YEAH THAT’S RIGHT – You waited all Spring and Summer, and finally, the only reason for getting out of bed early in the week is back: Justin McIsaac’s Top 10!

The Top 10 is brought to you by TJ’S in Portsmouth! My absolute favorite spot in Portsmouth to catch a game. Tell Bethany that McIsaac sent you.

10.  “KYLER” IS A HORRIBLE NAME, BUT KYLER MURRAY IS GOOD AT FOOTBALL

Drew Magary has written in the past about how truly awful American baby names have gotten, but 6 TD’s passing and 1 rushing for OU, and you can have the name “Maessun” or “Rikkee” or something and you’re still gonna get your props.

9. PELHAM BEAT HOLLIS BROOKLINE BY HOW MUCH?

Yo, no disrespect to the Snakes, who played lights out defense down the stretch last season, but if you tell me you saw a 43-14 win over HB coming, you’re a dirty liar. QB Ian Hoey completed 7 passes for 252 and 4 TD’s, which I feel is fairly efficient. Looking at the rest of the Pythons schedule, they have Souhegan (tough, but not impossible), Con-Val (should be a W), at STA (that’s a tough one), and West (probably a W). Can the snakes slither in to the playoffs? It’ll be fun to find out…

8. WINNY WINS AGAIN….

A 21-7 win over their rival for the Beach Boys Part 2: Electric Beachaloo has them at 5-0 and with a chokehold on D1 East. They really get into the iron of their schedule though, as a devil’s triangle (Judge Kavanaugh said that’s a football thing, right?) of Londonderry, Salem, and Pinkerton are in their last 4 games remaining.

7. … AND NOW EXETER IS ON THE ROPES

3rd loss of the year for the Blue Hawks, and now they have almost no room for error down the stretch. Exeter will be favored over the likes of Spaulding, Portsmouth/Oyster River, and Dover, but they can’t afford to have a bad night and get caught slipping before what could end up being a Loser Leaves Town Match with Londonderry on the final Friday of the regular season.

6. THE PATRIOTS PLAY 4 OF THE NEXT 5 AT NIGHT AND I’M NOT THRILLED ABOUT THAT

When you get to my age, you’re looking for as much sleep as possible, and especially when you just started producing an AM drive time radio show (NH Today w/Jack Heath! We’re on like 5 stations! I’m the token democrat on the show! The listeners call me and tell me they hope I die! Tune in!).

So to check out the Pats schedule and see all these 8 pm starts doesn’t exactly make me long for the days of all 1 pm starts in the late 80’s and early 90’s, (and in Rochester, we had to watch them on Channel 6 out of Portland, since they never sold out and would be blacked out on the Boston station), but how about a few more 4 pm games? Old man needs a nap over here…

5. SPEAKING OF THE PATS, ALL YOU BUSTAS THAT HAD THEM BURIED AFTER LAST WEEK AREN’T ALLOWED BACK ON THE BANDWAGON

Go listen to Felger and Maz and be miserable without us, chumps. You’re kicked off the bandwagon.

4. SHOULD WE JUST FAST FORWARD D1 TO SEE WHO BEDFORD PLAYS IN DURHAM?

Uh, I think it’s time to name D1…

It’s a name I’ve used in other divisions, and it never ends up happening…

I’m going to stick with it anyway though, because shooters shoot…

D1 IS NOW THE BEDFORD INVITATIONAL!!!

Yes, it’s true, we’ve tried this with Bow, Monadnock, and Windham before, but after the 45-0 dismantling of a good Central team on Friday, I think it’s a weight the Bulldogs can carry. Their average margin of victory this year is 44-3.5. I don’t even think you can legally score 3.5 points outside of Canada, but facts are facts. Welcome to the Bedford Invitational.

3. ‘SQUAM AND FRANKLIN SEEM DESTINED FOR A FINAL WEEK SHOWDOWN IN D4

Which, if they both keep winning, would only matter as far as who wears the home jersey in Laconia in a potential championship game as far as positioning goes, since they’d be 1 & 2 at that point. But, whoever wins that matchup would have the mental edge perhaps FOR that potential championship game. Right now Newfound is saying “YOU KNOW WE CAN HEAR YOU, RIGHT?!?”, and yes, I’m putting the D4 Cart before the horse, but that’s what I do!!

2. I’M HAVING A HARD TIME RATIONALLY DISCUSSING HOW GREAT THE CREED 2 SECOND TRAILER IS

Yes, I have a 45 minute Rocky podcast on my resume, so I’m a little biased, so I’m probably not the most unbiased source here, but JUST LOOK AT THIS THING. “He broke things in me that ain’t never been fixed” is already an all time Stallone line. And when Balboa and Drago Sr look at each other in the ring, I made sounds I haven’t heard since the first time I got the wind knocked out of me. I’ll be the first in line for this bad boy, believe you me.

1. SALEM BEATING PINKERTON IS A BIG DEAL

I thought Pinkerton was going to breeze into a final week showdown with Winnacunnet if they were able to get past Salem – and they still might, but now teams will enter matchups with the Astros knowing that Pinkerton isn’t invincible (when you’re playing Pinkerton you try to psyche yourself up any way you can).

Salem meanwhile knows they can hang with anyone – their only loss was by just 7 to Londonderry, and they get a much needed win headed into a tough pair of games with Windham and Winnacunnet. That side of the D1 bracket just got pretty interesting.

ALSO RECEIVING VOTES: 2nd straight year that a Fighting McIsaac hoops player has QB’d Dover to a win over Spaulding and I’m not sure how to feel about that, Shane Hudson and Jay Manzi killing it on V-Ball commentary last week, No I’m not talking about UNH’s 0-4 record,  Madison Lucontoni of Bedford going 6-6 on PATs and 1-1 on FG’s last week

Justin McIsaac writes the Top 10 every week (usually). He has 1,000 jobs, including radio color commentary for UNH Football, Producer of "NH Today with Jack Heath", HS play by play for MOSN, The McIsaac On Sports Network, college play by play for Dartmouth, St Anselm’s, UNE, Harvard, and whoever else will cut the check. Follow him on Twitter: @justin_mcisaac

Enter story body here