This Weekend in College Football: Week 1

Yeah, look, I’m just as surprised as you are.

As usual, all times Eastern and all predictions wrong.

Thursday

8:00: Central Arkansas @ Alabama-Birmingham (espn3.com): Mostly just posting this one because, well, for obvious reasons this weekend is greatly diminished, and also because I enjoy the Shutdown Fullcast joke about UCA being a bunch of Ozark ronin.

9:00: South Alabama @ Southern Mississippi (CBSS): I have no idea which, if either, of these teams are going to be good this year. But here you are: FBS vs. FBS football. I’ll pick USM.

Saturday

1:00: Eastern Kentucky @ Marshall (ESPN): Naturally, because of the pandemic there is no PAX this year. So I have plenty of time to watch the first full weekend of college football. Which is, of course, also not really its normal self during the pandemic. Also, Marshall.

1:30: Middle Tennessee State @ Army (CBSS): So instead we’ll get this nicely spaced out slate that features no Power 5 teams. Army will get in the first of its eight home games this year. Has that ever happened before? Well, since WWII anyway? Also, my site I use for TV listings started calling Army “Army West Point”, and while I do respect anyone’s decision to be called whatever they want, Army is still referred to plenty as just Army, so I’ll stick to that. (I have finally caved and started referring to Louisiana-Lafayette as just Louisiana, though.) Oh, and I like Army here.

4:30: Southern Methodist @ Texas State (ESPN): I am as unsure about everything as I about most of these contests, but I’m pretty sure Texas State will still be terrible.

8:00: Arkansas State @ Memphis (ESPN): I’ll also assume that Memphis is still fun and good.

Monday

8:00: Brigham Young @ Navy (ESPN): I need to check, but I think BYU may be the only FBS team west of the Rockies that is playing football this year. I’ll also take Navy here.