Latest / Unicorn Football Talk / Reaction: NFL Week 4 + College Week 5

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Reaction: NFL Week 4 + College Week 5 · Unicorn Football Talk

• Emily: It is time for Unicorn Football Talk to talk NFL week four, college week five. Are you ready? Hilary: I'm ready. Are you ready? Emily: I'm ready. So let's continue starting these reactions with the NFL undefeated teams and teams that haven't won any games until we're down to zero of these teams. So for the four and teams, we have the Chiefs, the Vikings, and the 49ers. So those are the only three teams that are undefeated left. Next up for the Chiefs after a bye week is the Chargers. The Vikings will be playing the Saints and the Seacks could take down the 49ers this weekend. At least we're hoping, right? Hilary: Let's hope for that. But that list is getting much shorter than when we started this just a few weeks back. Emily: For sure. it's very rare for a team to go undefeated in a regular season. I think it's only happened twice. So we'll get there. so for 0-4, I just first want to note that only one team has made the playoffs after starting 0 4. The 1992 Chargers made the playoffs. We do have one extra game in the season, so maybe it's a little bit easier now with one extra game and the extra playoff spot, but You have a tough hill to climb if you're one of these teams, all right? So we've got five teams left that are 0 and 4. We have the Dolphins, the Chargers, the Bucks, and then the Titans and Texans, which will be playing this weekend. So one of those is guaranteed a win, or I guess a tie. Hilary: Okay. I'm I'm going with one of 'em's gonna get the win. Emily: One of them's gonna get the win. I think we're getting less and less surprised by this list. I'm tired of saying that the Chargers surprise me. I think the Chargers are what they are. Chargers are playing Denver next, so doesn't look good for them. Dolphins are playing the Bengals, doesn't look good for them. The Bucks are playing the Cowboys. That could be a sneaky, upset because the Bucks have been playing teams close. other than that Hilary: They're without Baker Mayfield this week, right? Emily: They are, but they did keep it within a score last weekend with Green Bay. So, but I think Cowboys are a better team than Green Bay. So we'll see. We'll see how this list changes for next week. Hilary: I guess the Texans is still a surprise for me on that list. Emily: The Texans are still a surprise. They had a real shot to beat the Cowboys, I feel like, last weekend. very disappointing All right, let's do some NFL QB injury updates. I don't think this is something we would necessarily normally want to do, but we've started the season with so many injuries that it's made me wanna keep tabs on it. So out. We still have Caleb Williams for the Bears. They started Case Keenum two weeks ago and then Badget started last week. and they are winning. Doesn't matter who is the QB, the Bears are rolling. Dart is out for the season. Jameis Winston is in, still, still has that starting spot. Hilary: Okay, for now J J McCarthy is on the bench and warming up. Emily: You think so? Hilary: I think so. I don't think you'd we talked about this last week with the Giants, but I don't think you'd make that trade unless you really thought that you were gonna get useful play out of the person you traded for. Emily: I think so too. I don't think Jameis Winston is gonna last the whole season. I feel bad for the Giants, honestly. all right, keep going. Daniels for the Commanders looks like might start this week, possibly. Mariota was in, beat our Seahawks, and then Mariota was out last game. He was injured. I don't know if you saw that, but quarterback that came in and I don't even remember his name. He's hard to pronounce. not good for them. So hopefully Daniel starts. And then Baker Mayfield, still out. Jalen Daniels, not Jaden Daniels, started last week. Bucks lose. Not so sure how great he will be for them. Hilary: Okay, and then there's some new injuries or questions with Lamar Jackson, is that right? Emily: Yeah, he didn't play the second half with a with an ankle injury. I hate to see that. You know, I love him. I don't think it's like severe, severe. they have Tyler Huntley, who has been with the team six years, not consecutively, but has always been a solid backup for the Ravens. So I think they'll be okay while they hold on. Hilary: Okay, let's hope so that everything is okay with Lamar. Emily: All right. I watched a lot of football this weekend. It was really hard for me to full pull a final topics list, but I pulled two games. Steelers Browns. That was their Thursday night game. I think what stood out to me were a few things. DK Metcalf was called for taunting. And after that penalty, Kirk Herbstreet tried to make a comment, like, yeah, you see that all over the league now. And I'm like, I don't. think you see it all over the league and this is just normal for DK so I would not give him a pass. But Rodgers, Aaron Rodgers was sacked five times and I don't know if there's anything I enjoy more than watching Aaron Rodgers get sacked. Hilary: That was pleasing, I must admit. Emily: You're with me, right? Hilary: I am with you on that one, yes. Emily: and then just other interesting Steelers news, Joey Porter, who that was a hold in, not a hold out, upset about his contract and was complaining about a back injury and hadn't played. They finally traded him to Dallas and he was feeling better and