College football may be our country’s greatest sport, but the greatest sports day of the year is unquestionably this Thursday. I practically melt when the first notes of the CBS March Madness theme song hit at 9 a.m. PT.

As such, I specifically requested any combo college football/March Madness questions folks could come up with this week, thinking I’d maybe get two or three. To my pleasant surprise, there were nearly enough to fill the entire column.

In 2006, Florida became the first school to win both the football and men’s basketball national championships in the same year. Who do you predict is the next school to accomplish the double? — Mark N., Downingtown, Pa.

It’s hard to say anyone but Michigan as of this moment, given it hit the basketball lottery in hiring Dusty May. The guy took FAU to the Final Four in 2023, led the 2025 Wolverines from 8-24 to 27-10 and the Sweet 16 and now has one of the three favorites to cut down the nets next month. Maybe they’ll end the Big Ten’s 26-year title drought.

Meanwhile, football is only a few years removed from its last national title and just hired a future Hall of Famer in Kyle Whittingham. Granted, it’s far from a given that Whittingham will come in and dominate from Day 1, but even if he flames out in a few years, May, 49, seems like the kind of coach who could spend the next 15 years overseeing a juggernaut.

But if Michigan is 1A, Alabama is 1B.

Nate Oats is not the world’s most lovable hoops coach these days, but he’s turned the Tide into annual contenders, reaching a Final Four, an Elite Eight and two Sweet 16s since 2021. I could easily see him cutting down the nets at some point. The question is whether Kalen DeBoer will hang on long enough to do the same. I still consider him a top-five coach, given he’s 54-14 in his five full seasons as an FBS head coach and won 11 games (including a CFP first-rounder) last season. But the preponderance of blowout losses his first two seasons has admittedly dampened my confidence.

I was still covering both football and basketball during that 2006-08 period when Florida was the toast of college sports, winning a pair of national titles in both sports. Urban Meyer and Billy Donovan were still in their early 40s. I assumed both programs would remain at a high level for years. Donovan did his part, reaching three Elite Eights and a Final Four before heading to the NBA in 2015. But Meyer was gone within two years, and the football program still hasn’t recovered.

Hoops seems like it’s doing OK.

Take away Bruce Pearl’s Auburn ties. He argued the statistically better team (17-16 Auburn) deserves the NCAA Tournament over the most deserving (31-1 Miami (Ohio)). Translate that to college football: How large would the CFP need to expand before someone argues a 7-5 LSU deserves the Playoff over a 12-1 James Madison? — Craig B., Charlotte, N.C.

Probably not as large as you think.

As I’ve long said: While most college basketball fans openly embrace postseason Cinderellas, many college football fans seem almost allergic to them. Last year’s Tulane/JMU backlash being a prime example. But that’s largely attributable to the size of the fields. It was more pronounced back in the two-team BCS (when 2010 Boise State became villainized) or four-team CFP (2017-18 UCF), but even at 12, berths are at a premium. Which makes people uncomfortable with a Group of 6 team “stealing” one of those precious spots.

If you noticed, the highly compromised Pearl was on a one-man island regarding Miami (Ohio). Even though the RedHawks had no data whatsoever to support their case, the public sentiment was, c’mon, they went 31-1, just let them in. I sensed no real controversy over them getting a bid. But of course, it’s easier to say that when there are 37 at-large berths and the only power conference teams left by the end are indisputably mediocre.

While easy to laugh at the idea of someone pushing for 7-5 LSU, that’s not far from what Big Ten commissioner Tony Petitti is proposing with his 24-team Playoff. Last season, the final at-large spot would have gone to an 8-4 Iowa team with no Top 25 wins but also no bad losses. He himself said at Big Ten media days last summer, “There seems to be some feeling in college football that somehow if you’re 8-4 you’re not a really good football team. These conferences have gotten so much bigger and deeper. That’s a pretty good winning percentage last time I checked.”

Play this to its logical conclusion. Assume there are no automatic berths in his format. Say Iowa had lost one more game, to 7-5 Minnesota. And the No. 24 seed came down to the Hawkeyes and 12-1 JMU. He would absolutely argue Iowa had a better season because it played in a tougher conference, just as SEC commissioner Greg Sankey would for one of his teams.

Which of Kirk Herbstreit/Nick Saban/Desmond Howard would do the same on national television like Pearl did for Auburn?

