Ep 861 - Storylines and Game-by-Game Predictions for 2022

You're listening to the back home network, presented by home field. Apparel, welcome back to Crimson, Cask ale, and klaviyo, Scott Caulfield Journey here. Once again, it is the last day of August Scott word. It August go. Just absolutely vanish on us. We blinked and now it's time for football season to start is Indiana back on the Gridiron coming up here in just a while depending on when you're listening to this, maybe a day, maybe less than that.

If you waited and are listening to this while driving down to Bloomington, but the Hoosiers, back in action in football, it's good to see you again Scott. You've got your 83 special home-field shirt on. I've got my Steve the Bison. HomeField shirt on life is good. Where may be optimistic a little bit, just slightly about the start of the Season, maybe not.

But we're going to talk through, not just the upcoming game, but the whole schedule as we normally do in our last podcast, prior to the start of the Season, Scott, good to see you. How are you doing? It's time. It is time to start this Odyssey of a weekly podcast talking about IU football, to there's Dewey to weekly podcast. That's who it's gonna be. E upstairs, gonna be downstairs. Gonna be downstairs. Going to be Downs. No, we are excited. It's football, time.

I'm fired up to drive down Friday, night for the IU, Illinois gaming. It's fun that we start games with the Big Ten every single year. Be nice to maybe start one of these one of these years. We just get a nice, you know, Idaho first. But it seems like the Big Ten wants to always schedule us on a Big Ten game every single year. So I mean on the one hand, you know, I complain a lot about college football, not having

anybody in charge. Judge and and you know how it almost feels like the sport is popular in spite of itself, a lot of times but it I will say, if I was in charge I would absolutely start the season with IU playing against a big 10 team and with big games where people would want it, not until Illinois, Indiana does not qualify as a big-game. Know, that's like that. Me, like the NFL starting off the season with, like the Vikings vs, the bride cars or

the Well, maybe not that bad. I mean, it's, you know, but it's still it's like, let's pick two like sub mid-table teams and figure out a way to get them together on the first game of the season. I probably avoid that. But, you know, I will say, you know, back in 2019, Indiana started with games against Ball State and Eastern Illinois. That was a nice soft start to the year, they have three non-conference games to start the season in 2018 and they want

all three of those. So maybe you're onto something just from a Winds perspective. I don't know. We're also streaming live on Twitch. We're not going to do this every time, but we are going to do it sometimes actually, shy Town, jj-just shouted out, love that you're on Twitch, thank you, we appreciate you watching. We're going to try to put this on more on Twitch rather than on Twitter because Twitter to stuff gets lost and I don't know I let go it's time to spread our wings a little bit.

We've been doing Twitter for 12 years, let's get out and see different neighborhoods for a little bit before we get started just to remind Under that. We are part of the back home network in the back home network is brought to you by home-field apparel, which we are currently both sporting. As I mentioned. At the top of the top of the show here, hope-filled apparel your place to go for College

athletics, apparel. And now some Pro Athletics apparel as well as they launch their Colts collection this past weekend too much aplomb and and plaudits and I think deservedly so that was a really cool collection that they launched. They are certain to have some fascinating things coming down the pike. And Scott, I'm looking forward to seeing what they come up with next. Just just a huge array of t-shirts hoodies crewnecks.

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A home-field plugs that I know we're we always have to struggle that we talk about them, we've said it all before, I will say this over the weekend we took we have the wire mesh closet and our master closet. Took everything out, rip that out. Got the alpha system from clot from a container store. I installed it super easy to do but I think there's a moment yet. Take a look in the mirror, taking all of my hooded sweatshirts out and it's like I have a lot.

I got a lot, the greatest compliment that I can give HomeField apparel is that every single one of them made it back in like I was very like, I have three bags full of stuff going to Goodwill, I got a lot of good soldiers, got got left behind, but I will say that none my Tulane sweatshirt, my rice sweatshirt, my beloved Marshall sweatshirt, my to bison, sweatshirts, my Indiana oatmeal, they all made it back into the new closet. They're loving the new digs, not

a single home field. Apparel item was injured in my closet move. I mean, Ralph Lauren. Got booted, you know, Old Navy got booted, her postel got booted structure, got booted? Yeah. Scott he doesn't tell you this, but Scott doesn't clean out his closet since 1999, you know. So there's there's, it's been a while. Yeah. Tommy Hilfiger cross Colours. Yeah, they're all out. But, no, it literally all the home-field hoodies are back in and that's the highest praise that I can give say.

They made the Scott closet. Switcheroo. Well, that is about as High, Praise as one can get.

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their stuffs worth the money. I mean it really is and we don't just say that it's it. We're wearing it right now and we didn't plan it. It just it's How it goes. So anyway, home field apparel.com, be sure to check them out for the latest in stylings, get on their app, subscribe, get all their newsletter. You'll get all that stuff early on and that's the way to go

anyway. What we're going to do today, we've talked with various people, Scott posted a very nice podcast with Martha. The mop lady, which I have not listened to yet, but I'm sure it's delightful. I had a podcast earlier this week with Olivia Ray. We've got plenty to talk about still, we've got some leftover Twitter questions that we're going. To we have to do our normal thing that we do every year at this time and go through the schedule and give you are on the

record predictions. They are guaranteed to be something you can reliably bet. Against last year, I picked nine and three. The team went to and 10. The previous year, I think I picked maybe actually. Those let the previous year I was actually right. I think I said, six and two. They finished sixth in one, but most of the time, I am entirely Off the Mark Scott. I don't remember what Your predictions are like, but I also remember that you suck at this too.

So you know the 2020 I was under a Last Rose. I think I was predicting nine wins or something. I definitely predicted a win in Iowa. Last year if I've ever been good. I sucked last year. The, the absolute inescapable, gravity of the Triumph of Hope over expectations, is essentially, the story of crimson cash trying to pick. I you games so we will continue that streak. I'm sure but let's talk overview. We've gotten through all of fall Camp.

We've, we've seen a lot of stories, and we've seen a lot of people saying. We had to be optimistic about this team. There's a lot of things to like and then you read the Indy star this morning. And they've got Zach, Osterman and Dustin Dopey rack giving their projections and I think they both pick four and eight and essentially said, like be ready. There might be worse. Stuff that happens, you never

know. So, a lot of the experts, I think now that they've actually She had to put their cards on the table of not been particularly sanguine about. I use chances this year to do great things or maybe even good things. What's your overall sentiment before we get to the individual games? Right now, Scott about this upcoming IU football season, what's your temperature on things? You mentioned your podcast, Olivia and there's some good stuff in there but I want to hit on something.

You were talking about with the coach's eye. I just want to let you know that you know, I have four tickets to the game. To take my son but I have two extra tickets. I'm not going to release my depth chart of who I'm taking to the game. So I'm just letting you have Tom Allen wants to know that I'm not going to let you know. I'm not gonna tell you which son either I have two sons. They're battling it out its competition. We're not going to release which

son? No I think it's funny all the key which which of you which of your son's transferred from an SEC family. I'm curious what? That's totally not answering your question but that's fine. That's the Thing. This quarterback battle thing is driving me nuts because either if you know base lacks your starter then you're just being cute because you don't want

Illinois off the scent. Like you haven't shown the ability to like just focus on winning games as I said before, if if it is really a battle then like we should be very concerned and you know, I'm not sure how much this stuff does rollover but like it's not a fantastic look. If you're another SEC quarterback, who's like, hey I might want to transfer to it. Anna, you know, the place where I go and have to do a court, you know, battle out a walk-on to

get a starter spot like that. Maybe I'll just go to Michigan State. Like I, none of this is good. I'm very curious who's going to start out, you know, the under Center on Friday night, you know, the overarching thought that I will come back to as I've listened to all of this and it is, you know, people have tried to be positive.

I appreciate the positivity as you know, by listening to like Zach and Dustin. Do their their podcast, trying to kind of look at the positive way to do this, you know, is there a way you can be playing for a bowl, you know, into into

November whatnot? I come back to this, like we talked about before, there's just so many question marks across so many parts of the ball, but the thing that really hasn't been mentioned in anything that I've listened to that, I kind of come back to is, we always hit this in October and November is, you know, quarterback play, which we've talked Ad nauseam about, but the other one that I feel like you bring up Lat, I talked about and that we all kind of.

Look at the end of the year is like, man, we're getting killed on the line, you are lying, just, you know, can't protect you, we don't have time. It's like it's not we have a quarterback issue, but the court doesn't have time. It's like the RO line is just looking in depth compared to these bigger lines than injuries happen.

And then we talk about, you know, guys switching around and that's thing that hasn't been talked about as if I'm always question marks, the one coach who shown an inability to have a successful offensive line is the same. Inator, who's still there? And so the one area it's like I can guarantee. I'm pretty sure we're not going to have a great offensive line this year.

And that's something that every single year as we get deeper into the season is always the thing that we look at is like man this is really what's separating us you know because we don't have time to throw or not able to get you know, holes

open to run. And so the more I thought about it the more I look at that as like, we're not talking about it maybe just because people want to try and focus on other things and try to be able to Positive but I, you know, I think our lime play, there's no history that shows that you're going to get good line play Under the, you know, coaching staff that you have. And so if we're going to have the same, if not, you know, the same lamp. Oh, we've had the last two or three years.

I'm not sure how any of the other pieces really matter whether it's a culture of winning or a guys have, you know, they're not used to having you last season. The aberration are used to winning, it's like, well, if the line plays bad, we're going to have a struggle to be. Good. And that always seems to be what happens when you get in the meat of the Big Ten schedule. So I don't mean to pick on just one thing, but it's something that I've really been thinking about.

I have a hard time seeing a lot of W's when, when that's the case, when you're surrounding that, with question marks all over the place, I go on these long. 45-minute walks with my dogs most days. It's my primary, it's good cardio, it's easy on the joints and the dogs enjoy it.

