How to have the most fun this college football season
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Bill Connelly, ESPN Staff Writer
Off the field, college football is almost always threatened by storm clouds. On the field, it remains unbeaten.
The 2022 college offseason was defined by coaches yelling about stressful and exhausting recruiting calendars and the hand-wringing associated with players making loads of money from NIL deals and collectives. (We also had our annual late-summer conference realignment lightning bolt in USC and UCLA leaving for the Big Ten.) Everything was changing! Players were making money! Would things change on the field?
Nope. The 2022 season was an absolute delight.
This summer, we’ve again been inundated by talks of existential threats amid Congressional hearings, and NIL seems to be playing an even larger role in recruiting and transfers whether it’s supposed to or not. While that certainly alarms some more than others, almost no one seems particularly jazzed about the latest round of late-summer realignment moves, in which a lot of schools declared that they didn’t want to leave the Pac-12 but had to and all but assured either the death of the Pac-12 as we know it … or just the outright death of the Pac-12, period. The future appears foreboding in many ways, but once again, here comes the actual season to save the day for a little while.
Each year, as a season approaches, I write a paean to the glory of eating the whole cow, of delighting in all of college football’s on-field ridiculousness, from the national title race to the small-school glory and everywhere in between. (Here’s 2022’s piece, and here’s 2021’s.) Against decent odds, the on-field chaos and buzz somehow always make college football worth the off-field frustration, and while the latter is definitely growing, 2023 could offer a particularly impressive bounty of the former too. So let’s talk about how to get the maximum possible enjoyment from this coming fall.
The big showdowns
We might boast of eating the whole cow in these parts, but make no mistake: The biggest games are still amazing events. The nonconference portion of the 2023 season offers plenty of exciting and telling matchups, and the home stretch is absolutely loaded.
Based on preseason projections, here are the two biggest games of each week when it comes to combined SP+ ratings. (Games between two projected top-10 teams are in bold.)
Aug. 31: Florida at Utah
Sept. 3: Florida State vs. LSU
Sept. 9: Texas at Alabama, Oregon at Texas Tech
Sept. 16: South Carolina at Georgia, Tennessee at Florida
Sept. 23: Ohio State at Notre Dame, Ole Miss at Alabama
Sept. 30: Georgia at Auburn, LSU at Ole Miss
Oct. 7: Alabama at Texas A&M, Kentucky at Georgia
Oct. 14: Texas A&M at Tennessee, USC at Notre Dame
Oct. 21: Penn State at Ohio State, Tennessee at Alabama
Oct. 28: Ohio State at Wisconsin, Florida vs. Georgia
Nov. 4: LSU at Alabama, Notre Dame at Clemson
Nov. 11: Michigan at Penn State, Ole Miss at Georgia
Nov. 18: Georgia at Tennessee, Minnesota at Ohio State
Nov. 25: Ohio State at Michigan, Texas A&M at LSU
That’s six top-eight vs. top-eight (per SP+) matchups in the last six weeks of the season. Hell yes.
The Pepto-Bismol All-Stars
We’re getting a trade-off of sorts with the new clock rules that will go into effect this fall. On one hand, the overall number of plays will go down a bit (my estimate is by about 5%), which means fewer points and yards. Points and yards are fun, so boo to that. But on the other hand, (A) games were indeed too long, and (B) in theory, fewer points, yards and, most importantly, possessions means that teams don’t have as many opportunities to pull away from each other. That could mean closer games and, in theory, more upsets.
Certain teams will be playing in an inordinate number of close games. According to my final preseason SP+ projections, there are a whopping 20 teams with at least seven games projected to finish within one score (~7.5 points), including three teams with nine such games. You will want to be watching at least the fourth quarter of many of their games this year.
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9 tight games: New Mexico State, Northern Illinois, UTEP
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8 tight games: Cincinnati, Oklahoma State, Texas Tech, UNLV
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7 tight games: Ball State, Hawaii, Liberty, Louisiana Tech, Marshall, Navy, Nevada, Ohio, Pittsburgh, Texas Tech, UAB, UCF, Virginia Tech
There are 10 more teams that (A) are projected in the SP+ top 40 and (B) have at least six such tight games: Arkansas, Baylor, Florida, Kansas State, Kentucky, Missouri, Ole Miss, TCU, Texas A&M, Utah.
