How To Football: Week Three

This is coming out later in the week than usual, and that’s because I wanted to make sure there weren’t any surprises with cancellations around Hurricane Florence. The storm has taken some football from us and left us with a pretty sparse schedule, including wiping out every game ESPNU had lined up:

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What’s Better Than This? Shift

The rescheduled Boston College-Wake Forest game is the meatiest part of the Thursday night shift and it isn’t really even at night. Here’s some fun with sample size: Boston College is averaging 58.5 points per game so far this season. That’s 55 against UMass and 62 against Holy Cross, but still wild considering that Boston College are racking up those numbers. If the fightin’ dudes suddenly learned how to score points...

MEMPIS 3-1 Shift

Georgia State at Memphis is the only FBS game of the night. Yeah.

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Early Frost Shift

So hear me out: Oklahoma is going to trash Iowa State in retribution for last year and I honestly believe Troy at Nebraska will end up being the best game of the shift. But Florida State never got out of first gear against Virginia Tech and needed a last minute comeback to put away Samford. Like the school in Birmingham. And Syracuse has averaged 58.5 points per game, just like their conference mates in Chestnut Hill. If Florida State loses this game to start the season 1-2 and 0-2 in ACC play with Miami (FL), llvll, Clemson, Notre Dame, and Boston College left then I guess we’re going to find out how much leash Taggart is really allowed in year one at FSU.

Speaking of first year head coaches, I was really disappointed with Troy’s showing against Boise State and that kinda leaves me with no bearings at all for the Nebraska game. It’s clear that the Colorado game won’t define Frost at Nebraska an the Huskers did look good in defeat. But I shouldn’t have to tell you, dear reader of And The Valley Shook exclamation point dot com, about the importance of not overlooking Troy.

Sadly, our Rainbow Warriors are relegated to the nooner shift with a road sky game at Army. At least the east coast voters will get a chance to bask in the Hawaii’s glory?

For some reason unknown to man, Georgia Tech continues their obnoxious tradition of kicking off thirty minutes behind the rest of the nooners with they go to Pitt, who just got the hammer dropped on them by Penn State, relinquishing The Travelling The in the process.

Late late late in the shift Vanderbilt kicks off at Notre Dame. Sure, I guess.

Yin And Yang Shift

LSU at Auburn is the best game of the afternoon slate, but there are some pretty good games adjacent to it.

One of which is Boise State at Oklahoma State, which is a lock for over of the week. I don’t know what it is and I’m not going to look it up, I just know to take the over. Believe it or not, Oklahoma State is only 28th in offensive S&P+ to Boise’s six but the Cowboys have put up 56.5 points per game so far this season. Take the over.

Speaking of points, thirty minutes later Houston and their Major Applewhite/Kendall Briles offense link up with Kliff Kingsbury’s defense. Take the over!

To make up for all this over-taking, BYU and Wisconsin square off over on ABC. There is balance to the force.

i am so tired Shift

GameDay is going to be at the campus of TCU for the Ohio State-TCU game. The game is not being played at Amon G. Carter Stadium, but rather at JerryWorld in Arlington. It is the last game before Urban Meyer is slated to return to the sidelines at Ohio State. The Buckeyes will in this game.

I don’t want to get into this.

Instead, USC and Texas: Toyko Drift will probably be the best game of the shift, which is more or less an indictment of how bad the shift is. FOX is billing this as a blockbuster matchup regardless of how both teams have looked this season, dubbing it the finale to a trilogy. So let’s play ball with that idea:

The Trojans And The Longhorns

2 Trojans 2 Longhorns

The Trojans And The Longhorns: Tokyo Drift

Trojans & Longhorns

Trojans Five

Trojans & Longhorns 6

Longhorns 7

The Fate of the Longhorns

And just like the F&F franchise, they should have probably stopped after two.

(EDITOR’S NOTE: YOU TAKE THAT BACK ADAM!)

We have some low-key heaters elsewhere, namely Missouri at Purdue and Western Kentucky at Louisville, but I’m not sure those are “build your Saturday night around them” games. They might be awesome games but the results will really lack the punch.

Also, LOLBAMAWINS

Herm After Dark Shift

Herm Edwards is 2-0 and that’s wild, but things are about to get very real for him very fast: at San Diego State, at Washington, at Colorado, Stanford, at USC. This is what we signed up for.

We saw a lot from Washington in their opener against Auburn, but we know jack and all about Utah, which is usually the case. They tarred Weber State but then only put up 17 in a 17-6 win over NIU. So I’m interested in that game.

Jeff Tedford should have won coach of the year last season for his turnaround of Fresno State and I am absolutely rooting for him to tear the hide off of Chip Kelly’s UCLA just so he can finally get a tip of the cap from the national media, which he deserves.

Southern Utah at Arizona rounds out the shift if you have the PAC-12 Network, which you don’t.