So, you know, it really is serves a bunch of purposes, but I've been going back and listening to some of our From last year, not because I want to hear myself talk, but because I sorry, I want to get back into the mentality and also hear some things that I've forgotten about IU season last year, because let's be honest, a lot of what happened with I use season kind of it. Almost has gotten forgotten because we've concentrated on the big picture items, and it's

interesting because I was listening to the post Cincinnati podcast. And first of all, we were actually in a better mood after that podcast. Cast then I remembered us being. We weren't like it wasn't like happy action fun time or something like that or peanut butter jelly time, or whatever you want to call it, but it was,

it wasn't. We weren't like, we weren't downtrodden, we didn't sound like we've been run over by a truck, you know, and a lot of the comments were well, this team just not as good as we thought it was and there's problems and it's interesting because listening to that podcast dovetails exactly what you just restated, which is that that game And actually you go back and watch the game.

You'll see the same thing. The play calling wasn't that bad, the execution was bad and it was you know some of it was receivers dropping balls or Michael penix not being able to get the ball where it needed to be, but a lot of it was the

offensive line. A lot of it was not being able to block and weirdly as much as that was a big picture story and you know, go back and listen to your podcast that you did, you know, with, with the pot, John punt folks earlier that was something that they brought up at the time. I'm it's something that was brought up by think it was Danny. We're talking to in when the

podcast a couple of weeks ago. As much Focus was placed on the fact that Darren Hiller and the offensive line have been inadequate, it's fascinating that that was essentially treated as a non-story throughout the course of this off season and into fall camp and it is inexplicable as

consistently pours. The offensive line has been over the entire tenure of Tom Allen, How you don't make a change, there is a lot of pressure specifically on that phase of play for Indiana because it does it is essentially the glue that either holds everything together or dissolves and causes everything to fall apart series by series throughout the course of the year and it was the most consistent problem for the first half of last season before the lack of a competent quarterback,

became the problem for the second half for the last third of the season. So, I'm with you on that. And I do think that That I'm actually a little disappointed that it more of a bigger deal. Wasn't made of it. Now it's water under the bridge, whatever. And certainly you always see a lot of positive stories focusing specifically on will gosh. This walk-on wide receiver who

came out of nowhere now. Looks like he might start or hey this linebacker is really tackling hard or hey this former quarterback is looking really good at wide receiver. Like you always get those kinds of stories with fall ball and with the lead up to a season and I get that but I just Have to wonder in a program that got a lot more scrutiny.

How you know, would this have been a story every single day of that, there was a press conference and what will it be covered as if I, you continues to struggle on the offensive line. That that really does end up being a big question. Now, if the offensive line comes out and blocks adequately and gives the quarterback, whoever it is, I think it's going to be kind of Basel II, but whoever it

is time to throw. If it gives running backs holes, where they can actually he gained a decent amount of yardage and move the ball. Well okay, then then perhaps there were internal lessons being learned that are going to result in something more, positive moving forward. What else anything else? Stick out to you. As far as like your overall feelings about this team? Is there anything you feel better about now versus how you felt when we started picking this whole topic of football

back up in Late July? Anything I feel better about, I mean, II will say, you know, I hit on this a little bit with with Martha that you know, when you go back and look at some of the nice streaks and Tom Allen's, you know, the 2020 season the 2019 season, you know, Alan has shown, and I don't want to rehash where I talked to two. I've mentioned a couple different times. I talk to Martha about that, you know? I really think a change happened after that.

Wisconsin game we Take the New Year's Day six, Tom Allen got pissed which is the Big Ten off our logo, but he coach from a place of anger and it didn't work and something changed. I mean, it's I'm not saying it's just one thing that happened but you know where Tom Allen has been successful as coaching from a place of love. And I know it seems cheesy, but it's also team that has Elio written on everything.

So it's, you know, it's I'm taking a cue from from coach here, but when he coaches with that passion for a positive place, we do really well. You saw it in 2020, they wanted to run but As I mentioned in the other pod you in 2019, they also had that you know for game stretch my granted was against you know lesser opponents but they won you know at Rutgers at Maryland at Nebraska wait no not all those are our ATS.

Sorry sorry they won Rutgers at home and mess it up at Maryland at Nebraska and the Northwestern at home. But, you know, and it's like, all right, it's not the best, the Big Ten. It's like that's for I forget exactly where the That's four straight Big Ten wins, we haven't done that like in 15 or 20 years after that point to on the road, that's a great stretch and that propelled us to the Gator Bowl and we, you know, we played the Penn State team at the end of that very, very tough.

He's shown that once he gets a little bit of momentum and he's coaching from the right headspace that he can get this team to kind of go through places where maybe they, you know, are ahead. And that's when you look at the beginning, part of this schedule will get to Illinois in a second, but you Illinois, Hello, Western Kentucky.

I'm not saying it's it's a soup you know, automatic 3 and 0 as we'll get to we look at each game but you have a Runway there where you could get a little bit of positive momentum, you know, at Nebraska isn't easy but it's also not the toughest Putt in the Big Ten. It's maybe one of the better Road games. I wouldn't mind taking right

now. Like you have an opportunity here where the schedule lines up where you could you could get some nice momentum and and that's where I feel a little bit better that, you know, if Tom Allen can get, Of that positive vibe going getting the team to kind of play better as a, you know, some, you know, the the whole than the sum of the parts. I think they're, I think, they're in a good spot.

And that's what I feel has been the positive change that I've made, although I will say, overall, I'm probably as - as I've been, you know, the entire time like, I'm, I'm just, I'm nervous about this season, I'm curious about it, but I'm nervous. So, I will say I disagree with what you just said in as much as this.

I think this is interesting cause I think a lot of people have latched on to this idea that, you know, Alan needs to coach from a positivist perspective as opposed to a negative is perspective, but I think honestly like 2019 is largely explainable by one factor, which is that he hired a competent offensive coordinator, who ran a good offense, that regularly scored more than 30 points, a game and I don't think anything else mattered, you had Kaelyn Deboer and you go down.

You look at the list of games from 2019. Beat Ball State. They score 34 points, they scored 52 against Eastern Illinois.

They got crushed by Ohio State, but whatever they be Connecticut, 38 23, they scored, 31 points against Michigan State, and probably should have figured out a way to win that game, but then they score 35 against Rutgers 34, against Maryland, 38 against Nebraska, 34 against Northwestern 27 against Penn State on the road, and they scored 44 against Purdue, they lost to Michigan who was just had a superior team that day. Like they did, they were really

good offensively. Yeah. And I think 2020, yeah, you don't have kale and Deboer but you had as a kosterman is pointed out a lot of opt-outs for other teams that Indiana didn't have to face. And as we pointed out, everybody was under as unprepared as Indiana. Normally, looks in games in 2020 and Indiana had some Spirit to them in that season. And so, I don't know the, I guess if I'm pessimistic and I am about this season it's mostly because You got to be

optimistic. The question is would make you optimistic? Well I'm saying if I'm Pat I'm getting to okay, say if I'm pessimistic it's because there are so many things that have to go right in order for this season to turn around to a degree where it's a really successful year. If I'm optimistic, it's that there is something that you should be able to count on this year and that is a really stalwart defense.

This is Tom, Allen's bread and butter is a coach, he's got a Experienced group of players, he's got a talented group of players. He's got a group of players that was riddled by injuries last year to a large degree and much like we saw in, you know, like Kevin Wilson's last year, it may be a season where you have to lean a lot on the defense and hope you get just enough out of the offense. But that may be enough, you know?

Because I think one of the things about this schedule for IU this year, as we get into it is there are a lot of teams who Appear to be good but you don't necessarily know. And and and they may actually be average to bad. And I mean, this whole first stretch of the schedule with the exception I think of Michigan is full of teams that a really good defense. Might be able to stymie. You know, you've got, you've only got two ranked teams in the

first nine games that you play. And one of those games is at home, and the other game is against the team that may not actually be anywhere close to as good as their ranking indicates. Yes, we said that last year. About Cincinnati, but it may be actually the case this year because they lost a lot of the guys that led them to the college football playoff, you

know? So you look down that list and you know, Illinois, I do Western Kentucky, Nebraska, Maryland, Rutgers and even Penn State a really good defensive performance, a defensive performance that can generate turnovers and that's calling plays in the right order might yield some success that last year's team couldn't yield for one reason or another. So that's that's where I get, I

guess. Potentially Optimist. I don't have actually going to be anything that we have to pay attention to because I think this team has a lot to prove. The offense is a lot to prove the coaches, both new and returning have a lot to prove and the players especially on offense are just unknown quantities. And it's almost, it's probably been the single hardest thing. For me, Scott in talking about IU football going into the season. Is I want to be - to some degree

because I was burned. Last year, I want to be positive because Is, I'm naturally a positive guy about IU football, even if it doesn't always sound like it. But I do I know. So little about what we're about to see on Friday and beyond that. It's almost like I'm just you're just kind of inventing things to talk about and support or oppose.

Its, you know, it's like trying to get excited or angry about a concept car, you know, I mean if you just see, you know, the model on the floor, in Detroit at some Auto Show. So I mean it may look nothing like that. By the time it actually gets released to the public. What I mean getting upset about that is that's something that magazine writers do not like serious podcasters like you and me. Yes, master.

I mean, it is wild like a someone just two people don't stumble into it, you know, 20 minutes into an IU podcast, they're not listening to it. But it's if you know, of an Alabama fan, just stumbled in and, you know, heard people talking about, you know, our wide receiving Corps, you know, McCullers pretty. It's always looking pretty good out there. They'd stop that.

