This is the weekend college football fans have had circled on their calendars since the middle of summer. Texas vs. Oklahoma, Ole Miss at LSU, Penn State at Southern Cal, and a Top 3 matchup of Ohio State at Oregon. Those are the headliners but the slate is packed full of quality games in every viewing window from 12 to 10. If you are degenerate, #17 Boise State plays at Hawaii at 11:00 eastern.

Our guest picker this week was a former standout on the defensive line at Greenville High. He was a member of Steve Spurrier's first recruiting class in 2005. He was the first player in program history to play in four bowl games. We are talking about defensive tackle Nathan Pepper. (2005-2009). Nathan's career highlights included four sacks and two touchdowns. (See below). He also recorded 80 total tackles during his four years in Columbia.

Today Nathan is a project manager for Ryan Homes. If you are looking to buy a home or piece of property call Nathan's wife Bailey at Upstate Mortgage Company in Greenville. Upstate Mortgage has been helping South Carolinians since 1993 with the process of securing a home mortgage in a simple and straightforward fashion by offering buyers the latest in financial tools that enable you to make sound financial choices

All game times are listed in EDT. The games lines were locked Monday morning and may have moved by the time this article is published.

I never thought I'd write that an early October game between Coastal Carolina and James Madison is a playoff elimination game but here we are. The winner of this game would still need a lot of help, but the loser will catch a second loss. A Sun Belt champion is not going to get in a 12-team playoff with two losses. ULM and Louisiana are the only two teams in the conference with only a single defeat. Boise State, UNLV, and the American winner are likely ahead in the pecking order at the moment.

A pretty solid game to put you to bed on Friday night. Hopefully after you've returned from your local high school game. Utah caught a surprising home loss to the Sun Devils' rival before their bye week. They can't go 0-2 against the Grand Canyon State and stay alive in the Big 12 race. Last season the Utes boat-raced the Sun Devils right out of Salt Lake 55-3. Utah has also won the last four meetings. Utah HC Kyle Whittingham has a 30-year age advantage over his counterpart, ASU's Kenny Dillingham. We don't want to dissuade our readers from watching this game, but if Utah QB Cam Rising plays and is effective - they will win this game.

The Gamecocks haven't gotten many scheduling breaks this season and they certainly won't this week. Alabama is coming off their first loss to Vanderbilt since 1984 and return home to Tuscaloosa this week. Good luck Gamecocks!

The Red River Rivalry finally comes to the SEC. Excuse me, the Allstate Red River Rivalry finally comes to the SEC after 119 prior meetings. Texas leads the all-time series 63-51-5, but OU won 34-30 last season. A few other quick RRR game facts: Texas has the longest all-time win streak winning eight in a row from 1940-1947 and 1958-1965. Oklahoma has the largest margin of victory in series, throttling the Horns 65-13 in 2003. The winner of the game takes home the Golden Hat. The game has been played in the Cotton Bowl Stadium on the Texas State Fair grounds since 1932. It looks like Arch Manning is going to have to wait another year until he gets his first taste of the rivalry- Quinn Ewers should be back under center for the Longhorns this week.

This game just smells of upset. Southern Cal has lost twice already, both on the road and both about 2,000 miles away from their campus. Now for the first time this season, the Trojans will host an opponent in the Coliseum that is traveling cross-country.

These two storied programs have met 10 times previously with the Men of Troy holding a narrow 6-4 edge. They've played in the Rose Bowl three times, with Southern Cal taking all three of those games including a 52-49 thriller in the 2017 Rose Bowl (2016 season). Penn State won their only other bowl meeting in the Fiesta Bowl in 1982 (1981 season). The Nittany Lions have never beaten Southern Cal in the state of California.

Just like the Gamecocks, the football Gods aren't serving this game up on a silver platter for Florida. Not only has a record hurricane torn across the middle of the state, but the Gators get an angry Volunteer bunch that was physically beat up by the Razorbacks in Fayetteville. So far, the Nico Iamaleava led Josh Heupel offense looks like the Joe Milton and Hendon Hooker led offenses. They will beat up on bad teams and catch teams off-guard with their tempo, but will struggle with the more physical opponents. Florida has talent on their defense but they don't fit the bill of a more "physical opponent." Tennessee's defense is much improved over prior seasons.

Florida's next five games are Kentucky, Georgia in Jacksonville, @ Texas, LSU, and Ole Miss. The Billy Napier watch is on.

The game of the day. The Big Ten's oldest bully verses their newest one. Ohio State has dominated Oregon historically with a 9-1 record, including a win in the first ever championship game of the four-team playoff era. However, Oregon did earn their first ever win over Buckeyes in the schools last meeting in 2021. This will be only Ohio State's second ever trip to Eugene, with the only other coming in 1967. (30-0 OSU win). Reminder here: Chip Kelly, the guy mostly responsible for turning Oregon into a football power (behind Phil Knight), is now the offensive coordinator for Ohio State.

Another reminder: Jordan Burch is still in Eugene. This season he has 19 total tackles, five sacks and a fumble recovery.

Gamecock fans are going to be curious by how this one plays out. South Carolina had LSU beat. Ole Miss had the Gamecocks put away in the second quarter. Both games South Carolina continued to shoot themselves in the foot with dumb penalties and questionable decision making from the sideline. The winner of this game stays alive in the playoff hunt. It's hard to see the loser running the table the rest of the way. Speaking of the playoff, here's our guess for how it plays out:

ACC: Two- I don't think the league has two of the best 12 teams but it will get two in.

B12: One. For the sake of great TV- Hopefully Colorado its Colorado. This league is going to cannibalize itself.

G5: One. Boise State is the front runner with Army, Navy, Memphis, Memphis lurking.

B10: Three- Oregon, Penn State, and Ohio State. Prove me wrong Indiana and Illinois.

SEC: Four. Certain talking heads will scream and then the SEC will have four of the final eight. The SEC probably has 5-6 of the 12 best in the country.

And Notre Dame: The Irish' schedule shapes up nicely for a run.

Meet Iowa State, the P5 undefeated team you know the least about. Iowa State is allowing 10 points per game, which ranks sixth nationally. No team has gained more than 337 yards against the Cyclones this season. The defensive numbers are impressive, ISU ranks fourth nationally in pass efficiency defense, fifth in pass defense, sixth in turnover margin, eighth in interceptions and 13th in total defense. The players driving that defense; linebacker Kooper Ebel- 35 tackles, defensive tackle J.R. Singleton with 3½ sacks, safety Malik Verdon with 32 tackles and DB's Jeremiah Cooper and Jontez Williams with two interceptions each. The Cyclones have beaten North Dakota, Iowa on the road, Arkansas State, Houston on the road (shutout win) and Baylor. ISU doesn't have a currently ranked opponent on the schedule until November at #16 Utah.

We at Gamecock Scoop know the power of the words we put in these columns, from Rece Davis describing a prior game with almost the exact verbiage that we used in this column on Gameday, to our manipulation of the Heisman odds. We are helping Travis Hunter in this column just as much as Travis is helping himself on the field. We've been screaming, how is the best player in college football sitting with the 10th best Heisman odds?- he's now in the top 2, with our other favorite player, Boise State RB Ashton Jentry. Jentry has out-rushed most FBS teams with 1,031 yards in five games. It would be nice to see these two get rewarded with trips to New York and for one of them to take home some hardware, if they continue their current level of play. Colorado's play the last several weeks is actually backing up their coaches hype.