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FORT WORTH, Texas — A year ago at this time, Sonny Dykes sat in a sparsely decorated office and watched film during spring practice. He didn’t have a lot of time to worry about organizing his shelves when he was making a mad dash recruiting, hiring a staff and managing the transfer portal in his first few months on the job. And if he’s being honest, he wasn’t sure how the remodeling project was going with his team on the practice field out back either.

This April, his office is packed with the kind of hardware a historic season brings. There’s a purple Swarovski crystal football with a blinged-out TCU logo over his right shoulder (a gift from Penny Knight, wife of Nike founder Phil Knight). There are busts of Eddie Robinson, the legendary Grambling coach, and Bear Bryant, the Alabama icon, atop their respective coach of the year trophies — two of the nine national coaching awards Dykes won for 2022 alone. There’s even a plaque from the National Football Foundation, which named him a “Distinguished Texan” last month, which is about the highest praise you can give a guy from Lubbock.

“Ain’t that the truth?” Dykes joked. “I made the award up myself and paid them $100 to give it to me.”

All those awards and mementos commemorate last season, when TCU started 12-0, becoming the first current Power 5 school since Ohio State in 1944 to have a perfect regular-season record under a new coach after finishing below .500 in the previous season, with the Frogs having gone 5-7 the year before.

The storybook ride ended in disappointment with a 65-7 thrashing by Georgia in the College Football Playoff National Championship, but it doesn’t diminish the mountain the Horned Frogs climbed to get there, including eight second-half comeback wins and a CFP semifinal win over Michigan in the Fiesta Bowl.

With that comes a new level of expectations and a question for Dykes: Now that you endured the razor’s edge for a full season, coached a Heisman finalist (Max Duggan), a Thorpe Award winner (Tre’Vius Hodges-Tomlinson) and a probable 2023 first-round pick (Quentin Johnston), what do you do for an encore?

“You know, nobody wants the honeymoon to be the best part of the marriage,” Dykes said recently after a Saturday practice. “We’ve got to make sure that doesn’t happen here.”

IT’S HARD TO quantify the exact formula that made that TCU team so special, a mix of gumption and chemistry. There was a hunger from missing three straight bowl games. Duggan proved to be a gamer who was hard to break, even when he could hardly pick himself up off the turf. Running back Kendre Miller (who is also preparing for the NFL draft) rushed for 1,399 tough yards. And, Dykes said, the Frogs will miss the leadership established by guard Steve Avila, the consensus All-American, along with SMU transfer Alan Ali, who helped Dykes install the offense.

“[Avila and Ali] are just as important as the others — or maybe even more important — because those guys brought toughness and accountability,” Dykes said. “Steve was a uniquely gifted leader. And when you have a uniquely gifted leader on the offensive line, those teams are always really good.”

There are going to be new faces all across the offense this year — TCU ranked 118th in returning production in Bill Connelly’s February outlook — but Dykes hasn’t had to do as much of an overhaul on defense, where seven starters return for the second year in coordinator Joe Gillespie’s 3-3-5 defense.

Compounding the offensive losses, just days after an emotionally drained team returned from the national title game, offensive coordinator Garrett Riley, the Broyles Award winner as the top assistant coach in the country, departed for Clemson. If Dykes was still in that honeymoon phase, it was over.

Dykes raised eyebrows in Fort Worth when he replaced Riley with Kendal Briles, son of Art Briles, the former Baylor coach. TCU and Baylor turned the heat up on their rivalry, dubbed the “Revivalry” in the early 2010s after TCU joined the Big 12 and reunited with its old rival in Waco. Things got more tense after a 2013 game when Frogs coach Gary Patterson ripped Art Briles in a postgame news conference over a targeting penalty by a Bears defender.

“I didn’t build this program backing down to anybody, and I’m not going to do it to him,” Patterson said afterward.

The next year, Baylor stunned TCU with a 61-58 comeback win, and Patterson said he was threatened on the field by a Baylor player, which Baylor denied. The hate between the two was cemented.