Whoa, be the guy. It quarterback for the last year I guess who you're talking about a quarter and it's like and by the way there's a part, I'm joking, this is total joke but it's like with with how little is we know? Maybe McCoy is gonna play quarterback. I don't know. Like maybe he'll start as course. That's actually that's actually the big secret with the starting quarterback but it's not basil

act. It's not Tuttle, it's actually McCully. Who's been, you know, there's a whole thing with wide receivers, it's been a huge subterfuge so just that you would be breaking news. It's Alan wanted to have Have fun. I mean one play is not going to ruin it like just come out and have Bay's lack and Tuttle wind up at wide receiver and McCully

is quarterback. Just one play just to screw with everybody, of course, knowing I used to, you know, with I use luck, you know, he gets sacked, eras ACL throat of, you know, Bay's lack, and he'd get, you know, crushed and, you know, break his arm or something. That would be it. Well, I know you, you have new coordinators, you bring back like, literally, no production at any of the skill positions.

Ins. And then on defense, you're bringing a lot of people back, but it's also a defense that was completely anchored by Mike McFadden and whenever he was out the defense look completely unmoored and I'm not saying they can't figure it out, but he was such an integral part of that defect. Get just to the question marks in such an integral part of that defense. And, you know, it's there's even at the play calling point of

view. Like you mentioned, Alan is best when he has very Qualified coordinators around him. And I think that him moving to the defensive side is really good and it should sure up the defense. But as we've said many times in the past, we've had good defense

has where. But if you're, you know, but if your offense can't do anything, if your offense is going three it out in, you know, 28 seconds of Gameplay at some point, your defense is going to break and then, you know, they'll break, it'll be seven, nothing then it's 7 to 3 then it's 14. Rihanna's 2:39, it's like the defense completely. I can't specifically think want to stop ahead. We've had games, the defense for like they played pretty well we

lost 6:32. It's like they just they couldn't stop 18 drives in a row from Michigan when you're starting at the 50-yard line and that's what also concerns me. It's just, there are so many question marks. Well, across the way and this is what I kind of, you know, got onto Martha a little bit on the Pod is like I keep on saying like hope is not a plan. Even get the Hope tracker with him because he like he was describing how things are Go well and it's like use the word. Hope nine times that

explanation. It's like because there is nothing else to say. Because we haven't seen these guys, they're all question marks and honestly, your, you're hoping that things happen that really, I you does not have a history of doing, which is having high level transfers come in going from a to intense season, and rebounding, to 6 and 6. Like, you're asking for things like that. I want to ask you one more question for you dig into the schedule.

Yeah. Along these lines because I think it was Olivia but you maybe it was even Dustin or Zach on the spot and listen to a lot of preview pods, just kind of, I'm curious your high level expectations for this year. You don't need to pin down like number of wins and all this, but you know, it's the idea of people kind of are like, you know, to make a bowl or not. I personally think a bowl is that's a very, that's a very little aspirational goal.

But there is this kind of feeling of either, playing for a bowl or just winning a big game. And if you don't do either, Either of those things is, you know, if you go for wins you don't really win. Any of the big games is that anything? I'm just curious your thoughts. Like what are your? You can you know, high level expectations for the year. Not asking for a win total but just like, what do you what do you see as a successful year?

Yeah. The, you know it's tough because this was something we talked about Olivia and I did on the podcast and I think so, my perception versus what people's perception might be, is probably a little bit different. So. And I say that from this perspective like I I look at it, I think the way that people will look at it is if you get a big win against somebody and you know and then maybe you you don't make a bowl but you beat a Michigan or you betta at Ohio State.

I think you know that you couple that with Even a for win season or a 5 Wednesdays. And I think people would be satisfied with that. They'd say, okay, hey look, I mean Indiana's competing. I've seen some people say well gosh, I think it was it was destined to appear actually in the Indy star piece today who was like, well you know, if you win four games but you're just a pain in the ass to play every game and you're in every game until the fourth quarter.

That might that'll probably be satisfying for a lot of people. And this is where I think it gets dangerous with IU because I think there's a certain segment of the fan base, who is, that's what they want. They're perfectly satisfied with IU losing, as long as they gave their best and I think that that is a seductive and often very dangerous thing.

As far as what the expectations of the program should be because ultimately for me, This is a program that can't really afford two straight years of negative momentum, you can afford to kind of be in neutral for a little bit because that happens in college football because it at least puts you in a position where you're in the minds of recruits. You're in the minds of the national media, you're in the minds of your opponent's is as a difficult team to play against

it, to some agreement. That ended up being the way to Kevin Wilson era ended up where it's like well, you know, Indiana didn't really beat any of the big teams they beat Michigan State. I think once. It's under Wilson, they beat a couple of other teams that maybe were surprised and ever beat Wisconsin.

But they, you know, they, they were competitive in a lot of games, not against Wisconsin because we're never competitive against Wisconsin. But but that, you know, Indiana was at least a team that people paid attention to and, you know, they come close against Ohio State, or they come close against a Michigan. Whatever. I think that this year, Indiana has to, at least get to five wins regardless of what else they do.

For it to be considered a successful season relative to the overall state of the program. You know. I don't think you can look at a five and seven season in a year where you play in FCS opponent. And you've got, you know what looks like a relatively weak group of five team at home and say well gosh you know you're only gonna win two more games, you know I like you need at least when three more you need to win a couple of games in the Big 10 you've got. Opportunities there.

I don't think you could look at a 3 or 4 wins season, even though that would technically be better than last year and say, oh, that was an improvement. That was, that was sufficient for this year. I think I you and I think Tom Allen especially not NATO certainly for the fans but definitely on the recruiting Trail have to be able to point back to this season when they're on the recruiting Trail and say see that's a lot closer to what. I you football is not 2021 which

was a blip on the radar. It was a bottoming out that nobody expected. There were a bunch of bad things. It happened. But hey, look, we got this thing back on track quickly. So for me personally, think a 6 win season is got to be the floor for IU because that's what had been established. The previous decade for it to be considered a successful season.

For me, I think, a lot of you fans will look at a five wins season or a for win season, where you knock off a big team and say, that's that's successful. But for me, it's like, at this point you're playing for For, you know, for trophies, you know, relatively speaking you're playing for like the Little Caesars Bowl, you know? But you're playing for the opportunity to further the program, even if it's just incrementally and that's, I guess where I'm at with things now.

I don't think that I use going to get there as you're going to hear in a minute, but I do think that that needs to be the bar of expectations and anything below that, it's hard for him to sell me on the idea that the program has shaken off, what they dealt. Last year and actually has forward momentum at this stage and this is the part another larger. Big picture thing. I know I keep saying until we get to the schedule. But you know, this was kind of,

you know, the analogy. I always had with the Archie Miller era is that, you know, you mentioned like it's you know, getting the six wins is the floor and then getting to a Little Caesars Bowl, but it's like there's also the lingering. You also got to win a bowl at some point too.

And this is this is the Archie, Miller problem, is you kind of were just like mediocre but you know, the The issues of not getting these, you know, these certain checkpoints done, they do start to stack up and then you get to a point where it's like, alright, you gotta win like it maybe the team and the schedule and things aren't lined up for you now, but you by not winning a bowl in six years or as a Le but, you know, in 20 years as a program, for not making a bowl for doing two, and

ten, like all these things stacked up and I am with you, I'm not sure. We're going to get to a bowl, I don't think we, if we got there, we'd win one, but it's like that still has a goal that needs. Accomplished like this, still a boss in the video game, you've got to get through and just because you had a bad year last year in the schedules and break, right? Or you have a lot of question marks. Like we don't just get to now, push off, winning a ball five more years.

Like that is still stacked up and I think that is where I'm concerned about this year. Is that, as you said, if you just kind of go for winds, don't want don't beat a big team. Don't make it to a bowl. It's like all of these expectations, all these things people would like to see, done are now going to continue to be stacked on top of each other and it's like, at some point. You're going to You have to have a season where you do at all, which is asking a lot of this

program. But at some point, we have to ask for that, or we're just going to be watching a program. That's not going to win a bowl. Like this is not going to win a bowl in the next 15 years or even make it to a bowl. And so you know this is where you kind of get to atone for last season by doing knocking a couple of these things off. I mean that's that would be you know, beating Michigan or beating Ohio State. Getting like you said to the Little Caesars bowl and then winning that ball.

If you did that, well, would be a phenomenal season. But I think you're asking too much for the problem is you just you continuing to stack these expectations well and they're not going away. What? And one of the things I find fascinating about the narrative that has suddenly popped up this last couple of months about IU is that o last year was a fluke. You know like oh there was disconnecting the coaching staff Allen and War and didn't get

along. And you know, there were guys that maybe weren't totally bought in and we heard Mike McFadden talk About guys on the team that weren't bought in and there were all these unnamed people on the roster who weren't bought in who checked out at some point during the season who, you know, all of that. Okay. So if that's the case, if that's really the case, if it really was a fluke with all this bad stuff that happened, the culture

fell apart that quickly. The two questions come to mind, the first is culture was supposed to be Tom, Allen's big thing like May not have the best players but we have the best culture and we've got people that love to play for him and for each other and for Indiana University. So it does call into question. How good the culture was if it was able to fall apart that quickly in a season, when everything seemed to have lined up in favor of Indiana playing

really well. And having a chance in a starting with a national ranking, having a chance to be in the National conversation from day, one, but the other thing is I don't think I have one. Inside of your mouth, you can say 2021 was a fluke and you can't take it as an indictment on the Tom Allen error because it was so clearly out of step and then on the flipside, say well we can't expect that much how to the team this year.

