Stewart Mandel
@slmandel
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Editor In Chief for college football at The Athletic. Co-host of The Audible podcast. Husband, dad. Honest, and unmerciful. Emails: stewart @theathletic .com.
Sunnyvale, CA
Joined March 2009
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Wow, Brian Kelly was serious about boycotting the Playoff.
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FSU beat a Top 15 team while having to play a third-string freshman QB, never trailed, held a Top-20 offense to 6 points.
And now they're a 13-0 P5 champ with 4 Top 25 wins.
They're not getting left out, guys.
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That, or the time Texas Tech fired its coach for allegedly locking a player in a shed only for it to turn out the player’s ESPN commentator father hired a PR firm to stage an orchestrated smear campaign against the coach for not giving his son enough playing time.
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Saturday:
10 am ET: Netherlands-USA
Noon ET: Big 12 title game
4 ET: SEC title game
8 ET: B1G and ACC title games
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Today is Mark Emmert's last day as NCAA president.
Let's take a moment to highlight his accomplishments over the last 12 years:
--
--
--
--
Congrats, sir.
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Lincoln Riley has been a head coach for six seasons and has produced three Heisman winners.
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OK guys. Let's think about this for a second.
The current CFP No. 4 (Ohio State) and No. 5 (Texas A&M) teams are both available THIS WEEKEND!
Make. It. Happen.
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Goodness,
@notthefakeSVP
with a vicious stat.
Rutgers has more bowl wins over the last 20 years (6) than Michigan (5).
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My hot take: You'd have to be freaking nuts to take on being the Alabama coach that follows Nick Saban.
Stay where you are, win, then take the Alabama job after that guy invariably gets run out after three years for not winning 12 games a year.
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The weird thing is if Virginia and Texas Tech played in December it would be on ESPNU at 6 pm.
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The reason there are so many CFP semifinal blowouts is not because Oklahoma/ND/Cincy aren't deserving, it's because Alabama keeps playing in them.
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That's gonna be all she wrote for USC's Playoff hopes.
Would have been better off starting 11-0, losing at home by 23 in its last game and not advancing to its conference championship game.
Obviously.
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I remember when Jimbo-Saban had their spat in May, everyone was like JUST WAIT FOR OCTOBER 8!
October 8 is next week, and GameDay is going to Kansas.
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Hilarious exchange in Utah press conference. (NSFW)
Reporter: "Did you see that Caleb Williams had an expletive and Utah painted on his nails?"
Cam Rising: "It said F--- Utah?"
Reporter: "Yes."
Rising: "I don't give a s--."
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The new EA's games dynasty mode should include:
-- Your best player gets a better NIL deal and leaves.
-- Your conference fails to get a new TV deal and implodes.
-- Your coach leaves to take a coordinator job.
-- You earn points you can use to spend on more analysts.
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I'm told Rutgers is preparing to file a lawsuit Saturday to get the officials to stop counting Ohio State's points.
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Apparently I didn't word this clearly before.
-- Miami led 20-17
-- Georgia Tech was out of timeouts
-- Miami could have taken a knee on 3rd and 4th down and the clock would have run out.
-- Instead they handed off and fumbled.
-- Ga Tech goes 74 yards in 26 seconds to win.
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Ole Miss is going to lose to its rival because its receiver celebrated a TD by pretending to pee like a dog.
College football.
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Makes too much sense.
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Nick Saban, Bill Belichick and Pete Carroll should start their own ManningCast. No guests, just them breaking down in real time the biggest CFB and NFL game of the week.
You'd watch it.
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Just announced: USC-Colorado on Sept. 30 will be the Big Noon game on Fox.
Yep, a Pac-12 game at Noon ET.
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The Big Ten’s press release about Big Ten title game said its decision was based on “competitive analysis” by the ADs and presidents.
I obtained a copy of those meeting notes.
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Meanwhile I’m pretty sure Kim Mulkey could walk straight to center court with a flamethrower and they’d just politely tell her to move back.
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Week 3 CFB lineup is a dud.
Week 4 is ... spectacular.
