The Biggest Takeaway from the January 6 Report

Published

2 years ago

January 10, 2023

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The congressional committee investigating the January 6 insurrection delivered a comprehensive and compelling case for the criminal prosecution of Donald Trump and his closest allies for their attempt to overturn the 2020 election.

But the committee zoomed in so tightly on the culpability of Trump and his inner circle that it largely cropped out the dozens of other state and federal Republican officials who supported or enabled the presidents multifaceted, months-long plot. The committee downplayed the involvement of the legion of local Republican officials who enlisted as fake electors and said almost nothing about the dozens of congressional Republicans who supported Trumps effortseven to the point, in one case, of urging him to declare Marshall Law to overturn the result.

With these choices, the committee likely increased the odds that Trump and his allies will face personal accountabilitybut diminished the prospect of a complete reckoning within the GOP.

David Frum: Justice is coming for Donald Trump

That reality points to the larger question lingering over the committees final report: Would convicting Trump defang the threat to democracy that culminated on January 6, or does that require a much broader confrontation with all of the forces in extremist movements, and even the mainstream Republican coalition, that rallied behind Trumps efforts?

If we imagine that preventing another assault on the democratic process is only about preventing the misconduct of a single person, Grant Tudor, a policy advocate at the nonpartisan group Protect Democracy, told me, we are probably not setting up ourselves for success.

Both the 154-page executive summary unveiled Monday and the 845-page final report released last night made clear that the committee is focused preponderantly on Trump. The summary in particular read more like a draft criminal indictment than a typical congressional report. It contained breathtaking detail on Trumps efforts to overturn the election and concluded with an extensive legal analysis recommending that the Justice Department indict Trump on four separate offenses, including obstruction of a government proceeding and providing aid and comfort to an insurrection.

Norm Eisen, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and the former special counsel to the House Judiciary Committee during the first Trump impeachment, told me the report showed that the committee members and staff were thinking like prosecutors. The reports structure, he said, made clear that for the committee, criminal referrals for Trump and his closest allies were the endpoint that all of the hearings were building toward. I think they believe that its important not to dilute the narrative, he said. The utmost imperative is to have some actual consequences and to tell a story to the American people. Harry Litman, a former U.S. attorney who has closely followed the investigation, agreed that the report underscored the committees prioritization of a single goal: making the case that the Justice Department should prosecute Trump and some of the people around him.

If they wind up with Trump facing charges, I think they will see it as a victory, Litman told me. My sense is they are also a little suspicious about the [Justice] Department; they think its overly conservative or wussy and if they served up too big an agenda to them, it might have been rejected. The real focus was on Trump.

In one sense, the committees single-minded focus on Trump has already recorded a significant though largely unrecognized achievement. Although theres no exact parallel to what the Justice Department now faces, in scandals during previous decades, many people thought it would be too divisive and turbulent for one administration to look back with criminal proceedings against a former administrations officials. President Gerald Ford raised that argument when he pardoned his disgraced predecessor Richard Nixon, who had resigned while facing impeachment over the Watergate scandal, in 1974. Barack Obama made a similar case in 2009 when he opted against prosecuting officials from the George W. Bush administration for the torture of alleged terrorists. (Nothing will be gained by spending our time and energy laying blame for the past, Obama said at the time.)

As Tudor pointed out, it is a measure of the committees impact that virtually no political or opinion leaders outside of hard-core Trump allies are making such arguments against looking back. If anything, the opposite argumentthat the real risk to U.S. society would come from not holding Trump accountableis much more common.

There are very few folks in elite opinion-making who are not advocating for accountability in some form, and that was not a given two years ago, Tudor told me.

Yet Tudor is one of several experts I spoke with who expressed ambivalence about the committees choice to focus so tightly on Trump while downplaying the role of other Republicans, either in the states or in Congress. I think its an important lost opportunity, he said, that could narrow the publics understanding as to the totality of what happened and, in some respects, to risk trivializing it.

