This episode of The Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz previews the Miami versus Notre Dame rivalry game, with guest Sister Jessica Smetana joining the hosts to discuss the matchup. The conversation covers Malachi Toney's injury status, the College Football Playoff rankings and what a possible ACC Championship loss would mean for Miami's résumé.
The guest argues that Notre Dame's defense has been a concern this season. The discussion also touches on the Navy series, women's college basketball, the NASCAR Championship at Homestead, and NBA usage rates.
Listeners will hear the hosts weigh hypothetical playoff scenarios and debate the cultural differences between college rivals.
In this episode Dave Demichick, Jessica Smetana
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We welcome in Sister Jessica Smetana. She hosts the college football happy hour with Lucy Rodin, and also the Notre Dame podcast, The Echoes, with Mike Golic Jr. Welcome, Sister. Before we get into all the heavy Miami-Notre Dame talk, I want to know if you caught the medic of New York, the king of New York, on Law and Order SVU this week. It was Jalen Brunson.
Salam, Brother Amin. Inshallah, you are having a blessed morning. I am actually not in Mom Donnestown right now; I am in the homeland of Barack Hussein Obama, our brother. I did see Jalen Brunson on SVU. I saw a one-minute clip. I think that was the only bit of the episode he was in. His acting skills are about what you would expect, but it was still very amusing.
I love that Rick Brunson was in the scene too. And I can only think of what the negotiation was. It's like, look, if you want my son in this, I've got to walk through in the background. So he walks—he actually, the scene starts with Rick walking in, like, as a patron, and then Mariska Hargitay walks over to Detective Brunson, whatever his name is. Okay.
Detective Madison. And she acts her ass off in this scene. She has to. She is ass off, and Brunson is just reading his lines. But it's okay. He's a basketball player.
We saw SNL.
He's ass on.
He is ass on. We saw SNL. Stick to your day job, kid. So just a lot of hand-wringing over here about the game, what it could mean, the implications.
Which game?
You know the game. Come on now. Yeah, that's not play-coy.
Tennessee-Kentucky.
That's not play-coy here. We know the game.
UConn-Michigan last night.
Wow.
State of Stan?
I want to talk about that one as well. But before we get to that, there is this notion going around, and Marcus Freeman didn't do much to dispel it, of, like, Notre Dame is acting like, well, we don't know if Malachi Toney is going to play or not. Is that—what is that? I mean, I'm going to put it up to you. What is that?
I didn't really see—I didn't see a video of his clip from yesterday because I was traveling. But to me, it kind of just seemed like, well, there's no official injury report, so we'll just, you know, we're crossing our Ts and dotting our Is because there's no official word yet from the team on what actually happened.
Well, I can give you official word. He's out.
I mean, yeah, I think he's out. But, like, you know, you know how coaches are.
Just in case. You can relay that.
I'm not reading that much. I'm not reading that much into it.
You can relay that. I appreciate you preparing. Like, he's going to be there. I guess it's less snaps that you're preparing for him to not be there. But it's a weird—trust me.
But, like, do you actually think he is? Or do you think he's just, like, saying that?
He's just saying that.
I don't know. This whole thing is so—
Coaches say shit.
This whole—like, if we could have kept it private, we would have. Like, Kane's universe put out an IG still, and then all the pets' heads started falling off.
Abdul Latif, please put it on the poll. Do coaches say shit?
You got it.
They all just say shit. A useless sound montage for college football coaches would go so hard.
So just, I was shocked when the CFP ranked Notre Dame 11. Now there's obviously an argument for it, but I thought they'd go the other way with it.
Why? Why does—I'm so confused why anyone thought that after what happened last year.
I thought that they would go the other way with it because ultimately this is a TV show. And one funny hypothetical that we've been having fun with here is, what if the game were on ESPN? Would it be 1 versus 11? This is an NBC game, and all these things are designed to push you to watch the games. But they have established now, regardless of whether it's on merit or not, they have established what they've told you is, if Notre Dame loses this game, they're basically out because there isn't an opponent on their schedule that can booster credentials enough to impress the committee. Which is added juice, no doubt.
What was your reaction to what the CFP does? It did. Like, I guess you weren't that surprised. But now it does change what this game means, I think.
