I spent the weekend in the Denver area to catch Big 12 After Dark. It was a great time with great friends. There’s something special about attending a College Football game, and it’s even better with good company. If you’re reading this, you already love this sport, take the lesson from me, get together with your friends and plan the trip you’ll be glad you did.
American
The separation atop the American has become mostly clear, Army, Navy, Tulane and Memphis are the 4 top contenders. Memphis went on the road to face South Florida, a game that was expected to be a challenge, but Memphis won easily 21-3.
There is one great story in the conference, and that is the North Texas Mean Green. They appeared to be down and out against FAU in the 4th quarter, but rallied in the last 3 minutes to steal a victory. North Texas is now 5-1 which is an incredible start for the program. They’re now just a win away from bowl eligibility, it’s an exciting year for Mean Green fans.
ACC
Pitt and Syracuse are two of the pleasant surprises in the ACC. It wasn’t the prettiest effort by either but they both got the win. They each have a bye week this week before facing off on Thursday night next week. Get ready College Football Thursdays definitely will have it’s fastball back, this game is a must see.
An underrated game was Louisville at Virginia, it was a back and forth battle that Louisville won with a late TD drive. It’s disappointing for Virginia that they didn’t close out the win but it did show they can hang with one of the top teams in the conference. Louisville meanwhile kept themselves in the ACC race with a win, at least for another week.
Big Ten
The headliner game of the weekend was Ohio State at Oregon, and Oregon took down the Buckeyes in an absolute classic. This was a particularly disappointing and frustrating result for Ohio State fans. It’s not a result that changes any of Ohio State’s goals they can still win out and get a 1 seed. So why is the angst level so high? It’s the nature of the defeat. Once again issues like ill-timed penalties, turnovers and game management issues occurred on the biggest stage. There’s still time before the end of the season, but Buckeye fans have been down this road before and this really shattered a lot of optimism. Meanwhile this is a huge win for Oregon. The Lanning era has been fantastic so far, and they’ve had the looks of a contender, but previously the Ducks have fallen just short in their most critical games. That wasn’t the case here, they were ready for the moment and took the game in the clutch.
The alarms were beginning to sound on the “fraud alert” on Penn State in the first half. The Nittany Lions were down 20-6 to USC after a half where not much went right. Yet they didn’t stay down, Penn State’s offense buckled up in the 2nd half and Allar led them to a huge comeback victory. USC meanwhile has seen their season quickly fall apart. Suddenly the Trojans are only 3-3, and end of game situations have been a huge struggle for USC in each of the 3 losses.
Perhaps the wildest Big Ten game of the day was Illinois beating Purdue 50-49 in OT. It had the looks of a nice easy victory for Illinois in the first half, but Purdue rallied behind the efforts of freshman QB Ryan Browne to nearly steal a win. It’s the first signs of life we’ve seen from the Boilermakers this year, something that was desperately needed. Of course, it doesn’t get any easier. Purdue has to play Oregon next.
September Maryland wasn’t a thing this year as the Terrapins, who were previously unstoppable in September lost 2 games in their usually dominant month, but the punchline also existed because of their lackluster October performances. Unfortunately for Maryland the October issues continued with a 37-10 home loss to Northwestern.
Big 12
Colorado vs Kansas State proved to be a Big 12 After Dark thriller. The programs used to play annually and them getting back together again felt very right. A lot of Kansas State fans made the trip, and there was a lot of hostility between the fanbases all game. Kansas State began to take the game over behind the legs of RB DJ Giddens who had a big game, Colorado really struggled to tackle him, especially in the 2nd and 3rd quarters. Colorado meanwhile struggled with lots of injuries at receiver and it seemed to take Shedeur Sanders some time to trust the next men up, he took a lot of bad sacks for huge drive killing losses. Once Shedeur threw a bad pick when Colorado was trying to get back within a score, it felt like the point in the game where it would get away from last year’s Buffs team. That wasn’t the case here, the defense immediately answered a call and the offense marched right down to get it within 3. It was game on and Colorado would eventually get the lead shortly after a strange Kansas State 4th and long attempt. Avery Johnson hadn’t been in many positions yet where he had to deliver on a late 4th quarter drive while trailing to get the lead back, but he pulled it off here with 2 long passes to give the Wildcats the lead for good. Kansas State remains in Big 12 contention, while Colorado still has their goals in front of them, but the injury situations will be worth monitoring. The depth Colorado has at receiver is impressive because they were still able to move the ball through the air despite being down 4 of their top receivers by the end of the game. It was very apparent during the game that Travis Hunter was missed a lot more on the defensive side compared to the offense. Fortunately there seems to be expressed optimism that it won’t be long term, he wanted back in the game but further injury wasn’t a risk they could take.
