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- The Sickos Committee’s Weather Travel and Football Master Almanac Notebook. (SCWTFMAN) - The Southern Conference aka the SoCon!
The Sickos Committee’s Weather Travel and Football Master Almanac Notebook. (SCWTFMAN) - The Southern Conference aka the SoCon!
Welcome to the Sickos Committee’s Weather, Travel & Football Master Almanac Notebook aka the SCWTFMAN.
Here in our SCWTFMAN we will attempt to forecast the upcoming 2023 college football season by using our Sickos Committee alert system. We’re going to do this in the Farmer’s Almanac style. If you don’t know what a Farmers' Almanac is, basically it provides long-range weather predictions for both the U.S. and Canada. We will be applying our forecast to all of Division I in the United States. We’re trying to predict what the upcoming season holds for all Division I teams in college football using our Sickos Committee Weather Alert System.
First we will preview the 128 FCS teams in a conference by conference breakdown over the next coming weeks. Then we will get to the 133 FBS teams for a total of 261 team previews in all.
Will these previews be long winded and incredibly in depth? No. Will these previews be mostly based on “vibes” as assessed by the Sickos Committee weather forecasters? Yes.
Basically, we’re going to try to assess the team as a Sickos Warning, Watch or Advisory, give you their record last year, provide a little blurb about the team and for the FCS version to advise you of any of their games against the FBS and interesting schedule tidbits. We will do a couple of parts here for the substack as we can’t fit all the teams in one post.
The Southern Conference aka the SoCon
This was their logo up until about five or six days ago but now it’s the one below.
Chattanooga
Last Year 7-4 Overall and 5-3 in the SoCon. Finished Ranked 23rd.
Just missed the FCS playoffs with a last week loss at Western Carolina.
With the exception of the Western Carolina loss, the Mocs beat everyone they were supposed to last year, and dropped games against the top two teams in the conference and were blown out by a very good Illinois team to start the season.
Out of conference: North Alabama, Kennesaw St, Alabama
Rating - Sickos Warning - A mixed bag of OOC games combined with a wide open conference schedule could lead to a wide range of results for the Mocs this year. The Week 2 game against Kennesaw should be a fun place to start watching.
The Citadel
Last Year 4-7 Overall and 3-5 in the SoCon
The Bulldogs started the season 1-5 before winning 3 of their last 5 games, including beating rivals VMI to salvage the end of their season.
The Citadel will be installing a new spread offense in 2023, replacing the run heavy attack that saw 11 different players get at least 20 carries last season. As with any drastic offensive philosophy change, it could take time but may also catch someone out and is a good recipe for entertainment if it works.
Out of conference: Georgia Southern, Campbell, South Carolina State
Rating - Sickos Warning - A new offensive philosophy plus an early-season revenge game against a Camels team that beat them handily last season could make for some drama.
East Tennessee State
Last Year 3-8 Overall and 1-7 in the SoCon
Last year’s wins came over D-II Mars Hill, a winless Robert Morris, and a VMI team that went winless in conference. To make matters worse, standout running back Jacob Saylors is now on the Cincinnati Bengals.
Out of conference: Jacksonville State, Carson-Newman, Austin Peay. The Buccaneers will get another D-II game this season, but the remaining out of conference games are stiffer competition than last season.
Rating - Sickos Advisory - All signs point to another grim campaign, but we’ll keep our eyes open for upsets or new storylines.
Furman
Last Year 10-3 Overall and 7-1 in the SoCon. Made FCS Playoffs. Lost in Second Round to Incarnate Word. Finished Ranked 10th.
The good news: last year’s passing leader Tyler Huff is returning for his senior year and Clemson isn’t on the schedule this time around. The bad news: out of conference includes South Carolina. All things considered, the Paladins look poised to finish near the top of the conference again this year.
Out of conference: Tennessee Tech, South Carolina, Kennesaw State.
Rating - Sickos Advisory - The upset over the Gamecocks seems unlikely, and the conference slate goes similar to last year. Furman will look to knock off the Owls in their last season in FCS in Week Three, which will boost their potential slightly.
Mercer
Last year 7-4 Overall and 5-3 in the SoCon. Finished Ranked 24th.
The Bears will look to rebound to the top of the SoCon after stumbling slightly in 2022, but will have to break in a new quarterback after 5th year senior Fred Payton moved on in the offseason.
Out of conference: North Alabama, Ole Miss, Morehead State. A preseason-ranked Ole Miss team, and winnable games against teams that won one and two games respectively last season, including a D-II game apiece. 2-1 is the expectation here, but Ole Miss remains volatile.
Rating - Sickos Advisory - Should be a fairly business-as-usual schedule unless something really breaks in one direction or the other for the Bears.
Samford
Last Year 11-2 Overall and 8-0 in the SoCon. Conference Champions. Lost in the Quarters to North Dakota State. Finished Ranked 7th.
The Bulldogs only dropped 2 games in 2022, to the eventual FBS champions Georgia and FCS runners up North Dakota State. Head coach Chris Hatcher is entering his ninth season with the team, and they return QB Michael Hiers and leading rusher Jay Stanton, so expectations should be high entering the 2023 season.
Out of Conference: D-II Shorter University, Auburn, UT Martin. A somewhat easier OOC slate than last season, if only for the lack of Georgia. Shocking an Auburn team under new management would be fun, but won’t make or break this season.
Rating - Sickos Advisory - A stable team returning most of its offensive production, the Bulldogs should expect to compete for the SoCon title again this season.
VMI
Last Year 1-10 Overall and 0-8 in the SoCon.
The Keydets’ sole win in 2022 came over Bucknell, and only the game against Cornell and season finale against rivals The Citadel were by a single score.
They get Bucknell again in 2023, as well as Davidson and NC State (on the CW) out of conference.
Rating - Sickos Advisory - VMI’s ceiling in recent years has been the middle of the pack in the SoCon. It would take a few upsets to get to that position this season, but new head coach Danny Rocco sounds confident so we’ll see how it plays out.
Western Carolina
Last Year 6-5 Overall and 4-4 in the SoCon.
Out of conference: Charleston Southern, Arkansas, Eastern Kentucky. Charleston Southern won two games last season but the other two are steeper challenges.
Head coach Kerwin Bell has only been there two seasons, but his 10-12 record is currently good for second highest winning percentage all-time at WCU.
Rating - Sickos Warning - Last season’s 4-4 in conference was tied for the Catamounts’ best finish since 2017. They’ll be looking to improve on that but could be poised for a fall back to the bottom of the conference.
Wofford
Last Year 3-8 Overall and 3-5 in the SoCon.
Out of Conference: Pitt, William & Mary, Presbyterian. An above-average ACC team and a perennial FCS powerhouse aren’t what you want to see on your schedule the first two weeks of the season. The Terriers do get a Blue Hose team that only beat a D-II team last year in Week 3, so they should get a win out of conference, something that eluded them in 2022.
Wofford’s head coach going into 2023 is Shawn Watson, who coached them to all three of their wins last season as interim.
Rating - Sickos Warning - Within the last three full seasons, the Terriers have finished first and dead last in conference. Add a new head coach into the mix and anything could happen this year.
This has been an excerpt from the Sickos Committee’s Weather, Travel & Football Master Almanac Notebook.