Yeah, that didn't surprise me. But what did surprise me was how high Alabama was because essentially they're just giving Alabama a mulligan this weekend. If you look at the rest of their schedule, they play Chattanooga, Vanderbilt, and Auburn, which are three games that Alabama should win. So that is what surprised me. It surprised me how low UCLA was. It surprised me how low Texas Tech and Wake Forest were. But I think these are all part of the same conversation, Mike, which is, you know, the SEC teams were all either at the same spot as they were in the AP poll or slightly higher or, in a couple cases, considerably higher.
And I do want to push back on one thing, though, that Dave said about Minnesota because I get what your point is. They're 5-3 right now. They've got a couple big wins. Minnesota in particular, though, they did lose by several touchdowns to Mississippi State earlier this year, and they lost by several touchdowns to Purdue. That's not really the Big Ten team that I'm looking at as like, well, what's the difference between a 5-3 Minnesota and, like, a 5-3 South Carolina or Florida? The team that I'm kind of more curious about is Northwestern.
They don't have a signature win, but they're 6-2 right now. And that in the top 25, while there's multiple teams that are 5-3 that were. And the other thing, Mike, that I don't know if you saw that interactive ESPN blind ranking thing that they put out on their site yesterday. The Boise State's ranking is just, like, comically low. It should be much, much higher if you're just basing it off of the merits. And.
They did struggle with Texas State, but Texas State's not bad.
I mean, they almost gave up, but they're 7-1. They're 7-1, and they're at the bottom beneath teams that have lost many games and many games by blowout margins too. I think that's, like, the thing about the Alabama-Tennessee head-to-head that is pretty baffling is how much space is in between them, given that game really wasn't close.
Well, my pushback to the pushback is that the benefit to Tennessee of beating Kentucky would be like, what a quality win that is. And doesn't that show the greatness of the SEC for Tennessee to have knocked off Kentucky? But it's entirely based on the perception we've created around it. If the Gophers beat UCLA, it'll be the reaction will be like, see, we told you UCLA.
Yeah. No, I.
That's what I'm talking about.
I think, yeah, I understand. I understand that point. I think the UCLA thing is crazy because they're undefeated. You can only play the teams that you're scheduled against. And if you want to make a strength of schedule argument against teams that have one or two losses, like, that is a fair argument to make. And there's multiple sides of it. But if you're a team like UCLA that actually scheduled a non-conference opponent, it was Cal. Cal's having a terrible year. They may fire their coach.
Oh, dude, did you see those quotes from Rivera yesterday? That was insane.
I did. He said everything out loud that you would have preferred him to not say out loud if you were thinking Taj Lapois might keep his job at the end of the year.
He's like.
Basically.
Bumped his head. Like, he doesn't listen. He's like, I don't know if Lapois has actually signed his contract, right? So they can get rid of this guy.
That's like a whole, like, UC school system thing that apparently it takes a while for their contracts to get approved. But besides the point, UCLA did schedule a powerful non-conference team. They beat them. They beat Oregon, who is ranked. Like, it's they do have a team that the committee ranked on their resume, and they're undefeated. So if you want to make a strength of schedule argument, it's kind of like Florida State a few years ago. It's like, well, yeah, maybe there were some extenuating circumstances or quarterback got hurt, but they've still beaten everyone so far. And if they're going to go on and lose a few games, then you can drop them after they lose those games.
Why are we artificially, like, lowering their standing now? It kind of is implying that if UCLA does lose one game, they are out of it completely, which is pretty crazy if you look at who they have in the rest of their schedule.
I want to run by a Hellscape hypothetical that we stumbled on here in the local hour. Miami loses to Notre Dame as they're expected to. Miami drops one of the next three ACC home games to, like, Virginia Tech or Duke or whatever. Two loss, Miami gets to the ACC Championship, plays Wake Forest, a team that they beat. Wake Forest, if they get to the ACC Championship, you can assume top 15 team at least. Miami loses that game in the ACC Championship. You have a three-loss Miami, all three losses coming in a post-Malachi Toney world, but Malachi Toney slated to return if they play in the CFP.
What do you do? Does a conference championship hurt them? Miami would have two quality losses at this point, right? It's a top 10, Wake Forest and Notre Dame. What do you do, especially with a Malachi Toney return looming over it?