After the fire hose of Week 1, every week of the season features at least two games that involve the teams above and have a projected margin of three or fewer points. Be prepared to watch quite a bit of these games. (And since eight of the teams above are in the Big 12 — over half the conference! — be prepared to watch so very much of that wonderfully chaotic conference.) Here’s a selection:
Aug. 26: UTEP at Jacksonville State
Sept. 9: UCF at Boise State, Marshall at East Carolina, UAB at Georgia Southern
Sept. 16: Kansas State at Missouri, Virginia Tech at Rutgers, NMSU at New Mexico
Sept. 23: North Carolina at Pitt, Oklahoma State at Iowa State, Virginia Tech at Marshall, UNLV at UTEP, Nevada at Texas State
Sept. 30: Florida at Kentucky, Cincinnati at BYU (Sept. 29), Baylor at UCF, Louisiana Tech at UTEP (Sept. 29), Ball State at WMU
Oct. 7: Kansas State at Oklahoma State (Oct. 6), Texas Tech at Baylor, North Texas at Navy, NIU at Akron, Ball State at EMU
Oct. 14: Kansas State at Texas Tech, Florida at South Carolina, Iowa State at Cincinnati, Ohio at NIU, Sam Houston at NMSU (Oct. 11)
Oct. 21: TCU at Kansas State, Ole Miss at Auburn, Mississippi State at Arkansas, JMU at Marshall (Oct. 19), South Carolina at Missouri, Pitt at Wake Forest, Hawaii at New Mexico
Oct. 28: Oregon at Utah, UTEP at Sam Houston (Oct. 25)
Nov. 4: TCU at Texas Tech (Nov. 2), Texas A&M at Ole Miss, Kentucky at Mississippi State, UCF at Cincinnati, Marshall at Appalachian State, Navy at Temple
Nov. 11: Utah at Washington, Auburn at Arkansas, Cincinnati at Houston, Oklahoma State at UCF, Virginia Tech at Boston College, UAB at Navy, Ohio at Buffalo (Nov. 7), Ball State at NIU (Nov. 7)
Nov. 18: Florida at Missouri, Kentucky at South Carolina, Cincinnati at WVU, WMU at NIU (Nov. 14), ECU at Navy, Nevada at Colorado State
Nov. 25: Ole Miss at Mississippi State (Nov. 23), Florida State at Florida, Virginia Tech at Virginia, Kentucky at Louisville, Pitt at Duke, Colorado State at Hawaii
Dec. 9: Army vs. Navy
Weeks 8 and 11 (in bold) could be absolutely incredible, especially considering Week 8 also includes Penn State-Ohio State and Tennessee-Alabama and Week 11 also includes Michigan-Penn State and one of Georgia’s better upset opportunities (against Ole Miss).
Best. Midweek slate. Ever.
We got used to weeknights being part of our college football experience years ago. Back in the day, we had a number of Thursday night classics, and handing over Tuesday and Wednesday nights to the MAC in November is an absolute tradition at this point.
A lot of other conferences have jumped on the weeknights bandwagon, however, from the Big Ten and Big 12 to this weird, new version of Conference USA. We can debate whether that’s good for the athletes (or the fans in attendance), but there’s no question that it could be really good for our eyeballs in 2023. This year’s Monday-through-Friday slate is quite tasty. Here are some of my favorites:
Week 1: Florida at Utah (Aug. 31), Nebraska at Minnesota (Aug. 31), Louisville vs. Georgia Tech (Sept. 1), Stanford at Hawaii (Sept. 1), Clemson at Duke (Sept. 4)
Week 2: Illinois at Kansas (Sept. 8)
Week 3: Army at UTSA (Sept. 15), Virginia at Maryland (Sept. 15)
Week 4: Georgia State at Coastal Carolina (Sept. 21), Wisconsin at Purdue (Sept. 22), Boise State at San Diego State (Sept. 22)
Week 5: Jacksonville State at Sam Houston (Sept. 28), Utah at Oregon State (Sept. 29), Cincinnati at BYU (Sept. 29)
Week 6: WKU at Louisiana Tech (Oct. 5), Kansas State at Oklahoma State (Oct. 6)
Week 7: Louisiana Tech at MTSU (Oct. 10), UTEP at FIU (Oct. 11), West Virginia at Houston (Oct. 12), Tulane at Memphis (Oct. 13)
Week 8: Southern Miss at South Alabama (Oct. 17), NMSU at UTEP (Oct. 18), JMU at Marshall (Oct. 19)
Week 9: Syracuse at Virginia Tech (Oct. 26), Georgia State at Georgia Southern (Oct. 26)
Week 10: Buffalo at Toledo (Oct. 31), NIU at CMU (Oct. 31), Ball State at Bowling Green (Nov. 1), TCU at Texas Tech (Nov. 2), South Alabama at Troy (Nov. 2)
Week 11: Ball State at NIU (Nov. 7), Ohio at Buffalo (Nov. 7), Virginia at Louisville (Nov. 9), North Texas at SMU (Nov. 10)
Week 12: WMU at NIU (Nov. 14), Boston College at Pitt (Nov. 16), Colorado at Washington State (Nov. 17)
Week 13: Ole Miss at Mississippi State (Nov. 23), Oregon State at Oregon (Nov. 24), Texas Tech at Texas (Nov. 24), TCU at Oklahoma (Nov. 24), Missouri at Arkansas (Nov. 24), Penn State at Michigan State (Nov. 24)
Weeks 4-5 are nice table-setters, but honestly Week 10 might have the best set of weeknight games we’ve ever seen. We open MACtion with a particularly even set of contests, and then we get not only TCU-Texas Tech — maybe the single most “chaos potential!” game on the Big 12 docket — but also South Alabama-Troy, one of the biggest Sun Belt games of the year. That is spectacular.
