Looking ahead to Saturday? You bet. This should be a good one — not only for the games Keith McMillan and I are attending but the other games on the schedule as well.

Keith and I fly out today to Chicago and will see UW-Eau Claire at UW-Whitewater in the afternoon, Wheaton at North Central at night. All four of these teams are already on my ballot (not in the order the rest of the voters have, however), so I’m looking forward to seeing in person where they might stack up.

But even without those games it should be a good day of football.

Game that won’t live up to previous years: Bridgewater at Hampden-Sydney. This game should still be pretty good, it’s just that the last time Hampden-Sydney hosted, it came down to the wire. We urge all attending this game to cheer responsibly. First team to make a defensive stop wins.

Game that will be close but shouldn’t be: Guilford at Greensboro. These city rivals are about on the same level but Greensboro hasn’t shown much this season and Guilford has to be worried about where its next win is coming from.

Game that should be close but won’t be: No. 25 Whitworth at Eastern Oregon. Remember when EOU was in Division III? Yeah, it wasn’t that long ago. But Whitworth should be able to win this one handily.

Retired Trophy Game of the Week: RPI at Coast Guard. RPI will take the Shot Glass home for good. Yet another rivalry that Coast Guard is abandoning in dropping its program down from the Liberty League to the New England Football Conference. No more Mug, no more Shot Glass, and now the Secretary’s Cup is going to be played in September? Scratch that off the list of key rivalry games.

First to seven wins: Franklin and Marshall has scored nine points per game, Muhlenberg 16.7, and even that is inflated by the 30 points against The College of New Jersey, some of which were gift-wrapped. Last year, 15-10 F&M.

Top 25 upset waiting to happen: No. 16 Carthage. They need to find that offense, and fast. The trip to Millikin is not an easy one and neither is the opponent.

Getting off the schneid: Best shot, I think, is Massachusetts Maritime breaking its eight-game losing streak, traveling to Framingham State.

Off the hype machine: Remember what a big deal Christopher Newport/Shenandoah was last season? Hmm, not so much right now. Not only are both teams down from last season, it’s not even definite they are the top two teams in the USAC, as Ferrum already has put Shenandoah away.