How about that? A perfect Week 1!

Let’s keep the good times rolling …

Rutgers +3.5 (-122) at Boston College (FanDuel): If ever there were a time to back Rutgers, it would be now. Greg Schiano’s back is against the wall, and he’s rolling with AJ Surace as his QB. If the Scarlet Knights lose this, they probably won’t beat an FBS team this season. This line opened at +4 — a gross overreaction to the Week 1 letdown at UMass — and all the sharp money has taken this down to +3 in most spots. A reminder: Shop around … and #CHOP out.

Syracuse -3 (-115) vs. Cal (Circa): Two weeks in a row, Cal opens as a 1.5-point favorite, only to see sharp money completely go against the Bears. And with good reason: Cal lost by 21 at home in Tosh Lupoi’s debut. They gave up 8.7 yards per carry to UCLA. The Dome is a different beast, as is Syracuse early in the season. Throw in the fact that this game is three time zones away, and after Cal played in the late #Pac12AfterDark spot last week, and this is the recipe for Steve Angeli’s coming-out party for the Orange.

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Minnesota +1.5 (-122) vs. Mississippi State (FanDuel): This line has been all over the board this week, with the Gophers now favored at some shops. Quite frankly, I think Minnesota is simply the better team. At home, the Gophers will have to work to lose this one — turnovers, special teams miscues, etc. — and I just don’t see that happening to a P.J. Fleck outfit at this stage. As my colleague Bill Landis pointed out, the Bulldogs have not been road favorites since 2022 … and they lost that game by 10 points to Kentucky. That was with Mike Leach as coach, too. Ride with Goldy here.

Week 1 record: 3-0

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GREEN BAY, Wis. — You can be forgiven for forgetting that the last time Notre Dame entered a season ranked in the AP top-5 was in 2022, back in Marcus Freeman’s first season as head coach.

Then 17.5-point underdogs, the Irish entered the Horseshoe to take on Freeman’s alma mater, No. 2 Ohio State. They held their own, then held on for dear life. Up three at halftime, Notre Dame then got shut out in the second half by the Buckeyes in an 11-point loss that probably didn’t properly illustrate the gap between the two programs at the time.

Those Buckeyes, for all intents and purposes, came a missed field goal against Georgia away from winning that year’s national title. Those Irish took the rocky road that accompanies a new regime, from the peak of smoking Clemson to the valley of losing to Marshall and Stanford en route to a 9-4 campaign.

In retrospect, Freeman’s squad that year had no business being ranked in the top-5.

The depth and talented on this year’s team — with the Irish entering Sunday ranked No. 4 — further underscores that point.

Notre Dame beat Wisconsin, 41-13, in front of a bipartisan crowd at Lambeau Field. Freeman, the pupil, beat Luke Fickell, the teacher.

Freeman’s squad has legitimate national title hopes. Fickell’s squad has undergone a massive renovation in hopes of saving his job.

While the 2026 Badgers aren’t exactly the 2022 Irish, they did carry a bit of a mystery to them. And they exceeded expectations in hanging with a more touted opponent for a half, trailing 13-10 at the break on Sunday.

Then the Irish asserted their dominance.

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We just couldn’t have a normal Week 1, could we?

1. The ending of Western Michigan-Michigan was egregious. Absolutely egregious.

2. And no, I’m not just talking about Michigan students storming the field after beating a MAC team, although between getting to experience that win and not receiving letter grades this year, those freshmen in Ann Arbor sure are having themselves a rewarding college experience, huh?

3. Even if everything that the Big Ten put out early Sunday morning is kosher — and here I will give the league office props for revealing as much as they did — it still doesn’t explain or excuse just how out of sync NBC’s clock was from the game clock.

4. This, among many other shots fired, is what MAC commissioner Jon Steinbrecher said about power conferences back at his league’s spring meetings: “I’m not sure if the right response to all of this is ‘be careful for what you ask for because you may get it’ or B, ‘karma’s a b***h’ because we’re now living with what happens when the autonomy conferences make the rules.”