Two years later, in 2016, Art Briles was fired by Baylor amid an investigation of sexual assaults by football players. Kendal, who was his father’s offensive coordinator, was not implicated in any wrongdoing in the investigation and remained at Baylor for one more year after Art’s departure, then served as offensive coordinator for a year each under Lane Kiffin at Florida Atlantic, Willie Taggart at Florida State and Major Applewhite at Houston before joining Sam Pittman’s staff at Arkansas in 2020.

The two have known each other since 1999 when Dykes recruited Kendal Briles out of Stephenville, about 60 miles away from TCU, when Briles, a star quarterback, was a junior in high school and Dykes was an assistant at Texas Tech (Briles ultimately signed with Texas). And Briles has worked with several members of TCU’s staff at other stops, which Dykes said allowed Briles to understand how he expects his program to operate. Still, for Briles to land at TCU was shocking to many Horned Frogs fans, which Dykes understands.

“We’ve known each other for a long time,” Dykes said. “I don’t think I would have made the hire had that not been the case. I wouldn’t have been comfortable doing that if I didn’t know him well.”

Like Riley and Rhett Lashlee, who was Dykes’ OC at SMU before replacing him there, Dykes said he hired Briles because of his commitment to the run game, a complement to Dykes’ Air Raid background (Arkansas ran for 3,075 yards last year, the Razorbacks’ most since 2003). Briles said the offense will look a little different because they’ll play with a little more tempo and a lot more run/pass options.

“We want to run the football,” Briles said. “They weren’t as much RPO [last season], and we’re pretty heavy RPO. We’re going to tailor to our personnel and what fits. Production, at the end of the day, is what we want.”

TCU was able to reload after all the losses by landing several high-profile transfers. Whereas last year’s key finds came from Navy (linebacker Johnny Hodges) and Louisiana-Monroe (corner Josh Newton), this year Dykes added three transfers from Alabama: RB Trey Sanders, WR JoJo Earle and tackle Tommy Brockermeyer; two from LSU: WR Jack Bech and CB Avery Helm; and receivers John Paul Richardson of Oklahoma State and Jaylon Robinson from Ole Miss. He also landed a top-20 recruiting class that ranked third in the Big 12 behind Texas and Oklahoma, the highest-rated TCU recruiting class in the modern era.

“I think we’ve got tremendous speed and playmaking ability and we’re a year further along,” Dykes said. “I really like what we’re doing offensively. I think it fits the skill set of our quarterbacks. I think they’re excited about the direction of the offense. So I don’t know how much different it’s going to look to the typical fan in the stands, but it’s going to be a little bit different.”

It’ll start, more than likely, with Chandler Morris, the quarterback who beat Duggan last year before going down with a sprained knee in the season opener at Colorado. In his only previous start, filling in for an injured Duggan in 2021, Morris threw for 461 yards and two TDs and ran for 70 more and another TD in an upset of No. 14 Baylor, the eventual Big 12 champs that season. This spring, Morris has looked efficient in practice, distributing the ball and using his feet, in Briles’ offense.

“I’m really enjoying it,” Morris said. “Coach Dykes and I had a conversation the other day about how he thinks this is the best offense for me and thinks I’m built for this offense. We’re going to get the ball on the perimeter, put a lot of stress on the defense, try and get them in a bad situation and play with tempo, keep them on their heels and, and go after them.”

Dykes has been impressed with his performances, and also by the development of Josh Hoover, a 6-foot-1, 205-pound redshirt freshman from nearby Rockwall in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, who looks like a different player in 2023 after losing 15% of his body fat.

“We’ve got a couple of quarterbacks that can throw the ball around,” Briles said. “So I think we’ll be able to do some quick-game stuff. We’ve got some players that I think if we distribute the ball to, they can be really good in space.”

That’s especially true at inside receiver, where the Frogs believe they are stacked with players who can make people miss. On the outside, they still have to work in Bech, the 6-2, 215-pound LSU transfer who is recovering from an injury, and 6-4, 205-pound freshman Cordale Russell, one of the gems of that recruiting class who arrives later this summer.

“There are a lot of guys that people know that are here, but they haven’t really had a chance to produce yet,” Briles said. “So I’m kind of interested to see who’s going to kind of rise to the top and be one of those guys that we can rely on. I think we’ve got a lot of different options.”

IN THE BEGINNING stages of Year 2 of the Dykes era, coming off an appearance in the national championship game, some things feel different, like when he walked into high schools and students took photos of him with their phones.