Root for Oregon State and Washington State
In the 1990s, when the Southwest Conference dissolved and only half of it was absorbed into the new Big 12, the Houston Cougars, Rice Owls, SMU Mustangs and TCU Horned Frogs went from members of a power conference to mid-major status virtually overnight. TCU and Houston slowly worked their way back into the power-conference picture, but SMU is still trying and Rice appears pretty far back in the distance. (In fairness, Rice was pretty far back in the SWC, too.)
In the early-2010s, when the Big East lost key members and lost power-conference status while becoming the AAC, the Cincinnati Bearcats, Louisville Cardinals, Rutgers Scarlet Knights, UConn Huskies and USF Bulls were left behind. Louisville (ACC) and Rutgers (Big Ten) found quick bailout options, and Cincinnati’s long run of success — it has never really been a mid-major football program, even when it technically was one — earned the school a long-deserved Big 12 invitation last year. But UConn is now an FBS independent, stuck without obvious geographic options up north, and USF has now been left behind again, remaining in the AAC while rival UCF also made its way to the Big 12.
The sport’s power structure continues to funnel toward a smaller and smaller number of schools and conferences, and any time there’s a realignment-related lurch, some end up screwed because of it. We don’t know for sure what will happen with the four remaining Pac-12 teams that didn’t land spots in the Big Ten or Big 12 — the Cal Bears, Stanford Cardinal, Oregon State Beavers and Washington State Cougars — but while Cal and Stanford might still score an ACC bailout, OSU and Wazzu appear almost destined to end up in either a rebuilt and dramatically diminished Pac-12 (which features a number of current mid-major programs) or the Mountain West. They’re pretty much guaranteed a step down in status despite the fact that Oregon State and Washington State have been more well-run recently than three of the four programs that are leaving for the Big 12. Geography and market size are hurting them, and strong 2023 campaigns for either or both programs won’t help much in the long term, but … damned if it wouldn’t feel pretty good in the short term, huh?
Oregon State, in particular, is coming off one of its best seasons in 16 years, and while the top half of the Pac-12 is loaded this fall, it would be awfully fun to watch Jonathan Smith’s Beavers snare some wins over the departing teams … or maybe just win the conference outright.
No matter what, though, these teams’ home games against the departing schools should be awfully raucous, must-watch experiences. Here are those notable weekends:
Sept. 29: Utah at Oregon State
Oct. 14: UCLA at Oregon State, Arizona at Washington State
Nov. 18: Washington at Oregon State, Colorado at Washington State (Nov. 17)
It stinks that neither OSU nor Wazzu is hosting their big in-state rivalry game this year. But there should still be some fun and hostile games in there.
Iowa points watch
The Drive to 325 is on. Justifiably maligned Iowa Hawkeyes offensive coordinator Brian Ferentz, son of head coach Kirk Ferentz, has overseen one of the most appalling offenses in the country of late. The Hawkeyes averaged just 23.4 points per game in 2021 and, despite a nation’s-best six defensive touchdowns, only 17.7 per game in 2022. Ferentz kept his job and a robust salary, but his amended and incentives-heavy contract will require Iowa to score 25 points per game and win at least seven games to reach full compensation.
That average would have ranked 85th in FBS last season. It also includes defensive and special teams scores. In other words, the bar is incredibly low here. However, this should create a morbidly curious air around Hawkeye games this fall. I plan on soaking this in.
Wisconsin pass watch
I’ve cracked myself up all offseason imagining the Wisconsin Badgers coming out for their first snap of the season (against Buffalo on Sept. 2) in a five-wide formation and picturing the crowd reacting like the old fans in “Varsity Blues” when Johnny Moxon introduces the oopty-oop formation. [counting receivers on fingers] “One … two … three … four … five??”
It probably won’t be that much of a shock to Wisconsin fans when new coordinator Phil Longo unleashes his tempo- and often pass-heavy system — among other things, Longo offenses lean mostly on three-receiver sets and still produce 1,000-yard rushers. But head coach Luke Fickell’s hiring of Longo was one of the most jarring and intriguing hires of the offseason. Can Longo and a bevy of quarterback and receiver transfers create a cohesive system out of the gate? And can a land of big running backs and huge offensive linemen produce a consistent and threatening passing game, even deep into a blustery November?
The Deion Sanders experience
You could make the case that the Colorado Buffaloes scored a Big 12 bid a few weeks ago based solely on Deion Sanders’ charisma. The Buffaloes have been among the worst power-conference programs in the country for most of 20 years now, but they grabbed constant offseason headlines because of Sanders, their first-year head coach, and his complete detonation of the roster. Almost no one from last season’s dreadful team remains on the roster, and Sanders has signed well over 50 transfers.
How will this work out? It’s almost impossible to say because there’s no precedent. But the Buffaloes’ schedule is loaded with headline games — at TCU in Week 1, Nebraska in Week 2, at Oregon in Week 4, USC in Week 5 — and they’ll be a must-watch team for much of the season, at least until iffy depth catches up to them.