First of all, I do think Miami is going to beat Notre Dame. I have said this all week. I am deeply skeptical about Notre Dame's defense, not just because of the injuries, but because there have been several drives this season where they have just not been as good as they should have been. And it's not like a player talent issue. I think it is just a sort of lack of, like, organization pre-snap that is concerning that kind of reminds me of how they looked at the beginning of last season before they went on their 10-game win streak, and the defense looked much better after that.
But I think it's going to still be a great game. I know the spread is seven points and it's a home game and all of that, and Malachi Toney's out. But that is my concern for Notre Dame, even without Malachi Toney on the field. You still have a great quarterback. I think, Mike, would you say if you had to go the rest of the season without one or the other, you'd rather not have Toney, right?
No.
Really?
I'd rather.
What's the backup quarterback situation?
Luke Nicholl, but Darian Mensah is a Heisman contender because of Malachi Toney. Malachi Toney has gotten every got to have it play for this team.
That's true.
Their offensive production gets cut in half when he's not out there. And he's been in and out of the lineup a couple of times in these games have kind of hung in the balance. They go, they're three and out bad when Malachi Toney is not out there. But back to the hypothetical, just.
Yeah, back to the hypothetical.
What a lot of take that is, Mike. Ryan, I just have to hit pause for a second. You'd rather have the pass catcher than the guy at the trigger? I mean, that's a strong statement of what you think about.
Dave, there have been a lot of great I've had the pleasure of seeing a lot of great offensive talents at the University of Miami. Malachi Toney is the best offensive football player I have ever seen at Miami. He is just, there is no answer for him. He is such a gamer. He wins every rep. He is a flawless player. And this is a huge, huge impact. And yeah, I would rather have Mensah out because I know that I know what play Luke Nicholl is calling when the game is on the line.
He's dialing number one, and that tends to work out.
I like that you went kind of semi-formal as you articulated why you think. Like, David, I am a University of Miami enthusiast for many moons now. And among football players playing skill.
That's Bonafide's. But back to the hypothetical.
Back to the hypothetical.
We lose to Notre Dame. We lose to either Virginia Tech, which may be ranked at the time of their playing. It depends. A fascinating game inside the ACC tonight, Virginia Tech against SMU. So they lose two games overall. They make it to the ACC Championship. They lose to a top 15, either Louisville or Wake Forest. And they have three losses in a post-Malachi Toney world, but Malachi is possibly returning. Do you hold that loss in the ACC Championship against them and put a team like Alabama in over them?
Yeah, I mean, I think that we've seen last season the committee treats different conference championship games differently. I mean, we saw it with BYU last year. That wouldn't surprise me at all. I mean, there is, I think one thing that I have to remind myself, despite how I think ridiculous some of the rankings were on Tuesday night, there are still a lot of games left for a lot of the SEC teams and, like, a lot of the Big Ten teams too that didn't really schedule anyone in the non-con. Like, we're still kind of seeing how those teams are going to look now down the stretch.
So yeah, there could be, like, significant attrition with a team like Texas who is, I believe, a two-point favorite or a two-point underdog against Missouri on Saturday.
I think it's a two-point favorite at Mizzou.
Two-point favorite at Missouri. They have tons of injuries right now. The last few games on their schedule are not gimmees. Even a team like Georgia has to play a pretty decent South Carolina team a couple weeks before the season ends. And I'm not saying, like, oh, these schedules are a grind. It's just sort of the way that they're set up with the way, like, LSU still has four pretty tricky games ahead of them. And they're a team that was ranked pretty high despite the fact that their best win is, I guess, Clemson, maybe Texas A&M.
So there is still, like, a lot of ball left. There could be significant attrition with the SEC teams where you might get, I don't know, maybe there is a doomsday SEC situation where because of tiebreakers, you get, like, a three-loss SEC team in the championship game and then they lose. And then I don't know. I have to go look at tiebreakers. But yeah, I wouldn't put it past them to take the ACC Championship loser out of it, even if it's Miami.
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Dan Le Batard.
Put a finger in there, but if you tell anyone, I'll deny it.
Mike, Ryan.
Don't you stare at it. Eat it.
This is the Dan Le Batard Show.
Sister Jessica, I want to transition now over to women's college basketball. And I'm curious because UConn lost to Michigan last night.
Yeah.
Will NIL and the Transfer Portal also shake up what has been basically an oligopoly at the top of women's college basketball with the same five or six schools that have been running the sport for however long? Is NIL and the Transfer Portal going to do the same thing they did to college football and just open this thing up and level the playing field?
