Maryland is set to kickoff their 2024 season this weekend, as they host UConn at SECU Stadium. Jim Mora is in his third season as the Huskies' head coach, and is coming off of a disappointing 3-9 record in 2023. The team is expected to be one of the worst FBS squads in the country. The last time these teams met came in 2012, a 32-21 Maryland win in East Hartford.

Maryland enters this game as 20-point favorites, and ESPN gives them an 84.5% chance to win.

6.5 wins in the over under. Its juiced pretty heavy to the under. Ive been advised its a strong play. Still havent pulled the trigger.

Yeah, its a tough schedule. I'm thinking 6 is most likely. I'd be quite pleased with 7 wins.

Billy The Kid confirmed as starter Zack?

The uncertainty at QB is probably heavily influencing where the money goes. Last I heard Locksley still isn’t tipping his hand as to who will start, and may not announce it at all. But he surely already knows and I’m guessing it’ll leak when they start putting in the gameplan.

Edwards is just too inaccurate a thrower to make the passing game much of a threat imo, but he’s definitely an effective runner. I prefer Edge due to his better arm. Haven’t seen Morris to know enough about him, but he does have the most playing experience of the three and based just on numbers seems to fall somewhere in between Edwards and Edge as a passer.

Hopefully this game plays out in a way that at least two, if not all three, can get a decent amount of snaps, but we’ll see.

Billy The Kid confirmed as starter Zack?

Starter won't be announced, so we'll all find out together on the first offensive drive of this game. Haven't heard anything about one guy separating himself at all, though I assume it'll be either Edwards or Morris.

Wild that we don’t play Michigan or Ohio State and still have a tough schedule.

Welcome to the new Big Ten. Still gotta play two Top 10 teams on the road, and two more Top 25 (though I’m not sold yet USC is gonna turn around their defense in one offseason). And sounds like we better not sleep on Rutgers or Indiana this year. In typical UM fashion, I expect them to jump out to a fast start (4-0 looks very doable), then it gets dicey.

I mean Maryland isn't in a place where you can bank on beating Michigan St, even if it is at home. I expect that program to rebound eventually. 

But yeah, Ohio St and Mich this year got replaced with USC and Oregon on the schedule. I don't expect to win either one of those. USC is doable, I think. No chance out in Oregon.

Jonathan Smith is a great program builder, and should do well there, but I don’t see that quick a turnaround for Sparty.

About time for Maryland to be at a point where they can pull an upset over an Ohio State, Penn State, Michigan, Oregon every once in a while.

They've been very close with Ohio State a couple of times.

If the defense continues the trend they’ve set the last few seasons, they should absolutely be able to keep those games close. Question will be whether the offense has enough firepower to take advantage.

About time for Maryland to be at a point where they can pull an upset over an Ohio State, Penn State, Michigan, Oregon every once in a while.

They've been very close with Ohio State a couple of times.

My thought is, if he keeps recruiting his ass off the team will always be “relevant”

Recruiting prowess trumps in game coaching ability in college football. All day every day.

I mean...within reason, teams like Utah aren't amazing at recruiting but they have a long-tenured coach who gets the most out of his guys, when Utah beat USC to win the Pac-12 title game 2 years ago I feel pretty confident saying they did it with fewer 4-stars and 5-stars on the field than USC

I mean...within reason, teams like Utah aren't amazing at recruiting but they have a long-tenured coach who gets the most out of his guys, when Utah beat USC to win the Pac-12 title game 2 years ago I feel pretty confident saying they did it with fewer 4-stars and 5-stars on the field than USC

It sure didn't help that USC team was very poorly coached on one side of the ball, though it should also be noted Caleb Williams played much of that game injured.

There are definitely different levels of coaching competency throughout, and sometimes a well-coached team with a great gameplan can overcome a talent disparity. Still, at the end of the day talent is the biggest difference-maker, especially over the course of an entire season, and the list of national champions demonstrate that. Put another way, does Nick Saban have 6 national championships without all those Top 5 recruiting classes he stacked at Alabama?

Ask FSU and Miami how important actual coaching is with regard to just bringing in talent.

They haven't been recruiting elite classes for the most part since their glory days. They haven't been bottom tier recruiters by any means, but there's still a big gap between very good and elite talent. Due to the way top players are congregated among a very small number of programs, and he amount of depth the elite (and I'm talking like Top 5) programs have, over the long haul the best talent almost always wins titles.

The one recent exception just happened to be Michigan last year, whose talent composite ranking was only like #10 or 11. That can mostly be chalked up to what a great job Harbaugh & Co. did in developing what they had (and the low end of Top 10 still isn't bad, but there is still a lot of disparity in depth). The only other recent exception of a national champion not among the truly elite talented teams that comes to my mind was Auburn in 2010, and that's mostly because Cam Newton was a Superman.