Read: The January 6 committees most damning revelation yet

Bill Kristol, the longtime conservative strategist turned staunch Trump critic, similarly told me that although he believes the committee was mostly correct to focus its limited time and resources primarily on Trumps role, the report doesnt quite convey how much the antidemocratic, authoritarian sentiments have metastasized across the GOP.

Perhaps the most surprising element of the executive summary was its treatment of the dozens of state Republicans who signed on as fake electors, who Trump hoped could supplant the actual electors pledged to Joe Biden in the decisive states. The committee suggested that the fake electorssome of whom face federal and state investigations for their actionswere largely duped by Trump and his allies. Multiple Republicans who were persuaded to sign the fake certificates also testified that they felt misled or betrayed, and would not have done so had they known that the fake votes would be used on January 6th without an intervening court ruling, the committee wrote. Likewise, the report portrays Republican National Committee Chair Ronna Romney McDaniel, who agreed to help organize the fake electors, as more of a victim than an ally in the effort. The full report does note that some officials eagerly assisted President Trump with his plans, but it identifies only one by name: Doug Mastriano, the GOP state senator and losing Pennsylvania gubernatorial candidate this year. Even more than the executive summary, the full report emphasizes testimony from the fake electors in which they claimed to harbor doubts and concerns about the scheme.

Eisen, a co-author of a recent Brookings Institution report on the fake electors, told me that the committee seemed to go out of their way to give the fake electors the benefit of the doubt. Some of them may have been misled, he said, and in other cases, its not clear whether their actions cross the standard for criminal liability. But, Eisen said, if you ask me do I think these fake electors knew exactly what was going on, I believe a bunch of them did. When the fake electors met in Georgia, for instance, Eisen said that they already knew Trump had not won the state, it was clear he had not won in court and had no prospect of winning in court, they were invited to the gathering of the fake electors in secrecy, and they knew that the governor had not and would not sign these fake electoral certificates. Its hard to view the participants in such a process as innocent dupes.

The executive summary and final report both said very little about the role of other members of Congress in Trumps drive to overturn the election. The committee did recommend Ethics Committee investigations of four House Republicans who had defied its subpoenas (including GOP Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, the presumptive incoming speaker). And it identifie GOP Representative Jim Jordan, the incoming chair of the House Judiciary Committee, as a significant player in President Trumps efforts while also citing the sustained involvement of Representatives Scott Perry and Andy Biggs.

But neither the executive summary nor the full report chose quoted exchanges involving House and Senate Republicans in the trove of texts the committee obtained from former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows. The website Talking Points Memo, quoting from those texts, recently reported that 34 congressional Republicans exchanged ideas with Meadows on how to overturn the election, including the suggestion from Representative Ralph Norman of South Carolina that Trump simply declare Marshall Law to remain in power. Even Representative Adam Schiff of California, a member of the committee, acknowledged in an op-ed published today that the report devoted scant attention …[to] the willingness of so many members of Congress to vote to overturn it.

Nor did the committee recommend disciplinary action against the House members who strategized with Meadows or Trump about overturning the resultalthough it did say that such members should be questioned in a public forum about their advance knowledge of and role in President Trumps plan to prevent the peaceful transition of power. (While one of the committees concluding recommendations was that lawyers who participated in the efforts to overturn the election face disciplinary action, the report is silent on whether that same standard should apply to members of Congress.) In that, the committee stopped short of the call from a bipartisan group of former House members for discipline (potentially to the point of expulsion) against any participants in Trumps plot. Surely, taking part in an effort to overturn an election warrants an institutional response; previous colleagues have been investigated and disciplined for far less, the group wrote.

By any measure, experts agree, the January 6 committee has provided a model of tenacity in investigation and creativity in presentation. The record it has compiled offers both a powerful testament for history and a spur to immediate action by the Justice Department. It has buried, under a mountain of evidence, the Trump apologists who tried to whitewash the riot as a normal tourist visit or minimize the former presidents responsibility for it. In all of these ways, the committee has made it more difficult for Trump to obscure how gravely he abused the power of the presidency as he begins his campaign to re-obtain it. As Tudor said, Its pretty hard to imagine January 6 would still be headline news day in and day out absent the committees work.

