Allen Moff, of the Akron Beacon Journal, hit the nail on the head. “Two teams believing in themselves much more than outsiders are believing in them will tee it up Saturday afternoon when Kent State visits Ball State to open Mid-American Conference play.” You can read the excellent article he wrote about this game here. This actually is a huge match-up between 1-3 teams. Plenty of teams have gone on to have successful season after a rough non-conference slate, and both of these teams have lost close games to power teams.

Game Preview

• Who: Ball State Cardinals and Kent State Golden Flashes
• What: Football Game
• When: Saturday, September 29th, 3:05 PM
• Where: Muncie
• Watch: ESPN +
• Stream: WatchESPN, if you have ESPN +
• Line: Ball State - 7.5 according to vegasinsider.com

Both fan bases of these teams have been beaten up for a while now, but both fan bases of these teams should be optimistic for the future. Rarely do you get a match-up of two teams pretty much in the same place, both with the trajectory of the team and with regards to talent on the field. Both teams sport talented but erratic QBs. Both teams support defenses that can make plays, but can also give up plays.

On the field, I give the Golden Flashes a little bit of an edge. Paul Haynes actually put some talent on the defensive side of the ball. Their receivers are starting to show flashes of talent now that they have a QB that shows a pulse as a passer. However, I am giving the edge in this game to Ball State for a few reasons. One, the game is in Muncie. Two, Mike Neu is a little less new, and has more head coaching experience. So my prediction is Ball State wins a close battle that foreshadows the success both of these programs are going to have in the upcoming years.