played for Dallas last week. Hilary: Okay. Well, it'll be interesting. This is not the first time that the Steelers have traded players to Dallas. So we'll see how it works out for Joey Porter. Of course, the other big trade was last season when they traded Pickens. Emily: That's right. Hilary: Yeah. Emily: All right, the other game, and this is not just me being a homer, but the Seahawks Chargers. The reason I signaled this one out is it's a jumping off point for us to talk about officiating this past week. Let me start with the fact that the first two plays of the game were interceptions. Just think about that The Chargers intercepted. Seahawks get the ball, intercepted. It is believed to be the first game in NFL history where that happened. They don't have detailed records, but somebody tried to go back and sleuth it out, and there are statements out there that that's never happened before. So that was pretty interesting. And then I think this is a great jumping off point to just talk about the officiating this week. lots of officiating related news. So there were 30 enforced penalties in that game. 30. So Hilary: Wow. Emily: 30 for 280 yards. The Seahawks specifically had a franchise record for 150 yards of penalties. Think about that. Franchise record, you take notice. That's fifty years. Hilary: That's a lot of yards given up. Emily: Lots of yards. Seven of them were on personal fouls, which just really frustrate me as a fan. I think some of them were selfish, not thinking about team first and not happy about that. But other call-outs I read that there were first four weeks of this season, there have been 983 accepted penalties. That is the most of any season on record through four games. And this specific week was the second most single week as as far as going back to nineteen seventy eight, where the records go. So lots of flags. Hilary: So is that a focus by the officials to tighten things down and call more more penalties, or is that sloppier play on the team's parts? I mean, how does that shake out? I don't know. Emily: Know either. I've been listening to quite a bit of sports radio the last two days to see what other people's takes were. I don't think anyone like thinks that there's extra emphasis. Some people are estimating that maybe it's sloppier because nobody plays in the preseason anymore. But it was almost unwatchable. like every other play, it felt like there was a flag. They they have to figure it out. So, but anyway, before I move on, I also want to point out two officials were suspended week for things that happened over the weekend, not in the Seahawks game. in the Vikings game this weekend, referee Adrian Hill, was knocked down by a Vikings player and it really wasn't on purpose. It was just kinda like he was bumped into him. Hilary: yeah, I did watch that video and I believe that the player actually even extended his hand to offer to help the ref get up and the ref declined it. So he got up on his own, right? Emily: He got up in his own and he was mad. He lost his cool. He got animated, pointing at the player. so he's been suspended for one game. line judge Jeff Seaman has been suspended for two games. in the Cardinals game, Trey McBride, Cardinal Trey McBride, was arguing with him or get getting into words with him because he wanted a PI called. And Seaman is seen. I don't know if he's heard, but clearly dropping F U, F U twice. And yeah, you just can't you can't as a lineman ref, you cannot say F you to a player. we could probably talk a lot about this one and we probably don't have enough Hilary: Okay, so last week we talked about sportsmanship with players. This week we're talking about sportsmanship with officiating, coaches next week. What are where are we headed? Where are we headed with this? Emily: Maybe coaches. I know. And I'm guessing things are happening all game long that we don't see and things are said, but for some reason it was very visible this week. I don't know if this is a normal week and we just saw it, or if this is unusual, but they were suspended and The referees union is complaining about that. I think they're trying to get it overturned. I'm not sure where they'll land, but I don't think they'll be successful. I've assumed that that will stand. Hilary: I think the public pressure will make those suspensions stand, but also I wanted to just quickly point out that both of the suspensions are to very seasoned officials who we would hope would have a lot of experience in confrontational type situations and should have kept their cool. Emily: Totally, 100% agree. Okay, quick fun fact before I hand off to you. This is the first time in NFL history all four cat teams played each other on the same weekend. we had Bengals, Jaguars, and we had Lions, Panthers. That's your fun fact for the day, Hillary. What do you have for NFL? Hilary: Well, I love okay, I love that because I'm actually gonna talk about the Jaguars Bengals game. That was a game that I had circled last week as one to watch, and I really thought that that would be a pretty evenly matched game, and it was not really the case on that. The Jaguars led the entire way. Trevor Lawrence had two hundred and twenty-three passing yards a score, and Joe Burrow threw for four hundred and twenty-eight yards. One touchdown, two interceptions. Cincinnati put up four hundred and thirty-seven yards. So think about that for a minute. If Joe Burrow threw for 428 and their yardage was 437, no ground game there. And despite all of that