But Trump could not have mounted such a threat to American democracy alone. Thousands of far-right extremists responded to his call to assemble in Washington. Seventeen Republican state attorneys general signed on to a lawsuit to invalidate the election results in key states; 139 Republican House members and eight GOP senators voted to reject the outcome even after the riot on January 6. Nearly three dozen congressional Republicans exchanged ideas with Meadows on how to overturn the result, or exhorted him to do so. Dozens of prominent Republicans across the key battleground states signed on as fake electors. Nearly 300 Republicans who echoed Trumps lies about the 2020 election were nominated in Novembermore than half of all GOP candidates, according to The Washington Post. And although many of the highest-profile election deniers were defeated, about 170 deniers won their campaign and now hold office, where they could be in position to threaten the integrity of future elections.

From the November 2022 issue: Bad losers

The January 6 committees dogged investigation has stripped Trumps defenses and revealed the full magnitude of his assault on democracy. But whatever happens next to Trump, it would be naive to assume that the committee has extinguished, or even fully mapped, a threat that has now spread far beyond him.

Sports

Areas of concern: What could trip up each of our top 25 teams

Published

2 hours ago

July 9, 2025

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Areas of concern: What could trip up each of our top 25 teams

Jul 9, 2025, 07:00 AM ET

While optimism runs high at most every college football program this time of year, even the rosiest picture has some lurking shadows.

That is true even for the 25 teams in our post-spring Power Rankings. No matter how deep the rosters seem, everyone has some question marks or potential weak spots.

Our college football reporters take a look at the biggest areas of concern for each of the top teams, the potential Achilles’ heel that could keep them from reaching their goals for the season.

Area of concern: Wide receiver

The Nittany Lions addressed the wide receiver spot in the portal with Syracuse’s Trebor Pena and others, but until they actually elevate their production, questions will linger. Penn State has had only one wide receiver rank among the top 10 in the Big Ten in receiving in the past three seasons (Tyler Warren played tight end). Both Warren and top receiver Harrison Wallace III are gone, and Penn State needs its portal haul — Pena, a second-team All-ACC wideout in 2024, as well as Devonte Ross (Troy) and Kyron Hudson (USC) — to give quarterback Drew Allar enough capable targets this fall. Although Allar’s big-game struggles are also concerning, he hasn’t had a great group of receivers at his disposal during his Penn State career. — Adam Rittenberg

Area of concern: Running back

The position group that has been discussed more than any other since the spring at Clemson is running back — the only position on offense that loses the bulk of its production with Phil Mafah off to the NFL. But the Tigers have plenty of depth at running back, and that should help ease any concerns as they move into fall camp. Particularly because running back traditionally has been an area where Clemson has excelled, even when other groups on offense took a step back. (Clemson has had a 1,000-yard rusher 11 of the past 16 years, and that does not include 2023, when Mafah and Will Shipley split the carries nearly evenly and combined for more than 1,700 yards.) It is easy to see true freshman Gideon Davidson as a breakout player, considering the success Clemson has had with true freshman backs since Dabo Swinney arrived. Clemson also has receiver Adam Randall taking reps at running back to help round out the depth in a room that also features Keith Adams Jr. and David Eziomume. Jay Haynes continues to rehab a knee injury. — Andrea Adelson

Area of concern: Offensive line

The Longhorns lost four starters on the O-line to the NFL draft and are breaking in a new quarterback, although Arch Manning made two starts last season, as well as several key receivers with the losses of Matthew Golden, Isaiah Bond and tight end Gunnar Helm. They lost tackle Kelvin Banks Jr., the 2025 No. 9 draft pick, but Trevor Goosby got some key playing time last year at the position when Banks was injured. The Longhorns also lost 56-game starter Jake Majors at center and face Ohio State in Week 1, posing a quick learning curve for an almost completely new offensive line group. — Dave Wilson

