First off, a special thanks to all of our guest picker this season. (Spencer Lanning, Ty Erving, Nathan Pepper, Andy Boyd, Boomer Foster, Chuck Allen, Thomas Hooper, Ranzino Valentine, Charlie Carpenter, Ike Crofoot Jermale Kelly, Nick Jones and Parker White).

Caleb has our staff picks against the spread locked down- he's been amazing all season. Alan and Perry are neck and neck with Caleb for the straight-up pick lead. Alan has gone back-to-back and is looking for a historic three-peat in straight-up picks.

All game times are EDT. The lines were locked Monday morning and may have shifted by kick off.

This game has absolutely no playoff implications. The winner is probably headed to the Independence Bowl. These two schools played last week with WKU winning 19-17, ending Jacksonville State's 8-game winning streak.

This game carriers nationally significance for two reasons:

1. If Boise State wins they are going to get a first round playoff bye. If they lose, they are likely to fall out of the playoff altogether and be replaced UNLV. That would open the door Big XII winner to receive the four seed and the first round bye.

2. Heisman ballots are due on December 9th. Ashton Jeanty has one more chance to impress voters. He trails Travis Hunter in the betting markets. Jeanty has rushed for 2,288 yards and 28 touchdowns. He also has caught 18 balls for 102 yards and a score. He went for 192 with three touchdowns in Eugene in Boise's narrow three-point loss to #1 ranked Oregon.

The Broncos beat UNLV on October 25 in Vegas by a score of 29-24. Outside of a game against Portland State that Boise won 56-14 and Jeanty only had 11 carries, the 128 yards that UNLV held Ashton Jeanty to was his season-low.

Tulane's loss to Memphis eliminated the American from playoff consideration. It also meant that the Wave would have travel to West Point where the forecast calls for 28 degree weather. The two schools did not meet during the regular season but Tulane drubbed Navy 35-0 two weeks ago. Army's only loss came in blowout fashion to Notre Dame and Tulane was beaten by Kansas State and Oklahoma in September and Memphis last week.

Pretty simple here. The winner is in the 12-team playoff. As noted above, if Boise or if SMU lose, the winner is likely to get a bye. These two schools did not play each other in the regular season. Iowa State dropped back-to-back games at home to Texas Tech and at Kansas. The Red Raiders also beat Arizona State. The Sun Devils other loss was a head-scratcher at Cincinnati. Arizona State has won five in a row.

In a trend amongst the power conference Arizona State is playing for the Big XII in their first season.

The entire upper deck is sectioned off in Ford Field for the MAC Championship. Face value get in price is $10. There are currently club level seats available for under $100. Not sure why the MAC doesn't join the other Group of Five leagues and play their championship on the higher seed's home field. Miami beat Ohio 30-20 in the regular season.

No Coach Prime isn't returning to Mississippi to coach the SWAC Championship - but his former assistant T.C. Taylor is. Taylor has been a part of the JSU coaching staff since 2019. Taylor was star for the Tigers from 1998-2001. He's currently 17-6 as the Tigers head coach.

In case you were wondering: former Gamecock Rico Powers Jr. has four catches for nine yards and one rush for 19 yards. Powers was injured in JSU's week 4 win over Southern and hasn't returned since.

It is safe to say that both Georgia and Texas are safely in the field. Some in the SEC will complain that the Bulldogs would pick up a third loss and fell to other playoff contenders in Ole Miss and Alabama, but it's really not fair to punish a team for picking up a loss to the second ranked team in a conference championship game.

If Texas wins, they wrap up the 2-seed. If the Horns win and Oregon is upset by Penn State, the Longhorns are in line for the top overall seed. If Georgia wins they will get a first round bye and Texas is likely hosting a playoff game in two weeks.

Bevo has been banned from this game.

Marshall started the season 3-3, then won six-in-a-row to close 2024. Sound familiar? The Herd won their last game at James Madison on the last play of the game. Sound familiar? There are enough similarities between the Gamecocks and the Thundering Herd that South Carolina fans can vicariously root for Marshall this weekend.

Marshall and Louisiana did not meet during the regular season.

Scott Reed at Ducks Sports Authority, our Oregon Rivals sister site, does as good a job as anyone covering Oregon sports. We're going to direct you right here, for a full breakdown of this game.

In our eyes the ACC is simple as well. If the committee will drop Miami out of the playoff for a second loss - then it should do the same for SMU. Should the Mustangs lose in Charlotte, they will have been beaten by the two best teams that they've played. Their best wins would be a 1-point win at Duke and a 7-point win at Louisville. Alabama's resume is simple better and let's not kid ourselves, the goal of this committee is not to get the 12 best teams, it's to field the 12 best teams that will draw ratings. SMU's finale against Cal drew 228,000 viewers. Alabama's Iron Bowl win over Auburn drew 7.16 million.

Clemson wins and they are in the field and probably headed to Notre Dame or Oregon or Texas in two weeks. SMU makes it four-out-of-four for a new member school to play for a Power 4 championship.

On Monday it looked like South Carolina fans might have to do the unthinkable and root for a Clemson blowout, but the laziest committee ever assembled, and that's saying something, has already told us that they won't give consideration to teams that aren't playing this weekend regardless of the outcome of this week's game.