 Lane Kiffin on former Georgia QB Carson Beck reportedly making $4 million at Miami: 'Did they watch his game against us?' (Kiffin's Rebels beat Georgia 28-10, but again fell short of the CFP.) 🍀 UNC and TCU will open the 2026 season in Ireland. Will Belichick be there? 💰 Yesterday, the Division I Board of Directors cleared the way for schools to begin directly paying players, pending House settlement approval. One step closer. 🏆 The current state of the CFP's evolution, with more haggling going on this week. 🦬 This week in Colorado drama: Deion Sanders addressed the debate over the Buffs having already retired Travis Hunter and Shedeur Sanders' jersey numbers. 'The only reason we are having this discussion is because his last name is Sanders,' said the coach in defense of the decision. Technically true, one way or the other. To be fair, the QB set a ton of school records. ⏰ It's NFL Draft week. If you want to catch up on the whole thing with one click, Nick Baumgardner's got you. More on this Thursday. We'll find college angles. These days, I'm not sure how much 'College GameDay' you actively watch. For the past few years, I haven't paid as much attention to it as I used to, though it's always on in the background each football Saturday morning. Mostly, my ears clock in whenever Nick Saban says, 'A'ight,' which means he's fully activated his explanation mode. Last week's news that the upcoming season-debut edition of the Saturday institution will be Lee Corso's swan song made me realize a few things. On Aug. 30, I'm probably gonna wipe a tear or two while watching a 90-year-old man adorn himself with a gigantic animal hat. And then a week later, there's a chance I just tune out for good. 'GameDay' would be fine without me, but I'm guessing I wouldn't be the only one parting ways. Real quick: Last Thursday, we talked about the college football community that spent its week raising hundreds of thousands of dollars for a refugee resettlement charity. Final tally: $1,370,251. Have a good Tuesday. Holler at me via untilsaturday@ with any thoughts. 📫 Love Until Saturday? Check out The Athletic's other newsletters.