Brother Ameen, I think that there's more going on here than player movement in the portal. I think what you've seen over the last few years is a renewed investment in college basketball because of the popularity of college basketball and also I think the success of the WNBA over the last few years and being like a viable professional domestic option for players. And I think a team like Michigan, who upset UConn last night, is a great example of that because Michigan has not been a women's basketball powerhouse, but over the last few years, they have really invested in women's basketball and last year had a team that was very young that went really far in the tournament and was incredibly successful.
And so it's not entirely surprising that they beat UConn, especially at home. But the way that they did it was impressive. And also the fact that this team, I saw a stat in ESPN this morning, they are three and 47 against top five opponents. That is crazy. So this is a program-defining win for the Michigan Wolverines. And I think that there's just more interest and investment across the entire sport. And you'll probably see that come March.
And that's kind of how it's been the last few years. I think we've kind of been talking about this a little bit for the last, like, two or three seasons, but certainly, like, it feels more opened up now. Like, you had a team like UCLA win last year. It was a pretty massive deal for their basketball program. I will be going to the Notre Dame women's home opener tonight against Stonehill in South Bend. Very exciting stuff. And they're another team that they are more of a traditional powerhouse, sort of like a guard development destination in women's basketball, but they'll certainly be in the mix too.
I pray that you do not fall for the same banana in the tailpipe that Brother Zazlo did by taking a flight from Chicago to South Bend that is actually a bus from Chicago to South Bend.
They canceled that service.
Really?
Yeah. They did it for like one year and then they're like.
Pissed off too many people?
We'll do the planes again. Yeah.
So Jess, you legitimately think Miami is going to win this football game. You're not doing, like, an emotional protection thing. You think that. I do agree with you. Headed into the game, I felt good. And that was before the Mali injury. And I think that changes everything. But you guys were pretty hurt, especially, like, defensively. But you really believe this?
I am genuinely concerned about the defense. I think injuries aside, I would have told you that because I feel like there's a few reasons why I've been underwhelmed by the defense this season. One of them is that the starting best edge on the Notre Dame football team was ejected from the game five snaps into the BYU game for targeting, which was an absolutely insane thing to happen. So I guess we will never know what would have happened in that game had that not happened.
I do think it had a pretty big impact on how the rest of the game went. But even in spite of that, yeah, there's just, Mike, there's been times this season where, and I know, like, Bobby Petrino, he did this against your team last weekend. He's obviously a very good offensive play caller. And that North Carolina team does have weapons. But Notre Dame had a few really ugly drives against North Carolina where they're playing in this sort of passive soft zone defense and losing one-on-one matchups against players that are bigger than them. And I think we saw a little bit of that in the first half against BYU.
The Navy game, I don't count because that's a triple option offense that, like, it just, it's not, you're not going to see anything like that really the rest of the season. But they did get, you know, they looked a little lost against Navy for the first couple drives of that game. Again, I don't read too much into it, but yeah, I think there's just been a lot of lapses on a defensive side that I, frankly, I wish nothing but ill on the Cincinnati Bengals for the rest of the year so that Al Golden comes back because I think he had a little bit better grasp of, like, playing to the strengths of the personnel on the field.
Jess, I got to tell you, though, Al Golden would make such a great head coach for FSU. So as much as we'd like to see him return there, I think Tallahassee is the pipeline. And if not, then Manny Diaz.
Game it out real quick, though. What is the result, Mike, that is better for the U, do you think? Is it for Utah to beat BYU? To devil's damage check, I said a half hour ago, I think you want BYU to give Notre Dame a quality loss, which is what they would have taken. It broke Provo, but I also think it's a numbers game. And Jess is right that, like we talked about on Football America, the SEC is about to eliminate each other for the next couple of weeks and starting on Saturday.
So.
This one's easy. I can answer you right now. Kick BYU down. They already got one loss. Get them out of that pack. I like Utah right where they are. At this point, you want Utah to run the table. That makes the math so easy.
Also, is it still true, Jess? I don't have the numbers on it currently, but I remember this being the case, say, a half decade or so ago. The week after anybody played the triple option of Navy, they were really physically beaten up and didn't play as well as they typically did.
