What are the SEC's chances vs Big Ten this season?
Paul Pabst and Andrew Perloff chat with Yogi Roth about all things college football, including Notre Dame's schedule and the question on everyone's' mind: Big Ten or SEC?
Video Transcript
He's one of the smartest minds in college football.
Former Pitt receiver, former USC quarterback coach.
It's Yogi Roth, who is gonna be calling Big Ten games for NBC.
Yogi, we are so excited.
You're our new teammate.
How you doing?
Hey, you know what?
I'm just showering you guys with love.
I mean, I've been listening to you for, for a while, and to see this show come out, to watch it now in real person, to see that set behind you, I mean, this is not like Dan's Garage anymore.
I mean, you guys are- killing it, man.
Congratulations.
Just thrilled for you and, and all the work you've put into it and, and what you have now.
Thank you, brother.
It's great to have you on this show.
I wanna go back before we go forward and look at the 2026 season.
I was saying the other day, I th- I saw an article that said, "Who's the next Indiana?"
That come from nowhere team that does it.
I don't wanna skip past what Indiana's done the past two years.
Winning the national title, 16 and 0.
Mendoza gets the Heisman.
Kurt Signetti.
You remember the days.
You're not that old, but you're old enough to remember when Indiana winning six games- Mm-hmm was a big deal.
It was galactic what they did last year, wasn't it?
It was, it was beautiful on an every front, and it's given everybody hope, and also given a lot of head coaches a lot of stress.
Because now you gotta win.
If they can do it in Indiana, why can't you do it at, you know, insert school X, if you will.
But to me, s- so many, like, core memories come up.
I was at the Heisman Trophy, and I've been covering the Heisman for probably 15 years now.
And Fernando wins it, of course, and he walks into this room, it's like the media room.
And he doesn't know it, but about 12, 15 of his teammates, you know, NIL, y- you're flying out of PJ, you find your way to New York City.
And they're all kinda waiting for him there.
And he walks in and, you know, the last time we were at, like, a crazy house party was probably a while ago.
It felt like that, 'cause he rolls in, they surprise him.
They start mosh pitting, jumping up and down- like only bros can do in football.
Like a post-game celebration, if you will.
And it was just such an innocent but amazing moment to watch that happen in real time.
And I've known Fernando since he was a two-star recruit coming out of Miami.
He went to Cal and I called a bunch of his games back in the day.
So to, to watch that arc.
And then you add in Signetti, who, you know, Pittsburgh guy, you know, legendary Pittsburgh family.
Coached at Pitt back in the day as well.
To watch him do it the long road.
I mean, it's kinda like you guys.
You've been doing this, you know, your careers forever.
Yeah.
Now you got- We're just like Fernando Mendoza.
You're Signetti.
We're just like Kurt Signetti.
Yeah, exactly.
You're Signetti.
You're co- Show of the year.
Crown him.
Let's go.
Yeah.
I like that comparison.
Yogi, you have a podcast at Y Option with Todd Blackledge, and you did a fall camp tour.
I know you stopped by Indiana this fall.
I- any chance that they can repeat?
I mean, they hadn't won a title ever.
And now two in 100 years would be amazing.
Yeah.
Well, I asked Todd that question.
That was kind of our first segment, earlier this week or last week.
I said, "Hey, what's gonna stop them?"
A- and his line was great.
He goes, "Definitely not themselves."
Right.
And I think that's Indiana.
They're as well-coached of an outfit in any sport that we have seen.
I, I think Kurt Signetti is the modern-day Bill Walsh.
And studying Bill Walsh all summer for, for a bunch of random reasons, but he's got a conviction to him in his approach.
You go to practice, you don't hear music.
Not many places in America that happens.
You go to practice, you see ones on ones, best versus best.
You go to practice and you look at the offensive line and you think after the run you just referenced, it's four fifth-year seniors and one third-year player who started a bunch of games.
I mean, they're not gonna take a drop.
I, there is not a reason that we should not be talking about Indiana repeating.
They're gonna be in the mix.
They should be a playoff team again.
It's not gonna be easy in the Big Ten, as you know.
But th- this team hasn't fallen off.
And as Signetti always says, he's hunting for complacency.
From what I saw last week, no complacency in Bloomington right now.
All right, Yogi, let's stay in the same state.
I wanna get to the Big Ten in a second, but Notre Dame football.
They have a friendly, comfortable schedule.
You know, Wisconsin, you know, Michigan State, but then Miami later in the season.
CJ Carr, everybody loves.
I wanna ask you about him.
But they lost a couple running backs last year, high-end running backs.
One thing I'm concerned about, and other people are concerned about, if Notre Dame has this breezy schedule, will they be prepared for the playoffs?
Yeah, that, that's a fair question.
I'll say this, having visited them as well this off season.