Ride the Joe Milton wave
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Look out for these potential SEC upsets in 2023
SEC Now analyst Matt Stinchcomb breaks down four scenarios this season where an underdog team could walk away with a stunning upset win.
He’s got maybe the strongest arm in college football, and both his and the Tennessee Volunteers‘ upside make him the most important player of the season. He could also be benched for freshman, and former four-star recruit, Nicholaus Iamaleava within a few weeks. Heisman … anonymity … everything’s on the table for Milton in 2023.
Watch the mid-major standouts
Transfer portal departures and the recent run of conference realignment — which relocated the AAC’s Cincinnati, Houston and UCF (plus BYU) to the Big 12 — has seemingly drained the talent pool at the Group of Five level. But it didn’t drain us of high-level quarterbacks.
There were four G5 QBs on ESPN’s top 100 players list for 2023 — UTSA’s Frank Harris (No. 32), Coastal Carolina’s Grayson McCall (No. 53), Western Kentucky’s Austin Reed (No. 84) and Tulane’s Michael Pratt (No. 99) — and you could have made a solid case for others like Ohio’s Kurtis Rourke, SJSU’s Chevan Cordeiro, Toledo’s Dequan Finn and maybe even Boise State’s Taylen Green as well. And in addition, JT Daniels, the injury-plagued former five-star recruit and former starter at USC, Georgia and West Virginia, will take his big arm to Houston to finish his career at Rice.
Nonconference play will give almost all of these quarterbacks opportunities to shine against big-name opponents. We’ll get some head-to-head matchups, too:
Aug. 26: Ohio at San Diego State (Rourke), SJSU at USC (Cordeiro)
Sept. 2: Coastal Carolina at UCLA (McCall), Oregon State at SJSU (Cordeiro), Boise State at Washington (Green), Toledo at Illinois (Finn), Rice at Texas (Daniels)
Sept. 9: Tulane at Ole Miss (Pratt)
Sept. 16: WKU at Ohio State (Reed), SJSU at Toledo (Cordeiro vs. Finn)
Sept. 23: UTSA at Tennessee (Harris)
Oct. 7: SJSU at Boise State (Cordeiro vs. Green)
Oct. 14: Coastal Carolina at Appalachian State (McCall) (Oct. 10)
Oct. 28: Marshall at Coastal Carolina (McCall), Tulane at Rice (Pratt vs. Daniels)
Nov. 25: UTSA at Tulane (Harris vs. Pratt)
There are plenty of G5 stars outside of the quarterback position — Southern Miss RB Frank Gore Jr., Marshall RB Rasheen Ali, Colorado State WR Tory Horton, UTEP WR Tyrin Smith, Toledo CB Quinyon Mitchell, South Alabama nickel Yam Banks — and you should check them out, too. But the signal-callers are a must.
Watch as much smaller-school football as you can
It’s one of my annual messages: The more small-school ball you watch, the healthier you become. In my Friday preview columns during the season, I always try to identify at least one smaller-school game to keep an eye on, but here are two games per week that, either because of rivalry, competitiveness or high preseason poll rankings, are all but guaranteed to rock.
Note: The rankings below come from different sources. I used preseason coaches polls for FCS, Division II and Division III, and in their absence, I used last year’s final poll for NAIA.
Sept. 2: No. 5 Trinity (Texas) at No. 6 St. John’s (D3), No. 2 Grand Valley State at No. 11 Colorado Mines (Aug. 31). The GVSU-Mines battle pits one of D2’s most established brands against one of its best up-and-comers. (It also pits two great mascots you should Google: Blaster the Burro vs. Louie the Laker.)
Sept. 9: No. 3 Montana State at No. 1 South Dakota State (FCS), No. 3 Mary Hardin-Baylor at No. 5 Trinity (Texas) (D3). A couple of big-time matchups here. In the former, you’ve got the defending FCS champion against the 2021 runner-up. In the latter, it’s an established annual title contender (UMHB) against what is frequently its stiffest local competition.
Sept. 16: No. 1 Ferris State (D2) at No. 14 Montana (FCS), No. 7 West Florida at Florida A&M (D2/FCS). Crossover week! Two of D2’s best take on FCS name brands.
Sept. 23: No. 10 Sacramento State at No. 8 Idaho (FCS), No. 22 West Georgia at No. 7 West Florida (D2). The Big Sky should again be loaded with potential top-15 teams, and Sac State-Idaho pits two of last year’s more pleasant surprises against each other.
Sept. 30: No. 1 North Central at No. 17 Wheaton (D3), No. 3 Grand Valley State at Saginaw Valley State (D2). Saginaw Valley is typically good for an upset scare against either GVSU or Ferris State in a given year and should honestly be at least a top-20 team in the polls.
Oct. 7: No. 15 Southeastern Louisiana at No. 7 Incarnate Word (FCS), Saginaw Valley State at No. 1 Ferris State (D2). The last three SELA-UIW games have averaged 95 combined points and 1,218 yards. Last year’s game featured only 76 and 972, respectively, and it felt like a massive letdown.