Area of concern: Pass rush

The Bulldogs lost six veteran contributors on their front seven on defense, none more important than edge rushers Jalon Walker, Mykel Williams and Chaz Chambliss. Walker and Williams were first-round picks in the NFL draft, and Chambliss was an unheralded contributor over four seasons. They combined for 18 sacks and 28.5 tackles for loss in 2024. Making matters worse, Damon Wilson, a projected replacement on the edge, transferred to Missouri. Georgia feels good about Gabe Harris Jr., and it added Army transfer Elo Modozie, who had 6.5 sacks for the Black Knights last season. — Mark Schlabach

Area of concern: Quarterback

Quarterback Will Howard was everything the Buckeyes could have hoped for last year in his lone season at Ohio State. He was spectacular during the College Football Playoff, posting a QBR of 97.2 over four games during the Buckeyes’ march to the national championship. With Howard now in the NFL, the Buckeyes will be turning to either former five-star freshman Julian Sayin or Lincoln Kienholz this season, pending who wins the job during camp. Throwing to all-world wideout Jeremiah Smith will bolster whomever the starting quarterback winds up being. But even with Smith and All-American safety Caleb Downs anchoring each side of the ball, it’s difficult envisioning the Buckeyes truly contending again unless Ohio State gets good-to-great quarterback play like it did last season. — Jake Trotter

Area of concern: Offensive line

I don’t know that LSU has to necessarily worry about the offensive line because of moves made this offseason, but it has to be something to keep an eye on just because of the magnitude of the losses. The Tigers had one of the best tackle duos in all of college football last season in Will Campbell and Emery Jones, who were first- and third-round NFL draft picks. They lost four starters across the line in total. DJ Chester and Tyree Adams are back in different spots, while Brian Kelly added Braelin Moore from Virginia Tech. — Harry Lyles Jr.

Area of concern: Tight end

Since 2011, the Fighting Irish have had a whopping 10 tight ends selected in the NFL draft, including last season’s leading receiver, Mitchell Evans, who had 43 catches for 421 yards with three touchdowns. While the Irish feel they’ve upgraded their wide receiver group with the additions of Virginia transfer Malachi Fields and Wisconsin’s Will Pauling, tight end remains a bit of a question mark heading into preseason camp. Senior Eli Raridon has the size (6-foot-7) and hands to excel at the position, but he was plagued by injuries during his first couple of college seasons, after tearing an ACL as a freshman. He had 11 catches for 90 yards with two touchdowns in 2024. The status of another tight end, Cooper Flanagan, who tore his left Achilles tendon in the Sugar Bowl, is in question. — Mark Schlabach

Area of concern: Defensive line

It’s hard to say whether this is an area of concern just yet, but there are question marks with Oregon’s defensive line as the Ducks lost both Derrick Harmon and Jordan Burch from last year (as well as Jamaree Caldwell). Defensive end is a strength with Matayo Uiagalelei holding down the edge, but the rest of the line will require some newcomers to step up, such as USC transfer Bear Alexander and rising lineman Aydin Breland, who could be in line for a breakout season. A’mauri Washington, one of the few returning players, will likely be a fixture of the new-look line as well. — Paolo Uggetti

Area of concern: Pass rush

Alabama finished 13th in the SEC last season in quarterback sacks, and while sacks aren’t the end-all when it comes to rushing the passer, the Crimson Tide need to be more consistent in getting to the opposing quarterback. There’s not a pure edge pass rusher in the mold of Will Anderson Jr. or Dallas Turner on this roster, meaning Alabama will need to get more pressure from its interior linemen and perhaps a breakout season from redshirt sophomore outside linebacker Qua Russaw. — Chris Low

Area of concern: Quarterback

When the season ended, quarterback figured to be an obvious strength for BYU considering Jake Retzlaff was set to return. But with him expected to transfer as of late June, the Cougars are left without an established starter. McCae Hillstead showed flashes at Utah State in 2023, Treyson Bourguet started eight games in two years for Western Michigan and true freshman Bear Bachmeier was a big-time recruit who enrolled briefly at Stanford earlier this offseason before leaving for Provo. The expectation is that all three will have a chance to earn the starting job in fall camp, without a clear-cut front-runner. — Kyle Bonagura