For whatever it's worth, from my eyes, them and Oregon were the two best teams that I saw.
And then right below, that's Indiana, Ohio State.
You kinda make an argument for, for either one of those.
Not a lot separating, but enough for me to at least make that statement.
When I look at Notre Dame, the defensive front, Leon Gray, is gonna be an absolute beast.
This offensive line is real.
CJ Carr, as you referenced, he's a real Heisman contender.
I mean, he's one of the best quarterbacks in America, much like Dante Moore is.
Receiving corps, they're loaded there, and what's fun is they got, like, four or five guys with NFL last names, which is kinda fun, whether it's Burris or Bettis or Fitzgerald, which is, which is amazing with, with Larry being inducted and Devin being on the team now.
But then to your point at running back, when I watched it, you know, you talk to Marcus Freeman about the backs and that situation.
Mm-hmm.
He's like, "Look, I, I believe in development."
And, and I think when I look at Notre Dame in general, they got old school values, but they are a modern operation, whether that's portal, NIL, you, facilities of course, with what they just unvei- unveiled.
But point being, they also lean on, like, if we recruited you and we believe in you, we're gonna develop you and let, let you play.
So I, I think they're gonna be just fine in that, in that regard.
They have one of the best corners, if not the best corner in the country.
So yeah, the schedule, it, it's a good point, but that's the part, the part of a head coach, right?
You have to create a standard where every Tuesday and Wednesday, it's the most challenging thing you do all week.
So I, I expect them to meet that moment when Miami comes to town.
It'll be a hell of a game.
All right.
The Big Ten, NBC has the Big Ten all year.
Ohio State just loaded and loaded with talent.
If not Ohio State, who?
In the league, you're either going Indiana or, or you're going Oregon, and I'd probably go Oregon.
You're gonna see them play each other, and that, that's the really intri- interesting part about this league.
The teams at the top for the most part, there's a round robin if you wanna take the preseason polls or just the, the teams that we think are gonna be the best teams in this league.
I wonder what happens.
Do they all beat each other up?
I, I think that's a fair possibility.
I mean, this is much more NFL light than the Big Ten we grew up in.
I mean, the talent is so premium.
And then the teams right below Iowa, Minnesota, Penn State- Solitude Michigan, USC.
I mean, USC, they are built for it, in, in my eyes this year, to take a real run.
S- point being is it's just not gonna be an easy week.
Somebody's gonna get one of those big ones throughout the season.
Yogi, we're like six minutes into this segment and we haven't talked about a SEC team.
And the SEC being down is kind of this trending topic the past three years, and it, it doesn't feel though that there is a heavyweight, an LSU with Joe Burrow.
There doesn't feel like a heavyweight in the SEC.
Georgia might be close, but is there a heavyweight in the SEC?
Well, you know, they might say they're all heavyweights, right?
And, and that's whether they're- They do.
They do, but do you?
Yeah, the No, I don't, I don't think so.
But I, I don't, I'm not on the bandwagon that, like, the SEC's down.
I don't believe that.
I think what Kalen DeBoer has done at Alabama, right?
He's the one, like every other day he's trending for is he gonna make it through the season?
Folks, he's one of the best coaches in America.
Crimson Tide, you are so lucky to have him, 'cause he's doing w- you know, he's winning, going to the playoff, winning double-digit games in an era that Nick Saban had never had to live, right?
Alabama had the ability to recruit the best in the world, and it was them versus everybody.
That is not the planet that we operate in right now.
So yeah, I think Alabama's real.
You know, Keilan Russell, look out.
He's an absolute baller.
He's the guy they just named quarterback.
LSU and Lane, I mean it, it's the storyline of the entire off-season.
Can they hit the ground running?
How quickly can he pull so many new faces and get them together?
They obviously have a tough opener.
And then you gotta navigate what I like to call praise and blame.
You know?
I just believe praise and blame are all the same, but it's n- it's not easy.
It's a discipline to live like that.
So can Lane get his team to operate like that?
So I think there's a lot of heavyweights that, you know, play very impressive football.
Nice.
And much like Missouri.
Missouri and Iowa.
Y- y- you know, Missouri and Illinois.
Yeah.
You know, we saw what happened in the bowl games.
And that's why I think, like, I go Big 10 over SEC, 'cause we've seen it.
We've seen too many data points over the last couple seasons to, you know, I g- I get the NFL Draft, but you look at the games actually being played, and Indiana, Alabama was really the tipping point where you're like, "Okay.
Bama's a heavyweight.
Indiana might be the champ."
All right.
Before we get you outta here on Not So Fast, we don't break down the games quite like you do.
We like to look at things like uniforms.
Right now, to start the current season, 2026, who has the best uniforms in college football?
And I'm taking Pitt off the board for two reasons.