The best news for the Big 12 in terms of getting multiple bids is seeing separation at the top. Yes, there’s a lot of teams in the race right now when you look at the standings, but it does appear that BYU and Iowa State are beginning to separate themselves from the pack, both are still unbeaten and for multiple reasons this week was one where maybe the upset finally comes and they get taken down. BYU faced an Arizona team with a high upside, while Iowa State had a night game at West Virginia which is an extremely difficult place to play. Both teams handled the tests with ease in blowout wins. That’s not to say this league lacks drama, it certainly does.
The biggest upset of the weekend occurred when Arizona State upset Utah at home. The Utes have historically struggled in the state, but there was hope that they could win it with Cam Rising finally back, unfortunately Rising wasn’t quite right and struggled with the Sun Devils defense. It also became more apparent on Monday that the injury was worse than originally thought and once again ended his season, just heartbreaking. This was a huge win to help Arizona State move to 5-1 and squarely in contention.
Cincinnati beat UCF 19-13 in a an ugly game. The Bearcats stumbled out of the gates early with a few turnovers but managed to rebound and come out with a key road win. Cincinnati is now 4-2 and has yet to lose a game by more than 3 points. This is a much improved team that at least has their eyes on a bowl game. Meanwhile on the UCF side, the Gus Bus has crashed this season, they’ve now lost 3 in a row and potentially entering an even tougher stretch of the schedule. Recruiting has been good but at some point they’ll need to get that to translate on the field.
CUSA
Weeknight CUSA is here and it produced some entertaining games even if it wasn’t close on the scoreboard. Louisiana Tech in particular had a huge performance against Mid Tenn State. The Bulldogs had struggled more than expected on offense this season which led to Sonny Cumbie giving up the play calling during the bye, it was the breath of fresh air the offense needed because they pretty much did whatever they wanted on the MTSU defense. This win definitely keeps LA Tech in bowl contention.
The most competitive game wasn’t what you would expect, it was Liberty receiving a tough test from FIU. The Flames managed to survive in OT but with Sam Houston, Jax State and Western Kentucky all looking strong there’s certainly concern that one of them could dethrone the Flames this season. This conference race got a lot more interesting.
MAC
The MAC race is officially a muddled mess. One of the most stunning results of the weekend was the Buffalo Bulls dominating Toledo in a 30-15 victory. Toledo was long considered a big favorite to win the conference so this was a shocking result. Buffalo meanwhile has saved their best for conference play, the Bulls had a couple rough non-conference losses but they’ve already taken down NIU and Toledo now. Buffalo also has one of the easiest conference schedules. Making a bowl was considered an accomplishment entering the season, but forget about that, the Bulls have their horns pointed toward winning the whole thing.
Bowling Green hosted NIU in a massive game, it falls just short of being an elimination game for the MAC title but the loser would be well behind the 8-ball. Northern Illinois answered the bell with a 17-7 road win. It’s a particularly disappointing result for Bowling Green after they threatened Penn State, and were a few errors away from beating Texas A&M. Now the Falcons are reduced to just trying to salvage bowl eligibility. Northern Illinois might be the best team in the conference, when they avoid their own self inflicted wounds they can beat anyone.
Another key separation game was Ohio going on the road to face Central Michigan. It was a statement game by the Bobcats who really dominated at the start of this game and established a 24-0 halftime lead. Central Michigan rallied late but the Bobcats managed to hold on.
