Any Given Sunday. That’s pro football’s mantra about how even the league’s worst team is capable of beating its best.

The NFL’s average margin of victory this season: 10.8 points.

The average margin of victory in Southeastern Conference games this season? Try 10.03.

Parity — at least a measure of it — has come to college football. It’s a byproduct of the transfer portal, NIL and direct revenue-sharing. Anybody can be good these days … or at least good enough for one game.

Any Given Saturday.

Ancient Heismans in a trophy case and conference championship banners on the wall won’t hurt a program’s recruiting, but they sure don’t matter as much as they used to. This is about transactions, not tradition. The talent has spread.

In the top 10, the Associated Press poll features Indiana (2), Georgia Tech (7) and Vanderbilt (10).

Meanwhile, Penn State, Florida, Arkansas and UCLA have each already fired their coach this season. The mood also isn’t great at Florida State, Auburn, LSU or Wisconsin. There are even grumbles at 3-3 Clemson (among many others).

College football has never been this competitive, this wild — or this interesting. The fun isn’t being hoarded by a few super powers. The good teams aren’t as good and the bad teams aren’t as bad. The chase for the playoff now runs dozens of teams deep. Seasons can swing on a dime.

Two Saturdays ago, Arizona State lost to Utah by 32 points. Last Saturday, a sold-out stadium of Sun Devils stormed the field to celebrate beating then-No. 7 Texas Tech 26-22 and keeping ASU’s playoff hopes alive.

It’s fantastic.

It also has left college football in a strange place, caught between two eras.

In an earlier era, major programs that have invested heavily for generations are expected to beat the teams they have always beaten. Losses to non-name brands have traditionally been a sign of a failed operation with no hope for the future.

For example, two weeks ago Penn State should have handled a 3-2 Northwestern team the way the Nittany Lions once defeated 34 consecutive unranked opponents under James Franklin.

But we’ve entered a new day when just about any team can put together a strong roster on the fly. Even if those schools don’t surge up the polls as Indiana and others have, they can at least be competitive enough to beat you.

A new, active dollar, with money sent directly to players (or invested in top-line scouting) is more valuable than the old, passive dollar that paid for fancy locker rooms.

The result: Northwestern 22, Penn State 21. One of the difference-makers for Northwestern wasn’t a former five-star recruit, but Griffin Wilde, who caught seven passes for 94 yards and a touchdown. He arrived this season as a transfer … from South Dakota State.

Compounding everything is that programs of all sizes have asked their boosters to fund rosters, and that brings new expectations. It’s one thing to absorb a perceived bad loss when you’ve paid for a ticket to the game. It’s another when you’re helping to pay the quarterback. Rolled heads are demanded, ASAP.

Hence, Penn State fired Franklin despite his 104-45 record at the school.

Was Franklin’s dismissal justified? Or Billy Napier at Florida, or Sam Pittman at Arkansas, or Mike Gundy at Oklahoma State, or so on and so on thus far?

Sure. You get paid like these guys, you have to deliver. High salaries, high stakes. There is no such thing as “fair.”

Part of what makes college football great is that it is hardwired to reject patience and perspective, even if patient might be the exact thing programs need to be. No one was calling for Andy Reid’s job in Kansas City when the Chiefs started 0-2.

Yet here in late October, almost anyone not still in the playoff chase is thinking about canning their coach. Even a few who clearly can win the national title aren’t far removed from such discussions — do we have to fire up “The Paul Finebaum Show” from last month after Alabama lost to Florida State?

Regime change costs a fortune, yet it happens anyway. Penn State is on the hook for as much as $49 million for discarding Franklin. If Florida State cuts Mike Norvell, it owes $50 million-plus. He led the Seminoles to a 13-0 regular season in 2023. They are 5-15 since. Norvell is 44 years old. The last time Florida State won an ACC game, he was 42.

Castles crumble that fast these days.

Not everyone can win, but everyone thinks they should.

Not only are there not enough great coaches out there, and no one, in this system, can even say what makes a great coach. Old attributes such as recruiting charm or multiyear program development matter less. In-game strategy and talent identification matters more.

The margins are thin. The buyouts are huge. Half the sport is upside down.

Welcome to the chaos. Enjoy the show.

Clemson leading receiver Bryant Wesco Jr. will miss the rest of the season after sustaining a back injury against SMU this past weekend.

