Saturday Open Thread

It wouldn’t be college football’s opening weekend without the biggest game of Saturday being played in a domed NFL stadium, I guess. Anyway... today should be interesting while we wait around for Elon-Vanderbilt at 6 PM. Here’s your schedule for the day.

11:00 AM CT

• Colorado State at Michigan (ABC)
• NC State at East Carolina (ESPN)
• South Dakota State at Iowa (FS1)
• Sam Houston at Texas A&M (SEC Network)
• Buffalo at Maryland (BTN)
• Rutgers at Boston College (ACC Network)
• Delaware at Navy (CBS Sports)
• North Carolina at Appalachian State (ESPNU)
• Central Connecticut State at UConn (allegedly there is a stream)
• Bethel at Reinhardt (stream)

11:30 AM CT

• Richmond at Virginia (ACC RSN)

12:00 PM CT

• Northern Iowa at Air Force (MWN video)
• Rhodes at Augustana (stream)

Look... okay, who decided that Colorado State-Michigan was a game worthy of national television? Anyway, the early window is meh. UNC-App State should be fine, NC State-East Carolina has some outside shot at being interesting, Rutgers-Boston College... eh. Oh, right, Iowa had a dumb and scheduled South Dakota State.

1:00 PM CT

• Southeast Missouri State at Iowa State (ESPN+)
• St. Scholastica at Sewanee (stream)
• Berry at Maryville (stream)

1:30 PM CT

• Bowling Green at UCLA (Pac-12 Network)
• Webber International at Cumberland (stream)

Well, we always get reminded that Week 1 inevitably will include quite a few walkovers.

2:30 PM CT

• Oregon vs. Georgia (ABC)
• UTEP at Oklahoma (FOX)
• Arizona at San Diego State (CBS)
• Cincinnati at Arkansas (ESPN)
• Tulsa at Wyoming (FS1)
• North Dakota at Nebraska (BTN)
• Bethune-Cookman at Miami (ACC Network)
• Houston at UTSA (CBS Sports)
• Norfolk State at Marshall (ESPN3)

3:00 PM CT

• Troy at Ole Miss (SEC Network)
• BYU at South Florida (ESPNU)
• UC-Davis at Cal (Pac-12 Network)
• Tennessee State at Eastern Washington (ESPN+)

First off, the broadcast networks are scraping the bottom of the barrel here (UTEP-Oklahoma? Arizona-San Diego State?) Meantime the first of the Big Dumb NFL Dome Games is Oregon-Georgia, which... uh, sure, let’s just go on pretending this is gonna be a good game. I don’t know, Cincinnati-Arkansas sounds pretty good. So does Houston-UTSA. Those games are somehow not good enough for Fox and CBS.

4:00 PM CT

• Nicholls at South Alabama (ESPN3)

Oh hell yeah.

4:30 PM CT

• Texas State at Nevada (MWN video)

Really? This isn’t televised?

5:00 PM CT

• Rice at USC (Pac-12 Network)
• Morgan State at Georgia Southern (ESPN3)
• Florida Atlantic at Ohio (ESPN+)
• Middle Tennessee at James Madison (ESPN+)
• Wofford at Chattanooga (ESPN+)

Welcome to FBS, James Madison. They only sometimes call Middle for having 13 men on the field.

6:00 PM CT

• Utah at Florida (ESPN)
• Illinois State at Wisconsin (FS1)
• Albany at Baylor (ESPN+)
• Miami (Ohio) at Kentucky (SEC Network+)
• Mercer at Auburn (SEC Network+)
• South Dakota at Kansas State (ESPN+)
• Army at Coastal Carolina (ESPN+)
• Liberty at Southern Miss (ESPN+)
• UMass at Tulane (ESPN+)
• SE Louisiana at Louisiana (ESPN+)
• Grambling at Arkansas State (ESPN3)
• Presbyterian at Austin Peay (ESPN+)
• Lane at Arkansas-Pine Bluff (stream)

6:30 PM CT

• Notre Dame at Ohio State (ABC)
• Utah State at Alabama (SEC Network)
• Memphis at Mississippi State (ESPNU)
• SMU at North Texas (CBS Sports)
• Georgia State at South Carolina (SEC Network+)

If you are for some reason turning away from the Vanderbilt game, I don’t know, Utah-Florida should be an ass-kicking, Notre Dame-Ohio State... has two big names. You might flip over to Memphis-Mississippi State or Georgia State-South Carolina if either of those are close. Or Army-Coastal Carolina. It’s Army-Coastal Carolina.

7:00 PM CT

• Louisville at Syracuse (ACC Network)
• UL Monroe at Texas (LHN)
• Murray State at Texas Tech (ESPN+)
• Colgate at Stanford (Pac-12 Network)
• Maine at New Mexico (MWN video)

Oh, hey, what the hell is an ACC conference game doing here?

8:30 PM CT

• Idaho at Washington State (Pac-12 Network)

9:30 PM CT

• Boise State at Oregon State (ESPN)
• Kent State at Washington (FS1)

11:00 PM CT

• Western Kentucky at Hawaii (Team1 App)

Meh. Go to bed early.