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The Roost Podcast | Ep 153 – Fixing College Football with Shehan Jeyarajah

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In the midst of a crazy college football news cycle, we put Shehan Jeyarajah from CBS in charge of the sport and he had some pretty good ideas.

Who’s in charge anyway? After watching realignment overtake the sport once again we thought it was time to bring in someone to help us fix this increasingly unpredictable sport. To do that, we named Shehan Jeyarajah the czar of college football and asked him to clean up tv contracts, schedules, coaching hires, the transfer portal and more.

You can find previous episodes on the podcast page. For now, give a listen to Episode 153.

Episode Notes

DCTF

The Roost Podcast is now part of the Dave Campbell’s Republic of Football Podcast Network. You’ll still get the same content with the same hosts, but now under the DCTF banner.

Homefield

We’re thrilled to partner with Homefield Apparel, the premier proprietor of college football clothing. First-time buyers can use the code ROOST for 15% off their order. The Owls hoodie is a personal favorite. Shop the Rice collection or pick up something else (or both)!

Patreon

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Fixing college football with Shehan Jayarajah

  • “Defending Denton’s honor”
  • Under the radar Group of 5 storylines
  • Fixing realignment and conferences
  • Fixing coaching contracts
  • Fixing the Transfer Portal
  • Fixing eligibility rules
  • Fixing schedules and television contracts
  • Fixing college football’s postseason

Where can you find us?

The Roost Podcast is part of the Dave Campbell’s Republic of Football Podcast Network. You can find this podcast and all of our partner podcasts on Apple, Spotify and wherever you get your podcasts.

Subscribe on Patreon for exclusive Rice football recruiting updates, practice notes and more.

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The Roost Podcast | Ep 110 – State of College Football in Texas with DCTF’s Mike Craven

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DCTF writer Mike Craven joins us this week to unpack the latest college football storylines around Texas and recap a busy spring.

Fresh off his run around the state of Texas to catch up with college football players and coaches, Dave Campbell’s Texas Football’s Mike Craven stops by to discuss the major storylines impact the sport and the in-state teams. From recruiting to coaching narratives, we cover it all.

You can find previous episodes on the podcast page. For now, give a listen to Episode 110.

Episode Notes

Housekeeping

  • Don’t forget to rate, review and subscribe to the podcast on your platform of choice. Every little bit helps.
  • Please support us on Patreon. Be the first to get the inside scoop on what’s going on with Rice football and stick around for even further analysis. That includes updates from spring practices and more. Your support matters and makes The Roost better.
    Become a Patron!

State of Texas College Football with DCTF’s Mike Craven

  • What’s next for UTSA, North Texas and UTEP?
  • Realignment thoughts: reactions from across the state
  • Transfer Portal Math: Is it good or bad for G5 teams?
  • The future of recruiting strategy in college football
  • Incoming transfers who could make an impact in 2022
  • Major storylines in the state of Texas
  • How close is Rice football and his take on the Owls’ potential in 2022

Where can you find us?

Download and subscribe to The Roost Podcast on any of your favorite podcast providers. The show is available on iTunes, GooglePlay, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, TuneIn and PodBean. Please consider leaving a review wherever you listen.

Subscribe on Patreon for exclusive Rice football recruiting updates, practice notes and more.

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NCAA Football passes significant recruiting, transfer measures

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NCAA football passed two significant milestones this week. On-campus recruiting will resume June 1 and transfer policies have been relaxed.

This was a significant week for NCAA football. Two incredibly important announcements went forth from the D1 Council this week. Current and future recruiting cycles have been modified and player freedoms have been expanded.

Transfer Legislation

In a move long rumored to be in the works, the council passed a one-time transfer rule for all D1 student-athletes. Already in place for a myriad of Olympic sports, the most notable change was the expansion of this policy to football, baseball, men’s and women’s basketball and men’s hockey. The policy will go into place immediately, meaning athletes who transfer for the first time this summer and receive immediate eligibility for all sports.

MAC Commissioner and chair of the NCAA’s working group on transfers, Dr. Jon Steinbrecher offered his support in a statement. “Allowing student-athletes a one-time opportunity to transfer and compete immediately provides a uniform, equitable and understandable approach that benefits all student-athletes,” he said. “This decision is consistent with Division I’s goal of modernizing its rules to prioritize student-athlete opportunity and choice.”

Recruiting ramps back up

For the first time in more than a year, on-campus recruiting visits will be reopened. Programs across the country will be able to resume their normal recruiting calendars effective June 1. That means in-person evaluations and conversations for the class of 2022.

Subscribe on Patreon for exclusive Rice football recruiting updates, practice notes and more.

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College Football and COVID-19: Mid September Roundup

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College football is back, but this season has been far from normal. Here’s a roundup of the key stories around the nation.