Coach Dabo Swinney said Monday that Wesco had a “very serious” back injury but did not disclose more details. Wesco was injured on a punt return, when he landed almost directly on his head/neck area after a low tackle sent him somersaulting in the air upside down.

Though he got up and walked to the sideline on his own, he never returned to the field and was taken to the hospital in Greenville, South Carolina, for further evaluation.

Swinney said Wesco was released from the hospital Monday and was resting at home, and that the injury could have been far worse.

“It was a very, very scary injury, and the doctors did an amazing job,” Swinney said in a teleconference with local reporters.

“The doctors are very confident he’ll make a full recovery. Definitely something that’ll keep him out the rest of this season, but thankful that all indications are he’s going to be OK. Just a real blessing for that.”

Wesco leads Clemson with 31 catches for 537 yards and six touchdowns. He thanked those who sent him prayers on his Instagram stories Monday.

Former Alabama coach Nick Saban said he isn’t surprised by the recent string of high-profile firings in college football because fans and alumni who donate money to programs now are more influential than ever because of name, image and likeness, and revenue sharing.

There have already been nine in-season firings at FBS schools this season, including six at programs in Power 4 conferences.

“You know, I’m not [surprised] because everybody’s raising money to pay players,” Saban said. “So, the people that are giving the money think they have a voice and they’re just like a bunch of fans. When they get frustrated and disappointed, they put pressure on the [athletics directors] to take action, and it’s the way of the world.”

On Sunday, Florida fired Billy Napier, who was 22-23 in four seasons. The Gators owe Napier about $21 million, with half of that buyout due within 30 days. The remainder will be paid in three annual installments starting next summer.

Penn State owes former coach James Franklin roughly $49 million after it fired him on Oct. 12. It’s the second-biggest buyout in college football history behind only Jimbo Fisher’s $76 million buyout from Texas A&M following his firing in 2023.

“It’s unfair as hell,” Saban, now an ESPN analyst, told Franklin during the fired coach’s appearance on “College GameDay” last Saturday. “For you to go to the Rose Bowl, Fiesta Bowl, get to the final four [of the CFP], come out being ranked [No. 2] this year — an expectation that you created by what you accomplished at Penn State — and for those people not to show enough appreciation for that and gratitude for all the hard work that you did, I’m saying it’s unfair.”

Some of what the Nittany Lions owe Franklin, whose teams had a 104-45 record in his 11-plus seasons, might be offset by his salary at his next coaching job.

Sam Pittman (Arkansas), Mike Gundy (Oklahoma State), DeShaun Foster (UCLA) and Brent Pry (Virginia Tech) also were let go this season.

Foster, Gundy, Pittman and Pry were fired before October.

Stanford fired Troy Taylor on March 25 after two outside firms had found he bullied and belittled female athletic staffers and sought to have an NCAA compliance officer removed.

According to reports, the nine schools who have fired their head coaches are on the hook for about $116 million in buyout money, some of which will be offset if they get new jobs.

“It’s really different,” said Saban, who retired from Alabama in January 2024.

“Not in a good way from a developmental standpoint; a good way from a quality-of-life standpoint [for the players]. But we need to find a system that improves the quality of life of players but still focuses on the right stuff — development, getting an education, all those kinds of [things].”

Nine weeks into the 2025 season, the coaching carousel seems far from over. On Monday, Florida State AD Michael Alford said in a statement that a comprehensive review of the football program will occur after the season.

The Seminoles dropped their fourth straight game 20-13 at California on Saturday, to fall to 0-4 in the ACC. FSU has dropped nine straight ACC games going back to the 2024 season.

The Seminoles would owe embattled coach Mike Norvell about $54 million in buyout money. It would cost FSU about $72 million to pay off Norvell and his staff, sources told ESPN’s Andrea Adelson.

Wisconsin‘s Luke Fickell, who has a 15-18 record in his third season with the Badgers, received a vote of confidence from athletics director Chris McIntosh on Monday.

In a letter to Wisconsin fans, McIntosh wrote that the athletics department would make a stronger commitment to the football program and would move ahead with Fickell, who would be owed more than $25 million if he were fired this season.

Auburn‘s Hugh Freeze, Kentucky‘s Mark Stoops, Maryland‘s Mike Locksley, Clemson‘s Dabo Swinney and LSU‘s Brian Kelly are also catching heat after disappointing starts this season.