Oct. 14: No. 1 Ferris State at No. 3 Grand Valley State (D2), No. 6 Furman at No. 9 Samford (FCS). Furman and Samford have been quietly building sturdy FCS programs, but the headliner here is the Anchor-Bone Classic. Since 2017, FSU and GVSU have played seven times (including playoff games), and six have been decided by one score, including last season’s two meetings. The biggest game of the D2 regular season.
Oct. 21: No. 3 Montana State at No. 10 Sacramento State (FCS), No. 4 Pittsburg State at No. 6 Northwest Missouri (D2). Another huge Big Sky battle and the biggest D2 game in the Midwest.
Oct. 28: No. 1 Morningside (Iowa) at No. 3 Northwestern (Iowa) (NAIA), No. 3 Mary Hardin-Baylor at No. 12 Hardin-Simmons (D3). And here’s the biggest game of the NAIA regular season. Northwestern won the national title last season, thanks in part to Morningside’s upset loss in the quarterfinals.
Nov. 4: No. 2 North Dakota State at No. 1 South Dakota State (FCS), No. 2 Mount Union at John Carroll (D3). NDSU-SDSU, a game so big that it’s attracted College GameDay. There’s no reason to think the Dakota Marker will be any less huge this season.
Nov. 11: No. 8 Lindsey Wilson at No. 4 Bethel (Tenn.) (NAIA), No. 8 Idaho at No. 13 Weber State (FCS). By mid-November, the playoffs are looming quickly on the horizon, especially for D2 and D3. But LWC-Bethel is still a huge annual occurrence, and the Big Sky never stops cranking out big matchups.
Nov. 18: No. 3 Montana State at No. 14 Montana (FCS), No. 18 Richmond at No. 4 William & Mary (FCS). Montana is not picked quite as high as normal this season, but Brawl of the Wild — another former “College GameDay” matchup — is never anything but huge.
AVONDALE, Ariz. — Kyle Larson knew he wasn’t going to catch Denny Hamlin in the final laps on Sunday, not without the sort of help that only a caution flag can bring.
Larson got his lucky break.
Hamlin only got heartbreak.
Larson is now a two-time NASCAR champion after denying Hamlin what would have been his first career title when a late caution at Phoenix Raceway sent the championship-deciding finale into overtime.
Without that caution, which came with three laps to run, Hamlin had it locked up and was ready to finally shed the label of greatest NASCAR driver to never win a championship. But fellow title contender William Byron got a flat tire and hit the wall to bring out the caution, and a few minutes later, it was over.
“Just unbelievable,” Larson said. “I cannot believe it.”
Neither could Hamlin.
“I really don’t have much for emotion right now. Just numb about it ’cause just in shock,” Hamlin said after consoling his crying daughters on pit road. “We were 40 seconds away from a championship. This sport can drive you absolutely crazy because sometimes speed, talent, none of that matters.”
When the caution for Byron came out, Hamlin led the field down pit road and got four new tires on his Toyota; Larson only took two tires on his Chevrolet. It meant Larson was fifth for the two-lap sprint to the finish, with Hamlin back in 10th.
With so little time to run down Larson, Hamlin came up short with a sixth-place finish as Larson finished third. Ryan Blaney, who was eliminated from title contention last week, won the race.
“You do have to feel for that group and Denny. Doing a good job all day, it not playing out for him. But that is racing. It sucks sometimes,” Blaney said. “They can hang their head about it, but they should be very proud about the effort. They had the fastest race car here. Just one of those things where it doesn’t work out. Looked like it was going into his favor, unfortunately for him, it didn’t.”
It is the second championship for Larson, who won his first title in 2021 when he joined Hendrick Motorsports.
As Larson celebrated, Hamlin sat in his car motionless for several seconds, then wiped his face with a white towel, never showing any emotion.
Larson, who has been in a slump since his disastrous Memorial Day attempt to race both the Indianapolis 500 and Coca-Cola 600 on the same day, was also in shock.
“We didn’t lead a lap and won the championship,” Larson said. “We had an average car at best and had the right front [tire] go down, lost a lap and got the wave around, saved by the caution with the wave around. It’s just unbelievable. What a year by this motorsports team.”
When Hamlin finally got out of his car he embraced his crew members but it was a scene of disbelief among the Joe Gibbs Racing crowd. Team members were crying, some sitting in shock on the pavement; Gibbs himself stood silent, one hand on his hip and a look of disbelief on his face.
It is the sixth shot at a title to slip away from Hamlin in his 20 years driving for Gibbs. He led 208 of the 319 laps and started from the pole.
“Nothing I could do different. I mean, prepared as good as I could coming into the weekend and my team gave me a fantastic car,” Hamlin said. “Just didn’t work out. I was just praying ‘no caution’ and we had one there. What can you do? It’s just not meant to be.”
He said crew chief Chris Gayle made the correct call with four tires, but too many others took only two, which created too big of a gap for Hamlin to close on Larson in so little time.