And if they win three or four games, we see we need to be positive because that essentially means if last year was a fluke, then they should be able to just get right back to where they were in 2019 and 2020. You know, it should be something that if it's that much of a fluke can be stepped. Over and get you can get back

into your lane. And so I do think to some degree their narrative guess for from last year, the other narrative or we're talking about there is from last year that is, that is also kind of grown out which I really don't like and has not been given a good answer to me, is when you start digging in or asking people about her, people talk about, you know, like the lost to Rutgers, you know, 38, 23 or the Purdue lost 44 27, there's kind of this. Like, oh yeah, well, that's what

the team just gate. Like at that point, it seemed already given up and it's like, well we can't just gloss over like okay, so we're just, you know, The last four games just like we can't really get pissed of them. Losing you 38, 23 at home to Rutgers because like don't forget everyone quit at that point.

It's like well the fact that we're all just agreeing that the team had quit and just stop playing is like that's not that it's kind of mind-boggling that we just were kind of just that's that's what happened and that we're going to assume that you're going to go from a team that we all disagree. Just kind of basically gave up and was just riding out the stretch and just knew they were going to get boat race by Purdue and we're just going to turn on a dime.

I'm and make that a 75-year. It's like I still haven't gotten an explanation to that, right? No. It's I mean, the last four games, this team scored a total of 31 points. A total 44 total games for what is that? 240 minutes of play? They scored a total of thirty one point. I think it's a very good point and it look, I think you can be supportive of IU football and you can ask some very serious questions, not just about that stretch but about the entire

narrative. Out of that, we have been pushed over the course of this offseason which is that, you know, Tom Allen's team needed to find humility again and Alan native. And it's like, my God. I mean, you had like two good for IU seasons and suddenly you need a dose of humility that required a too intense season where the team just stop playing for five of the last six games.

I mean, that's, that's a heck of a, of a bill of sale that people are being asked to pick up and look who Maybe it's right. And and that's going to be the big interesting question about this year is, is there going to be enough demonstrable evidence on the field that last year was a total fluke, but if it is, then we should see this team win six games this year. That, that that's ultimately my point. If it was, it was truly a good point.

If it was truly an anomaly, we should see the team, win more games and and not just two more games. But for more games anyway, let's go ahead and get to the schedule. We're going to hold the Illinois game. Until the end so that we can talk about the Illinois game in like as the lead out rather than talking about it first and going through the rest of the schedule, this is an editorial decision that I have made. So, let's talk about the Idaho game.

This is a game Indiana has to win, certainly, but I will, the one thing I'll say that, and I think they will win. And I'll go first, you go second and then we'll flip the order. But I will say one thing and this is going to sound odd. I feel like it He had a one last year, fifty six to 14, but the lingering feeling out of that. Idaho game was that they weren't dominant enough and it felt like a dumb thing to say, with a team

that won a game by 42 points. But it really did feel like Indiana should have won that game like 73 27 and they didn't. And so, oddly enough, this is a game. I feel like, regardless of what happens in week, one Indiana needs to just step on their their throat from the moment that the the opening Whistle sounds not let up have a lot of offensive Firepower demonstrated throughout the course of the game. By that point, hopefully they'll

be a depth chart. So there won't be anything to hide and you'll know who the starting quarterback is because he throws like eight touchdowns, you know. So I think I do think Indiana has to win this game, but I think Indiana needs to win it in convincing fashion more so than they did last year. Because even though the score looked convincing, I don't know that necessarily the game they played was I love the idea of no depth chart again for Idaho, Turtle yelling for you here then.

Yeah, I mean, this is your thrown me for a loop on the not feeling. Talk about Illinois. Now, this is a, is a must win. I mean, like this is if you lose the Idaho at home pack it up and let's talk about basketball, like the really then let's, let's have really bad discussions. The rest of the year I think will shut down. Crimson Castle. Catch in 2023. You have to win this game.

I disagree with you. Like I just I don't think you can win by, you know, it can't be a close, you know, three-point field goal at the end of the game, but I think as long as you're winning by, you know, 14 to 21 points, I think, as long as the defense looks relatively good in your starters or kind of holding their starters down. I'm, we've had games where he'd beaten bad teams by a lot. Not, it hasn't done much in the season. We've had Seasons where we had close ones.

I just think from a perspective of the fans, you've got to win this game by pretty large. Reginald even has to be more than last year, but yeah, you, you have to win this game. You have to win this game. Let's move on to Western Kentucky as well. Check would say, alright, so I you want to know in both of our books, Western Kentucky. I'm gonna let you start. Go ahead again. I think this is a game that you, you have to win. Western Kentucky is a kind of an interesting team, you know, it's

funny. I listened to dust it. We referencing all is Dustin and Zach everybody else, but I listened to their podcasts. It was great and I think it was A costume who brought up the point, which I hadn't fully thought about that, you know, Alan. And we always talk about the defense of this team and last year, you know, yes, Western Kentucky has this weird Kirk Corky offense, but it's like that's kind of the way.

Allen's defense should be able to stop a team like that and wasn't able to. So again, I think that, yes, Western Kentucky is quirky, but I believe their offensive coordinator is gone. They have some new pieces there. You know, this is a team where again, if Alan is truly going to have this At the level that we expect it to be at, you should be able to be a Western Kentucky at home. I'm not even sure where they are. Madhu us very quickly where they are and like SM P plus.

By, I can tell you, on Pro Football Focus, they are projected to have eight point six wins and an 88 percent chance of making a bowl. So I don't know. I don't know where they are in Sp plus, but I can tell you that they're not, they're not poorly regarded, when it comes to PFF, I think it's the game that you you need to win and this is the point where I will say, this is a game that Indiana will get.

And if you get, if you don't win this, your path to even Four Winds is really going to be suspect and so I will give Indiana this wind. I have a mitt to know I'm a little, I'm a little edgy on this one. You know, Western Kentucky in Sp + going into this upcoming weekend is a 16 point. Favorite over Hawaii and expected to cover that come from Hawaii.

We saw got obliterated by Vanderbilt in week zero so that's not much of a test, but, and maybe it is a good thing that Western Kentucky is traveling to Hawaii. Because that's a long flight back and then they got to turn around and play at Indiana a week later, so the name of that disrupts him a little bit. I think it's gonna be really close game, just very similar to last year and, you know, I think in the end is going to have potentially some Growing Pains.

Early on offense, as they learn to play with each other. This will probably a gate, be a game that they squeak out in similar fashion to like the Florida International game, that they played down there a few years ago or Western Kentucky, that they played a few years ago or last year for that matter.

I'm with you I think it's game was going to be closer than people think like people are just been penciling Western Kentucky and is an automatic W and I do worry about I use coming into that game, perhaps not taking Western Kentucky as seriously as they should, but I'll give them a win in this. I don't want to be overly - at least this early in the prediction string. So, okay, so that we both have them at to know which I, you know, that's a, that's a

positive thing certainly. So, let's Jump Ahead, then to the next game, on the docket, which is Indiana traveling to nippert Stadium to take on the Cincinnati. Bearcats, obviously, this, this was the game last year. Are you really felt like I you left a golden opportunity on the table this year. It's one of those situations where you look at Cincinnati. They lost a lot of pieces but they are still. It's not just that they're

ranked. The ranked 23rd in the AP, poll 22nd the coaches, pull their projected by Pro Football, Focus to win nine games. You know they have a 5% chance to make the college football playoff again this year, I think that's probably a bridge too far.

The American is a Bit better than it was last year but this is still by all accounts a pretty good Cincinnati team and as we know Scott picking Indiana to win on the road period, whether it's in conference or out of conference is a dangerous game and much as I want to pick Indiana in this one, I don't see it happening. I think Cincinnati will not struggle particularly much at home as much as Cincinnati struggled in the first half last year against Indiana.

That's probably not going to happen this time around. I'll take the Bearcats in this one. Yeah. I mean they're projected for nine and a half winds are nine point nine wins this year, still ranks 16th at sfp+ there. They lost a lot but they're bringing a lot back coming. They have a deep, very deep roster for a, you know, for a team, not in the power 5, again, I was going back and looking like, you know, it's been a while since don't even 2019. But, you know, we haven't won a

true Road game. I guess last year was Western Kentucky, but this is going to be a real true. True Road game. The likes of which we haven't played since like 2019. I think this is where the rubber starts to hit the road and you have some muscle memory that hits in maybe a bad and maybe a bad way. And so, yeah. I like, I would say Cincinnati is going to win that game. I was a two-on-one Well - the Illinois game that we've decided not to talk about yet.

So 200 + 0. + 2. + 1. Yeah, so Indiana, then. It's faces off in the next game against the Braska Cornhuskers who have certainly had quite a start to the season already. They go to Dublin, they lose to the Northwest. What's that what their head coach depth chart look like for

that? It's well I think if there's one thing that we're pretty certain of is that regardless of what happens in the next few games, Scott Frost is still going to be coaching that game only because immediately after the game, Scott Frost buyout drops by a significant margin. You know. So you're going to see a situation here where one of two things could potentially be happening with this Nebraska. Team either a they're going to be the figure their next few games.

Are you talked about the the, the yin and the Yang? They play North Dakota FCS team at home. They played Georgia, Southern and then they play Oklahoma at home. And Oklahoma will probably smash them into tiny tiny pieces, so what's likely and then they get to buy that following week. So what you're going to get is a two weeks of like Nebraska licking their wounds after getting obliterated by Oklahoma with a two and two record.

And they're only FBS victory in that stretch coming against Georgia. Southern I imagine the heat is going to be on about maximum and Scott. I guess the question is is that a scenario where Nebraska rallies around Scott, Frost and goes out and plays a great game at home against Indiana, or is that a game, where the players are looking around the locker room saying, you know, He might be gone after this week. It doesn't really matter how we play, I don't know. What do you think?

This is a game that has an absolute. It's funny. Every team were playing with a bunch of question marks at Cincinnati after team is gone. And this is a team where I knew, I loved betting against Scott Frost last year because you just knew like they, they weren't going to beat a good team. Because Scott Frost would make a ton of mistakes at the end. He roll that over to this year and kept it going. Again that said, you know, Lincoln's not an easy place to play.