Yeah, we were talking about that on my show. I was trying to find whatever article, like, broke that down. It was, I think, from, like, the maybe, like, an Ohio State Navy game or something like that. This has been a big topic of discourse among Notre Dame fans, probably for the last, like, decade or so as it pertains to the Navy game, which, by the way, I heard you guys talking about rivalries. I have to say, not all rivalries are great matchups and not all great matchups are rivalries. And I think the Notre Dame-Navy series is a great example of that.
It is a rivalry series. They have played every year except COVID since, I don't know, 1913 or something like that. They've played 99 times against each other. It is a rivalry. Notre Dame has won the rivalry against Navy, like, 83 times of those 99 times because it's not really a great matchup. Even when Navy has a team, like, in 2024, their team was really, really good. It was a ranked first-rank matchup. Notre Dame played them at the Meadowlands and beat them by several touchdowns because they know how to defend the option.
And Notre Dame's offense, generally, if they're any good, they should be good enough to beat a Navy defense and score a lot of points. So I would say there's definitely something to it that especially defensive players do seem to get more banged up in the Navy series than playing against other teams. And maybe there's, like, the cut blocking or whatever, like, the type of style of play that Navy's offensive line has to play.
They're dirty.
I'm not calling them dirty. There were some dirty plays in that game. There were some Jerome Bettis Jr., our buddy Dave's, our buddy's son, the bus, mini bus. He got, like, suplexed out of bounds on one play and they didn't call it. Like, there were a few, like, okay, that was not really a great out-of-bounds tackle, but I don't think that they're playing dirty. I think that's just how they have to play to win. And the style of play is, you know, less easy for defensive players who are used to playing against, like, sort of drop-back offenses or even just regular, like, spread offenses than playing against a Navy and having to learn that the week of the game.
This is something that, like, former players talk about all the time. It's difficult. It's tricky. I don't think Notre Dame will ever cancel the Navy series, but I do think there's a non-insignificant amount of fans that are like, you could take it or leave it. We don't necessarily need to do this anymore.
You can check out Sister Jessica's podcast, College Football Happy Hour with Lucy and her weekly Notre Dame podcast, The Echoes with Gojo. Sister Jessica, thank you so much. Give my best to Brother Lehman and I eagerly await the ceremony that takes your relationship from haram to halal.
Habibi.
Thank you, Brother Ameen.
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Dan Le Batard.
I don't like the word blue, but I do have at least one pal that I can think of who has, actually, he says he fell asleep in Coitus.
Dave Demichick.
You may look at me and be surprised to hear this. I happen to be a vigorous love maker, so that would never happen to me.
This is the Dan Le Batard Show.
So we've got some fun stuff happening this weekend, guys. I don't know if you know. Look, hotels are booked in Miami. The Ubers are out of control. And I'm like, what's happening? What's going on? And then it came to me like a vision after my Salat prayer of the evening that championship series is happening at Homestead. And we have our resident gearhead, Brother Michael, with your brother Richard Gear on your head. Take us away to the NASCAR Championship.
Richard Gear is on my head. It is championship weekend, Ameen. And it's why I'm not in South Bend right now, because I got to be at this championship race. Now, not a lot of drama headed into Homestead. Kyle Larson basically just needs to get a stage point in the first stage or second stage, and he's basically your champion. Or if he doesn't get stage points, he needs to finish in the top 28. However, it's motorsports. Funny things can happen. I once saw Ryan Blaney have the best car in the field by a mile and his engine just straight blew up.
You never know what can happen. Two other drivers are still alive in the championship chase, Christopher Bell and Denny Hamlin, who had a missed opportunity last week. And it's really unfortunate. Denny Hamlin, the greatest NASCAR driver to never win a Cup Championship. If we were doing this by the old Winston Cup point standings, Denny Hamlin would be your Cup Champion. Just an unfortunate break. Kyle Larson racing his best races at the time you need it most. Larson, just play, just play it clean. Don't get in a wreck and just putt along and you are the champion for back-to-back years.
Prevent defense.
Prevent defense. However, again, this sport has a funny way of adding drama into it. Another major headline is Carson Hosobar, the highly controversial NASCAR superstar, the first NASCAR driver to get invited to the Met Gala since Jeff Gordon.
Wow.
He has been suspended by his own team, Aspire Motorsports. Yes, because last week he was brake checking Austin Cindric. He forced Austin, like, he hit the brakes. Austin Cindric wrecked his car twice.
