Maryland

[jpfalcon09]

I think we can hold them a little more and score a few more than last week. I say Maryland 48-34.

I feel similarly on this. I think our offense will work a little better with another week of chemistry building, and our defense under Coach Pelini will be a little better. I would predict 45-31.

35-14 Maryland. Winds will be blowing 15-25mph with likely rain showers. Both offenses will struggle to throw so this becomes a battle in the trenches with BG getting worn down in the 2nd half.

[chandler101]

The telling point will be the TOP this week. Last week, BG dominated TOP with 38 minutes to Oregon 24 but I would expect almost the complete opposite this week. Maryland and Canada's offense likes ball control. We may be one of the few teams that still huddles. Last week, we beat Texas in TOP by 34 to 26. It will go a long ways to keeping your productive offense off the field and to your point, wearing on the D. 38-24 is a good score.

[moneymaker02]

This is the next step in rendering MAC football even more irrelevant and unpopular than it's ever been before. Tied to an awful ESPN contract for all of eternity and now ESPN makes all the MAC games part of their additional subscription service. I wouldn't pay another nickel to ESPN given how much we already pay for all of their other services.

If the MAC had a set, they should have sued ESPN. Of course, given how shitty that ESPN contract has been since day 1, I'm sure ESPN was smart enough to put a provision in there that they could move these games to any future paid service when they felt like it. ESPN3 was bad enough, but at least those fees were rolled into existing contracts so the consumers didn't have to pay extra.

ESPN3 fees were still passed onto the consumer. ESPN bundled the cost of ESPN3 into current agreements with ISPs and cable/satellite providers, even if a person didn't care to watch their content. The result was ISPs passing the buck onto the consumer to recoup that money, so in a way ESPN+ is forcing people to double dip.

In the end, it's all about the bottom line and ESPN has suffered greatly from the cord cutting phenomena. Their only way to try and increase that lost revenue was to force people to sign up for ESPN+ and charge them to access content and what I basically term as "premium events", and to layoff hundreds of employees.

If you'll notice this year, MAC vs. FCS games are available on ESPN3 and any other OOC or conference games will require that beloved subscription. They're betting that you'll pay the extra $5 to watch the content you want because there's nowhere else to access it besides actually going to the game.

I guess i was just a little shocked that it was not on Big Ten Network as well

[Schadenfreude]

I guess i was just a little shocked that it was not on Big Ten Network as well

The home team owns the TV rights, which means the MAC's ESPN contract applies. One option would have been to air this on ESPNU or something, but I'm guessing the ESPN family of networks thought it had better options.

Another option would have been to play it at noon and try to get regional TV stations (especially ABC affiliates) to pick it up as an appetizer before the 3:30 p.m. kickoffs. A few years back, this might have been the approach, but I'm not sure local stations are doing a whole lot with college football anymore, at least when it comes to the MAC.

[kdog27]

I think we can hold them a little more and score a few more than last week. I say Maryland 48-34.

I feel similarly on this. I think our offense will work a little better with another week of chemistry building, and our defense under Coach Pelini will be a little better. I would predict 45-31.

35-14 Maryland. Winds will be blowing 15-25mph with likely rain showers. Both offenses will struggle to throw so this becomes a battle in the trenches with BG getting worn down in the 2nd half.

Getting all scientific on us no fair

[ZuluWarrior]

Maryland is primed for a letdown, BG fairly healthy, Clair starts getting national attention, Doege excites everyone, Pelini learns quickly from last week, strong crowd. and Jinks shows there may be something there:

Bowling Green 31
Maryland 20

[bgsufalcon24]

So much for a big crowd...Mother Nature is pissing on our parade big time.

Might not even see half the crowd we would’ve had if it was warm and dry...unless the students and townsfolk show up in big numbers. The out of towners aren’t driving hours in the rain to sit in the rain for 4 hours

[Schadenfreude]

The out of towners aren’t driving hours in the rain to sit in the rain for 4 hours

The bigger risk is to the walk up crowd, not those of us who have had this game on our calendar for months or years.

[MarkL]

It would be a real disappointment if the crowd is small. You schedule these big home games to get a) a shot at a win against a major team and b) a big money day. You have to walk away with at least one of those. Otherwise it is a wasted opportunity. Rain or not we should be able to pack the stadium for a Big Ten opponent, and we should be able to hang with Maryland.

[gmartin]

EMU just beat Purdue in a constant rain storm. That stadium was less than 1/2 full. At the Doyt now and not many tailgating. Predict 14,478.

[MarkL]

Hopefully we sold more tickets than that ...

[MarkL]

EMU beat Rutgers last year. Two straight years with a Big Ten win. Same Emu that used to struggle to hit 2 wins a year. Great turnaround by those guys.

[jpfalcon09]

Rain is going to keep people away tonight. Too bad since they worked so hard with the white out promo.

[kdog27]

Sucks. Hopefully some terrible weather can close the talent gap and we can steal a win.

[gmartin]

30 min before kickoff and only maybe 6k in stands. People are still out drinking in the lots but I still don't foresee more than 15k.