And their fan base is We're going to look at this stretch at the Heats going to be on, but I think they also look at this as they're playing Indiana. There at Rutgers at Purdue home to Illinois, home to Minnesota. You know, if you're at a Nebraska fan, you're thinking. All right, we could theoretically go for and one in that stretch and we need to. And if we can do that, we can right the ship. And that starts by beating Indiana and to them.

This will kind of almost be a Rubicon because they can't beat Indiana. I'm not sure. They, you know are going to be Illinois or Minnesota, or at Purdue. So be there, for one, could turn into one and four very quickly if they can't beat Indiana. And this is where I want to be optimistic. But there are just so many question marks that it seems full-hearted to say. All the question marks we have

on the offense. Like I don't even know whose have a quarterback is going to look like, I really want to reserve judgment until you this Saturday morning. But from what I see now and what, I know It sucks because this is probably one of the most winnable good Marquee games that you could have versus like not playing at, you know, at Illinois like an actual real, big ten road win, it's there. It's gettable. You have a coach who is going to

try and hand it to you. I think we're going to lose. Okay, I think it's gonna be close, but I could see us losing this one like 28 to 24 or something. So by the time this game starts Over a full football season in 2020 on and a partial football, season of 54 games up to that point. There's a distinct possibility that in that season and a half. Essentially Nebraska will have a total of 5 wins and those five wins leading into the Indiana

game. Will have come against Fordham Buffalo, North, Western North Dakota and Georgia Southern. That's, that's the so I to some degree. I hear what you're But your argument like that Lincoln's a tough place to play. I think that used to be the case but I don't know that that's necessarily the case now and we've seen not just good teams going to Lincoln and win but average to poor teams going to Lincoln and win.

You know whether you're talking last year with Purdue went in and beat them and you know you had I mean, Iowa beat them at the end of the season, they were really good, but even in the previous year, you know, they lost at home to Minnesota who wasn't that great? They lost it home to Illinois, who certainly wasn't that great? I think it is going to win this game because I think that this team is going to quit on Scott Frost when they lose like 63 272, Oklahoma and have to lick

their wounds for two weeks. And here, everybody, and Lincoln talked about how bad they are. So I'm going to give value the win here. I think this is the exactly the type of game that Indiana can win. Especially Really good defense on the road who has got experience playing in tough environments and isn't going to be rattled by a crowd at Memorial Stadium in Lincoln, that's likely going to be pretty rattled themselves. So anyway, let's move on next game in the last got frosting.

Just the oh yes, one stat that I heard that even from right now if he wins 50 games in a row as a coach he will still have a worse record than Bo Pelini had when they fired him. Which is just if you're a Nebraska Fan, you're just like, I'm, I'm done. I'm out. Lex next game. Next week for Indiana noon kickoff. We think homecoming, they play Michigan, Michigan. I mean, this there still is next. Okay, yeah, Marilyn. That's you know, that's the thing.

There's not much to say about this one. I mean, the question here is kind of lost like damage control more than anything else. It's not just will Indiana lose. Can Indiana. Get out of this without losing three or four starters for the season two like season. Injuries because that it always feels like that happens when you turn into October and you got to start playing these really top team. So yeah, we both have that one

as a loss, all right? But I will say this yes piggybacking very quickly off of what you said about. You know, if last year was a blip, it's frustrating because the thing about 2020 that I liked so much was our win against Michigan where we really just manhandled them. I know, it's a, you know, covid year, no fans all that, but on the field we were pushing them around.

Like we were getting The extra true yards like you watch that game and you'd be like, oh, the team in red is the historically good team, like, and to go from that to now, where you and I are just back to the, oh yeah, we're going to like a treating them, like Ohio State that's frustrating like that, really? I just want to take a moment, take a breath and say that's where I'm pissed because that was the moment in 2020 where I'm

like, this feels different. And if we are at the point where, you know, our lines and everything we're doing is at a level of In and were able to kind of not just win on like a weird fluky. You know, we had a couple of weird plays and they threw three interceptions. We had to go crazy reach and over time, but like we actually beat the hell out of Michigan. That game would have gone 5/4. We would have beat him by more. The fact were there within 18 months. We go from that to like, all

right. Yeah. They're they're they're two laps ahead of us. It's that that's bothersome and something. People should just take a breath and be like that. Something that sucks. That's all I'm saying. On the flip side, I think that 2020 game was about the, the most abnormal of games. I mean that Michigan won two games that year, they beat Minnesota and they beat Rutgers, I think was the other team that they beat like, that was, that was a bad Michigan team, that was very much like a game.

You're reading scores from the night, early, 1950s and lightweight Indiana, beat Michigan, and still went to and 7. Like what happened? That kind of I think we're gonna people are going to look back, 50 years, like we're going to be sitting here when were 90 email Yeah, I was has a great. Give me a grandpa like Michigan suck that year. Like why are you even mentioning this? So you know I just I don't I don't I don't I don't foresee it anyway.

All right, Maryland at home. This Maryland team is rated pretty well in the conference there they're projected on PFF college with six point seven wins it. Obviously, last year, kind of felt like Maryland's breakthrough year to some degree under Mike locksley as much as we've Lampoon them. They went to a bowl, they obliterated Virginia. Tech in that bowl.

They they had a, you know, it was one of those that seat the season last year that Marilyn had is the kind of season that we want Indiana to have eke out a bowl. I mean, Maryland wins last year, we're going to West Virginia Which give them credit for that Howard Adeline oil which was a surprise I've ever watching that Kent State Indiana by three at home and at Rutgers to close the season but they got waxed by Michigan, they got waxer. By Michigan State.

They got waxed by Penn State, they got obliterate, like absolutely destroyed by Ohio State and they lost by double digits to Minnesota. So, you know, and they also lost 5114 to Iowa. So, this is a team when they lost last year. They lost big. This is a kind of a fulcrum game because they're probably going to be better, because there's a lot of talent. Mike locksley is done. A really good job recruiting their the question is, can they go on the road and beat?

Indiana is Indiana going to be good enough that they avoid. The Fate that Oi had last year where they lost to Maryland at home. So to me, I think this is the game where, you know, being at home helps. And I think that again, in my scenario, you know, we've we've won at home and Idaho, we've won at home at Western Kentucky. We've lost now three in a row in my world and your world.

We had a win at Nebraska, you know, II, hope that most fans are at least understanding that a loss to Michigan is not the end of the season, but I think this is where the fans can rally a Bit help, pick you up and and like you I think Maryland's a little bit overrated, this year, their SP, I think in the 50s which seems a little bit high. And so I think this is a, you know, a nice spot for Indiana. Yeah we'll win go in the hole.

Wow. Okay I'm I'm kind of Maryland and Rutgers I think we're going to go 1 and 1/2. Be honest like I'm not sure which one we're going to win, which one we're going to lose. It feels like we might lose the, the home game, and win the road game, which is kind of, yeah, we're eiu waved, it which is, which is where I was, I was going with it, but I'll just have, I want. I want fans to show up. I want to be positive for home games. We're going to win the home.

You know, I look, I think that's a reasonable thing. And I do think as you said Marilyn's, been overrated, And I think that even if they are around as good as what people think, if there are six win or like a projected 6 to 7 win team, this is a game that they could very easily lose and not have it ruin their season. I mean, Maryland schedule, is they a buffalo Charlotte Southern Methodist, they're going to win all three of those games. They got Michigan. Michigan, stay.

They're gonna lose those two. They got Purdue Indiana Northwestern, they probably go to and one in those games that get some 25, and then they still have Rutgers at home to close the season. So there's an easy path. Two to six and six for this Maryland team, you know, even if

they lose this, Indiana game. And I think at this point, I'd feel comfortable picking Indiana to win, just because this is a, these are two programs that are very similar to each other and talent level in overall execution and in predictability or reliability. And that is to say neither of them are particularly reliable at all. So, I like Indiana in that game. Barely, I don't think it's, I think it's one where Indiana probably doesn't cover but I

think they can. In okay, our Rutgers at Rutgers the following week, I'll go ahead and say, I think they're going to lose this game and look, I think Rutgers the what they did to Indiana last year. Probably, should be illegal in several States. It's but an Indiana deserved it that, but but I do think the what gets lost is Greg, Schiano is a really good coach. And yes, I think his team's going to take a step back this year, on the offensive line.

They still don't really have a good quarterback. Yeah, but I also think that much like I think Indiana will win at home against a Maryland team, that's not particularly reliable. I think Rutgers is going to beat an Indiana team at home. That is not particularly reliable, you know, when in Piscataway against Indiana, team is not particularly reliable. And, again, it's a must-win game for Rutgers because they just, they don't have a lot of opportunities to pick up wins in the Big Ten.

And they've got a golden opportunity in the middle of October because they get Nebraska at home. And it might be Nebraska with a brand-new coach. They get a bye and then they get Indiana. That's a really tough setup for Indiana. I don't like their chances in this one so I'm going to pick a

loss. Yeah, I'm also going to pick Indiana to lose them and take the under on, whatever the over-under is, because she on has a great defensive coach Allen is going to have it. This could be a seven-to-three game. This could be like a Xander diamant special. So, yeah, I think that, like I said, I Indiana's history, probably means we lose Maryland and when truckers and have just a weird flip-flop, but I already picked us to win the Maryland game.

It's like I said, I think we're going one-on-one in the stretch and so I will also have is losing to Rutgers and then I get to buy the following week. Then they get Penn State at home. I mean, feels like that game in 2020 gets further and further away every single day, which it does actually that's how time works. I've learned, but it just, and Penn State is kind of an interesting spot because they just signed James Franklin, to this big contract extension and to some degree.