“I wasn’t jacked about that,” he said. “Hopefully that goes back to normal soon.”

But he also knows that comes with the exposure from all those awards and all the camera time he got last year.

“You want credibility,” Dykes said. “It’s hard. … I didn’t play college football. I coached at historically bad places, coached in the ‘gimmick offense’ [as the Air Raid was often dismissed]. You know, you just hear all this stuff for all the years and all you want is a shot at the big time. I think it just gives you a little bit of credibility. When you walk into a room, it’s a little different now than it was before.”

Dykes said the thing he was proudest of last season was the Frogs’ will to win, no matter if it was pretty or ugly.

Now, after arriving there, he has to help figure out how to do it all over again. This time, the Frogs likely won’t be picked seventh in the Big 12 preseason poll and instead will try to prove the way last season ended was the anomaly, focusing on the fact that Dykes’ team was able to survive and advance all year last season, no matter the obstacle or which side of the ball had a rough day.

“We were able to win the Michigan game 51-45, and we were able to win the game at Texas the way we did, a 17-10 game,” Dykes said. “It’s too bad that we played our one bad game we played all year in the national championship. We turned the ball over three times in the first half. We didn’t do that, ever. We played desperate and did all the stuff that bad teams do. I hated that was in the national championship game, but again, you’ve got to give our guys credit because we played well for 14 weeks when we had to. There wasn’t a ton of margin for error.”

This time around, he has proof to show his players they can believe. And he’s embracing that same belief himself while challenging his coaches and players to figure out how to live up to last year’s example.

“I think talent-wise, this year’s team will be on par with last year’s team or maybe better, top to bottom, just looking at the roster,” Dykes said. “But can you do those little things that allow you to win those games? And do you have that same type of leadership? I think we’re trending in the right direction.”

Morris was part of a team that made TCU history, but he said history is exactly what it is now.

“Nobody’s really talking about last year,” Morris said. “I think we’re all just very hungry right now to go out there and show what this team is all about. We know what the blueprint looks like from last year. Obviously, we fell short in the conference championship game (a 31-28 overtime loss to Kansas State) and the national championship game. We know our goal, we know what it takes to get there. We’re ready to write our own story.”

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CFP Bubble Watch: Who’s in, who’s out, who has work to do at midseason

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October 15, 2025

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CFP Bubble Watch: Who's in, who's out, who has work to do at midseason

Week 7 shook up the College Football Playoff picture. No team earned a more impactful result than Indiana, whose win at Oregon is now the best in the country during the first half of the season. Indiana’s playoff chances jumped 21%, climbing to a 93% chance to make the playoff, according to the Allstate Playoff Predictor.

Not only are the Hoosiers off the bubble, but Indiana also is chasing a first-round bye as one of the top four seeds, having cemented its place alongside Ohio State and Miami as one of the nation’s best teams.

Indiana wasn’t the only winner, though, as South Florida and Texas Tech both saw their playoff chances jump by at least 15%.

Below you’ll find one team in the spotlight for each of the Power 4 leagues and another identified as an enigma. We’ve also tiered schools into three groups. Teams with Would be in status are featured in this week’s top 12 projection, a snapshot of what the selection committee’s ranking would look like if it were released today. Teams listed as On the cusp are the true bubble teams and the first ones outside the bracket. A team with Work to do is passing the eye test (for the most part) and has a chance at winning its conference, which means a guaranteed spot in the playoff. And a team that Would be out is playing in the shadows of the playoff — for now.

The 13-member selection committee doesn’t always agree with the Allstate Playoff Predictor, so the following categories are based on historical knowledge of the group’s tendencies plus what each team has done to date.

Reminder: This will change from week to week as each team builds — or busts — its résumé.