We’re almost a month into the 2020 college football season and it’s been one heck of a roller coaster ride. With all the twists and turns, it was time for a quick update on the impacts COVID-19 is having on the season.

If you want to look back at the up-and-down news cycle, you can check out the late-July edition of this update here, the early August edition here or the mid-August update here or are most recent update here.

Rice Football is back!

As first reported by The Roost, Rice football has returned to practice and is on track to play their first game on Oct. 24 against Middle Tennessee. The Owls were the last team in Conference USA that intends to play this season to start fall camp.

Cancelations are mounting

Through three weeks of football, roughly 75% of the games scheduled as of Week 1 had been played. With a cancelation rate trending toward 25%, the odds of any team completing a full schedule are slim. This weekend saw multiple games (Houston at Baylor, Florida Atlantic at Georgia Southern) postponed the day before kickoff.

Schedules are fluid

UTSA was finishing a football game on Saturday when they found out who they would be playing in Week 4. The Roadrunners were originally scheduled to play Memphis, but that game was lost because of positive tests in the Memphis program. No sooner had that game been canceled than did Conference USA slide in Middle Tennessee into the off date. So much for games needing to be scheduled years in advance.

The SEC starts up this weekend

The Big 12 and ACC have already played games in a staggered fashion. The SEC opted to return all at once with marquee games including Mike Leach’s debut against No. 6 LSU, Mo. 23 Kentucky at No. 8 Auburn, and No. 16 Tennessee at South Carolina.

The Big Ten is back … with its third schedule of the year 

After the rumblings of a return proved true, the Big Ten announced their return to play protocols and conference schedule this week. Nebraska, who had led the charge to get back on the field, opens with Ohio State and hosts Penn State later in the season too.

Pac-12 and Mountain West announced return plans of their own

Once the Big Ten announced they would play this fall, the Pac-12 quickly changed its tune. There are more hurdles to jump through in California and Oregon before the westernmost conference returns to action, but things seem to be trending that way. The league will resume play the weekend of Nov. 6. The Mountain West, after initially shutting things down with the Pac-12, will start their season on Oct. 24.

Conference USA is running out of quarterbacks

Injuries to Charlotte’s Chris Robison and UAB’s Tyler Johnston put an already precarious quarterback situation into further uncertainty. Jack Abraham at Southern Miss and Asher O’Hara at Middle Tennessee are now the only healthy returning starters in the conference. We discussed the new hierarchy of C-USA signal callers in this week’s podcast.

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College Football: Odds suggest a bumpy 2020 season

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The past few weeks have served as a stark reminder that no matter how many precautions are taken, no college football game can be guaranteed.

When this post goes live on Saturday morning, 16 college football games will have been postponed since the season began three weeks ago. At the conclusion of today, 49 games will have been completed as scheduled. Simple math says that’s a rate of roughly one in four scheduled contests never making it to the field.

Rice football’s crosstown rival Houston was the latest to experience that staggering statistic firsthand. The Cougars were meant to play Baylor today in one of the quickest scheduling maneuvers in recent college football memory. The game was organized and planned in a little less than a week’s time. Less than 24 hours before kickoff, that game had been squelched too.

Houston’s equipment truck was already at the stadium.

Houston head coach Dana Holgorsen couldn’t spell it out on social media, but his non-so-subtle collection of characters conveyed a frustration mounting among coaches, players and fans alike. For whatever reason, this game just wasn’t meant to be.

Back to the math.

If rapid testing helps limit the impacts of transmission and contact tracing, that 25% number will be too high. But if the impacts of positive cases begin to tick upward as the number of games increase, it could be too low. The best we can do for the time being is use the data we have now as a proxy for what is to come.

If this rate of cancelations continues, the chances of having a season that looked anything like the “best case scenario” is slim. Many conferences have built in some buffer room and flexibility, but that would fix multiple cancelations per school. Eventually, the calendar runs out.

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Given any 10-game schedule with a 25% cancelation rate, a team would have roughly a 5% chance of playing all 10 games. On average, every 10-game schedule would end up with two to three cancelations. That’s sobering.

Those that do play could find themselves in situations like Austin Peay: who played their first game of the year without any healthy long snappers and relied on quarterback pooch punts. Or Texas State, which swapped quarterbacks because from game one to game two because of precautions. It’s going to be weird.

Some teams will be more fortunate than others. The odds suggest somewhere around a half dozen of the teams playing this fall will complete their entire schedules as-is. Some others will be on the other end, losing large chunks of their seasons. It’s going to be strange, but that’s the reality of playing college football under these conditions.

Be grateful for the college football you do get to watch this year. From Campell vs Coastal Carolina on national TV to a marquee SEC matchup in October and everything in between. If your team is playing, cherish it. There’s no guarantee they’ll be playing next Saturday, no matter what the schedule says.

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