The 44-year-old Virginia native had been extremely jinxed in five previous championship finales, with bad luck, bad strategy and bad cars breaking his heart in 2010, 2014, 2019, 2020 and 2021. Sunday was his first time eligible in the winner-take-all race in four seasons.
Hamlin was remarkably loose and calm all week, rented three houses in Scottsdale for 30 friends and family, won the pole and then dominated Sunday’s race.
He just didn’t close it out.
“Man, if you can’t win that one, I don’t know which one you can win,” Hamlin said.
Larson was OK during the race, but hasn’t won since early May, a slump that has now extended to 24 consecutive races.
Hamlin teammate Chase Briscoe finished 18th in his debut in the championship finale, while Larson teammate Byron was 33rd after his late issue. He felt awful for ruining Hamlin’s chance even though his Hendrick Motorsports teammate won the championship.
“I’m just super bummed that it was a caution obviously. I hate that. Hate it for Denny. I hate it for the 11 team,” Byron said. “I mean, Denny was on his way to it. I hate that. There’s a lot of respect there. I obviously do not want to cause a caution. If I had known what tire it was, known that a tire was going down before I got to the corner, I would have done something different.”
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Kyle Bonagura
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Kyle Bonagura
ESPN Staff Writer
- Covers college football.
- Joined ESPN in 2014.
- Attended Washington State University.
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Mark Schlabach
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Mark Schlabach
ESPN Senior Writer
- Senior college football writer
- Author of seven books on college football
- Graduate of the University of Georgia
While there was stability at the very top of the college football hierarchy in Week 10 — with Ohio State and Indiana rolling to big wins — there were plenty of surprises and consequential results further down the pecking order.
The biggest shockwaves came in the ACC, where Georgia Tech suffered its first loss of the season, Miami lost for the second week in a row and Virginia emerged in sole possession of first place. If the Cavaliers can hold on and win the ACC championship, they would be a most unlikely participant in the College Football Playoff.
As with last season’s inaugural 12-team CFP, the five highest-ranked conference champions, plus the next seven highest-ranked teams, will make the field. Unlike last year, the four highest-ranked teams (not necessarily conference champions) will be awarded first-round byes. The other eight teams will meet in first-round games at the campus sites of seeds Nos. 5 through 8.
From there, the quarterfinals and semifinals will be played in what had been the New Year’s Six bowls, with the national championship game scheduled for Jan. 19 at Miami’s Hard Rock Stadium.
All of that is just the tip of the iceberg, though. Apart from the playoff is the 35-game slate of bowl games, beginning with the Cricket Celebration Bowl on Dec. 13.
We’re here for all of it.
ESPN bowl gurus Kyle Bonagura and Mark Schlabach are projecting every postseason matchup, including their breakdowns of how the playoff will play out, and we’ll be back every week of the season until the actual matchups are set.
Jump to a section:
Playoff picks | Quarterfinals
Semis, title game | Bowl season
College Football Playoff
First-round games (at campus sites)
Friday, Dec. 19/Saturday, Dec. 20
Times and networks TBD.
Bonagura: No. 12 North Texas at No. 5 Oregon
Schlabach: No. 12 Memphis at No. 5 Georgia
Bonagura: No. 11 Virginia at No. 6 Georgia
Schlabach: No. 11 Virginia at No. 6 Ole Miss
Bonagura: No. 10 Notre Dame at No. 7 Ole Miss
Schlabach: No. 10 Notre Dame at No. 7 Oregon
Bonagura: No. 9 Texas Tech at No. 8 BYU
Schlabach: No. 9 Texas Tech at No. 8 BYU
First-round breakdown
Bonagura: North Texas to the playoffs? Sure, why not? After ending Navy’s undefeated season Saturday, the Mean Green are positioned as well as anyone else to win the American, which will likely result in a playoff spot. You can drum up a scenario where San Diego State gets picked from the Mountain West, but the American champion is in the driver’s seat. And picking from the league’s pool of options is tough: Navy, Memphis, North Texas, Tulane, South Florida and East Carolina all have just one conference loss. The Mean Green have been the most impressive over the past three weeks.
Georgia Tech’s loss to NC State means the ACC no longer has an undefeated team, which stands as another indicator the ACC will be a one-bid league. Is that team Virginia? The Cavaliers’ only loss of the season also came against NC State, but that was classified as a nonconference game, so they’re still undefeated in league play. Regardless, it’s hard to be optimistic about the chances any ACC team will win a first-round game.
Schlabach: It was another unpredictable Saturday in college football with three teams in the AP Top 10 falling. I’m sure we’ll see plenty of chaos over the final month of the regular season, too.
Vanderbilt’s dream season hit a road bump at Texas, as Longhorns quarterback Arch Manning threw for 328 yards with three touchdowns in a 34-31 victory. The Longhorns have won four in a row after most of us left them for dead. They’ll play at Georgia in two weeks, followed by home games against Arkansas and Texas A&M.
Georgia Tech suffered its first loss of the season in an ugly 48-36 defeat at NC State. The Wolfpack had 583 yards of offense, including 243 rushing, as Tech’s defense had no answers. The Yellow Jackets will play surging Pittsburgh and rival Georgia in their final two games, so they’ll have to get things fixed quickly.