Area of concern: Offensive explosiveness

The Illini had a good and efficient offense in 2024, but they weren’t particularly explosive, tying for 64th nationally in plays of 10 yards or longer and tying for 66th in plays of 20 yards or longer. Although quarterback Luke Altmyer and a veteran offensive line return, Illinois needs to replace its top two receivers in Pat Bryant and Zakhari Franklin, who are off to the NFL, and leading rusher Josh McCray, who transferred to Georgia. Offensive coordinator Barry Lunney thinks Collin Dixon, who averaged 14.7 yards per catch in limited work last fall, and incoming freshman Brayden Trimble can spark the offense. “Overall, we’re going to have a little bit more vertical speed in what we’re doing to stretch the defense than what we did,” Lunney told me. “That’s no slight on Zakhari or Pat at all. Those were just kind of bigger, stronger guys.” — Rittenberg

Area of concern: Pass rush

ASU’s late-season surge, from a decent team to one capable of coming within one play of the CFP semifinals, took place primarily thanks to players who are returning in 2025. Obviously losing star running back Cam Skattebo hurts, but the Sun Devils have some of the best overall returning production numbers in the country. We don’t know that they have a pass rush, though. It was an issue last season — ASU ranked just 110th in sacks per dropback — and while both of their sacks leaders (Clayton Smith and Elijah O’Neal) return, that duo combined for just 8.5 sacks between them. Kenny Dillingham evidently thought he had the answers in house, as he didn’t add a single edge rusher in the transfer portal, but while the secondary is sound and experienced, giving QBs too much time to find receivers can bring down even the most seasoned defense. — Bill Connelly

Area of concern: Defensive front

What was perhaps South Carolina’s biggest strength last season could be its biggest concern going into 2025. Gone up front are stalwarts Kyle Kennard, Bam Martin-Scott, Demetrius Knight and TJ Sanders, among others. That left a lot of holes to fill, and the Gamecocks largely addressed them by hitting the portal hard. Rising star Dylan Stewart will be the flashiest player and Bryan Thomas is the lone established senior, with transfers Gabriel Brownlow-Dindy, Davonte Miles and Justin Okoronkwo filling a big void. But perhaps the biggest name to know is sophomore Fred “JayR” Johnson, a rangy linebacker with lauded leadership skills who South Carolina hopes will blossom into the centerpiece of the defense after playing a small role as a freshman in 2024. — David Hale

Area of concern: Wide receiver

With receivers Jaylin Noel and Jayden Higgins both off to the NFL — having been drafted by the Houston Texans in back-to-back rounds — receiver is a good place to start. Noel and Higgins combined for nearly 2,400 receiving yards last season and that type of production will need to be replaced by more than just two players. But even with those holes to fill, the lack of a pass rush last season remains a glaring question mark. If the Cyclones can’t improve upon their conference-worst sack total, it’s hard to see how they can make a run at the Big 12 title, especially given the unknowns at receiver. — Bonagura

Area of concern: Defensive line

One of the most underappreciated keys to SMU’s playoff run last season was the veteran talent up front on defense. Elijah Roberts, Jared Harrison-Hunte and Jahfari Harvey all came from Miami and had multiple years as a starter under their belts in 2024. There won’t be nearly so much experience this year. Add in the departures of Ahmad Walker and Kobe Wilson at linebacker, and there’s a vacuum waiting to be filled in terms of leadership. SMU does return safety Isaiah Nwokobia, who was an All-ACC performer last season, and there’s buzz surrounding East Carolina transfer Zakye Barker at linebacker, but establishing some key voices — and performers — on the D-line remains a question. — Hale

Area of concern: Defense

Does the defensive makeover actually work? The Red Raiders’ D can’t get much worse than what it was in 2024, and that’s not hyperbole. Texas Tech finished 126th in total defense in 2024. The secondary was 132nd in passing yards per game. Shiel Wood takes over as defensive coordinator, and there have been tons of portal additions to this side of the ball. Players such as Stanford linebacker David Bailey and Georgia Tech end Romello Height stand out, along with five transfer defensive backs. There’s really only one way for this group to go, and it’s up. — Lyles Jr.