You would think that happens more often.
And now it's really a dirty pull. And NASCAR didn't suspend him. It's pretty telling that Spire did.
So, like, for example, like you said, Kyle Larson, all you got to do is just, like, just show up, basically, and complete the race. And you've got this. You would think that someone would send a goon in to go do exactly that.
You know, 2311, Denny Hamlin's team. You find weird bedfellows and allies, but you also there is a respect and integrity to this sport. And with Carson Hosobar not in the field, the chances that someone crashes into Kyle Larson have now gone down. We're hoping for good weather out there. It should be an amazing race. I have a parlayout right now that I've put on my social media, on my Instagram. We have Tyler Reddick, who's competed very well at Homestead, top 10.
We have Christopher Bell, top three, and we have Denny Hamlin, top five.
It's funny. In many ways, it is the anti-baseball, right? Like, baseball is like, we're trying to cheat any which way we can. We're going to invent new ways to cheat that other people haven't thought of yet. And NASCAR, it's like a gentleman.
What was so frustrating is last week Kyle Larson got off to such a bad start that the door was open there and just a missed opportunity for I flipped. Kyle Larson used to be my favorite driver and now I'm a Denny guy because I want to see him finish this story. Now, there is a chance for one of the more miraculous title wins ever, but he needs a little luck. One race, one champion. Watch the NASCAR Cup Series Championship at Homestead, Miami, this Sunday, 3:00 p.m. Eastern on NBC.
Brother Tony, a little bit earlier, you hit me in my ear with, he can't keep doing this.
He can't.
He can't keep getting away with this.
He can't.
You're talking, of course, of the one and only Huka Doncic.
Huka Doncic, who's by every metric and by every number you can see, is putting up the most goddy stats we've ever seen to start a season. And I feel like, let's see, what's November 6th? I'm giving it till January. Like.
That's a long time.
Like, I think November, December, like, he's going to tear the league apart. The moment the clock strikes 27, we're going to have some sort of, you know, wheel fall off, like in NASCAR.
The crazy thing is his usage rate. League leading, and he's always one among the league leaders, but this year is the highest of his career. So it's like a guy who's already very extreme in that regard. This is the highest of his career. He's at 40%. And for those who are like, what's usage rate? I'll explain it to you. Basically, if you think about it, on any given time on a basketball court, you've got five guys on your team. In a perfect world, 100% of the possessions get divided among all five guys equally, so everyone gets about 20% of the offense.
He's got 40%, meaning he's literally doing the work of two guys anytime he's on the floor. It's incredible.
I'm not going to lie, it seems low to me. You just described usage rate to me and I was expecting him to be, like, four-fifths.
Like, you got to think about it. This is when he's on the floor and everything that happens, every fast break and every kick out to a guy hits a three or whatever, all those things included, he's still at 40%. And that, ladies and gentlemen, I just don't think is sustainable. Not in today's NBA. And he's defending this year better than he has in the past. He's put in effort. He's talked about this being something that he wants to do. My thing is like, hey, man, then you got to let go of the rope a little bit.
Which is the other part of this that's kind of funny is that JJ Reddick, when he came in, was a guy who was really about, like, I thought he had some nice offensive philosophies, but now it's kind of like, give the ball to Luca and get the hell out of his way. It's not like what's happening right now in Miami with Giannis.
It's interesting, though, Ameen, that we have, you know, obviously MVP and we have most improved player. Maybe we need X Factor award because that's Walker Kessler. He has completely changed the conversation for the Lakers and how that team looks when he's out there with Luca, right?
Absolutely. I mean, but Luca's been asking for a center pretty much since he got there. And they've given him Jackson Hayes and they've given him DeAndre Ayton and they've given him basically a bunch of guys.
Bums.
Yeah, they're not good enough. Guys who aren't good enough. And Walker Kessler is the first bona fide talent at center he's played with since he left Dallas.
I'm just surprised that he's held up for as long as he's held up because he's also had injury plagued his entire career. And now you look at these two pieces, Luca and Kessler, and it's like, is it a ticking time bomb? Are they starting off too good?
Kessler, 30 minutes a game. So it's like, that's decent. Like, you're playing him, I think.
Ramping him up a little bit.
