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Everyone knows Saturdays are for college football, but we've got plenty of weekday action in Week 9, including an ACC clash when Cal visits Virginia Tech on Friday Ahead of the weekend, be sure to check out Bruce Marshall's breakdowns of some of the best games earlier in the week. Middle Tennessee at Delaware (Wednesday, 10/22) Until the MAC gets going with its midweek MACtion in a couple of weeks, Conference USA makes sure football junkies get their fix every Tuesday and Wednesday. Besides, it's the only chance we get to pay close attention to the likes of Middle Tennessee and Delaware, squaring off in Newark. We've probably picked enough on Derek Mason and the folly of the Blue Raiders for hiring him as their coach after the 2023 season, but it bears some repeating how much MTSU seems to have missed the target with this hire. Perhaps the Blue Raiders had peaked under Rick Stockstill, but they still made 10 bowl games in his 18 seasons at Murfreesboro. Mason, whose last head coaching adventure at Vanderbilt ended with the school's first ever winless season in 2020, subsequently didn't last more than a year with DC assignments at Oklahoma State and Auburn. All MTSU has done since Mason's hire before last season is regress; a 3-9 opening act in 2024 was worse than any season on Stockstill's watch and getting to three wins this season looks a mighty chore, considering Mason sits 1-5 at the halfway mark. Though sophomore RB Jekail Middlebreook (433 rushing yards; no one else is above 81) is doing his best, there is little balance in an offense generating barely 82 yards per game on the ground, ranking a lowly 131st out of 134 natrionally. QB Nicholas Vattiato has been forced to chuck it 40+ times in recent games. Though not abysmal, Mason's 83rd-ranked defense can't compensate for the offensive imbalance. That's at least kept MTSU from getting humiliated lately, and allowed it to barely slip inside the spread two weeks ago vs. Missouri State, but it's a very low bar set by the Blue Raiders these days. There is not much MTSU can do with an offense scoring at a 17 PPG pace (127th nationally). Though Delaware has cooled a bit in recent weeks, there's more to like with the Blue Hens. Delaware isn't to the point yet where it can afford to lose the turnover battle and hope to succeed in its first season at the FBS level. In its three wins, the Blue Hens are +2 in turnover margin; in the three losses, the margin sinks to -5. Yet the winning culture established in the FCS ranks is helping Delaware stay afloat in its maiden FBS voyage under head coach Ryan Carty, whose team won nine games last year before making the step up. The Hens have a bit more balance than MTSU, running for nearly a yard more per carry (4.1 YPC vs. 3.2 YPC for the Blue Raiders). Quarterback Nick Minicucci has turned into a legit gunslinger, passing for 736 yards the past two weeks (including 422 in last week's loss at Jacksonville State) and earlier having tossed three TDs in the romp at Florida International. Already this season, vs. what looks to be two bowl-bound foes in UConn and Western Kentucky, Delaware has earned a split and could easily have won both. Regional observers have provided positive reports on Delaware's progress, and the consensus is that this is a spot where the Blue Hens are probably worth a look as long as the spread stays beneath double digits. The total looks a bit steep considering MTSU's offensive shortcomings. South Alabama at Georgia State (Thursday, 10/23) It's the first time we've gotten a look at either of these sides in one of these midweek specials this season, and one of the few times in recent years we've had a chance to check out Georgia State in a featured TV affair. There hasn't been much else to talk about lately with Panther football, which has been spinning its wheels for most of the past two seasons for head coach Dell McGee. Beyond a rousing early-season upset over Vanderbilt a year ago, not much has gone right for McGee. The Panthers have only covered the spread twice since that upset of the Commodores last September. Unfortunately for McGee, Vandy remembered that result and put 70 on GSU in the rematch almost five weeks ago, which was just a few weeks after Ole Miss put 63 on the Panthers in the opener at Oxford. That has helped skew the defensive stats downward, but GSU has still given up 40+ in its last two Sun Belt games (vs. Appalachian State and rival Georgia Southern). The 41.4 PPG average puts its 134th and last in the country. That's taken away from one of the more interesting storylines of the season, in which much-traveled QB TJ Finley showed up on campus at the start of September and was in the lineup the following Saturday vs. Memphis. Now at his sixth (sixth!) school, Finley understandably struggled to find rhythm, with Texas Tech transfer Cameran Brown taking the snaps in last week's loss vs. Georgia Southern. It might take McGee enlisting Bijan Robinson and the Atlanta Falcons offense to compensate for the leaky defense. GSU might be just the foe that South Alabama is looking for after an exasperating six losses on the spin. The Jags have been competitive for head coach Major Applewhite in all of the setbacks, save perhaps the worst effort of the season vs. Coastal Carolina on Sept. 20. That followed spirited covers vs. Tulane and Auburn that hardly suggested the season was about to head in the wrong direction. The bottom has yet to fall out in Mobile, as in their last two games, the Jags have lost in OT at Troy and were beaten on a last-play field goal by Arkansas State last Tuesday. The offense, rocked after spring practice when QB Gio Lopez transferred to Bill Belichick's North Carolina, still seems in safe hands with dual-threat Bishop Davenport, who has been serviceable enough this season with nine TD passes, while punishing RB Kentrel Bullock (568 rushing yards) has provided a viable ground game. Sun Belt sources suggest there is a wide gap between these sides, and while the South Alabama offense hasn't always been reliable this season, the chance to attack the soft Panthers defense