Jump to a conference:
ACC | Big 12 | Big Ten
SEC | Independent | Group of 5
Bracket

SEC

Spotlight: Tennessee. The Vols have looked like a borderline playoff team against unranked opponents in recent weeks, beating Mississippi State and Arkansas by a combined 10 points with one overtime. Offensively they’ve been elite, averaging 300 yards passing and 200 rushing per game. Defensively, they need to stop the run to make to challenge in the SEC. They’ll have a chance against Alabama on Saturday to further legitimize their hopes. With a win, Tennessee’s chances of reaching the playoff would jump to 52%, according to the Allstate Playoff Predictor. Tennessee ranks No. 10 in ESPN’s game control metric and No. 19 in strength of record. The Vols are projected in the committee’s No. 12 spot this week, which means they would get knocked out of the actual field during the seeding process to make room for the highest-ranked Group of 5 champion. The five highest-ranked conference champions are guaranteed spots in the playoff, so if the fifth team is ranked outside of the committee’s top 12, its No. 12 team gets the boot.

Enigma: Texas. The Longhorns took a baby step toward a return to CFP relevance with a big win against Oklahoma, but it was their first win against a Power 4 opponent and their first against a ranked team. Texas has the 15th-most-difficult remaining schedule, and with two losses is already in a precarious position. The Longhorns will play three of their next four opponents on the road (at Kentucky, Mississippi State and Georgia). There were encouraging signs from the win against the rival Sooners, from the stingy defense that flustered quarterback John Mateer all game to what looked like an improved offensive line that gave quarterback Arch Manning some time to throw. He completed 16 of 17 passes for 119 yards and a touchdown when under no duress. If Texas can continue to put it all together against the heart of its SEC schedule, it could make a run to be one of the committee’s top two-loss teams.

If the playoff were today

Would be in: Alabama, Georgia, LSU, Oklahoma, Ole Miss, Texas A&M

On the cusp: Tennessee

Work to do: Missouri, Texas, Vanderbilt

Would be out: Arkansas, Auburn, Florida, Kentucky, Mississippi State, South Carolina

Big Ten

Spotlight: USC. The Trojans have looked like a CFP top 25 team through the first half of the season, with their only loss a close one on the road to a ranked Illinois team. In Week 7, USC’s convincing 31-13 win against Michigan pushed it into more serious Big Ten contention. Ohio State and Indiana are the leaders, followed by Oregon, but USC has the fourth-best chance (7.1%) to reach the Big Ten title game, according to ESPN Analytics. That will change when the Trojans go to Oregon on Nov. 22, but they don’t play Ohio State or Indiana during the regular season. A win at Notre Dame on Saturday would be a significant boost to USC’s playoff résumé, while simultaneously knocking the Irish out of playoff contention. According to the Allstate Playoff Predictor, USC’s chances of reaching the playoff would adjust to 58% with a win against Notre Dame. According to ESPN Analytics, USC has less than a 50% chance to win its games against Notre Dame and Oregon.

Enigma: Washington. The Huskies have improved significantly and quickly under coach Jedd Fisch, who’s in his second season. Their only loss was to Ohio State, 24-6, on Sept. 27, but they lack a statement win that gives them real postseason credibility. Wins at Washington State and Maryland are certainly respectable, but bigger opportunities loom starting on Saturday at Michigan. This game has significant implications, because if the Huskies can win, they stand a strong chance of hosting Oregon as a one-loss team in the regular-season finale. According to ESPN Analytics, Michigan has a 67.6% chance to win on Saturday, and Oregon has a 70% chance to beat Washington on Nov. 29. The Huskies are projected to win every other game, though. A win against Michigan could increase their playoff hopes significantly.

If the playoff were today

Would be in: Indiana, Ohio State, Oregon

On the cusp: USC

Work to do: Nebraska, Washington

Would be out: Iowa, Illinois, Maryland, Michigan, Michigan State, Minnesota, Northwestern, Penn State, Purdue, Rutgers, UCLA, Wisconsin

ACC

Spotlight: Georgia Tech. Raise your hand if you had Georgia Tech at Duke on Saturday circled as a game that would impact the College Football Playoff. The Yellow Jackets would have been the next team to crack the latest CFP projection this week, and their chances of reaching the ACC championship game will skyrocket if they can win at Duke. Georgia Tech currently has the fourth-best chance to reach the ACC title game behind Miami, Duke and Virginia. ESPN Analytics gives the Blue Devils a 61.8% chance to win. The only other projected loss on the Jackets’ schedule is the regular-season finale against Georgia. Even if Georgia Tech reaches the ACC title game and loses, it could get in as a second ACC team with a win over Georgia.