5. I re-share that quote because I was surprised that Steinbrecher ended up being as measured as he was in his statement in response to the Big Ten’s explanation:

6. While we’re at it, hats off to Lance Taylor for handling everything as classy as he did:

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We’re back with another edition of CFB Forecast! It’s just me this season, but we’ll play it straight:

Three best bets — spread, moneyline, quarter, half, prop, you name it.

We’ll start with rather simple bets, given all of the turnover that occurred across the nation this offseason.

Michigan State -9.5 vs. Toledo (-115, Bet365). Toledo is a popular team in the public, so this is an automatic fade, especially at this price. The line is -10.5 in most spots, so there’s some value on MSU here. The Spartans are a bit of mystery — heck, so are the Rockets with a new coach — but it’s hard to imagine a Big Ten team not beating a visiting MAC team by double digits. I am high on Toledo this season, as I wrote in my Week Zero column, but just not here on Friday night.

Duke -7 vs. Tulane (-125, Circa). Buy half a point here to be safe, although Circa still offers the best spread price with the Blue Devils at -7.5 with just -105 juice. My eyes pop at 7.5-point lines, since those are usually good spots to fade the public in by taking the favorite, and this case is no different, especially with the odds as big as -9.5 elsewhere. Both teams lost a lot this offseason, but Tulane also lost its coach to Florida. Manny Diaz, meanwhile, is back to lead Duke, where he’s posted consecutive 9-win seasons. Take Duke at home.

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UCLA ML at Cal (-122, DraftKings). Cal was favored in this game most of the summer, but the Bob Chesney hype train became just too much to handle come August. Still, if he’s everything everyone says he is — and I am firmly in the #TeamChesney camp — then you probably won’t get a better opportunity than this one right here, as a short favorite against a guy making his head-coaching debut in Tosh Lupoi. The Bruins are -1.5 if you’d like to take the chance and avoid most of the vig.

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Week 1 is here, and that means it’s time to make some predictions, both bold and not-so-bold.

The College Football Playoff bracket? That could be bold, depending on the teams you pick.

Was taking Penn State to beat Alabama in the national title game last year bold?

Honestly, not really.

But it was a horrible prediction, and is worth remembering as we embark on another season of predictions here.

Let’s start with my Playoff bracket, which I unveiled this week on The Podcast of Northern Aggression:

Yeah, I have Notre Dame winning it all. So, too, do Bill Landis and Doug Lesmerises, my co-hosts on the podcast. As does Pete Sampson, my co-host on The Independent podcast.

Fade accordingly.

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The first rule of the podcast: What happens on the show, stays on the show.

Make sense?

OK, maybe that’s counter-intuitive for a podcast. But it goes a long way in describing the circle of trust that Marcus Freeman relies on as he gears up for his fifth season leading Notre Dame.

The routine will go something like this: Every fall Friday for the past four years, Dominique Barber puts his kids to bed, throws on some Notre Dame, Ohio State and Minnesota gear, heads to his Minneapolis garage, and hits record on a pregame video.

Then he’ll fire off the clip to two of his best friends: Freeman, the head coach at Notre Dame; and James Laurinaitis, the linebackers coach at Ohio State.

“I won’t give a full-fledged scouting report,” Barber told The Inside Zone with a laugh. “I’ll watch my Gophers, the Irish and the Buckeyes, and I’ll report back. If I watch an opponent that they’re playing, I’ll give my two cents.

“There’s just so much pressure that they have on them, and I want to give them a laugh going into Saturdays and a smile. Let them know that this isn’t the end of the world, and that there are people that support them.”

How did Barber, Freeman and Laurinaitis become the three best friends that anyone could have?

Thank Laurinaitis, who grew up with Barber in the Minneapolis suburbs, teamed up with him at Wayzata High and was set to play with him with the Gophers before Ohio State swooped in and landed the linebacker as a recruit.

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We’re back, people.

Week Zero arrives Saturday. And while we’re changing things up a bit from last year’s wagering talk — we’re going with futures in the Week Zero spot here instead of game plays — we still plan on having you covered with the best bets of the week.

Here, let’s take a look at some preseason futures.