offense, they had only two touchdowns to show for it. So they went up and down the field unsuccessfully. and then Jaguars next up is the Eagles in London. And the Bengals go to Miami versus the Dolphins. And I wanted to circle back because when I saw that the Jaguars and Eagles were gonna be in London, at first I thought that I was making a mistake looking at the schedule. We talked about last week how the London game didn't sell out. I don't know if it eventually did, but there are actually three London games three weekends in a row this year. But maybe three games in three weeks is too Emily: Too many. Hilary: too many. also on the officiating front for that game, Alex Moore is the head ref for that crew, and they called 24 penalties for 244 yards. So that fits right in with your earlier comments about a heavily penalized weekend. The other game I looked at was the Giants versus the Cardinals. The Giants won that game. Ugly. However, the Giants are in first place in the NFC East at 3-1. Jameis Winston had three TDs and two interceptions. Deonti Banks had a pick six for 98 yards to seal the win near the end of the game. And Malik Neighbors looks like he's fully back from his injuries. He had six catches for 120 yards. Giants defense was strong and pretty much won the game for them. They sacked. Jacoby Brissett a couple of times. Next up for them is Washington Commanders. Little side note on that is the Giants released Odell Beckham Jr. this week. He played a total of 20 snaps with one target and no catches. And I think the reason they did that is they were trying to make way on their roster for their punt returner, Braxton Berrios, they've elevated him enough times from the practice squad that they need to make room for him on the roster. Arizona, not much to say there. Brissette had three interceptions and not a lot of positive things going on. They host Detroit next week. Yeah. Emily: yeah, Giants three and one, I don't think that's gonna last. So time will tell. Hilary: Right. All right. And one last quick call out on the NFL before we move on to college. I want to call out the Vikings special teams. Right now they are making a huge difference. They're coached by Matt Daniels. And I think you could make the argument that they're one of the best special teams groups in the league. They have a kicker who is 12 for 12 on the season for field goals. And in two of their four games, the field goals have been all of the points scored. So thank Goodness for their kicker who is named Will Rikard. He's twelve for twelve and they have a great punt returner in Miles Price. So shout out to them. And that takes us to college, I think. Emily: I think it does. I watched a bunch of games and I know I homered out and talked about the Seahawks, and I don't want to just do this every week, talk about my teams, but I had to shout out Northwestern. So they opened up their brand new stadium and I used to have season tickets to that stadium. It was the worst stadium, I think, in any of the big conferences. It was just rinky dink, run down, little. it just didn't feel like big time football. And that stadium looked beautiful on TV and it's just gorgeous. I'm gonna have to go to a game next year. They played Penn State and they won big time, 34 to 13. They're in the cusp of cracking the AP top twenty-five. Their only l their only loss was to number seven Indiana, twenty nine to twenty three, but they have some tough games ahead of them. they've gotta play Iowa, Oregon, and Ohio State. So good luck. Don't think that their record will last. Hilary: Wow, that's a tough slate coming up for them. Emily: Tough slate. Good luck to them. All right. Then, really quick, the only reason I'm calling out the Tennessee game. They played Auburn. but they pulled their quarterback, their five-star freshman quarterback phase on Brandon. He has not been looking great. He was sacked 10 times the week before when they played Texas. And he was three forever. eight with zero yards and then he threw a critical interception on the wrong side of the field and they just pulled him. And you just I don't know that you see that that much that the starting Hilary: Wow. Emily: quarterback is is pulled. they put in George McIntyre and it looks like they might be starting George McIntyre this weekend. So I'll be watching for that. Hilary: All right, and they're up against Arkansas. Is that right this weekend? Emily: That is correct. They're up against Arkansas. George McIntyre didn't exactly light it up, but he was coming from from a backup position, completed eight of ten passes for eighty six yards. But maybe with a full week of practice he'll he'll show up a little bit better. What do you got Hilary: Okay. Emily: on the college front? Hilary: Well, what I've got is I had the Florida Missouri game circled. And I thought that might be close. Wasn't quite sure. Yeah. Gators were totally rolled. Final score, Missouri 45, Florida 17. Missouri had 550 yards of offense. They held the Florida star back Jaden Baught at 12 carries for 13 yards. And in the A P poll, Missouri's up eleven spots to number fourteen, Florida down eight spots to number sixteen. Wowza, I don't know what to make of that whole carousel of who's beating who down there in the SEC, but I can't keep track. And is Florida for real? I don't know. Is Missouri for real? We'll see. Emily: No, that was that was unexpected. But yes, it's a carousel for sure. Hilary: Yeah, and then off my radar until I did a little digging this