One could look at Austin Peay or Samford’s non-conference foes and easily see why the two football teams could start conference play with a winning record.

Playing NAIA and Division II opponents should give these two schools wins.

Austin Peay (3-1, 1-1 OVC) beat NAIA school Bethel College from Bethel, Tenn., and then gained some respect by beating Indiana State on the road.

Samford (3-1, 1-0) opened the year by beating Division II West Alabama and then followed that with a win against Presbyterian College, a school in its first year playing at the Football Championship Subdivsion level.

But once conference play unfolded, Austin Peay lost to a more athletic Tennessee State team and then beat last year’s league champions Tennessee-Martin.

Samford opened up OVC play last week with a come-from-behind win against Southeast Missouri.

It’ll be interesting to see how the final eight weeks unfold in regards to these two teams.

First-year wonders

First-year head coach Rick Christophel at Austin Peay, Pat Sullivan at Samford and Watson Brown at Tennessee Tech have led their teams to a combined 9-3 record.

That isn’t far off from what happened last year to first-year coaches in the league.

Southeast Missouri’s Tony Samuel, Murray State’s Matt Griffin and Tennessee-Martin’s Jason Simpson went a combined 7-5 through the first four weeks of the 2006 season.

TSU has unfair advantage

Tennessee State plays Florida A&M this Saturday in the Georgia Dome in Atlanta in the Atlanta Classic. This is the last of the three classic games TSU plays every year.

And because of this rule that the league granted to TSU when the school joined the league in 1988, the Tigers, along with a rotating team every year, only have to play seven OVC games.

Last year, controversy abounded when TSU and Tennessee-Martin were both in the hunt for the league title. UTM was the school last year that only had to play seven league games along with TSU. Eastern Illinois and Jacksonville State, the two teams along with UTM and TSU that had a chance to win the league on the last weekend, had to play eight games.

The league needs to either get rid of this exception for TSU or the Tigers need to find a new conference. It’s that simple.

What others are saying

“Rick Christophel admits he didn’t say much to Govs defensive coordinator Granville Eastman for the better part of Saturday’s 17-14 win over Tennessee-Martin.

It wasn’t that the first-year Govs head coach was upset with his top defensive assistant, but one rule of the football sideline is when your assistant coaches are on their game, it’s better to sit back and watch them weave their magic…”

“Having the confidence your coordinators can adapt on the run is proof of a cohesive coaching staff.

And right now, Austin Peay is a cohesive football machine.”

-Leaf-Chronicle sports editor Jimmy Trodglen in his Sept. 24 column about Austin Peay’s 3-1 start.