Area of concern: Defense

Despite the fact that talented defensive end Mikail Kamara is returning, the transfer-heavy unit that allowed the fewest rushing yards per game in the Big Ten last season lost some key contributors. Gone to the NFL are CJ West and James Carpenter, and while Indiana did not hesitate to dip into the transfer portal to reload with players such as Hosea Wheeler (Western Kentucky), Stephen Daley (Kent State), Dominique Ratcliff (Texas State) and Kellan Wyatt (Maryland), one of the Hoosiers’ strongest position groups last year has a lot to prove and live up to in 2025. — Uggetti

Area of concern: Stopping big plays

K-State’s offense was delightfully explosive last season, but the defense often gave up as many big plays as the offense created. The Wildcats blitzed a lot and harassed QBs well, but they ranked 110th in Total QBR allowed and 107th in completions of 10 or more yards allowed. That’s a concern considering the defense lost both leading pass rusher Brendan Mott and four of last year’s five starters in the secondary. Defensive coordinator Joe Klanderman might have to fiddle with the risk-reward balance to get the most out of this defense and help the Wildcats contend in the ultracompetitive Big 12. — Connelly

Area of concern: Wide receiver

One of the reasons Florida is expected to improve in 2025 is because of the talent that quarterback DJ Lagway brings. But the Gators’ top receivers from last season, Elijhah Badger and Chimere Dike, left for the NFL. Eugene Wilson III is back, but also coming off season-ending hip surgery. It will be up to Vernell Brown III, Dallas Wilson, Naeshaun Montgomery and J. Michael Sturdivant (UCLA transfer) to help establish themselves. — Lyles Jr.

Area of concern: Wide receiver

The Wolverines ranked 129th last season with just 1,678 passing yards. Quarterback play was part of the issue, as Michigan cycled through three quarterbacks (Davis Warren, Jack Tuttle and Alex Orji) in its first season after losing national champion JJ McCarthy. But Michigan’s receivers collectively didn’t make enough plays, as no wideout caught more than 27 passes or totaled more than 248 yards. The onus will be even greater on Michigan’s receivers with tight end Colston Loveland — the Wolverines’ only reliable target last year — now playing for the Chicago Bears. Instant impact from transfers Anthony Simpson (UMass) and Donaven McCulley (Indiana), combined with internal improvement from the likes of Fredrick Moore and Semaj Morgan, will be paramount if Michigan is going to threaten opposing defensive backfields in 2025. — Trotter

Area of concern: Linebacker

The Hurricanes did another fantastic job shoring up positions across the roster in the transfer portal, especially considering how much turnover they had from last season. But if there is one position that still has some questions, it is linebacker, mainly because depth may become an issue as the season wears on. Miami returns three key veterans in Wesley Bissainthe, Jaylin Alderman and Popo Aguirre, and signed NC State transfer Kamal Bonner and Rutgers transfer Mo Toure. Miami often looked slow and out of position at linebacker last season, but the new scheme from defensive coordinator Corey Hetherman should help. The player to keep an eye on here is Toure, whom Hetherman coached while he was at Rutgers. Toure is coming off a knee injury (his second torn ACL in three years), but his potential to fit into this defense, considering his past with Hetherman, is huge. — Adelson

Area of concern: Defensive end

For the past three years, Louisville was able to rely on a genuine star off the edge in Ashton Gillotte, who racked up 21.5 sacks from 2022-24. Gillotte is off to the NFL now, a third-round pick by the Chiefs. That leaves a major void at defensive end. Louisville has a couple of transfers — Wesley Bailey from Rutgers and Clev Lubin from Coastal Carolina — hoping to fill the void, but the strength of the D-line will certainly be on the interior, where the Cards have much more established depth. As Louisville works to remedy issues defending the pass, finding someone — or, ideally, a few guys — who can get after the QB will be one of the most critical jobs for the defense as it prepares for 2025. — Hale

