In case you missed it – and judging by the TV viewership numbers, you probably did – NASCAR had a contentious championship round this past weekend. Though Kyle Larson emerged as a deserving two-time champion in Phoenix, the biggest story around the track was instead the sport’s flawed method for determining a champion.

The league seems to have finally reached a breaking point with its championship format, with Friends of the Program Fred Smith at Road and Track and Jeff Gluck at The Athletic giving the winner-take-all events established in 2014 a better obituary than I ever could.

In short, the sport strained to reach new audiences following a boom in interest sometime around the early 2000s and, partially to satisfy growing TV contracts that demanded stakes in each and every of the 36-race schedule, established a sort of 10-race playoff* format that replaced the traditional season-long points race.

*For some unknown reason the governing body initially termed this postseason “The Chase” and would send extremely rude emails to anyone in the industry who used the “playoff” word up until capitulating in 2017 and adopting the terminology that makes sense to the rest of the sporting world.

In 2011, racing fans enjoyed the most thrilling battle of the Chase era when Tony Stewart won five of the final ten races, including the season finale at Homestead to tie Carl Edwards on points and claim the championship via tiebreaker. NASCAR, finally, had its Game 7 Moment for the new format.

Former CEO Brian France (and, to be fair to him, a number of eager TV execs) took the exact wrong lesson from that season and decided to build the entire championship format beginning in 2014 around forcing a season-deciding matchup in the last race of the year, no matter what happened before it. In essence, he failed to understand that those moments are special because they happen organically, not just because the TV broadcast tells you they’re special.

The new format slowly stripped credibility from newly-crowned champions, and made large stretches of the schedule irrelevant in service of creating a thrilling season conclusion.

I worked in NASCAR for nearly seven years during this stretch, when insider angst over the sport’s dimming popularity reached a fever pitch. We were racing in locations that made no sense for their juncture in the schedule, alienating a large group of our core fans to reach the mythological casual race fan and gin up TV numbers for a new contract that mostly went to pad the league’s coffers.

Does any of this sound familiar to a college football audience?

Playoff expansion, in conjunction with malicious conference realignment, has fundamentally altered the beats of a sport that has been familiar for so many years. Beyond that, there are so many stakeholders involved in the sport that logical advancements to the postseason were held up for years simply to make sure that the Rose Bowl happened during sunset in Pasadena.

That’s not to say it can’t get worse. The Big Ten is still pushing hard for an expansion to 24 or 28 teams, and guaranteed spots for the biggest two conferences, probably to satisfy valuation for an impending private equity deal to finance teams in the conference with more money than they could possibly spend propping up non-revenue sports.

The leadership at NASCAR seems to have finally reckoned with the floundering its own playoff manipulation caused, and will likely move on to a new format in 2026. College football needs a little more time for self-reflection, as Purdue and UCLA will still be a conference game by then.

It’s pretty wild that a single camera lodged in the back corner of a long-defunct music venue in Little Five Points (then run by the now-owners of Smith’s Olde bar, and now a vintage clothing store) can capture the pure energy hard coded into a song like this performance does. I’ve been coming back to this song, and band, a lot in the last few days after a wonderful Bandsplain episode from The Ringer that took a deep dive into just why they resonated with fans for a longer run than a host of similar pop punk bands from their era. 

You’re not better than eating at Taco Bell, but if you want to pretend you are, a homemade crunchwrap supreme is a fantastic weeknight dinner that can be thrown together with any combination of ingredients.

No. 5 Georgia at Mississippi State (noon, ESPN)

Georgia has played with its food in nearly every single game this season. That the Bulldogs have prevailed in all but one game speaks to a battle-tested team once the playoffs come, but it’s also a little weird just how much they’ve had the scratch and claw to come out on top. Mississippi State has been up for the fight with better opponents all year, with only one truly uncompetitive loss, but only has one conference win to show for it.