Football blue bloods are quite resistant to sustained down periods, mostly because they are near recruiting hotbeds, have strong national brands, etc. Basketball blue bloods have proven themselves to be similarly resistant, but the reasons seem less obvious to me. Why does Arkansas of all teams have a strong basketball reputation as compared to South Carolina? How come Gonzaga is so good year in and year out but Washington State isn’t? They feel less obvious than the assured excellence of Georgia and Ohio State in football. — Asa M.

In basketball, much more so than football, it seems like the best coaches are so consistently good that it almost doesn’t matter where they are. You see that most obviously with guys such as Rick Pitino and Kelvin Sampson, who’ve jumped around a lot (not always by choice). No one could win at St. John’s for decades, but then Pitino gets there and quickly wins. Sampson goes away for six years, comes back at Houston and turns it into one of the best programs in the country.

But the transient ones are the exception. Think about how many recent or current coaches in that sport stayed in one place for decades: Mike Krzyzewski, Jim Boeheim, Jim Calhoun, Roy Williams, Bill Self, Tom Izzo and others. Arkansas had one of those guys in Nolan Richardson, and Gonzaga has one now in Mark Few. Even once a coach leaves, the program’s cachet usually carries on. John Calipari is probably not at Arkansas today if not for the legacy Richardson left behind.

Which brings me to a related question: How exactly do the top basketball coaches manage to almost never have a down year, despite the constant roster turnover? There was only one Nick Saban in modern college football, but in basketball, at least prior to all the recent retirements, it felt like there were closer to eight of them at any given time.

Three theories:

• A good recruiter in hoops can get players to go almost anywhere. For instance, anyone who’s ever been to Syracuse in the winter should appreciate Boeheim’s ability to land future NBA draft picks year after year. But even if Syracuse landed the Boeheim of football tomorrow, he would not be able to overcome the dearth of four- and five-star recruits in that region.

• By no means would I suggest coaching college basketball is easy — but it’s definitely easier than football. It takes far fewer players to field a good team, which means far less recruiting time. If a hoops team has a star point guard, shooting guard and center, it’s not the end of the world if the small forward isn’t great. Whereas even if a football team is good at most positions, a bad offensive line could sink the whole season.

• A much-bigger NCAA Tournament gives coaches wider latitude. You don’t have to win a national championship, or even reach the Final Four, to have a “successful” season.

Take Izzo. His lone national title came a quarter-century ago. Were he an SEC football coach, they may have run him out for that years ago. But Izzo has reached 28 consecutive NCAA tournaments and made eight Final Fours. That’s an incredible resume. Mind you, there have been quite a few seasons over the years where Michigan State bowed out in the first or second round, but even those don’t go down as “bad seasons.”

Though they probably would if basketball had a 12-team tournament.

Dabo Swinney at Clemson and Joey McGuire at Texas Tech have a lot of similarities. Neither was a coordinator. Both are “program manager” types known for their charm and salesmanship, and both are in their mid-50s. However, they’re going in opposite directions in their career. Dabo has openly rejected the new era of roster building, while McGuire has embraced it. Which would you pick to run your program for the next 10 years? — Benjamin D.

Interesting that you chose those two in particular, given a couple of brouhahas with my recent Top 25 coach rankings.

Both Bruce Feldman (who had Dabo No. 8 in his rankings) and Ralph Russo (who actually said out loud he’d have him in the top 5) were incredulous I had Dabo way down at No. 19. Whereas I found it puzzling they could still be so high on someone whose program has fallen further and further from relevance.

Meanwhile, I got a flood of complaints in the comments of my rankings story for leaving McGuire out. I didn’t even seriously consider ranking him, given he’s had only one big year so far (and went 8-5/7-6/8-5 before that).

So while I’m down on Dabo, and cringe to think how out of touch he might have become 10 years from now, I think I’d still default to the two-time national champion as of the moment. While McGuire just led Texas Tech to its best season in 17 years, who’s to say it wasn’t a one-off? Might the Red Raiders revert to the pack having now lost arguably the best defensive front in the sport last season? Could Cody Campbell’s hit rate on this year’s expensive portal class be lower than last season’s?

Now, it’s a different story if I’m not bound in writing to keeping the guy for 10 years. In that case, then I’m more inclined to take a risk on the less-proven but more forward-thinking McGuire, knowing I can cut bait in a few years if he flames out. Maybe Dabo will have redeemed himself by then.