Yeah, but Luca's at 36. And as I said, his minutes are high-impact minutes. Like, there's not 36 minutes where he's chilling on the side. It's 36 minutes where every possession, he's got the ball in his hands and he's doing stuff in a way that kind of, like, makes me think, yo, is Austin Reaves being underutilized right now? Because what was, like, a really nice balance before, now it feels kind of like you're kind of getting where you fit in. And I don't know. I mean, it's obviously they're winning, so they're going to be like, we're cool with this.
I think JJ Reddick was talking about this because they sat their starters at the, like, they were blowing somebody. I can't remember who. And then they came back. The other team came back. And so he had to sit the bench guys and bring the starters back in. And he basically sounded like Stan Van Gundy afterward or Jeff Van Gundy or any of the.
It was the Brony game where he was minus 11 minutes.
He's like, I can't, well, I learned that.
Austin Reaves had to get his headband back.
I got to play my guys the whole time.
Alright, enough about this crap. Let's talk about the big rivalry game coming up here. And speaking of rivalry.
What rivalry?
I just told, we're talking about, I think we accept that the U versus the Irish is one of the great non-regional. It's a circumstantial rivalry because they're two high-end teams and they are once again here. Is this, Mike Ryan, by your estimation, the greatest disparity between cultures among any rivals? I guess USC, Notre Dame is similar, but is the U, I guess I don't really know what the University of Miami is. Is it a wild party school?
Not really. No, no. I don't really know what the school's like. I didn't go there. And the only people that go there seem to be, like, white rich kids from New Jersey. So, yeah, like, the party's in the tailgate, no doubt. And it's a bunch of people.
But that's because we're there.
Yeah, and it's a bunch of people that went to Miami, dot, dot, dot, Dade College.
Yeah. Go bazooka sharks. Isn't that what they are?
Well, that's funny because Notre Dame fans, I mean, a giant percentage of them have nothing to do with Notre Dame or aren't from Indiana or anything else. They just vibed to the school decades ago.
Well, because it was on TV.
It was on TV and that's how you have a lot of people that. Raves fans.
Cup fans.
Like, when Miami's rivalry with Notre Dame laid dormant, I actually kind of liked Notre Dame. I didn't have any memories of it being a fierce rivalry. And I liked being able to watch their games every week on television. So you do build some affinity for the brand and relationship. So I kind of get that. Nationally, though, people don't understand what an outlier Miami is. If you ask someone on the street, like, hey, what's Miami's student body? They'd say, I don't know, like 50,000. We have 17,000 people at this school, a really small alumni base. They are such an outlier when it comes to power football.
It's really a miracle that they're here.
It's Duke in basketball. Like, you have a tiny private school in a state that's bigger and you think, like, oh, University of North Carolina against Duke. Those are two big schools. Duke is a tiny school. University of Florida against University of Miami. Miami is a tiny school.
Well, Duke is a, again, talking about rich white kids from New Jersey.
Same thing.
That's the kids that go to Duke. And, like, no offense to the academics at Miami, which I'm sure.
Miami's a backup school for Duke a lot.
Duke is, like, a really high academic school. So it's like nerdy rich white kids from New Jersey. Like, the players that play at Duke, they often talk about going to Chapel Hill to pick up girls because the talent pool's a little deeper.
But here's where the outlier is even more magnified because everyone just assumes, well, Miami got back into the game with NIL. Yeah, they did. But it's a lot harder for them to get into the game with NIL because their alumni base is so small by comparison. Honestly, when you shine a light on Indiana, Dave, correct me if I'm wrong, doesn't Indiana have the single largest alumni base in the nation? It's no surprise that they're back.
It's not something like that, right? And Mark Cuban, you know, provides millions of dollars on his own. I think the thing with the other Indiana school, the second best college football program in the state of Indiana, Notre Dame, what's fascinating with them is this is pretty severe. I don't know if this is still true right now, but I'm pretty sure it is. You can't be in the other gender's dorm room after midnight. Imagine that. Imagine being a co-edulator.
Haram, yes. By the way, that's what my mom said.
I think that's true.
I wanted to go to Miami originally out of high school and my mom said, that's where the haram is. And I said, okay. So she just said it was a.
Mom knew?
Yeah, it was a land of facade.
Habibi.
Yeah. So, Dave, let me ask you a question. First of all, who's Indiana's rival?
Purdue, man. They play for the Oaken Bucket every year.