Put those two trends together and it feels like you can pretty much write the recap now (Georgia Survives Game Mississippi State in Starkville With Late Turnovers), but it’s still going to be a little unnerving if this one stays as close as some advanced statistical models seem to think.

No. 6 Ole Miss vs Citadel (1 pm, SEC Network)

I would like to see how many points a Lane Kiffin offense could put up in a game like this if it really tried for all 60 minutes. My guess is 130.

No. 3 Texas A&M at No. 22 Missouri (3:30 pm, ABC)

An under-the-radar great game with the potential to cause a seismic shakeup in the SEC race if Missouri and backup quarterback Matt Zollers can upend the Aggies. An A&M win almost certainly locks up a playoff bid, while a loss sets up a nervous few final weeks in College Station.

No. 16 Vanderbilt vs Auburn (4 pm, SEC Network)

Auburn’s defense has been one of the country’s best units this year, and could very well give the Commodores problems if the offense – now relieved of its subpar playcaller – can muster up any points. We must also mourn the fact that Diego Pavia has been denied a chance to beat Hugh Freeze for a fourth consecutive season.

No. 4 Alabama vs LSU (7:30 pm, ABC)

Is the fact that Alabama can not run the ball going to catch up to them at any point this season? This feels like it should be a trap game – especially because Kalen DeBoer only loses to inferior teams at Alabama and oh buddy is LSU an inferior team right now – but we could also just be straining to find interest in this week’s conference slate.

Florida at Kentucky (7:30 pm, SEC Network)

Please don’t watch this game, neither team wants you to look directly at them.

If you had asked me which school would debut glow in the dark uniforms, and also feature a Medieval Times halftime show on Halloween weekend, I would have absolutely guessed Coastal Carolina. These could have leaned even further into the Myrtle Beach airbrushed tank top aesthetic, but let’s praise progress and G5 schools leaning so hard into their own typecasting.

Tulane at Memphis (9 pm, ESPN)

Winner stays alive in the race for a G5 playoff bid. Both coaches might also be very distracted by negotiating contracts at new schools. 

No. 7 BYU at No. 8 Texas Tech (Noon, ABC)

Biggest game in Lubbock since the Michael Crabtree game in 2008, and it’s a shame this one won’t be under the lights. These teams might meet again in the Big 12 title game, but the winner holds an inside track to January football.

If this is your first time watching BYU, yes their quarterback wears No. 47 and you’re not going to get used to it at all.

No. 9 Oregon at No. 20 Iowa (3:30 pm, CBS)

Uh, did everyone else kind of lose track of Iowa after the week two loss to Iowa State? The Hawkeyes have been really impressive since then, including giving Indiana its best test of the season. Meanwhile, Oregon suddenly finds itself in a precarious position, with the playoff committee ranking the Ducks a full three spots lower than their AP poll position. This game is way more interesting than it has any right to be.

Florida State at Clemson (7 pm, ACC Network)

The loser of this one might not make a bowl. Both these teams were in the top ten two months ago!

No. 10 Notre Dame vs Navy (7:30 pm, NBC)

Marcus Freeman has mostly handled service academy teams without much fuss, but we’re holding out hope this one will stay interesting. A loss eliminates either team from playoff contention.

San Diego State at Hawai’i (11 pm, It’s Complicated)

If the G5 bid doesn’t come out of the American Conference, it might just go to SDSU. In their path is a shockingly good Hawai’i team – that’s already bowl eligible! – in what might be the best After Dark matchup of the season.

Praise be, we enjoyed these things, some of which require a subscription.

Matt Brown at Extra Points did some amazing FOIA work to find out which college football teams are selling the most beer at games this year. Vanderbilt restarted its volleyball program, and Phantom Island has a wonderful new episode on the three years between announcing the team and their first game this fall. In another episode of Hey, this sucks: FOIAball has receipts on how the Department of Homeland Security is using college football games to surveil students and other attendees on campus. Secret Base has a wonderful explainer on just why Steve Spurrier hated Georgia so much. Coming soon: Join Bois on the long history of charging the mound.