WIN TOTALS

Illinois over 7.5 (+135, Bet365): I have been captain of the Illini hype train this offseason. They have quietly been one of the more consistently good Big Ten programs in the Bret Bielema era, and if QB Katin Houser is the real deal — and with Barry Lunney as his OC, there’s no reason to think he won’t be — then I think this season in Champaign has the chance to be special. Ca’Lil Valentine is the best running back that no one is talking about, and Bobby Hauck should be an upgrade at DC. Illinois has to play Ohio State and Oregon, but even if those are both losses, can you find three more on this schedule? Because that’s what it would take for this bet to not hit.

Georgia over 9.5 AND Ohio State 9.5 (+141, DraftKings): The Bulldogs haven’t won fewer than 10 regular-season games in a full season since Kirby Smart’s first season, in 2016. The Buckeyes haven’t won fewer than 10 in a full season with a full-time head coach since college football added a 12th regular season game. These are the two surest things in the sport, and though both are juiced heavily to the over, why not combine them into a parlay? DK lets you do that, whereas most books don’t. While I suspect that there will be some surprising SEC unders this season due to the nine-game league schedule, UGA still has the easiest schedule of all 16 teams, per ESPN’s SOS index. OSU’s is the toughest in the Big Ten, and the Bucks also play Texas in the nonconference slate. But they could still afford to lose two games amid the gauntlet of Texas, at Iowa, at USC, at Indiana, Oregon and Michigan. And considering OSU is the overwhelming preseason No. 1 team in both major polls, I’ll ride with the scarlet and gray here.

Oklahoma over 7.5 AND Houston over 7.5 (+144, DK): I’m #TeamSooners this year. Their schedule is brutal, but they return one of the most experienced rosters in the country, particularly on the offensive side of the ball (more on that later). OU’s win total is 8.5 at most shops, so some creative accounting here on DK gets us to 7.5. Houston is in similar territory, so I combined the two here. Willie Fritz is one of the best coaches in the country, and he has a returning QB in Conner Weigman who will be working with the same OC and QB coach in consecutive years for the first time in his career.

Louisville over 7.5 AND Toledo over 7.5 (+175, DK): Shop, shop, shop. While Toledo is a consistent 7.5 across the board, Louisville is at 8.5 in some spots, and again, not all places let you parlay these together. Jeff Brohm has been a head coach for 12 years at three schools. He’s gone over this total eight times, including in each of his last five seasons. Toledo, meanwhile, feels like a great buy-low spot to team up with the lower UL total. The Rockets rank 130th in ESPN’s Bill Connelly’s returning production index, as the roster completely turned over once Jason Candle left for UConn and Mike Jacobs came in from Mercer. But Jacobs might be the G6’s version of Curt Cignetti: He’s gone over this total in each of his nine full seasons across three different lower-level stops, and he brings with him 14 players from Mercer, where the Bears went undefeated in Southern Conference play, made the FCS playoffs and finished in the top-20 nationally. Toledo has the third-best portal class of any MAC team, per 247Sports, and the Rockets were picked to finish third in the preseason league poll. Week 3 vs. Temple feels like a swing game for this bet … unless Jacobs really is the next Cig, and has the Rockets ready to roll from Day 1.

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CFP FUTURES

I find very little value in betting the national championship race, given that there seems to be a clear top-seven entering this season and that all are priced accordingly … for the most part.

Indiana +1050 (Circa): I’m not saying the Hoosiers will repeat, but this is tremendous value. Yes, even after they won it all with odds as long as 100-1 at some books last year. If Josh Hoover is the real deal, IU will at the very least be a contender again. They return arguably the best group of offensive linemen in the country, their receivers are studs and that defense should again be elite, particularly in the front-seven. This price has moved a little given the uncertainty of the eligibility of Stephen Daley and Kellen Wyatt, but this team is probably a contender even without those two.

Fresno State to make CFP (+5500, Bet Rivers): Why not? There will be a Group of 6 team in the CFP, after all. And the new-look Pac-12 offers a ton of uncertainty … and opportunity. Matt Entz is an elite coach, having won two national titles while leading North Dakota State, and he surprised everyone by going 9-4 in Year 1 with the Bulldogs last season. There is still QB uncertainty, which is probably driving this low price, but these guys are worth taking a flier on at this number.

