Week 3 college football TV schedule and open thread

There should be some good ones today. The early and afternoon viewing windows are led by top-25 conference foe match-ups.

The Gators play in the evening slot tonight, hosting the North Texas Mean Green at 7:30 p.m. on ESPNU. It’s the last Florida home game until October, as the Gators travel to play opponents in Tennessee the next two weekends. After Florida plays, feel free to come back to this thread to comment while watching any of the later games.

Here are our picks for today’s viewing windows:

Early (12:00 p.m. to 3:30 p.m., Eastern)

Florida State at Louisville (12:00 p.m., ABC): College GameDay will be at this game of two top-ten teams, which is somewhat surprisingly slated for the noon slot - until you consider that the times for this week’s games were set before the season began. ABC’s night game feature will be USC and Stanford, which probably looked more appealing before the Trojans were demolished by Alabama.

And this game was slotted at noon before Florida State beat Ole Miss and Louisville’s Lamar Jackson set the early Heisman race on fire, scoring 13 touchdowns in his first two games this season (including eight in the first HALF of their first game). The dynamic quarterback threw for 411 yards and rushed for 199 more against Syracuse last week. But, Jackson and the No. 10 Cardinals will face a tougher challenge against No. 2 Florida State.

Miami at Appalachian State (12:00 p.m., ESPN): It’s kind of weird that the Hurricanes are traveling to play in Boone, North Carolina, right? The Mountaineers won 11 games last year and very nearly upset Tennessee in Knoxville to start the season.

Afternoon (3:30 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. Eastern)

Alabama at Ole Miss (3:30 p.m., CBS): The last time that the top-ranked Crimson Tide were in Oxford the Rebels tore the goal posts down. And last year, as you may recall, Ole Miss won again, besting the Tide in Tuscaloosa. Nick Saban has been critical of his team’s performance during their first two wins, and you would have to imagine that he is quite eager to break his losing streak to the No. 19 Rebels.

Oregon at Nebraska (3:30 p.m., ABC): The No. 22 Ducks travel to Memorial Stadium to face the Cornhuskers and their second year coach, Mike Riley, who coached for 14 years at Oregon’s rival Oregon State.

East Carolina at South Carolina (4:00 p.m., SECN or Watch ESPN): East Carolina is a dangerous non-conference opponent to schedule. The Pirates are currently on a six-game winning streak over ACC teams, and gave Florida a fight last season in The Swamp (and the previous season in the Birmingham Bowl). The Gamecocks won their opener against Vanderbilt, despite scoring only 10 points, but struggled on both sides of the ball in a loss to Mississippi State last week.