Area of concern: Wide receiver

Just like last season, a big question for the Aggies’ potential is how their wide receiver room will shake out. The Aggies lost Noah Thomas, a bright spot in an otherwise spotty position for A&M and new offensive coordinator Collin Klein, to Georgia after Thomas caught 39 passes for 574 yards and eight touchdowns last year. No other player caught more than two TDs or eclipsed 400 yards on the season as the Aggies fought through a QB change from Conner Weigman to Marcel Reed. This year, the Aggies are looking toward NC State transfer KC Concepcion (71 catches, 839 yards, 10 TDs in 2023, 53-460-6 last year), Mississippi State transfer Mario Craver (17-368-3 as a freshman), as well as returners Ashton Bethel-Roman, 6-2, 220-pound freshman four-star recruit Jerome Myles and dynamic 2024 five-star recruit Terry Bussey, who played something of an all-purpose role last year. As this group goes, so will Reed and the offense. — Wilson

Area of concern: Quarterback

Austin Simmons seems like a talented individual — we’re talking about someone who is athletically gifted enough to play baseball for Ole Miss as well. But anytime you are replacing one of the better quarterbacks in your conference, in this case Jaxson Dart, who was a first-round NFL draft pick, there has to be some level of concern. But from what we’ve seen out of Simmons, there’s promise. His drive against Georgia last season, where he led a 10-play, 75-yard touchdown drive to tie the game while Dart was injured, should give the Ole Miss faithful something to be excited about. — Lyles Jr.

Area of concern: Tight end

It’s been a struggle at tight end for the Sooners, and there’s again uncertainty around the position heading into the 2025 season. Granted, there was plenty of blame to go around for Oklahoma’s struggles on offense last season, but finding more consistency at tight end in both the receiving and blocking categories would be a big boost for an offense that has tons of new faces. There isn’t a definitive starter at tight end entering preseason camp. Transfers Will Huggins (Kansas and Pittsburg State) and Carson Kent (Kennesaw State) are expected to battle with converted linebacker Jaren Kanak for the job. — Low

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UCF’s Frost: Nebraska job ‘wasn’t a good move’

Published

2 hours ago

July 9, 2025

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UCF's Frost: Nebraska job 'wasn't a good move'

Associated Press

Jul 8, 2025, 09:28 PM ET

FRISCO, Texas — Scott Frost’s celebrated return as coach at UCF comes with the backdrop of a failed tenure at Nebraska, the alma mater he said he didn’t want to talk about at Big 12 football media days Tuesday. Even though he did.

Frost said, “I really want to keep it about UCF,” just a few hours after telling a reporter from The Athletic that he never wanted to take the Nebraska job in the first place coming off a 13-0 season in 2017 that sparked debate about whether the Knights should have had a chance to play for the national championship in the four-team playoff.

“I said I wouldn’t leave unless it was someplace you could win a national championship,” Frost told The Athletic. “I got tugged in a direction to try to help my alma mater and didn’t really want to do it. It wasn’t a good move. I’m lucky to get back to a place where I was a lot happier.”

When the same reporter asked Frost in a one-on-one interview what he learned from his time in Nebraska, the former Cornhuskers quarterback said, “Don’t take the wrong job.”

Frost’s tone was quite a bit different in two settings with reporters at the 12,000-seat indoor stadium that is also a practice field for the Dallas Cowboys.

“When you go through something that doesn’t work, just ready for another chance, and I’m ready for another chance,” Frost said. “This is about the Big 12. This is about UCF. Everybody has success in life and has failures in life, for all sorts of different reasons. I’m excited to get back in a place where my family and I get treated well.”

Frost inherited an 0-12 team at UCF and turned it into an undefeated American Athletic Conference champion in only two years. Nebraska fans were ecstatic when he made the move 20 years after leading the Cornhuskers to a perfect 1997 season and a split national title with Michigan in the final season before a championship game was established.

Three games into his fifth season in Lincoln, Frost was fired with a 16-31 record. Almost three full college seasons later, it’s back to Orlando — after one year working under Los Angeles Rams coach Sean McVay.