HEISMAN TROPHY

One general rule of thumb I have when it comes to the Heisman is to not bet on any of the preseason favorites, as you will almost certainly find better prices on all of them at some point in the middle of the season.

That said, I did break my own rule for one guy, as I discussed on the latest episode of the podcast of Northern Aggression with Bill Landis and Doug Lesmerises:

Jeremiah Smith (+1600, Circa): The guy is the best player in college football, bar none. He has a chance to be the best Ohio State player ever, too. And he has a pro-style OC in Arthur Smith who will be hellbent on getting the ball into his best player’s hands as much as humanly possible. Considering Smith is as low as +800 at some shops, Circa’s preseason price is hard to resist.

As for the longshots …

John Mateer (+2500, Circa): Mateer was the favorite last season before he got hurt. He was never himself after rushing back from injury. Oklahoma has the third-most returning offensive production in the country, has the bulk of its offensive staff back and has the type of schedule that will allow for big moments. This is a great price on a guy who has played a lot of football.

Lincoln Kienholz (+10,000 DK): Kienholz nearly beat out Julian Sayin for the Ohio State job last season. Now he’s with QB maestro Jeff Brohm in a pass-happy offense at Louisville. He’s worth keeping an eye on.

Nico Iamaleava (+10,000 DK): Another guy with a lot of football under his belt, Iamaleava will now benefit from the Bob Chesney regime. Chesney, for what it’s worth, has won the offseason with all of the changes he is bringing to UCLA. Iamaleava is not part of those changes, which is validating of the one-time five-star’s talent. If nothing else, I’m curious to see how this marriage plays out near Hollywood.

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Programming note: Slices of Tuna will take some time off from its Monday-Wednesday-Friday offseason routine as we put the finishing touches on some longer preseason content.

Enjoy your last CFB-free weekend!

1. What the?

Actual college football kicks off in eight days, and there are players who just played in NFL preseason games who are now trying to join college rosters in time for kickoff.

“CFB is so broken man,” one personnel staffer texted Thursday, unsolicited.

Find a friendly judge, and anything is possible.

That’s how eight former players were able to enter the portal Wednesday, as they were granted a restraining order in a Louisiana court case.

Give Greg Sankey credit for reportedly trying to put a stop to this, I guess. But this is a classic case of the old adage about pigs getting fat and hogs getting slaughtered.

How many billions — amid thousands of billable hours — had the powerbrokers in charge of college sports spent across the past 150 years or so in an attempt to not give players so much as an inch in their battle for being able to profit off their college exploits?

How often did we hear some version of Only the top 1 percent will actually make money.

How many decision-makers threatened to take their ball and go home if this billion-dollar enterprise actually allowed its labor to earn money?

It was nonsense then.

It’s nonsense now.

This is a bill past due, and we are now all witnesses to the carnage in its wake.

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Just another drama-filled week in L.A. basketball, ain’t it?

1. All-America time

Anyone else find it ironic that the SEC has 14 of the 27 preseason AP All-Americans but the Big Ten has the top-two teams in the preseason AP poll? Or that Ohio State has just one preseason All-American despite receiving 40 of 69 first-place votes in the AP poll?

Here are some other facts to chew on regarding the All-America teams, which were released Tuesday:

Breakdown by conference (including first- and second-team)

• SEC: 24

• Big Ten: 16

• Big 12: 6

• ACC: 4

• Notre Dame: 3

• Sun Belt: 1

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Happy Last Non-Game Week Monday of the year.

1. Can we settle this in the postseason?

There’s usually a method to Curt Cignetti’s madness.

Whether it was demanding folks to Google him on his first signing day or predicting that Indiana would make the Big Ten title game in Year 1, the Hoosiers’ coach was strategically attempting to wake up a fan base that was on life support, as he would later say.

When he joked last summer that Indiana was playing an “SEC schedule” with its lack of marquee nonconference opponents, well, he at least backed it up by winning it all in Year 2.

But Cignetti’s latest comments are a bit of a head-scratcher.

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Happy Friday! Two more weeks till kickoff …

1. Lynn has lived the coaching life

D’Anton Lynn learned to plant flowers while with the Cleveland Browns.