Enigma: Virginia. The Hoos have won back-to-back overtime games against Florida State and Louisville, putting themselves in contention for a spot in the ACC championship. They host a tricky Washington State team on Saturday that just gave Ole Miss a few headaches, though, and need to avoid a second loss to an unranked team. The toughest game left on their schedule is Nov. 15 at Duke. Without an ACC title, Virginia is going to have a tough time impressing the committee with a schedule that includes a loss to unranked NC State and possibly no wins against ranked opponents. It didn’t help the Hoos that Florida State lost to an unranked Pitt, as the win against the Noles was the highlight of their season so far.

If the playoff were today

Would be in: Miami

On the cusp: Georgia Tech

Work to do: Virginia

Would be out: Boston College, Cal, Clemson, Duke, Florida State, Louisville, North Carolina, NC State, Pitt, SMU, Stanford, Syracuse, Virginia Tech, Wake Forest

Big 12

Spotlight: BYU. The Cougars needed a late-night double-overtime win at Arizona to stay undefeated and are on the path to face Texas Tech in the Big 12 championship game. The question is if they can stay undefeated until the Nov. 8 regular-season matchup against the Red Raiders. BYU has its second-most difficult remaining game on Saturday against rival Utah, which is also in contention for the Big 12 title. BYU has a slim edge with a 51% chance to win, which would be a critical cushion considering back-to-back road trips to Iowa State and Texas Tech await. The Big 12 has also gotten a boost from Cincinnati, which has a favorable remaining schedule and could be a surprise CFP top 25 team. If BYU stumbles over the next three weeks, a road win at a ranked Cincinnati team would help its résumé. Speaking of the Bearcats …

Enigma: Cincinnati. Is this team for real? The Bearcats have won five straight since their 20-17 season-opening loss to Nebraska, including three straight against Big 12 opponents Kansas, Iowa State and UCF. All three of those teams are .500 or better, and the selection committee will respect that as long as it holds. Cincinnati also has November opportunities against Utah and BYU, which could change the playoff picture in the Big 12. ESPN Analytics gives the Bearcats less than a 50% chance to beat Utah, BYU and TCU.

If the playoff were today

Would be in: Texas Tech

On the cusp: BYU

Work to do: Cincinnati, Houston, Utah

Would be out: Arizona, Arizona State, Baylor, Colorado, Iowa State, Kansas, Kansas State, Oklahoma State, TCU, UCF, West Virginia

Independent

Would be out: Notre Dame. The Fighting Irish have the best chance to win out of any team in the FBS, with a 49% chance to finish 10-2. According to the Allstate Playoff Predictor, Notre Dame would have a 50% chance to reach the CFP if it runs the table. That seems accurate, given the selection committee would compare Notre Dame against the other 10-2 contenders, and it’s a coin toss as to whether the room would agree that the Irish’s résumé and film make them worthy of an at-large bid. How Miami and Texas A&M fare will impact this — as will the head-to-head results if those teams don’t win their respective leagues and are also competing with the Irish for one of those at-large spots. It helps Notre Dame that opponents USC and Navy could finish as CFP top 25 teams if they continue to win. Undefeated Navy could also make a run at the Group of 5 playoff spot.

Group of 5

Spotlight: South Florida. South Florida. The Bulls are back on top after their convincing 63-36 win at previously undefeated North Texas, which just a week ago was listed here as a potential Group of 5 contender. Following the win, the Bulls’ chances of reaching the CFP increased by 20%, according to ESPN Analytics. South Florida’s lone loss was Sept. 13 at Miami, 49-12, which was a significant defeat against what could be the committee’s No. 1 team. Although that result showed the gap between the Bulls and one of the nation’s top teams, it certainly didn’t eliminate South Florida, which has one of the best overall résumés of the other contenders. With wins against Boise State, Florida and now at North Texas, this is a team that earned the edge in this week’s latest projection. Still, South Florida has the second-best chance of any Group of 5 school to reach the playoff (30%) behind Memphis (42%), according to ESPN Analytics.

