NCAA football nerds, unite! The final page of Phil Steele’s 2024 College Football Preview magazine went to press last Friday night. Steele said on his socials that the printed mag should be available via direct-mail order by the middle of this month and on newsstands around the third week of June.
And the timing couldn’t be better. With the Broncos getting ready to take a siesta by wrapping up their three-day spring mini-camp on Thursday, the loneliest four-week stretch of the Front Range sporting calendar, mid-June to mid-July, or what the Grading The Week team likes to call “vacation season,” is almost upon us.
Plus, for the first time in three years, Denver’s not hosting a championship parade in June. So forgive us for looking ahead a little. OK, a lot.
See, the kids in the GTW offices upstairs are some serious, old-school college football junkies. For them, the unofficial start of football season isn’t the minute they open up preseason camp at Dove Valley. Oh, no. It’s the first time they wander into a Barnes & Noble this month and see Phil Steele’s magazine resting on a shelf next to its thinner cousins from Lindy’s and Athlon, just waiting to take our money.
Until that day comes, though, Team GTW will be busy saving our pennies and playing the W-L game in our heads, over and over and over again.
And hey, speaking of, FanDuel recently updated its projected over-under on 2024 college football win totals for FBS schools. While it’s largely rooted in science, keep in mind that over-unders on victories are also 100% rooted in getting as much action – money, scratch, moolah – from prospective bettors as possible.
FanDuel set the bar on CU wins at 5.5 and the one for CSU at 6.5 – the same as Air Force (6.5) and Wyoming (6.5). Far be it from Team GTW to tell you how to spend your money on the futures front. But we’re sure as heck happy to tell you where we wouldn’t.
Taking the over on CU at 5.5 wins – A-minus
Do we believe in first-time DC Robert Livingston? Kinda. Do we believe in returning OC Pat Shurmur? Oh, heck no. Do we believe in starting a true freshman at left tackle in a Power 4 league? Not really.
But we believe in Travis Hunter, dang it. And we believe in Shedeur Sanders. We believe that even if Deion Sanders isn’t interested in developing or meshing talent, he’s a genius at recruiting and acquiring it.
Assuming the Buffs manage at least two or three wins out of that September gauntlet of home to NDSU, at Nebraska and CSU, there’s probably enough quality line play to keep Shedeur in one piece and enough quality depth to survive the Big 12 marathon to come. Nine wins sounds optimistic. Playoff talk seems downright loopy. But anything fewer than six victories, even if you’re not drinking the Prime Kool-Aid, should feel like a disappointment.
Taking the over on CSU at 6.5 wins – C
The GTW crew is begging you, Jay Norvell. Prove us wrong. Give us a reason to believe that a corner’s finally been turned in FoCo. That the biggest underachievers in the Mountain West are heading back to the postseason for the first time in seven years. Seven long, long, long years.
The Rams’ six-seasons-and-counting bowl drought is the program’s longest since 1989 when Earle Bruce showed up and laid the foundation for Sonny Lubick to build into a beast. If Tory Horton can stay healthy and Brayden Fowler-Nicolosi can temper his hero-ball moments, the pieces are there. But facing Texas’ Quinn Ewers in Week 1 and Shedeur in Week 3 means asking for those pieces to be ready, and hungry, from the jump.
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