2024 Week 8 Results
A Perfect Day
It has finally happened. It took 7 years to get our first 10-0 entry and we got 3 in a 4 week span. It has been two years since that and we have not seen a perfect entry. That all changed this last week. Alex W. has conquered the board and secured the first 10-0 week in years, the 4th ever in the Pick Em. And the first winner of the 10-0 Bonus. What a magical week. On top of that, we had a record EIGHT 9-1 entries. Two of those tied for 2nd place which gave us our first ever coin flip deciding game (that result down at the bottom). It was far and away our highest scoring week. For example, we have had a 5-5 entry finish in the top 5 this season, and this week we had a 5-5 finish in the bottom 5. Points were being passed out like candy on Halloween. Let’s dive into the week and look back at what built into a perfect week.
Three Noon games kicked us off on Saturday, two of which were over by the end of the first quarter. But one team continues to bring drama with their games and this week was no different. Miami went into Louisville as a 4.5 point favorite looking to remain undefeated while coming off back to back asterisk filled wins. What quickly turned into a shootout just as quickly turned into a 3rd straight rig game for Miami.
The game ends in a 7 point win for Miami and another cover. Miami churns on and Cam Ward has joined Ashton Jeanty atop the Heisman polls.
The next game up was a bit of a ‘Who’s real’ test between Nebraska and Indiana. And well…
Indiana steam rolled Nebraska all game long on their way to a 56-7 win and a decimation of everything corn. Indiana moves to 7-0, has one of the best offenses in the country, and are on a war path in the Big Ten.
Our first of two Troops games rounded out the Noon slate as Army made their Top 25 debut for the season in a 15.5 point spread at home vs ECU. Army was scoring early and often and the chatter around the streets is starting to pick up on their QB being potentially a serious game changer.
Army rolls to easily cover and continue their undefeated season. Dont look now but we have new contenders this season in College Football.
The afternoon slate brought in 4 big games with one of the best rivalries kicking it off. (Look away, Auburn fans)
Another chess move by Saban to say these as they prepare to go into Tennessee in a must win situation for both teams. The first half felt a little too similar to Tennessee as of late:
But they are officially a 2nd half team and by the end of it, Neyland was looking like an Iron lung convention in the 1930’s.
Though you can tell there hasn’t been a lot of experience with it as of late.
Our next game up between Notre Dame and Georgia Tech technically was played, but was over on Friday once this announcement came through:
Notre Dame continues marching towards the Playoff, but matchups with both Navy and Army linger in the near future.
Next, Michigan traveled to Illinois as a 3.5 point favorite. Illinois went full throwback playing in their 1900’s uniforms.
The game then proceeded to essentially be played in 1900 as well from the looks of the offensive stats, but Illinois proved to be the more battle tested team and handled business to pick up another big win, and they even added a little insult to injury of it as well.
Illinois slowly but surely has been grinding through tests and raising their hand as a real contender in these new conferences.
The final afternoon game have us the other half of our Troops double header as Navy took on Charlotte in a big conference matchup. Similar to Army, this was in full control from the start.
Army and Navy are both for real and are both starting to make legit Playoff pushes. I will state this here now, if Army and Navy do meet in the AAC championship there may be an executive order to whether or not we actually end up including the traditional matchup the week after. But for now, let’s take it all in.
LSU (-2.5) at Arkansas kicked off the night slate and LSU quietly has been sneaking right back into full contention after dropping the Week 1 game to USC. This was the game of the week I saw 0 seconds of and looking at the score don’t think I missed much as LSU rolled over Arkansas to pick up another dominant win. One insane stat to share from their run as they head into A&M week:
Then comes Georgia vs Texas. Holy moly what a shit show. First, an early benching of Quinn Ewers brought in what Texas hoped would be the spark they needed.
Which quickly backfired…
To then one of the craziest moments we will see all year. A Texas interception that would have put them in prime position to make it a one possession game in the 2h is called back for DPI. And the Texas fans said ‘not on our watch it isnt’
A 10 minute delay of trash on the field was concluded by the refs overturning their own penalty call and giving Texas the ball back, in a top 5 matchup. One of the most absurd moments in college football in years. If you were not watching this live it is hard to really explain the insanity of the entire situation, but ultimately it just didn’t matter. The Dawgs battled through some of the most insane calls in ref history to firmly defeat Texas and put themselves right back atop the SEC boards.
And then Kansas State rolled West Virginia too.
And that will ALMOST conclude our Week 8 slate. Alex W. takes the 1st place win for the week going 10-0 as we covered earlier, but in the 2nd place spot we had another full tie. Dave H. and Elliott F. both tied for 9-1 with 53 points in the week, which in any other week is an almost guarantee win, but in this week it will result in another 3rd place finish for one of them. As stated in the Week 6 recap, these ties will now be broken but a coin flip at an announced time. On the live gamecast page on Saturday night the timing was announced for Sunday at 9:01pm coin flip. Winner will get the Wild Card AQ and 2nd place prize, loser gets a firm handshake for a great week. So with that I present a recording, with time stamp in top right corner, of the coinflip:
And so congratulations to Dave H. for taking the 2nd spot this week and securing the Wild Card! Just two weeks left to secure your spot!
We are onto week 9! To vote for which games you would like to see in the Pick Em you can do so here: Week 9 Poll
Check out the latest full standings here.