* No. 6 Ohio St at No. 9 ND
* No. 3 FSU at Clemson
* No. 18 Colorado at No. 13 Oregon
* No. 10 Bama at No. 17 Ole Miss
* No. 25 Iowa at No. 7 Penn St
* No. 24 UCLA at No. 12 Utah
* No. 23 Wazzu at No. 16 Oregon St.
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Updating the NCAA enforcement manual.
UNC systemic academic fraud: Not a violation.
Boise St letting freshmen sleep on players’ couches before school started: Violation.
Baylor covering up sexual assaults by football players: Not a violation.
Reselling textbooks: Violation.
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That overturned punt return will distract everyone from the fact Iowa gained 2 yards in the second half.
**2 yards in the entire second half**
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Such a weird regular season when Illinois finishes with more Top 25 wins than Alabama.
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Mike Gundy, whose 9-3 team lost a game 33-7 to South Alabama and 45-3 to UCF, has been named Big 12 Coach of the Year.
As opposed to 11-1 Steve Sarkisian.
Who votes on this? Other Big 12 coaches.
Bon voyage, Texas.
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All it took was Alabama losing two 1,000-yard receivers in its last three games for someone else to win it.
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The judge's decision in Oregon State/Washington State vs. the Pac-12 is in.
In favor of the OSU/WSU.
"Oregon State and Washington State will be the sole members of the board."
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The 30 for 30 on this guy is going to be spectacular.
CMU is investigating whether Connor Stalions was on its sideline vs. MSU in CMU gear.
AD Amy Folan: “We became aware of these photos late yesterday and we are in the process of determining the facts surrounding them. … We have no further comment at this time.”
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Boo Corrigan explaining why Liberty over SMU, first mentions that Liberty played no P5 teams ... then brings up SMU's losses to Oklahoma and TCU.
So ... don't play those guys?
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Cam Rising, who just announced he'll be coming back for his seventh season, began his career in 2018 at Texas.
Tom Herman was in his second year.
Sam Ehlinger was a sophomore.
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It appears universities are going to try to pin their inevitable outbreaks on “irresponsible” students rather than ... themselves, for formulating completely unrealistic plans just to cash those tuition checks.
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This bowl season about to see losses by the committee's No. 3, 4, 5, 7, 8 and 9 teams.
Not exactly the strongest argument for an 8-team playoff.
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Ladies and gentlemen, the highlight of my journalism career just took place, at the CFP media hospitality room.
I asked Joey Chestnut whether a hot dog is a sandwich.
Quote: “Absolutely not.”
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Michigan and Washington are going to play twice in 2024, one in the national title game, the other as a conference game on Oct 5.
This sport is full-on drunk.
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Arizona/ASU/Utah avoided having to defect until the last moment possible.
Oregon needed last-second convincing to join the freaking Big Ten.
George K had 13 months to deliver a TV deal that, if even slightly better, keeps the conference together.
A failure of epic proportions.
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Imagine spending $80,000 on a ticket to watch your team lose.
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GameDay HAS to go to Lawrence next week if it's 3-0 Duke at 3-0 Kansas, right?
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How much time does John King spend practicing that touch screen in the four years between presidential election nights? This is his Olympics.
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Lincoln Riley: Two seasons as a head coach, two Heisman QBs. Incredible.
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How does this help determine whether he can complete a pass to an open receiver?
Anthony Richardson just set a combine record for quarterbacks with a 40.5” vertical with this…
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Seniors will graduate from Michigan this spring having never seen them lose to Ohio State.
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If nothing else, Zach Smith can probably go ahead and take the word “Coach” out of his Twitter handle.
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This is my first time watching the Aaron Rodgers segment on Pat McAfee.
I'm not sure I realized what level of unhinged he's reached.
I miss the more innocent days when he was hosting Jeopardy.
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What a bombshell. A likely first team All-American on the No. 2 team in the country provided his teammate a gun that became a murder weapon.
And then his coach Nate Oats had the gall to call it "wrong place, wrong time!"