First, your uniforms are awesome, and you went there.
What do you got?
Yeah.
Understand.
And like part of me goes classic.
Yeah.
Michigan, Ohio State.
Right.
But you're, you're better than that though.
Penn State's always cool.
You're better than that.
But I'm better than that.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I, I'm gonna go, and it might even be, you know, lazy, low-hanging fruit, but I think the creativity that comes out of Eugene.
And again, back to the substance- Sure from Dan Lanning, I think it's next level.
'Cause it's not just flash, right?
There's stories behind it, whether it's, you know, stomping out cancer and, and designing around the jerseys in that regard, and bringing that individual in to tell a story to the team to inspire them.
Every week, that to me is the must-look.
Like, that's the team on Instagram.
I'm like, "All right.
What are they rolling with- Yeah on Monday?"
So I'm going Oregon Ducks.
Okay.
I'm gonna go with Tulane, the green wave.
The colors pop.
The helmets pop.
The football's pretty good.
I don't really care that the football's good, but the uniforms are spotless.
I'm old school.
Penn State.
Yogi, you grew up a Penn State fan, I know this, like I did.
How do you get better than the simple, you know, blue and white?
Yeah, I'm with you.
I mean, I could also argue the cardinal and gold from the Trojans.
Like, there's something- Yep.
Yes iconic about that.
As a Pitt guy, picking Penn State as the uniforms after you took Pitt off the board, that was gonna be a hard one for me.
All right.
So I'm staying with the Ducks.
Last thing on this show.
Yeah.
Every guest, we ask a question.
It's called Such Thing As A Dumb Question.
We invented it here on Not So Fast.
You played at Pitt.
You were a walk-on, and I don't know how much you played or didn't play.
But we don't know much about walk-ons.
Does a walk-on actually suit up and stand on the sidelines, or does somehow- maybe sometimes a walk-on has to sit in the stands or not get a ticket to the game?
How does that work?
That's a great question.
It, it depends on how you play.
You know, I was lucky.
I played in my second game as a true freshman- Oh and then started and got put on scholarship.
So I was kinda like that walk-on story that you hear about.
Yeah.
Some guys don't, and a lot of it goes to roster limits.
You know, some schools, they are only 105 are allowed on the sideline.
And this was back in the day, where you have 125 on the team- Right and you're Nebraska.
You gotta watch from the stands, or you can maybe, you know, stand on the sideline with a jersey on.
But the, right now, walk-ons sadly are slowly being phased out- Ah in college football, which part of that's good because that means everybody's getting a scholarship or some sort of- support when they're in college.
But to me, walk-ons are a lifeblood of the game.
Just to- And I hope that they remain to put a bow on this, you're saying that was not a dumb question.
No, not a dumb That was a, that was a great question.
And, and on behalf of all the walk-ons, I love a good walk-on story.
All right.
If there's a game I'm calling and there's a former walk-on earned scholarship, 99.9% of the time- that name is getting dropped, even if he doesn't play.
Right.
Gotta tell the story about this guy.
Gotta tell it, man.
Hey- Gotta love on him by the way, one of your teammates was inducted in the Hall of Fame in Ken, Larry Fitzgerald, of course.
Of course.
I know you were there this summer.
Can you tell us the coolest Hall of Famer you met while you were in Ken?
Ooh.
I'm gonna say Larry Fitzgerald to start with that.
Kurt Warner was kinda fun, just because he was his quarterback.
Yeah.
But really, what was so cool is, like, you look around the party and you're like, "Oh, my."
Like, everybody there- Oh is a Hall of Famer.
And everybody's so cool.
And I think I really walked out of there believing this even stronger.
You know, you guys, you guys are icons in our profession.
Dan, who you work with, is an icon in the profession.
Like, you treat everybody like y- you should be treated, and I think it's the same way with Hall of Famers.
Nobody was acting too cool for school.
Nobody was brushing by you.
They always knew you kind of wanted to say hello and give a handshake.
And Larry was the best at that, and, and might be the best of all time at that.
So to see him there and celebrate him with all of our teammates, I was telling my wife, like it w- it was- one of the coolest moments of my life- Awesome to be with guys that you created all these memories with.
I mean, they saw me get a scholarship.
They were with you in a loss on the road.
They were with you when you broke up with a girlfriend- or you graduate, had your first baby, or whatever.
And we stayed up till 3:30 in the morning just talking shop all night.
Man, I need Andy Lee to get in as a punter so I can go back to Ken.
Oh, that's awesome.
Yogi, we're so excited for this season.
Starting Thursday, Eastern Illinois and Minnesota.
I hope you get to join us all season long.
There's gonna be so much great Big 10 football.
Thanks, buddy.
I'm all in, fellas, and congratulations to both of you on creating this new show.