Georgia Tech, Miami, Vanderbilt and Navy all fell out of my 12-team bracket. I replaced them with Texas Tech, Notre Dame, Virginia and Memphis.
CFP quarterfinals
Wednesday, Dec. 31
CFP quarterfinal at the Goodyear Cotton Bowl Classic
AT&T Stadium (Arlington, Texas)
7:30 p.m., ESPN
Bonagura: No. 7 Ole Miss vs. No. 2 Indiana
Schlabach: No. 5 Georgia vs. No. 4 Alabama
Thursday, Jan. 1
CFP quarterfinal at the Capital One Orange Bowl
Hard Rock Stadium (Miami Gardens, Florida)
Noon, ESPN
Bonagura: No. 5 Oregon vs. No. 4 Alabama
Schlabach: No. 7 Oregon vs. No. 2 Indiana
CFP quarterfinal at the Rose Bowl Game presented by Prudential
Rose Bowl (Pasadena, California)
4 p.m., ESPN
Bonagura: No. 8 BYU vs. No. 1 Ohio State
Schlabach: No. 9 Texas Tech vs. No. 1 Ohio State
CFP quarterfinal at the Allstate Sugar Bowl
Caesars Superdome (New Orleans)
8 p.m., ESPN
Bonagura: No. 6 Georgia vs. No. 3 Texas A&M
Schlabach: No. 6 Ole Miss vs. No. 3 Texas A&M
Quarterfinals breakdown
Bonagura: Half of this week’s projected quarterfinal field — Texas A&M, Alabama, Oregon and BYU — was off this weekend in what felt like a quiet one for college football. The only change for me here from last week is that Georgia Tech is gone, with BYU in its place. The Cougars travel to Texas Tech this week in what might be the most consequential conference game outside the SEC and Big Ten the rest of the way.
BYU is following a similar script to last season, when it started 8-0, only to lose twice late in the year and miss out on a trip to the Big 12 title game. Things are tight again in the Big 12, so this is as close as it gets to a must-win game for both teams.
Schlabach: My quarterfinal matchups largely remained unchanged from a week ago, although Texas Tech replaced Georgia Tech in one of the games.
The CFP selection committee members wouldn’t admit it, but hopefully they’ll tweak the final rankings to avoid the intraconference matchups in my bracket. There are all-SEC matchups in the Cotton Bowl and Sugar Bowl, and an all-Big Ten contest in the Orange Bowl.
Texas Tech and BYU are in the driver’s seat for a Big 12 title, and I’m not sure the unbeaten Cougars are getting enough love nationally. They’ve already beaten Utah and Iowa State, and they’ll have a chance to make an emphatic statement when they play the Red Raiders on Saturday.
CFP semifinals, national championship game
Thursday, Jan. 8
CFP semifinal at the Vrbo Fiesta Bowl
State Farm Stadium (Glendale, Arizona)
7:30 p.m., ESPN
Bonagura: No. 4 Alabama vs. No. 1 Ohio State
Schlabach: No. 4 Alabama vs. No. 1 Ohio State
Friday, Jan. 9
CFP semifinal at the Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl
Mercedes-Benz Stadium (Atlanta)
7:30 p.m., ESPN
Bonagura: No. 3 Texas A&M vs. No. 2 Indiana
Schlabach: No. 3 Texas A&M vs. No. 2 Indiana
Monday, Jan. 19
CFP national championship
Hard Rock Stadium (Miami Gardens, Florida)
7:45 p.m., ESPN
Bonagura: No. 2 Indiana vs. No. 1 Ohio State
Schlabach: No. 2 Indiana vs. No. 1 Ohio State
National championship breakdown
Bonagura: With Ohio State and Indiana both winning decisively, there is no reason to revisit the title game projection. They continue to look like the two best teams in college football and haven’t showed any signs of slowing down.
Schlabach: Ohio State and Indiana continued to roll this week. The Buckeyes got off to a slow start before dismantling Penn State 38-14. The Buckeyes will be heavy favorites in their next three games — a road trip to Purdue and home contests against UCLA and Rutgers — before closing the regular season at rival Michigan in the Big House on Nov. 29.
Indiana also got off to a slow start before routing Maryland 55-10 on the road. Indiana has won its past three games against Michigan State, UCLA and Maryland by a combined 120 points. It doesn’t figure to get much more difficult over the Hoosiers’ final three games against struggling Penn State (road), Wisconsin (home) and Purdue (road).