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What I don't understand in the Spectrum-ESPN clash, is why would customers have any loyalty to Spectrum at this point? Or any other cable company? Just cancel. What do they offer that you can't get from YouTubeTV or another provider at this point?
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This is the fourth time since 2014 the Texas Longhorns had 0 or 1 player drafted.
Richest athletic department in the county.
Most talent-rich state in the country.
You would think it impossible.
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The last Pac-12 championship game will be the biggest it's ever had.
-- CFP berth on the line for both UW and Oregon.
-- Rematch of their fantastic Oct. 14 game.
-- Nix vs. Penix for the Heisman?
Friday night in Vegas.
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My favorite thing about Week 0 is that UMass-New Mexico State is the ESPN primetime game.
Meanwhile, you'll need Pac-12 Network to watch No. 6 USC.
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For some CFB perspective on 9.9 million viewers for the women's championship game.
That's more than last season's:
-- Sugar, Orange and Cotton Bowls
-- Big 12, Pac-12 and ACC title games
-- Notre Dame-USC
-- LSU-Alabama
-- Ohio St-Penn St
-- Bama-Texas A&M primetime on CBS
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Since it appears Ole Miss and Chris Beard are intent on sportswashing his December arrest for Assault by Strangulation, here's the police report with all the gruesome details.
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My final four would be:
1 Alabama (if it wins tonight)
2 Clemson
3 Ohio State
4 Cincinnati (if it wins) or Coastal
And don’t give me “G5 team would get destroyed by Bama/Clemson” Bc so did ND and A&M.
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Boise State got punished for letting freshmen sleep on players' couches before they were enrolled. ... UNC 2 decades academic fraud: Nada.
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Oregon is exactly why the SEC plays 8 conference games and schedules a Western Carolina in November.
It’s damn hard to win 9 straight conference games.
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Somehow the "130th-ranked pass defense" has held "potential No. 1 pick" Will Levis to 14-of-25 for 90 yards and three picks.
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I’m behind on my news. What awful tragedy happened at Michigan this weekend?
Countless members of the University of Michigan family have reached out to me over the weekend and I wanted to express my appreciation. Like any community, we face our share of challenges and adversity. There have been many such moments in our history. But as our team showed so…
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For anyone who’s ever proposed promotion and relegation in college football.
Well, it happened.
Promoted: Houston, UCF, Cincinnati, BYU
Relegated: Stanford, Cal, Wazzu, Oregon State
Doesn’t sound so fun when it’s college athletes, not rich owners, paying the price.
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Imagine if someone told you 2 weeks ago today:
Ohio State will hang 62 on Michigan. Tua won’t win the Heisman. UNC will hire Mack Brown. Kliff Kingsbury will be the next OC at USC. Liberty will hire Hugh Freeze. Urban Meyer will retire.
College football comes at you in a hurry
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Give a lot of credit to K-State AD Gene Taylor. Replaced Bill Snyder and Bruce Weber with an FCS coach (Chris Klieman) and a longtime assistant (Jerome Tang). Klieman won the Big 12 and Tang has them in the Sweet 16.
Didn’t try to win the press conferences. Hired the right guys.
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Saturday night, rejected Big 12 expansion candidates UCF and Cincinnati will play in primetime on ABC while Big 12 incumbents Texas and Iowa State play in prime time on Longhorn Network.
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Bill Walton: “You’ve been trashing Oregon all season long.”
Dave Pasch: “I haven’t done a college basketball game in two months.”
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Next year's playoff:
Oklahoma w/ Hurts. vs. Alabama
Ohio State w/ Fields vs. Georgia
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Silver lining: Steve Spurrier finishes as the AAF's all-time winningest coach. (7).
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Out of uniforms and pads, would you guess this is the best right end in college football? (Arguably best in years)
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This is just all-around awful. I’m not saying the star players should get preferential treatment but the ultra-strict officiating has turned this game into a shell of what it could have been.
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In the texts SI obtained, Stalions bragged that he was flying in for games "pre-Covid."
And we know he was there again starting in '21.
