A Mississippi State site on 247Sports ranks the Bulldogs' 2024 opponents and has UMass behind FCS Eastern Kentucky.
Gotta love SEC guys.
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As you probably heard, former UMass HC Walt Bell has been hired as offensive coordinator for the Western Michigan Broncos.
Bell was fired about halfway through last season as OC of Indiana. After the season the Hoosiers also fired their HC and the rest of the staff. Indiana is currently ranked last in the new eighteen-team Big Ten. The down side of the super conferences is that teams like Indiana have to co-exist with Michigan, Ohio State, USC, Iowa and Penn State. The best the Hoosiers can hope for is a .500 Big Ten season.
Bell will have more talent at Western Michigan than he had at UMass. He inherited a depleted roster in the low 50's in scholarship players.
At Western Michigan, Bell has transfer QB Hayden Wolff who has over 5,000 career yards and 30 TD's at Old Dominion. He also get MAC Freshman-of-the-Year RB Jalen Buckley who totaled over 1,000 yards in 2023. First Team All-MAC WR Kenneth Wolmack is also on the roster.
The Broncos also return four of five starting offensive linemen, which is always a good thing. The bad thing is the Broncos schedule. They open at Wisconsin and then Ohio State, which is a great way to get your team beaten up. Also, they only play five home games, so I don't expect Western Michigan to improve much on their 4-8 2023 record.
UMass and Western Michigan do not play in 2024, but the Minutemen and the Broncos should hook up shortly when UMass joins the MAC in 2025.
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The Big Ten's and SEC's plot to take over the college football playoffs seems on hold.
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