As a high school junior, Lynn would do anything to be around the game. His father, Anthony, had embarked on coaching after an eight-year career as an NFL running back. And he told his son time and time again to go into any profession but this one.

Not that D’Anton was listening as he rode along with Dad to the office over the years, a period that included Anthony’s stint coaching Browns running backs.

D’Anton had been a ball boy at his father’s previous stops. He’d worked in equipment rooms, too.

“Half the day, I would be laying down mulch, planting flowers, doing stuff outside, doing stuff with the field,” D’Anton told The Inside Zone of his time in Cleveland. “And the other half of the day I’d be doing drills with the DBs or in the meeting room, watching film. And then at the end of the day, I’d just go home with my dad.”

Score another one for nature over nurture, as Lynn shunned his parents’ advice and has since made a career for himself as a successful defensive coordinator.

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So Christmas Day is gonna rock, isn’t it?

1. Whittingham is true to himself

If looks could kill, then I was dead right where I sat.

My introduction to the pure hatred that drove the Michigan-Ohio State rivalry came at Big Ten media days in 2009. I, a student reporter at Penn State, found myself face-to-face with Buckeyes safety Kurt Coleman.

Penn State was the defending Big Ten champion. Ohio State was the preseason favorite. The programs had split the last four conference titles, with the Nittany Lions winning in Columbus the previous season.

Michigan, meanwhile, was mired in the RichRod experiment.

So, not knowing any better, I, in so many words, asked Coleman if Penn State was Ohio State’s biggest rival for the upcoming season.

Seventeen years later, and I can remember the look he gave me like it was yesterday.

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Happy National S’mores Day to all who celebrate. (Maybe this will remind me to use my firepit for the first time this summer.)

1. Eye-opening announcements

Let’s start with two perfectly 2026 moments from the weekend:

First, Virginia announcing that defensive linemen Jacob Holmes and Cazeem Moore — two guys who exhausted their eligibility last season but would have a fifth year under the new rules — will be “integrated” into program activities.

Then, BYU’s associate AD for communications went on CougarBoard to dispel rumors about the status of AD Brian Santiago:

Games start in less than three weeks. What else does the offseason have in-store for us?

2. It’s all in the name (and number)

I was at Notre Dame on Saturday for interviews with the secondary, and — Leonard Moore’s dominance aside — cosmetic changes seemed to own the day.

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Preseason football is here, the coaches’ poll is out … let’s play some football!

1. Preseason rankings

The USA Today coaches’ poll featured few surprises this week, with Big Ten teams taking the top two spots, and three of the top six.

Ohio State and Oregon were Nos. 1 and 2, respectively.

Ohio State (38) and Indiana (14) received the most first-place votes.

The AP poll will come out Aug. 17.

I vote in the NFF-FWAA Super 16 poll, and in keeping with my weekly updates last season, I’ll share my preseason ballot here:

1. Notre Dame

2. Ohio State

3. Texas

4. Georgia

5. Oregon

6. Indiana

7. Miami (FL)

8. Oklahoma

9. Texas A&M

10. USC

11. Ole Miss

12. LSU

13. Texas Tech

14. Alabama

15. Houston

16. BYU

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FBS commissioners and Notre Dame athletic director Pete Bevacqua are scheduled to meet Monday in Dallas for College Football Playoff meetings.

Ahead of that gathering, The Inside Zone checks in with Big Ten commissioner Tony Petitti to talk a little more in-depth on the proposed 24-team system.

1. Origins of a 24-team CFP proposal

A year ago, Tony Petitti sat down with The Inside Zone and went long on the origins of an expanded CFP model — then the 4-4-2-2-1 format — that threatened to flip the sport on its head.

Public backlash had been strong. The Big Ten commissioner had gotten behind the proposal earlier from the podium at his conference’s media days in Las Vegas, and reaction around the sport was largely negative.

Remember, that proposal featured four guaranteed berths apiece to the Big Ten and SEC, with just two apiece for the ACC and Big 12.

Fast forward to this year, and there’s a new preferred postseason format — with the rest of the sport, by and large, supportive of the proposed change.