Often wonder why Penn State right now is picked sixth in the conference in terms of overall wins their projected for? I think so, Seven point two wins right now on the season which for Penn State is pretty bad. You would think, okay? Penn State, that's a team that should be like right up there with Ohio State and Michigan, but they just don't have a lot in the hopper. They're not ranked coming into the season. Michigan state is projected with

slightly more wins. Even though I think they're a big regression candidate and it just looks like I think Penn State is going to struggle against big teams, but this is also a Penn State. It's very physical, they're very well, put together, they're very solid and I can easily see Penn State losing a bunch of, you know, they got a, they got to go to Purdue, they could lose that game. They got to go to Auburn. They got to go to Michigan.

They got Ohio State of the home, they got Michigan State at home. They could lose all of those games, but they could win literally every other see game on their schedule, because I think they're just better than all of those other teams that they're playing, but, you know, not just the Indiana's, but the Minnesota's, and, and the Maryland's in the Rutgers.

So, I I think Indiana could be competitive in this and, you know, if Indiana gets some momentum, if they somehow beat Maryland and Rutgers, you never know. I mean, they get a week off, they could roll in. I just don't see that happening here. So, I'm gonna take Penn State in this one, the Penn State Penn State's weird because when you look at the Big Ten eith, I'm going to say, we're going to lose but I'll just talk.

Expertise lie for a second, Ohio State and Michigan are in a different category and people normally lump Penn State into that. With them, but it's like, Penn State has been to one big ten title game, they always recruit pretty well, but it's like, it never seems to lead to enough. And yet, we always play them, you know, tough.

But we never, we have a tough as tough a Time, beating Penn State and like things net outside of the penix play and the game in 2020, which maybe is Kismet every other time we play them lines up where it's like, oh, like, you know, they have the huge scandal with Ski everyone shut off its like oh that's the year. We have standards him on as a quarterback and we lose Lily 2:50 you know every time we have an opportunity to get a couple on Penn State.

Something happens on our side too, they've never been a team that frightens me, we play them way tougher than we should yet. We never beat them outside of 2020. I know we did, but it's like we're always. We're just always really close and can't get it done. They don't scare me. It's not a team. They shouldn't be the In the world, like lumping in with Ohio State and Michigan is like this threesome. It's not there. Not there.

We every time we lose them it feels like it's only a seven-point game all that said you know, we're not beating them this year. They're just there isn't enough there. We're not going to beat him this year. So yes, we're losing to them next week. Indiana. At Ohio State, not in the face. That's about all I can say about that one. Just just I mean almost a is that Notre Dame is a top 10, ranked team? Yeah they are playing at the Horseshoe Notre.

Dame is also a hugely public tedious that people put money on. That Vegas knows. They are a 17 point Underdog. I will say James that I recorded a podcast today. I never hit record if you like such an idiot, but we are talking about this, I think The goal for this game is not winning, is that you would like, to go into that game and not be a 30-plus point Underdog to Ohio State, like, you'd like to keep it at 28.5. Like just, let's not be a 30-point, dog at Ohio State

going into the game. I just don't want to lose by 40 points. Plus, I mean, I don't care what the spread is. I would just prefer to cover it even if it's by one point look Indiana's. Play-Doh. Hi. Yo, State at times in the last ten years, pretty competitively, it hasn't always shown in the final score. Last year's game was an absolute Abomination.

Like, if you sat through the rain at Memorial Stadium and watch that game, you know, watching Indiana, Just systematically Surrender in every phase of the game. Is it went on was one of the more embarrassing parts of the Year, despite the fact that everybody will have state was awesome. But watching that happen was really disappointing and you gotta go to the horseshoe.

Maybe you capture, Ohio State looking past you as they should, but I just want to see Indiana compete a little bit in this game. And if compete means only losing by 28, instead of 42, so be it. But I mean, there's, they're not winning this game so it's not even worth talking about.

All right, at Michigan State, penultimate game of the season for Indiana. So, we've talked a lot in other podcasts about Michigan State, probably being a little overrated, their 15th coming into this season, and yet, there are pro I'll Focus projection is only seven point Four Winds. This is a team that looks primed for some degree of regression to the mean. And you know, you look, you look

at what they did last year. Obviously, they deserve a huge amount of Applause for going 11 and to that, you know, they'll really only had one bad game all year. They like many other teams got obliterated by Ohio State, but they did so much good the rest of the season. If only they hadn't lost to Purdue, I mean, who knows what happens? You know, down? Stretch with them in terms of, you know the new year six bowls

or stuff like that. But the sneaky thing about them last year is kind of a sneaky thing about Indiana. The previous year which is that they made hey against a bunch of really bad teams. You know, you look at their first ten games of the season, they did beat Michigan and I'm not going to take that away from them. But it's a rivalry game against a Michigan team that they just seem to own you. Look at the rest of the teams. They beat Northwestern, Youngstown State Miami.

Team that ended up firing their coach at the end of the year. Nebraska Western Kentucky. Rutgers Indiana Purdue Maryland like that, was there, that was there wins, you know, and yes they did beat Penn State at the tail end of the season. I don't take that away but like most of their wins came against pretty subpar competition and even struggled against Indiana who was on on Vapors at that point. Like they barely beat that. Indiana thing, go back and watch

that tape this year. The one thing that's really interesting about them, is they they've got some sneaky interesting games on the schedule, they got to go to Washington for the Michael penix experience.

Hopefully, Michael is still starting by week 3, they got to go to Maryland, they had Ohio State at home, Wisconsin at home, and they're at Michigan and in there at Illinois, in a four week span, from October leading into December or deceit to November. I couldn't we play them in that Illinois. Now, thought like I would love to get him a oh, the Ohio state Wisconsin. Michigan. And let me get him after that. Yeah, I know, I know. But instead of Rutgers does but

but look, I don't think. I know that Michigan state is so good that they're going to just cruise through all of that. And I think they could come into that Indiana game with maybe a 6 and 4 record, or 5, and 5 record or something like that. I think it's entirely in the cards for this Michigan State team. That said, I mean, it's hard for me to Envision, I mean, to 2019, Indiana team who was

significantly better. Lost at Michigan State against, what was a, not a great Michigan State team that year. I have a hard time seeing Indiana Waltzing in to Spartan Stadium and knocking off Michigan State this year. So I'm going to I'm going to mark that down as another L. I do think if Indiana was playing Michigan State at home, this year may be a different story but they're not agreed. Maybe if they play him in a different, a different time of the year they there. Unfortunately.

That that stretch is going to be rough for the on there at Washington for Michigan State there at Washington like I said, Ohio state Wisconsin, Michigan. At Michigan. But then they get a little bit of get right playing at Illinois, Rutgers at home, and then they get Indiana at home. The home back-to-back. I don't like either. So and again, what I will say is that to me, Michigan, state is really the team that we got to keep our eye on as Indiana fans

and how we play against them. And this is a game that I think is, is a huge game because, you know, I was joking about Penn State, but, you know, you have Ohio State, you have Michigan, you have Penn State, and then if If we get to a point where Michigan state is just a bridge too far, and like I said earlier, pods, you know, the last six years were three and three against them. We have a second, second place finish in the Big 10 East, they don't.

And a lot of our winds have been more lopsided toward us. And a lot of our losses have been really close games. I would say that we've been better in that series over six years, in a lot of different ways. If we let them kind of, you know, get ahead of us by a

furlong. So to speak in horse racing terms, that's not good because We can't be at the bottom with Rutgers and Maryland death fighting for one or two wins every year and maybe, you know, they get rid of Divisions but it's like Michigan, State's a great avatar for where we want to be as a program. Where if things break, right? You can win a couple of those games. So it's just I'm very curious to this game. I don't think we're going to win.

But if this is a game again where it's like a thirty eight to ten, or just a complete beat down, I think I think you need to throw some Sirens off because sure, you can get smoked by Ohio State and gets poked by Michigan. But if you're letting State get to a point where you can't see them. They're taillights anymore. You've got a, you've got a problem. That means this is really gone off the rails in two years. Anyway, Finally, the old Oaken Bucket game. Anything can happen? It's true.

I say it all the time but it's true. So two things about this. First of all, the level to which Purdue fans act like they're put upon and football and then they get this brown bunny of a schedule where they have, they have one ranked opponent all season right now and it's Wisconsin on the road, the rest of their schedule even unranked. State team, Indiana State at Syracuse FAU at Minnesota at Maryland, Nebraska at Wisconsin, Iowa and Illinois Northwestern at Indiana. I mean, good.

God honestly, it's an embarrassment. If you're pretty, when you don't go ten and two against the schedule and I wanted to write that down, put it in the on letters. That's an embarrassment.

If you don't go 10 and to that, that is, that is a cakewalk of a schedule for Purdue and it just, it's, it looks Prime for a little bit of underachievement, but this is a Purdue team that because of how much of it Cakewalk that schedule is is projected to win seven point, eight games this year by PFF college and I think it's worth noting unfortunately for IU and the Tom Allen experiment that Alan's only beaten Purdue once during his time at IU and it was you know that multiple overtime

game that they played up in Ross Aid in the 2019 season. When Peyton Ramsey pulled the game out of the mouth of the tiger a couple of times Managed to figure out a way to win it, Purdue really right of the ship last year and they do deserve some credit for that but this year it feels like everything's lined up for Purdue to compete. I mean, action of an 8% chance to win the conference there in the Western Division.

And you look at the teams over there, it's like I mean Minnesota is favored to win a little bit more like half a game. More Wisconsin's actually projected have slightly fewer wins. Is Iowa's projected to have slightly fewer wins. I mean these are decimal points, we're talking about here but you look at that that Division and you say you know, produce got as good a chance as any of them to win that Division and get to the conference title game, which would be disgusting.