Funny how the critics chastised Notre Dame for passing on the Pop-Tarts Bowl. However, not a peep when shunned basketball teams pass on the NIT. — Sean P.

Indeed. Playing top-12 BYU in a wildly popular bowl game that 10 million people would have watched is absolutely the same exact thing as a .500 basketball team taking on Bradley on a Tuesday night on ESPNU.

(Personally, I did not begrudge the Notre Dame players making that decision in the heat of the moment. I was just disappointed we didn’t get that matchup.)

Of the traditional basketball blue bloods that do not have the same level of success on the gridiron (Kansas, UNC, Duke, UCLA, Kentucky), which has the best case to be a surprise contender for a Playoff spot the soonest? I will even throw in Michigan State, Louisville, Arizona, Syracuse and UConn. — Nolan C., Lincoln, Neb.

Duke nearly pulled it off last season, thanks in part to a bizarre ACC tiebreaker that got it into the conference title game. But the Blue Devils at least get to claim being the first school in that league’s history to win a football, men’s basketball and women’s basketball championship in one school year.

But losing Darian Mensah unexpectedly with no obvious successor on hand (Manny Diaz got San Jose State’s Walker Eget on short notice) makes it hard for me to say a CFP berth is imminent.

Of all the other schools you mentioned, I’d say Louisville under Jeff Brohm has the best shot. The Cardinals have appeared in the CFP rankings at least once in each of the past four seasons (but finished there only in 2023.) They were off to a 7-1 start last year, which included a big upset at No. 2 Miami, before star running back Isaac Brown got hurt and they lost three straight games en route to a 9-4 record.

Brown will be back this season, but in general, Brohm is relying heavily on the portal. This year, that includes leaning on Ohio State’s three-year backup QB Lincoln Kienholz. So I have no idea what to expect from Louisville. But other than Miami, there’s no ACC team I feel strongly about. In fact, though I had the Cardinals at No. 17 in my early Top 25, they were still the second-highest ACC team. So I’m saying they’ve got a chance.

It would also be fun to take this question in reverse. Which football blue blood that’s not usually great in basketball will make it to the Final Four the soonest?

I’ll go with Indiana.

As a nod to our current era, an award is created to honor the best player to have used up their eligibility all at one school. Who is the trophy’s namesake, and who would 2025’s winner have been? — Anonymous U.

I assume you mean the namesake would be someone from the transfer portal era rather than, say, Tim Tebow? Or any other four-year standout from the previous 80 years or so of guys staying at one school?

I’ll give the honor to one of our All-Geezer team honorees last summer, South Carolina’s Luke Doty. After losing the starting quarterback job as a freshman, he could have taken the obvious route and tried somewhere else, but instead he remained in Columbia for six seasons, changing positions a couple of times along the way.

Without further ado, the 2025 winner of the Luke Doty Award is Kansas quarterback Jalon Daniels, who made his first college start in 2020 when Les Miles was still the coach and went on to amass 10,727 yards of offense in six seasons in Lawrence.

It’s been 25 years or more since Julius Peppers and Charlie Ward excelled at both football and basketball in college. Is it just not possible to do both (or do both well) today? — Abala Shice, Sacramento, Calif.

Remarkably, Peppers wasn’t even the only two-sport star at UNC then. One of his teammates, Ronald Curry, was both the Tar Heels’ starting quarterback for four years and started at point guard. Which seems utterly preposterous today.

It would be very hard to even play both sports, much less excel in them, given the year-round demands. Say someone plays the entire football season, then switches over for the rest of basketball season. The football coach would not be thrilled about him missing the entire winter conditioning period and possibly some or all of spring practice. Not just because it might affect physical development, but because it’s a key time for team bonding ahead of a new season.

The more realistic path would be that of former Miami (Ohio) star Quinten Rollins. He played four seasons of basketball, then used his fifth year of eligibility in 2014 to play football and turned himself into the MAC Defensive Player of the Year and second-round pick of the Green Bay Packers.

But man, that takes quite a rare athlete to pull that off.

Do you root against the “football schools” in March Madness? — Luke M.

Not intentionally. I root for Cinderellas, and it just so happens that nearly all of them do not field FBS programs. Two notable exceptions this year, though: No. 14 seeds North Dakota State and Kennesaw State.

Side note: I will be unabashedly rooting for my Santa Clara this week given it’s the closest Division I school to my house. No offense, Kentucky fans.