Mountain West
Boise State and UNLV both returned to their dominant form, but it’s been interesting to see how the middle of this conference continues to evolve.
San Diego State is still figuring things out under Sean Lewis, but it’s clear this team has figured out how to pull off wins in close games. That might be all that’s needed to reach a bowl in year 1 and get things rolling again for the Aztecs program.
New Mexico blasted Air Force 52-37, a wild result for a few years. For one, it felt like New Mexico was much improved but could only show hints of it against a tough early schedule. Now that has eased up the Lobos are impressive, especially on offense. It will be fun to continue to monitor this team.
Colorado State has started to look the part of a team that’s figuring things out and they showed that against San Jose State, a team that felt like a potential wildcard contender. Getting Tory Horton back helped the Rams offense a lot, but the emergence of Avery Morrow at RB has made their offense less predictable. That’s a fortunate development because Horton is unfortunately out for the year due to injury.
The biggest win for any MWC team was Nevada’s 42-37 win over Oregon State. The Wolfpack have been improved all season, but for the first time since week 1 finally secured the close victory to show for it. Nevada is getting it done on the ground, running for 353 yards as an offense, and their defense forced key turnovers late to help them to victory.
Pac-12/Independents
There’s not really much to cover from the Independents, but the Pac-12 certainly had some fun games.
Washington State continues to have the look of a team that can contend for a Top 25 ranking. The Cougars frustrated Fresno State for a tough road win. They made it a rough day for Mikey Keene and co.
Oregon State meanwhile is beginning to struggle a bit. The Beavers did what they needed to win last week, but paid the price for the close games this week in a loss to Nevada. It may not be that bad of a loss in the end but still not what they had in mind entering the season.
SEC
Texas vs Georgia will be very interesting to monitor next week. The Longhorns are the only SEC team that’s looked dominant so far. They played what is likely a bad Oklahoma team, but still covered the spread by halftime despite an incredibly sloppy start in the first half. The dominant efforts stop there. Alabama, Georgia and Tennessee are all thought of as the other top national title contenders from the conference and yet none of them looked impressive in beating some of the worst teams in the conference at home.
Ole Miss and LSU was an intriguing game, even though I personally feel both teams are being overrated by the media and polls. This felt like a separation game where the winner could eventually prove me wrong but the loser is probably going to be eliminated from the playoff race down the line. Ole Miss led a lot of the game but when it came down to the critical moments they once again came up short. This appears to be what Lane Kiffin teams are at this point, it’s still better than what Ole Miss typically experiences without him but this year’s team had all the hype of being the one to get over the hump and it just hasn’t done that.
Vanderbilt for whatever reason was a 12.5 point underdog to Kentucky, and I couldn’t make sense of that line. The Commodores haven’t lost by multiple scores to anybody and Kentucky or all teams was suddenly going to do that? Turns out Vanderbilt didn’t let any of the stardom from last week get in the way, they led from start to finish to take down Kentucky and move closer to bowl eligibility.
Sun Belt
This was a good weekend for Sun Belt contenders, it really felt like all of the top teams flexed their muscles. UL-Monroe’s incredible season continued with a dominant win over Southern Miss, something that can’t be taken for granted, dominant wins aren’t usually a thing for ULM, but the Warhawks continue to be the best story in the sport. Louisiana took down Appalachian State, JMU rebounded to destroy Coastal Carolina and Texas State blasted Arkansas State. Those look to be the 4 Sun Belt favorites, and who had the West being tougher than the East?
The wildest game of the day in the Sun Belt was Georgia Southern’s comeback win over Marshall. The Thundering Herd seemed to be stampeding toward a quality road win, before suddenly the game turned on…a safety? Georgia Southern got a safety in the 4th quarter to bring the score to 23-5 (just had to mention the weird score.) This generated a 21-0 run to finish the game for Georgia Southern. Massive win for the Eagles to keep their goals intact, and also frustration on Marshall’s side because they didn’t close this one out.
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