And that makes this IU game very important for them and it may be at a point where it's not that important Indiana. This is the kind of game that if Indiana's within three games of Purdue going into this game, this is a game Indiana. Be expected to win at home because it's the bucket game and because they should be playing over their heads on this.

I doubt that will happen though because as we've seen so far in the Tom Allen era they've struggled to play against teams Purdue teams that were kind of at their same level, you know. They they lose in that game that you. And I went to in 2017. Indiana does up in Ross Aid. The following year in 2018, Purdue wins by 2821 again. This Time in Memorial Stadium. They did win in 2019 and that rain-soaked game 41. Or 4441 was the final Indiana.

Didn't get to play them in 2020, which is a shame because I think they would have beaten Purdue again, because pretty wasn't very good that year. And then last year, obviously, it wasn't even like those two teams weren't shouldn't even know in the same field with each other. That's how Superior Purdue was in that game. I can't pick Indiana in this game. Like the nothing that's happened. The last year-and-a-half would tell me that Indiana's put themselves in a position. To beat Purdue.

So I yeah, I think unfortunately, I got to pick Purdue in this man. What about you? I was thinking of that 27 game that we went to and you and I were both frustrated because of the time and I can't, I can't remember all, but I remember at a time we had the discussion that, you know, Purdue didn't have more Talent than Indiana. I think Indiana was coming off of the Pinstripe.

Bowl that the year before Purdue was coming off of, like, horrible season and the Indiana was carved the Foster Farms Bowl the previous season. That's right. That's right. That's right. But it's like, you know, we were like the Indiana. His Superior Talent or just has a better level of town of nothing else. Our talent is equal, but yet we both were pissed in the third quarter because we're like, Purdue is just the way better Coach team just not making

mistakes. Not making mental errors and, you know, we've kind of always judged ourselves against, you know, Brom, but to your point out Islands, only beaten them one time. Again, 2020 probably would have gotten a win, so it's a little bit unfair, but it is what it is, but there's a lot of bad losses there. And I would also say this That, you know, I'm still gonna have a hard time getting the taste out of my mouth.

As I said earlier of how this team when things started to go wrong, just completely quit on and everybody seemed to quit at the end of last year and, you know, you and I both have us now in our projections, losing four games in a row going into this their own for there's not a chance of the bowl and unfortunately going to have maybe again in our reality here may be a tough loss at Rutgers a big loss to Penn A ass-kicking at Ohio, State may be a tough loss of Michigan State.

Like, you have all the makings of another situation where all the Alchemy is, right, for a team to kind of start quitting again and does Alan. And this coaching staff does the is there enough muscle memory to make sure this doesn't happen again. I'm not sure. And that would be my fear. Is that a team?

It's on a five-game or a four-game losing streak in the Big Ten, hope of a You know, successful quote-unquote season is gone and in our scenarios that we have here, we haven't gotten that big win, we're not playing for a bowl, so you're not really playing for much. Does this team have what it takes to kind of, you know, circle the wagons and get it done. And I got to go off recent history and I didn't see it last year and they really, really didn't circle the wagons and so I am with you.

I think they lose the Purdue. All right. So let's jump back to the start of things. This Illinois game, I'm sorry. I made you wait till the last second here, but I think, actually, this helps because a lot of times you can get you and me, both can get carried away. It's like, oh, they're gonna win this and then this. And I think I like to avoid that with the first game. So let's talk about this Illinois game. So this game at one point this summer, Indiana was favored by

six. Yep. The sharps have jumped all over this game in the last 24 hours and Indiana is now favored by one and a half was five and a half before Illinois beat Wyoming. And then it went to three. I didn't know. To move down to one and a half. Yeah, I'm looking at, I'm looking at PFF college right now. And right now, Indiana is a one and a half Point favorite, as of, this is where this 1058 on Wednesday night, money, line for Indiana is minus 136. Illinois is plus 1, 13.

Indiana overall is grading out, essentially as I've been the slightest of favorites, in terms of the overall game, this is almost essentially a toss-up on a neutral field and, or excuse me a toss-up at home for Indiana, which means on a neutral field, that Illinois would probably be slightly favored. Now, Illinois, I didn't look awesome in that game against Wyoming. They search, you know, they Wyoming is not very good. So it's hard to take a whole lot out of that game.

But Illinois did look competent. And there's, you know, there's the arguments either way, it's like, is it an advantage or a disadvantage that your opponents haven't seen you? You know, I'm sure Indiana would argue. Well, it's an advantage because they don't know what we're going to do. Illinois is going to be like, well, it's an advantage because the more depth chart.

Right? Well yeah, you know, he's gonna probably argue, hey, it's an advantage because we got to play a game with each other and actually it's funny. I think for Illinois it might be less of an advantage than it would have been for Indiana. Because Indiana has a bunch of guys that have never played together on offense before, you know? So it almost wish that the roles were a little bit reversed here but clearly, this is a game between I mean two teams that aren't great or even necessarily

good. These are two teams that are going to struggle for the course of the season to claw enough wins together to get to bowl eligibility right now, Illinois, with that win their projected at 6.5 wins on the season Indiana's projected at 4.4, which is tied for last in the conference with Rutgers. I think if I saw correctly, Bill Connolly's sfp+ predictions. Actually have this game. As a 23:23 tie which can't happen. But it essentially it I think it rates out to Illinois winning by

one in his projections. So either way, you want to look at this from an analytics perspective. This is a game that the computers can't decide between the two teams so I'll ask you first. How do you see this going? And, you know, let's just let's just kick stick with that. How do you see this going? So be smarter than a computer. Right. You're asking? Yes, I'm I will say this. I want to give you a compliment happy.

You did this the way you did. Because I had some very big thoughts about Illinois and I think it connects to, it would have messed up my whole well done. I'm saving this fast. So yeah, against what I do. All right here, you're a pro. Here's my thought we talked about the Idaho game. This is a must-win game like this is because and this is where I would have gotten this. All It. But I do believe this.

If you can't be Illinois and home, you're not going to beat Nebraska. You're not get, you're not going to beat Mario. You're not going to tell me as a fan. That this team has what it takes to beat Nebraska to beat Maryland to be truck. Maybe Rutgers, but there's nobody else in the schedule in the Big Ten that I think you can beat if you can't be Illinois. And I've lived through so many seasons where we have, you know,

a really close loss. And then we have the post game where it's like, man, we were so close and you were getting there and we have a lot to build on And you know, to me it's like that's all out the window. This is a results game. You've not told us anything that's fine. Last year was a blip, that's fine, go out and win a game. Like I do not care how you do it, you can do it by 30.

You can do it by 3, and then we can discuss things later, but we are now in a results business, with this team. I'm tired of, hey, we're going to have four wins, we're moving in the right direction. Like, no, no, we moved in the right direction, five years ago, we are now in the Direction Where We want to be and that's a team that wins. At home against Illinois, a team that you're only four spots below and SP plus not saying that's like the Bible.

But this is not a bridge too far, and if you can't beat this team, Rutgers is the only other team you're going to play in the Big Ten. That's, that's similar to this team in a rankings scenario. So if you want any kind of fan support this year, you got to win this game because you don't win this. I mean, I'm still a fan. I'll still go but it's like I'm not going to go expecting to win any other game because it'll be based on literally, no evidence.

If you It win this game. So you have to come in. You have to win this game. This is a great matchup for Indiana. That needs them in so much better. We're not playing like Penn State or Michigan State, or Ohio State. So, all it's so important. You have to win this game. All that said, I think we're gonna lose. I'll say all that. Like I do think. I think we're going to lose. I think it's going to be tight. I just, I will go back to To everything that we talked about.

There are question marks. You know, if we were going into this season and we didn't know who the quarterback was and we had a new defensive coordinator, I think you. And I would both be talking. That's a lot of question marks going in this year, we have that. Plus, we don't know who our running backs are we don't know who are our best wide. Receiver is a guy who played quarterback last year. We don't know anybody else. We have a new offensive coordinator.

Just tons and tons of questions on a hiss team that historically

has just not done. Well, with answering questions, not done well coming back from Bad years and you can say, alright, well things can be different but there's just noodles of history on my side and just like we've been in this scenario many times and the same thing happens over and over again, and the seat feels like a team that's going to lose to Illinois. Beat Idaho, beat, Western Kentucky. And then be like, all right, and we're kind of moving in the right direction.

And then we're just gonna have a bunch of losses. After that, we talked about, you know, finding the right way. We're so close and tough losses. Has and all that BS. But I will say to the team, I'd love to be proven wrong. I don't think it's going to be a blow. I think it's going to be really, really, really close, but I think we're going to lose. I think that's an eminently Fair. I've really gone back and forth

on this one, a bunch. And I've I think that The one thing about this game that I think might not be a Harbinger one way or another, the rest of the season is I think there's going to be a lot of residual. We want to go out and prove something attitudes among the players because they've heard a lot this offseason and for the people that were coming back last season about how inadequate they are at the various things

that they're doing. And, you know, I think this Defense does feel slept on and they've been pretty quiet on it throughout the course of the offseason. I think that the offense even though it is kind of put together with duct tape right now. In terms of the lineup, I do think that there's, there's a different approach being taken, that's going to be better than last year, and, you know, as long as they can get adequate

blocking. And this is probably a good game for the, for this for this IU team because I don't think Illinois is Is in the Personnel shape to really be able to adequately test. The IU offense of wine in the way that a Michigan or a Penn State or an Ohio state would. And even if they are, I don't think that they got a very good. Proving Ground game last week against Wyoming to some degree.