should help end the Jags' slump, though taking the Over might be a bit bold. North Texas at Charlotte (Friday, 10/24) Every season there seems to be a team that's miles off of the opposition to such an extent that we can't ignore the ineptitude. This fall, that seems to be Charlotte, with a new coach in Tim Albin who might be wondering why on Earth he left a good gig at Ohio U to take on this task in the Queen City. The results haven't been pretty. The lone highlights through the first seven games are a narrow 42-35 win at home over FCS team Monmouth and a near-miracle backdoor cover (barely so, getting 17.5 points as a 17-point underdog) two weeks ago at Army thanks to a 16-yard TD pass from QB Grayson Loftis to WR Hunter Gibson with just eight seconds to play. Still, that's not much for highlights. Loftis, a transfer from Duke, has been in the lineup the past month in place of North Carolina transfer Conner Harrell, who was performing with a bit of flair early in the season before suffering a season-ending ACL injury in the loss to Rice on Sept. 18. Loftis is having a bit of a bumpy go, completing only 48% of his passes while tossing just three TDs along with four picks. The ground game, gaining a paltry 3.1 yards per carry, isn't providing much of a diversion either. That's all bad news for a defense that certainly can't carry the load by itself, given that it's leaking nearly 35 PPG (125th nationally), routinely exposed fore and aft by any competent offensive foe. The Mean Green certainly qualify as competent if not a bit better, having received votes in the weekly rankings this season and still in the American race with a 6-1 overall record. Their only blemish is a recent home loss to South Florida when everything went haywire in a three-and-a-half minute span wrapped around halftime when the Bulls scored four TDs en route to a shocking 63-36 blowout. Showing no ill effects last week vs. a competent UTSA, UNT exploded for a 55-17 win in Denton that has put head coach Eric Morris back into the discussion for the variety of high-profile jobs. Morris alerted anyone who would listen in in the summer that the QB job was in good hands despite the transfer of last year's starter, Chandler Morris, to Virginia. Drew Mestemaker stepped into the breach at the First Responder Bowl vs. Texas State and proceeded to pass for 393 yards and has continued to perform at a high level, closing in on 2,000 passing yards with five games still to go, and he already has 17 TD passes (with only three picks). There are weapons galore at Mestemaker's disposal; the Mean Green is almost perfectly balanced between run (254 plays) and pass (247 plays) and gains 5 YPC on the ground, featuring slashing RBs Caleb Hawkins and Makenzie McGill II, who have combined for nearly 900 yards and 13 TDs. Among a gaggle of receivers, sophomore Wyatt Young (26 catches at 15.2 yards per reception, with six TDs) is the most productive of a deep collection. All of this potency has helped UNT to the top spot in scoring offense nationally (45 PPG!) as well as four covers in the last five (and five Over results in its last six). This truly looks like a nightmarish game for the 49ers, and since the Mean Green seem to score points by the bushel, we can envision them taking care of most of an Over by themselves. California at Virginia Tech (Friday, 10/24) We've reached another phase of what has already been a very disjointed campaign at Virginia Tech, with a slow start that earned Brent Pry the axe after an unsightly loss to Old Dominion on Sept. 13, followed by a brief surge of excitement and back-to-back wins upon the promotion of OC Philip Montgomery to the interim position. A close 23-21 win at NC State on Sept. 27, after losing five times by one score a year ago, was thought by some to perhaps be a turnaround point. Instead, the Hokies slipped in their next game at home vs. underdog Wake Forest, and while the subsequent effort at still-unbeaten Georgia Tech wasn't terrible (a 35-20 loss), any thought that Montgomery might be able to salvage something now seems remote. Though we haven't seen Tech pack it in yet by any means, the situation is hardly ideal. The offense has been mostly misfiring all season; dual-threat QB Kyron Drones has been inconsistent, with his only 200-yard passing games since the start of September coming against FCS side Wofford and in a belated fashion in the aforementioned Old Dominion loss, piling up the bulk of his 266 pass yards long after the outcome had been decided vs. the Monarchs. Also, aside from one huge effort (174 rushing yards) vs. NC State, RB Terion Stewart has failed to make much of an impression, and the ground game has lacked some of the bite it had a year ago. Though legendary Tech DC Bud Foster has returned to the staff in an advisory capacity, the Hokies rank 78th in total defense, while the turnover margin hardly registers these days (-3 on the season). The visit of a perplexing Cal team somehow seems appropriate in what has been an oddball campaign for Tech; Is there any program more odd than the Golden Bears? Though Justin Wilcox is doing his usual credible job in Berkeley, and Cal is just one win from bowl eligibility, it's a bit of a carnival ride for the Bears. This team is still apt to do Cal-like things, like drop what seem to be easy catches and earn a series of head-scratching penalties. However, there are still some things to like with these Golden Bears. One of them is true freshman southpaw Jaron-Keawe Sagapolutele, the latest Hawaiian QB to make it big on the mainland, who for the most part has flashed some real upside with his 10 TD passes. Running back Kendrick Raphael has provided some balance with 495 rushing yards, and the defense, when not guilty of some of those perplexing penalties, is good enough to keep Cal competitive, ranking a respectable 34th nationally at 324 yards per game. There's enough to like about Cal to assume that if the Bears keep their focus, they can make this spread work to their favor, and maybe even steal a win. Cal's recent trend to the Under (5-1 in the the last six) also makes us think this score might stay low as well.