“I really enjoyed two years off,” Frost said. “I got to spend a whole year with Ashley and the [three] kids, and I’ll never get that time back. I played more catch with my son and touch football in the yard with him and going to little league and seeing my daughter do gymnastics. And then some time out in L.A. really, really helped reset me, too.”

Images endure of Frost celebrating a 34-27 Peach Bowl victory over Auburn that clinched UCF’s perfect 2017 season almost a month after he had been named the coach at Nebraska.

Fast-forward almost eight years, and Frost was delaying a scheduled roundtable with reporters to take a few pictures with the players he brought with him to media days.

“Yeah, being around the guys,” Frost said of that moment. “I’m sorry, I’d rather be around the guys than you guys.”

And there are times when Frost brings up the old days with his new guys.

“We talk to them about all those things,” Frost said. “What happened in 2017 is at times relevant, but this is a new team. So we only point those things out, not to live in the past, but just to help them with any lessons that we want to learn.”

Frost wasn’t sharing the lessons he learned in Nebraska with everyone.

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Big 12’s Yormark ‘doubling down’ on 5+11 model

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2 hours ago

July 9, 2025

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Big 12's Yormark 'doubling down' on 5+11 model

Adam RittenbergJul 8, 2025, 12:52 PM ET
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FRISCO, Texas — Big 12 commissioner Brett Yormark is “doubling down” on the so-called 5+11 future College Football Playoff format, while acknowledging that it might benefit his league more in the future than currently.

The Big 12 and ACC have pushed the model, which would award automatic bids to the five highest-rated conference champions, plus 11 at-large bids determined by the CFP selection committee. The 5+11 model gained some support at the SEC’s spring meetings, while the Big Ten has focused more on a model that would award four automatic bids to Big Ten teams and to SEC teams, plus two apiece to the Big 12 and the ACC.

Yormark, his fellow commissioners and Notre Dame athletic director Pete Bevacqua must determine the CFP format for 2026 and beyond by Dec. 1.

The Big 12 had only one representative, champion Arizona State, in the inaugural 12-team CFP last year. Arizona State lost to Texas in two overtimes in a CFP quarterfinal matchup at the Peach Bowl.

“Five-11 is fair,” Yormark said Tuesday in his opening address at Big 12 media days at The Star. “We want to earn it on the field. It might not be the best solution today for the Big 12 … but long-term, knowing the progress we’re making, the investments we’re making, it’s the right format for us. And I’m doubling down today on 5+11.”

Yormark added that he expects ACC commissioner Jim Phillips to take the same position when that league holds its media days this month in Charlotte, North Carolina. The ACC sent two teams, champion Clemson and runner-up SMU, to the 12-team playoff last year. Yormark touted the Big 12 as the “deepest football conference in America” and said he believes the league will have multiple CFP entries this season.

“I have a lot of faith in the selection process,” Yormark said. “They are doing a full audit of the selection process to figure out how they can modernize and contemporize and how they use data and how certain metrics can be more heavily weighted.”

Yormark told ESPN that he’s “relatively confident” that the CFP will go to 16 teams in 2026 and laid out the next steps to making it happen.

“The first step is we got to figure out, with the selection process, we’re kind of doing a deep dive,” he said. “Where can we improve it? Where can we modernize it? Are we using the right metrics? Are things weighted appropriately or not? So we’re going through that conversation, and I think on the heels of that, we’ll move into the format because I think for the room people need to get confident, more confident, in that selection process. And assuming they do, which I’m confident they will, we’ll be able to then address the format that makes sense.”

In March, the CFP named a Big 12 athletic director, Baylor’s Mack Rhoades, as the chair of its selection committee. Yormark said that in addition to schedule strength, “new metrics” will be added to the selection process to ensure fairness to all conferences.

The Big 12 will have the Week 0 stage as Iowa State and Kansas State renew their rivalry in Dublin. Other key nonleague Big 12 matchups include Baylor-Auburn, Baylor-SMU and Iowa State-Iowa.

“I’m confident we’ll get to the right place,” Yormark said. “And ultimately, I’m confident we’ll go to 5+11.”

ESPN’s Pete Thamel contributed to this report.