I almost wonder if that might have given them a little too much confidence in their ability to stop an opposing offense. So this is tough because you know, I know this is not me being optimistic, this is me thinking. All right, this is a game that is winnable because of the opponent. It's also winnable because of the circumstance, so I think Indiana again, like you said, it's a close game. I do think that that they win

this one. And it's probably not that high scoring of a game because I think Indiana is going to struggle a lot on offense. I think Illinois is likely going to struggle on offense because of Indiana's defense. I think it could come down to some degree to special teams and I think ultimately because Indiana is at home because it's a night game because I think it'll be a fun atmosphere for most of the game. I think Indiana wins this. It'll be something like something dumb like 22:18 or

something. Like Bat where, you know, I would take the under in this game because I think both of these teams are going to struggle to score, and I think it's going to be frustrating for both fan bases to watch. But I'll take Indiana with the win in this one. I don't feel good about it and I'll probably be eating my words

when we podcast. Inevitably this coming Sunday, but I'll take it. If that's the case, you know, if Indiana loses, it will prove a lot of the things I have in the back of my head about where this team is really at talent-wise and coaching wise and if they Win. Then it gives me a glimmer of hope that perhaps they figured some things out that they needed to figure out in the offseason

and I hope they win. I mean it would be a real shame as you said to lose the fan base after the first game, because as you said, if they lose this game, even though I don't think it's going to be particularly well, attended at Scott, Dolson said, you know, they're aiming for like the low 40s in attendance and that's almost entirely a product of the fact that this is a high school football weekend and a lot of people that I know who would normally be, there are not going

to be able to be there because they're going to be a South of the going to be it you know, whatever teams are playing but it would be a shame for people to wake up on Saturday morning or come home on Friday night, turn on the game and be like, well that's what I expected and no wonder I wasn't excited about things so so I do think Indiana wins this just to recap.

This means Scott ended up with a projection of 3 and 9 for the season with Indiana, beating Idaho, Western Kentucky and Maryland and that's it. It means Ins and I'm disgusted in myself. This is some degree. Means I finish with a five and seven projection because I had Indiana beating Illinois, Idaho. Western Kentucky, Nebraska and Maryland, but both of us basically had Indiana. No, no longer winning after the 15th of October which when you think about it, that's pretty much.

That's, that's our brand. That's an Indiana, that's it. But look, I think honestly, I think that might be the, the upper and lower bounds of what this Deanna team can accomplish. I mean, I think a three win season would be a disaster. I think that would really, would be very hard to look at a three win season and say that things are going in the right direction. And this is what, You Know, Dan was talking about on the podcast you did with him.

That would be a real clear indicator, that the momentum really has died out. I think a five wins season is one of those where it's not a success, but it's also not a failure, you know, you more than double your wind total. You want a road game in the Big Ten?

You win three big. Ten games, you know, she go 3 and 6 in conference, you still don't go to a bowl and you probably have games like yeah, you know, but you but, you know, you're looking at that Purdue. Now, I will say this, in this scenario there five and six going into the Purdue game

playing for a bowl. Yeah. Which you know I think in the eyes of a lot of people would be at least a move forward for IU and I moved back to somewhat of the normalcy that they had established to the first four years. So we'll see, you know that and that's something I got onto with Martha. Like to me that's I think in the end I think that would be a very successful Seasons. We can be playing for a bowl in the Oaken Bucket game. That would be great.

I think we're going to get, I don't think we have to win it, you win the bucket. We beat Purdue and get to a bowl. But you know when you look back on Allen's ten-year-old, you talk about, you know, being in the right direction. And again, if 2021 is a blip, it's based on the fact that even the years we didn't make a bowl, we were playing for a Bowl against Purdue. And so that, that is, that does mean. Nothing when you're you know, so close to the edges of Indiana.

You're really on that, you know, Mendoza Line I think that's important. I think it's a big difference being in that game with five wins versus Four Winds like that that just makes a big difference because at least there's some hope if you're going with four wins. It's like, all right, well, we're not playing for really

anything. Yeah. Well, we'll see, I mean look, there's a lot of intrigue, not nationally, and probably not even with a large part of the fan base, like a large part of the fan base is kind of written off IU football. Which is a shame, but it was bound to happen. Given what happened last year?

Like, it was, it was as predictable as the sun coming up in the East. But, you know, for those of us who have been in this thing for the Long Haul Scott, we know we've been here before and it's kind of like, you know, I'm curious what we see, because I just don't know, and I can't remember like even though last year when entirely off the rails, I I you know, I knew what we would get, it was exactly wrong but I knew going in and I can't think of the last season

where we went into the year not having no clue what we were going to get. Maybe Kevin Wilson's like third season, where it's like they had to put this together or is it going to be another like three or four win year and you know if that was a weird year that they got was 2013. That is the last time I can, it's been a decade basically since I felt like I had no clue what to expect out of the team and that's essentially where I've been.

All summer, and I don't even know if that's going to get solved in the first three weeks of the Season. Like it, I think it's really going to get to that Cincinnati game before we really have a sense of what this team looks like. I've never been as curious for a season as I am for this one. Any I just projected three wins. So I don't think we're going to be great but exactly to your point you come in and previous years and at least it's like all right I know I know what I'm envisioned.

A good Michael penix, I envisioned a bad boy. Michael penix. I envisioned a good bench, apple and vision. A good son failed. I know the the offense that this team likes to run. I don't know any of that and nobody does. Like, I mean, and even with Walt Bell, it's like, all right. Well he was an offensive coordinator. But that was like, what six years ago, he was a head coach for six years. Like he, and it seems like he

has all hands off at he could. I'm not saying it's gonna happen, he could just be like, hey, we're gonna go air raid. The core just, I picked up Western Michigan's Playbook last year, we were there. We're just going to go nuts and just, we're going straight deep routes all the time we could. That we could go nothing but for yard runs. We could go with no running backs and just we're going to

use the pass as a run. We're going to go no passing and just go running 42 yards every single time. Like, we could do, I formation, like, Wishbone. Like I have no idea. It's all on the tents. All the table. We could have flea flickers or daughter than McCauley playing. This could be. It's a little bit of like we got a tiny bit of this, in the Bill, Lynch era where he would run some just wild plays the Middle of games. Like what are you doing?

Like you're lining up. You'll five wide receivers on one side and like it is the, I don't know who's going to play. I don't know who the quarterback is, I don't know the style we're going to play. I don't know what jerseys were going to have fun. Like I just I do not know what's coming out of that tunnel and for me that's that's interesting because we just haven't seen that before.

I'm not sure it's going to result in a lot of wins, but I am very intrigued and like we said in one of the other ones you have this dichotomy of Was 20, 21, the blip, or was 2022 the 2020 or 2022 blip? And it feels like that might be solved with a lot of these these questions. But it's to me, it's this is a fascinating year and I'm I wouldn't miss this one game for anything. So I think it's going to be just a lot of stuff will be revealed

in my mind. I think I'm going to know a lot more at the end of the Illinois. Gave him. I could be wrong to where I just felt like I need two more games to figure this team out but it's I couldn't even tell you what the first four. Plays are going to look like. Now, I or the first four quarters. It's just like, the whole thing's a mystery and look, we anyone noticed like we talked this whole podcast we really talk about players too much because what do you say like?

I mean I think we're right. There's no depth, good point. Yeah right. Can't blame us for that one of anyway. So um anyway I think we've gone long enough. Good to be back with you Scott and talking about this. Again, we programming note, folks, what we're going to do You even though there's a Friday game we're going to keep our North.

We haven't talked about this Scott I'm just letting you know we're going to keep our normal Sunday podcast schedule, not Saturday. We're going to give everybody an extra day off ruminate on the game a little bit. Let's enjoy calm it down. Slightly watch watch all the good college football that's going to happen on Saturday and then we'll be back Sunday morning we may do that when live we're still playing around with the live things.

It depends on how awful Scott and I look at 9:30 in the morning. When we drag ourselves out of bed and say, let's talk how you football, this town and get me some coffee. You know? It's sometimes it's not pretty. So we might have to shower or something. Before we do we go live.

But if we do, check us out on Twitch, we're going to try to go live on Twitch. As I mentioned, the, the channel is Crimson cast live on Twitch. Subscribe, you'll get a notification, and we're going to probably do all of our Lives stuff there while still putting the podcast out on the feeds. A couple of other quick programming notes. Normally during football season. And we're going to keep this this year. We normally tape tape, we normally record. There's no tape anymore.

You know. I made a Maxwell. Yeah, Jonathan Wilson's recording. Our podcasts know. We're, we normally record a preview podcast on Thursday night or Friday. Sometime during the day, depending on when the game is, if it's an early game, sometimes we'll, we'll do it Thursday night and sometimes just not both of us sometimes. Just one of the other. There's normally going to be at least one other podcast that pops up during the week on the feed. That'll be focusing on football.

Whether that's an interview or something else. We try to bring folks in from around the IU Spectrum, to talk about stuff. So we will have a decent amount of content for you moving forward. And if you have comments questions, whatever you can always reach us on Twitter at Crimson cast right in anytime. You know, we don't get to every there's still comments and questions we have from a couple days ago.

We don't get to all of them but you folks are always generous with your time time and your thoughts and we always appreciate that. So please keep those coming in, we'd love to see them and we will be with you all season, we're not going anywhere. We podcast it, through all the last year and got it. We did that. We're going to we're going to podcast. I mean, it can't be much worse than it was last year. And well, I didn't say it can't be worse. I just had a can't be much worse.

It could be worse, but we'll be around all season. So hopefully you folks around as well. Scott, any final thoughts for? We wrap up. We've gone long. Let's go. Are you? Let's do it. Alright, thank you, folks, for joining us. Thanks to home-field apparel, our presenting sponsor here on the back. Home network will be back on Sunday as we recap Indiana. Illinois.

Hopefully want to know start to the season for the Hoosiers for Scott, I'm Galen will catch you folks on the flip side bring back the Bison. So long everybody.