Week 0 was weird. The kind of weird that you expect from something called “Week 0.” People wanted to point to lack of preparation time as the reason the Florida-Miami game was such a cluster. However, they had as much practice time as anyone else. The NCAA rules on when preseason practice can begin are determined by the date of first contest. Just like everyone else, Florida and Miami had 29 days to hold a maximum of 25 on-field practices. Furthermore, they did not have to deal with the start of classes like most schools will. Most of the schools playing their first game on Labor Day weekend will have at least the last week before the game while school is in session, which brings in stricter limitations on practice time that the Gators and Hurricanes did not have.

Oh, and Hawai’i and Arizona were able to put on a pretty good game. No, they were not perfect. The quality of both of those teams is less than either Florida or Miami. Somehow, the Arizona Wildcats playing IN THE MIDDLE OF THE PACIFIC OCEAN looked better than the two who were still in their home state.

Tom took advantage of the chaos to go 2-0. CDA and Shawn each picked up a game each. Meanwhile, VU 04 and myself went 0-2. Oh, and Import could not be asked to step away from his “Vandy Lifestyle” long enough to make picks for this nonsense. Either that or he wanted to make me have to actually do math down the road while setting the standings based on winning percentage.

I do need to publicly thank VandyTigerPhD. I have blatantly stolen his HTML code for the standings and picks tables. Without his previous work, this would be a much uglier looking contest. It greatly pains me to say a nice word about him. Anyway, here are the rules in case you are new or need a refresher. They will be included every week for clarity.

The Rules

1. All SEC games against FBS competition will be picked. FCS games are excluded since lines are often not available until very late in the week or even the morning of the game.
2. One other game, typically a matchup of Top 25 teams, will be part of the picks.
3. The picks will be made AGAINST THE SPREAD. Too many games are easy to pick heads up. Also, this will serve as a PSA for why you should not get into sports gambling if Tennessee (or wherever you reside) makes it legal.
4. The lines will be taken from ESPN sometime Monday, so they may not match what is listed at the time this article is published.

The Standings

The Picks

GAME	DotP	Shawn	Tom	VU04	CDA	Import
Texas State (+34) @ Texas A&M
Toledo (+11.5) @ Kentucky
Ole Miss (+5.5) @ Memphis
Mississippi State (-20) @* Louisiana-Lafayette
Duke (+35) @** Alabama
South Carolina (-8) @*** North Carolina
Georgia State (+26) @ Tennessee
Georgia (-21) @ Vanderbilt
Georgia Southern (+28) @ LSU
Oregon (+3.5) @**** Auburn
Missouri (-18) @ Wyoming
Northwestern (+6.5) @ Stanford