RoxAnn Rodney-Isbrecht earns Week 8 Armchair QB win in tiebreaker

The eighth week of the Tri-City Record’s annual Armchair Quarterback competition has been contested and we made sure to continue our long-standing tradition of challenging our knowledgeable ‘superfans’ over some ultimately tough choices on the gridiron. Our pigskin diehards attempted to pick the winner of two local high school games, five collegiate games and three professional games that occurred during week eight. When all was said and done, all our expert pickers suffered no less than three defeats, which caused quite a logjam at the top of the standings, while one of our gurus needed a pair of wins last Sunday just to stave off a losing record. At this rate, our contest is looking a lot like the stock market, with spikes up and spikes down!

Let’s start by recapping the games from week eight of our competition. In our local high school football games, our two Tri-City teams were in action on the gridiron, and for the first time this season we can report that both teams were victorious on the same Friday night! In Coloma, the Comets (3-5) hosted Niles Brandywine for their second straight home game, and shutout the visiting Bobcats, 26-0. In Watervliet, the Panthers (3-5) took on visiting Parchment, in a battle of teams with the same mascot. In the rainy mess on the turf, it was the Watervliet Panthers that came out on top, as they won, 31-14. Despite losing records, both teams have a chance of making the playoffs; fingers crossed!

In collegiate action, Michigan, Michigan State, Notre Dame and Western Michigan all continued their seasons last week. When the games were final, the results were mixed, with two teams winning and two teams losing. In terms of final scores, #2 Michigan (7-0) hosted Indiana, and despite falling behind after the first quarter, cruised to victory, 52-7. #21 Notre Dame (6-2) rebounded from a flat performance the week prior to dominate #10 USC, 48-20, regaining the precious ‘Jeweled Shillelagh’ in the process. On the other side, Michigan State (2-4) returned to action from a week off by leading into the fourth quarter at Rutgers, only to see it slip away in a 27-24 defeat, while Western Michigan (2-5) hosted Mid-American Conference foe, Miami (OH), suffering a 34-21 defeat, their second straight loss and fourth in their last five games.

Finally, in professional action, we saw the Chicago Bears and Detroit Lions play week six of their seasons, and, well, in something we’ve become quite accustomed to during the early part of the year, the teams finished going in opposite directions. The Lions (5-1) made the trek down to a warmer climate, as they traveled to Tampa Bay to take on the Buccaneers for the first time in the post-Tom Brady era; Detroit would emerge with the 20-6 victory. Meanwhile, in the ‘Windy City,’ the Bears (1-5) hosted NFC North rival, Minnesota, looking to extend their winning streak to two games. It was a close, early-afternoon game, but in the end, the Vikings exited the playing field with the one score victory, 19-13.

When the final whistle blew and all the scores were verified, the best marks of the week were a solid 7-3 overall. We use the term ‘marks,’ because an astounding four Armchair Quarterbacks: RoxAnn Rodney-Isbrecht, Rodney Lynch, Maureen Ovington and Mike Banic, all landed on that record, and will have to go to a tiebreaker to determine our top four positions this week. Each of them had to be biting their nails hoping they’d take the crown!

Because we have a tie in the weekly standings, that meant we had to go to the dreaded tiebreaker scenario to determine our weekly champion, runner-up, third place and fourth place finishers. Our tiebreaker matchup, which featured Ferris State and Grand Valley State (#AnchorUp), finished with a total of 77 points. Based on their highly educated guesses, none of our panelists came within two scores of the actual result. However, it was determined that RoxAnn, thanks to her prediction of 63 total points, will take home the top step of the podium and the gold medal this week.

Finishing in the runner-up spot will be Maureen (who predicted 49 total points), while Mike (who predicted 48 total points) will be excited by taking home the final step of the podium with his third-place finish. Meanwhile, Rodney (who predicted 47 total points) will be disappointed to know he will have to settle for fourth place, despite being just a couple points short in our tiebreaker.

