Offseason Vibe Checks 2025: The MAC
Split Zone Duo: College Football Podcast
Richard Johnson and Alex Kirshner
4.9 • 916 Ratings
🗓️ 23 April 2025
⏱️ 42 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Alex and Richard break down offseason happenings in the Mid-American Conference, which saw lots of coach carousel turnover.
* Ohio: Tim Albin to Charlotte, OC Brian Smith replacing him
* Ball State: An off-the-beaten-path coach hire, bringing on a guy who most recently coached non-scholarship football in the Pioneer League
* Miami: It’s a Return to the MAC for QB Dequan Finn
* Buffalo: Pete Lembo tries to follow up a surprisingly good opening act
* Bowling Green: Has an offseason loss of a coach ever looked better than the Falcons winding up with Eddie George?
* Western Michigan: Major staff turnover as Lance Taylor tries to fix it
* Toledo: Jason Candle has a good roster (as usual) and spicy spring game commentary
* NIU: Losing basically everything from last year’s team that beat Notre Dame, and also preparing for a conference switch
* Akron: A portal exodus
* EMU: Ditto, but Chris Creighton is a hard man to count out
* Central Michigan: Trying something different with Army’s Matt Drinkall as head coach. We applaud the spirit of the hire
* Kent State: Well, it’s really, really bad
The MAC also has some realignment coming for this season, with UMass joining back up. They’re not officially Midwesterners again until July, though, so we’ll discuss the Minutemen when we check in with the independents.
(Ed. note! We recorded most of this episode shortly before the spring transfer portal window opened, but we made a few updates before publication on 4/23, mostly to cover the late-spring firing of Kent State’s head coach.)
Elsewhere in Offseason Vibe Checks
* Big Ten
* SEC
* ACC
* Big 12
* Sun Belt
* AAC
Subscriber exclusives all offseason long
Two of them just this week!
* What on Earth is going on at Cal?
* The NFL Draft QB Tiers Special, with Ben Solak and Derrik Klassen
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Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | We're coming, and we ain't backing down. |
| 0:01.9 | We don't need a bunch of cats in here looking in the mirror. |
| 0:04.5 | Everybody just do your job. |
| 0:06.7 | You understand that? |
| 0:07.7 | Hey, will you shut up? |
| 0:08.6 | I'm bitterly disappointed with the officiating today. |
| 0:11.1 | Guys being dudes. |
| 0:12.3 | And they run through our like a shit through a ten horn, man. |
| 0:14.8 | Ah, fuck it. |
| 0:16.3 | Thank you, Lee. |
| 0:17.4 | Thank you, Alex Kirshner. |
| 0:18.9 | Thank you, Lee. Thank you, Alex Kirshner. Thank you to Max. This is, as we're recording it, this is our final vibe check. |
| 0:24.7 | Do not know our publication schedule, but this is our final of the off-season vibe checks, |
| 0:30.5 | which is where we take what you've done from roughly Thanksgiving weekend until roughly the beginning of spring practice and just break it down. Talks and ball in a ballless world. Everybody's talking about basketball, March Madness, this, NC tournament, that. |
| 0:45.0 | Baseball season, this. Baseball. Enough. English Premier League race for the finish fat. No. Well, that's no race. We're talking about Maxion. |
| 0:55.5 | We are talking about the mid-American conference. |
| 0:59.5 | And yes, it is the vibe check. |
| 1:01.0 | This is not a 20-24 recap. |
| 1:02.9 | It is not a 2025 preview. |
| 1:04.3 | It is checking on how things have been going since roughly the end of the regular season |
| 1:07.7 | until the time that we're recording this in the middle of the spring |
| 1:11.6 | here as we get ready for the next college football season. One note for the Mac is that they |
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