Watch this video. Coach Spack not only advocated for the playoffs being in Normal, Illinois, he literally negotiated the contract. Pretty cool story. He talked about it for like 5 minutes uninterrupted:

Can you clarify a bit. I subscribe to Disney+ and through my cable I have ESPN. Do I still need to subscribe to ESPN+ to watch this game? I was planning to but if it comes with my Disney+, that would be great.

I find it very difficult to sign on to espn2 and I have an espn account. Won’t take my password. Have to get a special sign in code emailed to me and it rarely comes and when it does I am timed out. WTF is going on?

For us, I think it's an extra $1 per month to add ESPN+ to our Disney+ account. I think what recently changed is that now you can access ESPN+ through the Disney+ app.

Nice. I'll have to look for that. Even if it's cheaper than full price I'll take it.

ESPN+, Hulu, and Disney+ are separately sold products. As @MTBAggie mentions you can get deals by buying them as a bundle or sometimes as a perk from credit cards, cell phone providers, etc. The update is that ESPN+ and Hulu content, if you subscribe to them, are now visible in the flagship Disney+ app. So you could watch Lion King, the Aggie game, and Jimmy Kimmel all in one app now instead of switching.

@69aggie ESPN and ESPN2 are “linear networks”, that is channels that are only offered through a cable tv package. Said cable package can be through a traditional cable operator like Comcast or Spectrum or virtual cable packager like Hulu+Live TV or YouTube TV. If you are at your house, you can tune in to the channel through the normal means. But maybe you want it on your phone, you can also unlock ESPN/ESPN2 on the ESPN streaming app by proving to the app that you have access to those channels through your cable subscription, usually by logging in with your cable company account info. ESPN/ESPN2 linear are not available for sale a la carte from Disney (at least yet) without paying a cable company. All of the annoying email and pin verification stuff is to crack down on password sharing, to make it less convenient for multiple households to share accounts.

Local kcra has been broadcasting the game (channel 58 i think) and the game can be streamed free from their website, unless playoffs are not part of the deal. Its worth checking.

Looks like the free tickets that were purchased by a donor and a last-minute surge have filled up the stadium pretty nice. Hoping for a great environment for all the players.

https://herosports.com/2024-fcs-playoffs-second-round-predictions-bzbz/

I was talking to someone in the department last night who said attendance was looking like 6000-7000 unless there was a last minute surge or big walk up. Hopefully we’ll have at least 10k. AgAlum sent me a cowbell (you can buy them at the bookstore I found out last night), so we’re ready to roll!

I hope it is a big cowbell. The one's that fans had at the MSU game were so small they were hard to hear. It's great that many of them were donated by some players' families though.

StubHub went from 133 listings, to 90 something, to now a handful. SeatGeek has three.

Was looking at Hastings's stats and wondered how they compared to Maier in 2018 and they're remarkably similar.

Hastings: 303-436, 3745 yds (312 ypg), 69.5 comp%, 32 TD, 8 INT in 12 games
Maier: 364-557, 3931 yds (302.3 ypg), 65.4 comp%, 34 TD, 10 INT in 13 games

However what's different how they got there. Larison is our leading receiver this year as a RB with 755 yards. But we have 4 guys with at least 500 rec yards and another with 474. In 2018, we had two WR with more rec yds than Larison has (Doss with 1334 and Harrell with 896) but they were the only two over 400 (Gilliam was third with 385).

We also had a more productive overall run game in 2018 (26 more rush ypg). Gilliam had 976 yards, Thomas had 686 and Modise had 293. This year, our second leading rusher (Perez) only has 212 yards.

Didn't really have a point there, just thought that was interesting. Can you imagine how prolific our offense would be if you could combine Larison with Doss and Harrell? Not that Gilliam was bad (104.7 total ypg that year and as a redshirt freshman) but he's not Larison (173 total ypg)

I see we're getting yet another step up in video production, this time with serious, nearly NFL quality cameras (and hopefully camera operators.) As I watched them set up they seemed to be a highly professional crew.

Does anyone know who foots the bill for this? NCAA? ESPN?

You can’t assume that Doss and Harrell would have had the catches they did on a team that was featuring Larison and vice versa, there are a limited number of touches.

It would be nice if they had Doss, but it would be nice if the current team had Gilliam, a pre-injury Thomas and had Amoah and Ford.

Total:
The over/under is 53.5 points.

Moneyline:
UC Davis is -400 (bet $400 to win $100) to win outright, and ISU opened at +300 (bet $100 to win $300) to win outright."

Spread:
Aggies -10.5

I'm excited. I think it's going to be a great game

Wasn't the spread around 7 points before?

It would be awesome to have Buchanan next to Meyer.

. It looks like it opened at 7.5 and the line moved based on bets over the last couple of days.

Spilt milk under the bridge!

N
No wimpy cowbells for us!!

Great job!

How cool is that. Bring back Bossie Cow Cow.

opened to 7, then up 7.5, then shot to 10.5. Don't see that kind of movement often in FCS

love these! Bring some to the tailgate if you have extras!

That’s true, though I do think if you had those three weapons, they’re going to get close to their current numbers. Larison might not have the receiving yards he does this year if Doss is on the team in place of any of our WRs. But Doss isn’t taking any carries away from Larison and Larison isn’t taking many receptions from Doss. I think the offensive stats would likely be a combination of the two years. The rushing yards would be more consolidated with Larison (as opposed to being more spread out in 2018) and the receiving stats would be more top heavy as well, as opposed to what we have this year. And I think Larison might even have better rushing stats as teams had to worry about a borderline NFL caliber WR out there.

If Larison was a WR, then yes, unless you’re running an Air Raid system where the QB throws 55 times per game, someone’s stats are going to suffer. But having Doss, Harrell and Larison with a either of the two QBs and a coach who knows what he’s doing, you’re going to end up with a FCS version of the 99 Rams with Bruce, Holt and Faulk or the Manning Colts with Harrison, Wayne and James.

Fun to think about and discuss, at the very least.

Go Ags! Beat the Redbirds!

Beat the Birds!

I’ll be on a plane at gametime. Hoping i can at least follow on my cell. Let’s win!
Go Ags!

Our run for the National Championship starts today. My wife and I will be there and we hope Aggie fans will be loud and proud. Go Ags!