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This is amazing, but is anyone gonna tell Marty? He has no idea! 🙂

I bet NOBODY had this preseason ranking after two weeks !!!

In honor of The University of Akron’s most famous, and favorite Offensive Coordinator, we’re inviting you to “Party With Marty!” in the grass area behind the south goal post on Saturday September 26th! “I Partied With Marty!” tee shirts will be handed out to the first 1000 participants courtesy of Sully’s Tool and Party Rental. In addition, $2.00 Bud Lights will be available in a commemorative “I Partied With Marty” souvenir cup! Hey Zips fans…let’s “Fill the Hill!” Show up in the beginning of the 2nd quarter to get your cups, tee shirts, and party hearty with Marty! Let's show Las Vegas how to really party!! BEAT UNLV!

What's best for Akron? At this point, do we want him to be eligible? If so, won't that throw a wrench into things? Poff supposedly won the QB battle over the Summer, so would they just go ahead and put him out there? How can you bench CB at this point? I don't know, to me, it just makes things potentially worse for the team chemistry.

The bottom half of the teams are genius. Per Google for FY2024-25, here is the media payout per school: Ohio State: ~$91.55 million (highest, boosted by postseason performance) Penn State: ~$88.9 million Next 14 Fully Vested Members: $76 million to $80 million each Oregon: ~$48M Washington: ~$46M There are ~20-40 teams from that graphic that will likely break away from the NCAA to form their own super league at some point. Most of the Big Ten teams will not be part of that "cool club". When they remain in the NCAA with the rest of us peasants, they'll have ample resources to outspend the Akron's of the world. Effectively, they're playing the long game. Well done.

In all fairness, Rutgers is usually pretty historically bad. They were good the first time Schiano was there and stepped up a bit in his first few years after returning, but seem to be getting back to normal. Here’s to hoping they suck next year!

Tailgate setup at 8 a.m. then? 😄

But we have 9 10 11. Could be better but also could be worse. At least we're not 12 or 13 and we can't play ourselves lol

Keep it going Zips. Perhaps this is the year we catch lightning in a bottle. Stranger things have happened. As Ted Lasso says "Believe".

Too bad we don't play #12 or #13 😑

Well, I figure that if Marty can't be there, maybe AI Slop Marty like in the picture can be the fill-in

Including the next two 2027 - at Arizona State, Rutgers, UNLV - hosting Maine 2028 - Lafayette, at Wyoming, at West Virginia, at Vanderbilt 2029 and 2030 right now Akron has four OOC games scheduled but the James Madison home-and-home is almost assuredly going away.

It's definitely growth but not in the traditional sense. Gotta find a new metric to measure "growth" cause year to year growth won't quite make as much sense as it used too. Maybe a percentage of students in Ohio? Something like that

Women’s soccer is now 4-3 after beating Mercyhurst 4-0

I think there is still value in college athletics as it keeps alumni engaged, enhances the college experience, and provides marketing for the University. All of this said, the costs have got out of hand. I get why the Nick Saban's and Urban Meyer's of the world made what they did. Their programs were highly profitable and they were highly successful. I don't think athletics necessarily needs to turn a profit, but it also shouldn't be financially crippling schools. IMO no MAC football coach is worth $600K+, yet you have multiple making $1M+. They're only able to command that because MAC Universities, along with most of the G5, are heavily subsidizing athletic departments to the tune of ~$25M+/year. If that subsidy was something more manageable, let's say $10 million, staffing costs across all sports and building costs would be greatly reduced.

It's more college athletics, but I'll put it here. Many schools are moving in this direction. https://www.axios.com/local/raleigh/2026/08/11/unc-looks-to-place-athletics-in-an-llc What does this mean? We are a lot closer to players becoming employees than ever. An LLC provides a tax ID number that will allow the universities to pay salaries through normal payroll.processes. Depending on how it is set up, there could be no connection to the university other than using their facilities and names. I don't know what other choices schools have right now. Some day, team names could be things like "Alabama Roll Tide LLC Football Division brought to you by the University of Alabama". The players would not be required to go to school or anything. They would simply have a job. See how it becomes professional football? Can laws be passed to turn this back? Maybe, but it depends on how far this goes before laws are passed. Sometimes something goes so far that there is nothing laws or courts can do to turn it around. For example, the hole in the ground that used to be the East Wing of the White House. The tacky ballroom that is being built may be so far along that Congress couldn't change it if they wanted. They work on it every day and Congress hasn't done anything yet. It could be finished before they start. Same with college sports. It could be so professionalized before Congress does a the that there is nothing they can do.