What do they call it? The what?
PU, the Oaken Bucket.
Oaken Bucket? Is it named after someone?
Oak is made of oak.
Got it. Oaken Bucket. I thought you said Oaken like McCully Culkin, but you lost the C. Like, you're a bull.
No. I mean, it's so sad. It really is. And obviously, I'm biased and I went to the correct one. I went to Indiana University. But they reside on either side of Indianapolis, one to the north, Purdue, West Lafayette, which begs the question when you go to West Lafayette, how bad must East Lafayette be if this is where they put the college? But either way, Bloomington, glorious, gorgeous, especially at this time of the year, with the foliage and otherwise, rolling hills and streams running through. And then you go an hour north of Indianapolis, flat, dreadful place.
I can't imagine. It's as though the entire, you spend four years in black and white. It's an atrocity there. I feel bad for them. Maybe that's the biggest disparity in culture is Bloomington versus West Lafayette. But I think that Notre Dame, being a student there, my perception at least of Miami is that it would be a great time to be down there in Miami for four years of your life versus choosing to live in South Bend for four years. E gat.
Okay, wait. Going back to Purdue and Indiana, does that make, like, ooey-pooey, like a child born out of wedlock or something like that? Like, what is, how do you guys view that?
Ooey-pooey?
What, I-U-P-U-I?
Yeah, ooey-pooey.
Ooey-pooey.
You guys don't know ooey-pooey?
Yeah, yeah. I-U-P-U-I.
I don't think they call it that anymore, but yeah, I hear you. Yeah, it is some deal with the devil.
You're right. A bastard child?
I've got an interesting one in terms of rivals that have distinctly different cultures and they reside in the same state. Texas and Texas A&M are wildly different.
Oh, yeah.
Yes. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Like, so Texas is like Austin. It's like very kind of like cutting edge and tech.
Progressive.
Progressive school kids. And then A&M is.
Giggum. A cult. A cult. Weird stolen valor. It's just, I love College Station. I'm still in a, like, active College Station chat. I root for my Aggie.
I went there to scout Chris Middleton in, like, 2011. And I was like, first of all, everyone wore white. And, you know, as a black man in Texas, that got me a little, hey, what's happening here?
But they are very nice. As most people that want you to join a cult are.
Yeah, that's how they get you. That's how they get you, huh?
Like the carpet cleaners.
In Seinfeld, right?
They're so nice. I imagine there's a pretty big difference between the student bodies of Stanford and Cal, which are near each other, but both good schools. But my perception is that Cal Berkeley is stoner you and Stanford is probably very buttoned up.
Stanford is the rich kids. Again, Stanford is the rich kids and Cal is like, hey, I had to go into a lottery to get into the school, right? I feel like it's like, say that UCLA and USC. USC is the rich kids and UCLA is like, I had to go into a lottery to get into the school. Arizona State and Arizona, it's like, hey, do you have a pulse for both of them?
You lost a lottery. You had one.
Georgia Tech Georgia is definitely, you know, this is.
Yeah, that's a great one.
One is like, hey, we're academics and you have to be the top 1% of the 1%. And the other one is, do you have a pulse? Although someone told me, like, over the last, like, decade or so, Georgia has slowly gotten better at academics and that blows my mind.
And North Carolina Duke too.
Yeah, North Carolina.
Midwest Virginia, one side knows how to read.
Wait, I'm trying to think. Who's Illinois?
Illinois?
Minnesota?
Northwestern would be a giant.
Iowa?
You put the S on Illinois.
Yeah, they're in.
Illinois.
Who is Illinois?
Possessive. Yes, apostrophe. Come on. Astaghfirullah, brother. I know the language.
Yeah, I thought next up is Oregon.
No, no, no, no. Only if you're playing the game. It's the Oregon Trail. That's the only time it's acceptable to the.
I agree.
What a game.
I agree.
That's, by the way, Grand Theft Auto.
Is that coming out?
Oh, my God. Mike, you've been sending me pictures of all the activations and stuff. I got to get down to Las Rosas.
Their marketing budget is in the billions. The bar did great yesterday just because people wanted to see the GTA stuff.
Is there an NA Patriot beer? Ooey-pooey.
"Give my best to Brother Leeman."
We might have other topics to cover, but let's be real: all that matters here is the rivalry coming up this weekend.
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