While we had one of our largest tiebreakers of the season to date, we did not need any further scenarios to determine our final two weekly positions in the standings. Finishing in fifth place, with a record of 6-4, was our neighborhood-friendly fire chief, Bill Whitney. While he was a successful 5-0 in his college picks, he will rue the day he selected against both of our local high school teams, in addition to trying to will ‘Da Bears’ to a victory.

Unfortunately, everybody knows that each week we must have a ‘cellar dweller,’ who will take home a sixth-place finish. That ‘badge of honor’ this week belongs to Greg Krell, who found himself going from the ‘top of the heap’ to ‘bottom of the barrel,’ with a 5-5 record in our ten-game slate. This has been rarified air for our ‘gambler’ this year, but he also picked against our two local teams, in addition to keeping his loyalty to his beloved FSU Bulldogs.

In case you are new to our newspaper or need a refresher on how this competition works, let’s take a moment to bring you up-to-speed. Each fall, our newspaper enlists the assistance of six local football fanatics, who should be deemed ‘superfans’ really. Each week, the six-person panel is given a list of pre-selected games from the local high school, collegiate and professional ranks, and is given the daunting task of selecting the winners of each game.

Weekly records are kept from the beginning of the high school season through Super Bowl Sunday, with each week’s edition of the paper reporting on the progress of each participant. At the conclusion of the football season, the panelist who has the best overall record will earn the right to wear the 2023-24 Tri-City Record Armchair Quarterback hat and claim bragging rights until the next season begins.

In the event there are multiple AQBs that have the same weekly or season-long record, their place in the weekly or overall standings will be determined by a weekly ‘tiebreaker’ game. In addition to trying to pick the winners of each week’s slew of games, they will also predict a total score from a specially selected game, one that usually stands out on a local or national level. The quarterback that predicts closest to the actual number of points scored by both teams will receive the higher position in the standings.

In the season-long race for the hat, there have been weekly positional changes almost every week that this competition has commenced this year. That must mean that the streak will continue, right? That’s correct, as we had a shuffle amongst half of our six panelists. All we will say is – this contest is going to be up and down and quite interesting – all season long!

In terms of the overall classification, RoxAnn continues to keep her tight grasp to the lead in the race for top honors, with her overall record standing at 56-24 through our first 80 games. Despite falling a couple places in the past couple of weeks, Rodney has regained some footing, jumping two spots into second place, with his overall record standing at 52-28. Meanwhile, we now have a tie-for-third place between Bill and Greg, who each possess an overall record of 51-29. The final two positions in our overall race belong to Maureen in fifth place, with an overall record of 50-30, and Mike in sixth place, with an overall record of 47-33. The nine-game margin between the top and the bottom of the standings has held steady for several weeks now, and based on observations over the past few rounds, there are still many twists and turns coming that can shake up the race!

The season continues this week, as week nine (the final week of the regular season) of the high school football season is contested across the ‘Great Lakes State,’ along with week eight of the college football season and week seven of the professional football season. If you are a fan of the game being contested on the gridiron, and, seeing you are loyally reading this column on a weekly basis, you must be – I know that you are excited to be watching plenty of football games with your family or closest friends right now. You may not be excited about the result of your favorite team, but that’s how the ball bounces!

Be sure to check back each week as our panel of ardent, loyal pigskin pickers weave their way through the football season, in pursuit of their own ‘one shining moment.’ Now, here are your week nine games that our qualified panelists were tasked with picking:

Decatur at Coloma (Fri)

Watervliet at Allegan (Fri)

Air Force at Navy (Sat)

Michigan at Michigan State (Sat)

Penn State at Ohio State (Sat)

Tennessee at Alabama (Sat)

Western Michigan at Ohio (Sat)

Detroit Lions at

Baltimore Ravens (Sun)

Las Vegas Raiders at

Chicago Bears (Sun)

Miami Dolphins at

Philadelphia Eagles (Sun) *

* tiebreaker