Enigma: UNLV. Undefeated UNLV survived a scare from 1-5 Air Force on Saturday to stay undefeated and in contention for a playoff spot. UNLV and Boise State, both of the Mountain West Conference, are the only teams outside of the American Conference with at least a 5% chance to reach the playoff, and they play each other in a critical game on Saturday. UNLV has scored at least 30 points in each of its six games this season and is 6-0 for the first time since 1974, but it hasn’t always been pretty. UNLV scored the winning touchdown against Air Force with 36 seconds left and allowed the Falcons 603 total yards. The Rebels have the fourth-best chance to reach the playoff at 9% behind the American’s Memphis, South Florida and Tulane.

If the playoff were today

Would be in: South Florida

Work to do: Memphis, Navy, Tulane, UNLV

Bracket

Based on our weekly projection, the seeding would be:

First-round byes

No. 1 Ohio State (Big Ten champ)
No. 2 Miami (ACC champ)
No. 3 Indiana
No. 4 Texas A&M (SEC champ)

First-round games

On campus, Dec. 19 and 20

No. 12 South Florida (American champ) at No. 5 Alabama
No. 11 LSU at No. 6 Ole Miss
No. 10 Oklahoma at No. 7 Georgia
No. 9 Texas Tech (Big 12 champ) at No. 8 Oregon

Quarterfinal games

At the Goodyear Cotton Bowl, Capital One Orange Bowl, Rose Bowl Presented by Prudential and Allstate Sugar Bowl on Dec. 31 and Jan. 1.

No. 12 South Florida/No. 5 Alabama winner vs. No. 4 Texas A&M
No. 11 LSU/No. 6 Ole Miss winner vs. No. 3 Indiana
No. 10 Oklahoma/No. 7 Georgia winner vs. No. 2 Miami
No. 9 Texas Tech/No. 8 Oregon winner vs. No. 1 Ohio State

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2025 NLCS: Live updates and analysis from Game 2

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6 hours ago

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October 15, 2025

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2025 NLCS: Live updates and analysis from Game 2

  • ESPN

Oct 14, 2025, 10:25 PM ET

The opener of the National League Championship Series between the Los Angeles Dodgers and the Milwaukee Brewers had a little bit of everything.

So what can we expect in Game 2? We’ve got you covered with the top moments from today’s game, as well as takeaways after the final out.

Key links: How this NLCS could decide if baseball is played in 2027 | Bracket

Top moments

Follow pitch-by-pitch on Gamecast

Ohtani gets in on the fun with RBI single

Muncy’s drive adds to L.A.’s lead

Dodgers take their first lead of Game 2

Teoscar answers with a blast of his own

Chourio gets Brewers on board first

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MLB postseason a hit as ratings highest since ’10

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7 hours ago

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October 15, 2025

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MLB postseason a hit as ratings highest since '10

  • Associated Press

Oct 14, 2025, 08:04 PM ET

NEW YORK — Major League Baseball is having its most-viewed postseason in the United States in 15 years.

Viewership is averaging 4.33 million through the division series, according to MLB and Nielsen, a 30% increase over last year and the best since 2010.

Last Friday’s 15-inning thriller between the Seattle Mariners and Detroit Tigers averaged 8.72 million viewers on Fox, Fox Deportes and streaming. The Mariners’ 3-2 victory in the fifth and deciding game of the AL Division Series was the most-watched division round game on Fox since Detroit’s Game 5 win over the New York Yankees in 2011 averaged 9.72 million.

The two AL Division Series on Fox, FS1 and FS2 averaged 4.15 million, the most-watched division round on any network since the NL Division Series on TBS (Cubs-Cardinals and Mets-Dodgers).

The series between Toronto and the Yankees, which the Blue Jays won in four games, averaged 7.65 million in the U.S. and Canada.

Viewership for all four division series in the U.S. averaged 4.17 million, its highest since 2011, and a 17% jump from last year.

Blue Jays division series games in Canada averaged 3.65 million, a 10% increase from the team’s last ALDS appearance in 2016.

Sunday’s first game of the AL Championship Series between Seattle and Toronto averaged 10.02 million in the U.S. and Canada, including 5.31 million on Fox, Fox Deportes and streaming. The U.S. viewership is a 32% increase over last year’s Game 1 of the ALCS between Cleveland and the Yankees on TBS.

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