week, Pitt is 5-0 and entered the AP poll for the first time this season with their 35-33 win over Virginia Tech. Next up for them is University of North Carolina. And that brings us to Virginia Tech. The coach is James Franklin. He's in his first year after being let go by Penn State. And that game had a controversial ending. I don't know if you saw that or not. Emily: I saw the replays of it. So Virginia Tep attempted a walk-off field goal to win and it looked like it was good. So I didn't see the actual game film, but social media was posting all these different angles. the kick sailed over the goal post. According to NCAA rules, kicks above the goalpost must be fully inside of the post to be declared good. And kicks that go higher than the post are also not subject to replay. So everybody in the stands were celebrating and they said no good. Hilary: Yeah, the kicker thought he made the kicker thought he made it. it was crazy. Emily: fans the fans thought they made it. It was yeah, it was definitely in my social media feed. but yeah, thanks for pointing out Pitt. But before we move on and wrap up, you have to give us an update on North Dakota State. What happened? Your your your adopted team. Hilary: Okay. My adopted team, Go Bison. They're five and after a win over Wyoming. They'll face UNLV next. A side note on that is North Dakota State is currently tied with Miami as the top ranked scoring defense in the country. They are currently allowing nine point eight points per game with their opponents. Go Bison. Emily: that's All Hilary: it. Emily: right. Let's get everyone ready for the weekend. What games are we circling for college? Obviously, Georgia Alabama is a big game. I won't talk about that. So I went digging for any other game that caught my eye. The UCLA Oregon game is appealing to me. UCLA is experiencing a bit of a turnaround under their head coach Bob Chesney. apparently they have a ground attack that averages two hundred and eighty one yards, rushing yards per game. But the ducks are the ducks. They're coming off a bye and they have a high powered offense averaging forty seven point five points per game. So I think that'll be kind of intriguing. Hilary: go UCLA. I think that Oregon has the advantage there because of coming off the bye week, but I will be cheering for UCLA on that one. And the game that caught my eye is number seven Indiana is at Nebraska. And Nebraska is unranked, but they're currently five and and the game is in Lincoln. So I think that Nebraska is gonna have a huge packed stadium home field advantage for that. And There are only 15 unbeaten teams in the FBS right now, and both of these teams are currently unbeaten. So I think it's an interesting matchup. It's a second road game for Indiana. And I'm expecting Indiana to lean on their run game first to force Nebraska defense to really play full coverage of the field and stay honest. And then Indiana will probably try to light it up with her passing attack afterwards. So I think the key for Nebraska is to stay in a clean game. They're currently a fairly heavily penalized team. they average more than eighty yards of penalties per game. And I think that yardage could make the difference for them. So they need to they need to clean it up and wishing them luck, I would like to see them beat Indiana. Emily: Right, let's talk NFL. Games were circling. And yes, I'm circling 49ers versus the Seahawks for obvious reasons. the 49ers are undefeated. Let's see if the Seahawks can beat him. But the interesting stat here, Brock Purdy hasn't been sacked this season. Think about that. The entire Hilary: We're gonna fix that. Emily: we're gonna fix it. Four games, he hasn't been sacked. You have to go back to 2005 to find a quarterback that has gone four games. Peyton Manning had a zero sack start to his season in 2005. Second game and last game I will circle before I hand off to you. Bills, Rams, Hilary: Okay. Emily: Monday night football. I find this game very intriguing. The Bills tough loss to the Patriots, which no one expected. the Rams did not look Great against the Eagles. They actually should have lost that game and unfortunately didn't. Based on the season so far, I would expect the Bills to bounce back and beat the Rams, but the Rams are the Rams. So can they finally show up this season? Hilary: not gonna bet against Josh Allen ever. So I'm for the Bills on this one. I don't know how y know how you feel about that. I guess I shouldn't say how do you feel about that. I know I know who you're cheering for. Emily: I'm for the Bills. I didn't even know I needed to respond to that. I hate the Rams and their inner division and I just like Josh Allen. I like the Bills. So go Bills. Hilary: All right. I'm going out of our division. I'm circling the Raiders versus Patriots in Foxboro. I believe the Patriots are slightly favored, but I want to know which Drake May is gonna show up because he's been all over the map so far this season. Some really stellar games and some really not so stellar games. And the Raiders just need to get their run game going to take some pressure off of Kirk Cousins. the Patriots defense is pretty tough to throw against. I'm cheering for the Raiders on this one. Emily: Same. that's a really good one to circle. That that should be interesting. All right. We got a good week ahead of us and it'll be fun to come back and talk to you next week. Hilary: Okay, Emily, it's always a pleasure to talk to you. Unicorn football talk. Catch us next week.