Inspirational thought of the week:
What do you do when you love somebody
And you decide to go it alone?
Ah, no, no, it never pays to give up on someone
When on the inside the feelin' is strong
Oh, here we go again
I thought what we had was over now
But here we go again
-- "Here We Go Again" Isley Brothers
Here at Bottom 10 Headquarters, located inside the 18-wheeler of tissues being delivered to the "College GameDay" set for Coach Corso's final show, we have spent the offseason staring at the map. Specifically, a United States puzzle map. We picked up the piece labeled "Massachusetts" and held it while we kept one eye on the calendar and one eye on the clock.
Then, as the long hand hit 12 and it became midnight and thus was officially Tuesday, July 1, 2025, we slathered crazy glue onto the back of that wooden facsimile of the Codfish State and screamed, "UMASS IS WALKING BACK TO THE MAC, BABY!"
That's when the lights came on. Standing in the doorway were the kids from whose playroom I'd stolen the puzzle. They were crying. There was a dog, apparently named Mac, who thought I'd called him for a walk. Now he was crying. Then there was my wife, in her pajamas and mad because I'd woken her up. She pointed to my hand, still held high in the air about to slap Massachusetts into the heart of the Mid-American Conference and said, "Nice job, moron. You palmed the side with the crazy glue. I hope you like UMass as much as you say you do, because I'm out of nail polish remover. That's gonna still be in your hand when the season starts."
With apologies to former Villanova running back Larry Glueck, Lester Hayes, Harry Cover and Steve Harvey, here's the 2025 preseason Bottom 10 rankings.
1. State of Kent (2024 record: 0-12)
The defending Bottom 10 champs have lost 21 games in a row and fired coach Kenni Burns. But they let him stick around until spring practice had already started and said they didn't fire him because his record was 1-23 but rather because of a list of reasons presented by university leaders. That included maxing out his $20K "P-card" which stands for personal card, not something the doctor has you use to check your alkaline levels.
2. Kennesaw Mountain Landis State (2-10)
Our Bottom 10 JortsCenter investigative unit has discovered a pile of wilted flowers and an accompanying thank you note, found in a dumpster behind the Kent State football offices, with a Kennesaw State return address. The card reads: "Thanks for botching your coach firing so bad because it made people forget our even worse coach firing last fall. Love, The Owls (not the ones at Rice, FAU or Temple)." Why were we digging through the dumpster at Kent? Because we heard that Greg McElroy said that Nick Saban was going back to coach his alma mater.
3. UMess (2-10)
The Amherst Amblers are indeed back where the Bottom 10 football gods want them, rejoining #MACtion after nearly a decade away. They were in the MAC from 2012 to 2015, during which time they won eight games over four seasons. Then they went rogue, during which time they earned 18 wins over nine seasons. Is it weird to leave a conference and then return? Sure. But did we really believe that a group of Minutemen could resist the idea of independence?
4. Southern Missed (1-11)
The 2025 roster of Brett Favre Disaster Relief U. has 17 transfers from the SEC, nine from the Big 12 and five from the ACC. The last time there were this many out-of-towners in Hattiesburg they were on their way to siege Vicksburg.
5. The State U. Fightin' Accountants
Between rev share and payrolls and school shoe deals promising unprecedented NIL payouts and the Kansas Nayhawks receiving a $300 million donation and players kinda sorta not really gambling and court settlements that were supposed to fix everything but then we find out that, no, there's more that has to be sorted out to players' parents complaining about unfulfilled financial promises to everyone from Tom Brady to Shane Gillis telling us that college sports cash is screwed up but no one has any real solutions ... can we please just kick off the games already?
6. Whew Mexico State (3-9)
Sources have also told Bottom 10 JortsCenter that New Mexico State officials have looked into the possibility of not playing any games this year and instead hosting stadium jumbotron SEC Network watch parties to see all their former players winning games at Vanderbilt.
7. Livin' on Tulsa Time (3-9)
The Golden Hurricane lost their last four games of 2024 by surrendering an average 55.75 points per contest. It was the most excruciating finish we've been forced to witness since the "Game of Thrones" finale.
8. FI(not A)U (4-8)
The Panthers Not Owls moved up to FBS football nearly 25 years ago and since then have posted only four winning seasons, the last coming in their legendary 9-4 campaign in 2018 that ended with a win in the Popeye's Bahamas Bowl. Over the past five years, they have averaged 2.6 wins. Exactly how I feel after I have eaten too much Popeye's.
9. Mizz-ery State (8-4, FCS)
Speaking of moving up to FBS, the Bears are doing so after 115 years of playing at lower levels. During that time, they posted an FCS playoff record of 1-4 and a bowl mark of 0-4, including two losses in the Mineral Water Bowl. College Football Playoff, here they come!
10. I'm in ... Delaware (9-2, FCS)
Speaking of repeating ourselves, the Fightin' Blue Hens are also movin' on up, but bringing a very different résumé to the FBS job fair. Delaware claims six national titles, five in Division II and the 2003 FCS championship. Plus, it was the first program of the Level Formerly Known as 1-AA to draw more than 20,000 fans per game. The Blue Hens open the season versus Delaware State, not be confused with the State of Delaware. If they had to fight the entire state of Delaware, that wouldn't seem fair. Though, if it was set to the music of George Thorogood and there was blue crab being served, I would totally be there.
Waiting list: Georgia State Not Southern, Baller State, Akronmonious, Temple of Doom, ULM (pronounced "uhlm"), UTEPid, Muddled Tennessee, coach girlfriend headlines.