Petitti spoke with The Inside Zone to discuss the mechanics of a 24-team CFP, a model that was met with eyerolls when it first publicly surfaced in the winter, but one that has slowly but surely been embraced by every power conference this side of the SEC.

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Don’t mind me as I admire my new favorite .GIF.

1. Cig!

All that Curt Cignetti talk late last week, and it turned out he saved his best one-liner for last, at least publicly.

Appearing on a “Pardon My Take” episode that aired on Friday, the Indiana coach said of the Hoosiers being the hunted: “I bought a bigger gun.”

What’s better? The swagger of Cig, or the reaction from SEC country?

2. Green with envy (and anger)

Looking for thoughts on Notre Dame’s jersey sponsorship agreement … or the Irish’s leprechaun jersey patch for its alternate green jerseys … or their Shamrock Series unis?

Pete Sampson and I recorded an episode of The Independent heading into the weekend.

And I swear, we talked actual football, too, which kicks off for Notre Dame unofficially on Thursday, the date of the program’s first camp practice.

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CHICAGO — USC opens fall camp today. The season is almost here.

But first, more from #TalkinSZN …

1. Talk your stuff

Curt Cignetti talked his stuff before he ever coached a game at Indiana — then the losingest program in college football history.

Predict the Hoosiers to be in the Big Ten title game in Year 1? They missed out only because of a tiebreaker.

Win that game a year later? Declare that they’re a year late.

Go 16-0 and win a national title?

Yeah, that happened. And it gave the conference its third straight national title to boot — sending the SEC into a crisis that league has spent much of the offseason trying to talk its way out of.

So what did you think Cig was going to say when he finally took the podium Thursday at Big Ten media days?

Back down?

Nah.

“We don’t run a hype machine up here in the Midwest,” he said. “We believe everything is earned, not given. When we fall short, we say: ‘We fell short.’ We don’t cry a river, whine and complain. That’s why we’re the best.”

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CHICAGO — Three quick takeaways from Day 1 of Big Ten media days, where Illinois, Iowa, Penn State, Rutgers, USC and Wisconsin held court.

Up Wednesday: Michigan State, Minnesota, Ohio State, Oregon, Purdue and UCLA.

1. Lots of SEC talk … in a good way

Of the 23 questions that Tony Petitti fielded Tuesday morning, eight made reference to the SEC.

For once, it’s not because it just means more over there.

In fact, it was hard to ignore the three CFP national title trophies that were displayed to the Big Ten commissioner’s right while he stood at the podium.

“In addition to winning three consecutive titles, the Big Ten has dominated the first two seasons of the expanded College Football Playoff,” Petitti said. “Seven Big Ten teams combined for the nation’s best 11 wins, more than double the next closest league.

“There have been 22 games played in the first two years of the 12-team CFP — 14 of those 22 games have featured Big Ten teams, including two games with Big Ten teams facing each other.”

Petitti talked up the league’s middle-class, a point that the SEC seemed to fixate on during its media day.

Perhaps the SEC’s move to nine league games will lead to more losses for that conference’s bluebloods, proving the league’s point.

Or perhaps it simply won’t matter, not when the Big Ten is dominating the CFP the way it has the last three years.

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My last intro in this space proved pretty prophetic, huh? (Even if I am as shocked as everyone else that LeBron ultimately chose Philly.)

On to the slices …

1. It’s B1G time

Big Ten media days are Tuesday through Thursday here in Chicago, and with that comes the unofficial conference preseason poll, which I was happy to be a part of this year.

Doug Lesmerises conducts the poll, and he and Bill Landis had Audrey Snyder and me on “The Bill and Doug Show” this week to break down the poll and dive further into our picks.

My projected order of finish, in the interest of transparency:

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Kenni Burns' lawsuit against Kent State will move ahead after the school was denied dismissal of nine of the 12 claims brought forth by the ex-coach.

Burns had sued the school, its board of trustees and several other individuals (who have since been dismissed as parties) on March 31 for wrongful termination, breach of contract and defamation, among other claims.

The school had fired Burns on April 11, 2025, which was 15 days after it had put the coach on administrative leave with pay for what athletic director Randale Richmond said at the time was an investigation into Burns for violations of school policies.

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