So the one season he apparently wasn't helping (2020) happens to be the one where Michigan imploded. 😲
Guess who I found standing behind Don Brown in the 2019 Notre Dame/Michigan game? You guessed it. Wearing his signature hat, it's Conor Stallions.
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The same committee that approved Tate Martell and Justin Fields' waivers took another look at Luke Ford's -- who wanted to be closer to ailing grandparents 190 miles away -- and denied it.
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It’s too bad the committee doesn’t do a final ranking. Would be curious to see whether Florida could lose a third straight game without dropping.
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Dave Doeren makes $5 million, and he's begging fans to donate their entire paychecks to an NIL collective.
The model is so, so broken.
NC State coach Dave Doeren calls for fans to donate to
@SavageWolvesNIL
@packofwolvesnil
. Asks for 5,000 fans to donate $1,000 apiece so we can "recruit, retain and develop." Calls coming week "maybe the worst week in college football" with portal opening.
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If ND has to vacate 2 years' wins bc a few students committed fraud, shouldn't UNC have to vacate 17 years of wins?
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The state of college football in a nutshell:
After tonight, teams from outside the Southeast are 3-12 in CFP semifinals.
They're just better at football down there. It's not a media creation.
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Texas spent $24 million to buy out Tom Herman and his assistants.
They are paying Sark $5.2 million.
They are losing 42-21 to a 1-8 team.
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Oklahoma State announces QB Alan Bowman has been granted a 7th year of eligibility.
Guy played for Kliff Kingsbury at Texas Tech.
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HC Jimbo Fisher
OC Bobby Petrino
DC D.J. Durkin
Is this America's most lovable program or what.
Jimbo Fisher is finalizing a deal to hire Bobby Petrino as
@AggieFootball
’s OC and Petrino will take over play-calling duties, sources tell ESPN. Petrino, one of the top offensive minds in football, was briefly OC at UNLV after spending last three seasons at Missouri State.
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How rough was Signing Day for UCLA? One guy they were waiting on opted to walk-on at Washington instead.
I mean, ouch.
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With that, Notre Dame held Alabama to its fewest points (31) since the 2018 national title game vs. Clemson almost two full years ago.
The gap is not an ND problem, it's a college football problem.
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NCAA justice ...
Taking money from an agent = bad
Taking money from boosters = bad
Steering kids to sham classes = not our problem.
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Gary Barta just faulted Cincinnati for having not played since Nov. 21 while others around them have played "2 or 3 games."
Ohio State has played 1 game since Nov. 21. But said they didn't consider moving them.
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Man, the year the ACC got two teams in the CFP it went 0-6 in the bowls, including 0-3 in NY6.
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In about 75 hours, we went from wondering whether the NCAA would cancel its basketball tournament to a nationwide eight-week moratorium on public gatherings (of 50-plus).
This week has felt like 10 years.
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If Alabama and BYU can agree on the details of a game within a couple of weeks, please, for the umpteenth time, why do we need to schedule these things 15 years in advance?
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There’s a famous story (possibly urban myth) that when Nick Saban left MSU for LSU he sent a plane to pick up his assistants and no one got on it.
So far no one from ND has taken their seat on Brian Kelly’s plane.
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My main takeaway tonight: Just how badly out of touch the primarily East/West Coast-based political media is with the pulse of the country.
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Imagine if I told you in 2005 that the next time Texas plays USC you'll be watching a Clemson-Louisville game instead.
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Counterpoint: They're 11-0 and ranked No. 1 in strength of record.
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Interesting how the Big Ten's rules become flexible when one particular school needs them to be.
Ryan Day hints that the Big Ten 21-day rule is being discussed. Says it's being looked at really hard. Gene Smith pushed hard for change last week. Will be a big decision looming for Big Ten next week.
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Schools with the most Top 100 picks:
Georgia (8)
Alabama (6)
Cincinnati (5)
Just remarkable evaluation and development by Luke Fickell and staff.
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Folks, Kansas is up 42-21 on a Houston team that won 12 games last season.
Lance Leipold is the real deal.
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