Complete bowl season schedule
Saturday, Dec. 13
Cricket Celebration Bowl
Mercedes-Benz Stadium (Atlanta)
Noon, ABC
Bonagura: Jackson State vs. Delaware State
Schlabach: Jackson State vs. Delaware State
LA Bowl
SoFi Stadium (Inglewood, California)
9 p.m., ESPN
Bonagura: Arizona vs. San Diego State
Schlabach: Arizona vs. San Diego State
Tuesday, Dec. 16
IS4S Salute to Veterans Bowl
Cramton Bowl (Montgomery, Alabama)
9 p.m., ESPN
Bonagura: Louisiana Tech vs. East Carolina
Schlabach: Jacksonville State vs. Coastal Carolina
Wednesday, Dec. 17
StaffDNA Cure Bowl
Camping World Stadium (Orlando, Florida)
5 p.m., ESPN
Bonagura: Buffalo vs. Jacksonville State
Schlabach: Buffalo vs. Old Dominion
68 Ventures Bowl
Hancock Whitney Stadium (Mobile, Alabama)
8:30 p.m., ESPN
Bonagura: Arkansas State vs. Western Michigan
Schlabach: Liberty vs. Central Michigan
Friday, Dec. 19
Myrtle Beach Bowl
Brooks Stadium (Conway, South Carolina)
Noon, ESPN
Bonagura: UCF vs. Marshall
Schlabach: East Carolina vs. James Madison
Union Home Mortgage Gasparilla Bowl
Raymond James Stadium (Tampa, Florida)
3:30 p.m., ESPN
Bonagura: South Florida vs. Florida State
Schlabach: UConn vs. Florida State
Monday, Dec. 22
Famous Idaho Potato Bowl
Albertsons Stadium (Boise, Idaho)
2 p.m., ESPN
Bonagura: Toledo vs. UNLV
Schlabach: Ohio vs. UNLV
Tuesday, Dec. 23
Boca Raton Bowl
Flagler Credit Union Stadium (Boca Raton, Florida)
2 p.m., ESPN
Bonagura: Southern Miss vs. Coastal Carolina
Schlabach: Temple vs. Miami (Ohio)
New Orleans Bowl
Caesars Superdome (New Orleans)
5:30 p.m., ESPN
Bonagura: Western Kentucky vs. Old Dominion
Schlabach: Western Kentucky vs. Southern Miss
Scooter’s Coffee Frisco Bowl
Ford Center at The Star (Frisco, Texas)
9 p.m., ESPN
Bonagura: UTSA vs. Hawai’i
Schlabach: North Texas vs. Louisiana Tech
Wednesday, Dec. 24
Sheraton Hawai’i Bowl
Clarence T.C. Ching Athletics Complex (Honolulu)
8 p.m., ESPN
Bonagura: Boise State vs. California
Schlabach: Hawai’i vs. Tulane
Friday, Dec. 26
GameAbove Sports Bowl
Ford Field (Detroit)
1 p.m., ESPN
Bonagura: Maryland vs. Ohio
Schlabach: Maryland vs. Western Michigan
Rate Bowl
Chase Field (Phoenix)
4:30 p.m., ESPN
Bonagura: Baylor vs. Northwestern
Schlabach: Baylor vs. Northwestern
SERVPRO First Responder Bowl
Gerald J. Ford Stadium (Dallas)
8 p.m., ESPN
Bonagura: Temple vs. Troy
Schlabach: Boise State vs. Iowa State
Saturday, Dec. 27
Go Bowling Military Bowl
Navy-Marine Corps Memorial Stadium (Annapolis, Maryland)
11 a.m., ESPN
Bonagura: NC State vs. Tulane
Schlabach: Wake Forest vs. Navy
Bad Boy Mowers Pinstripe Bowl
Yankee Stadium (Bronx, New York)
Noon, ABC
Bonagura: Pittsburgh vs. Minnesota
Schlabach: SMU vs. Minnesota
Wasabi Fenway Bowl
Fenway Park (Boston)
2:15 p.m., ESPN
Bonagura: Wake Forest vs. Army
Schlabach: NC State vs. South Florida
Pop-Tarts Bowl
Camping World Stadium (Orlando, Florida)
3:30 p.m., ABC
Bonagura: Miami vs. Cincinnati
Schlabach: Georgia Tech vs. Cincinnati
Snoop Dogg Arizona Bowl
Arizona Stadium (Tucson, Arizona)
4:30 p.m., CW Network
Bonagura: Miami (Ohio) vs. Fresno State
Schlabach: Toledo vs. Fresno State
Isleta New Mexico Bowl
University Stadium (Albuquerque, New Mexico)
5:45 p.m., ESPN
Bonagura: New Mexico vs. Washington State
Schlabach: New Mexico vs. Washington State
TaxSlayer Gator Bowl
EverBank Stadium (Jacksonville, Florida)
7:30 p.m. ABC
Bonagura: Louisville vs. LSU
Schlabach: Louisville vs. Vanderbilt
Kinder’s Texas Bowl
NRG Stadium (Houston)
9:15 p.m., ESPN
Bonagura: TCU vs. Oklahoma
Schlabach: Houston vs. Oklahoma
Monday, Dec. 29
JLab Birmingham Bowl
Protective Stadium (Birmingham, Alabama)
2 p.m., ESPN
Bonagura: Memphis vs. James Madison
Schlabach: Troy vs. UTSA
Tuesday, Dec. 30
Radiance Technologies Independence Bowl
Independence Stadium (Shreveport, Louisiana)
2 p.m., ESPN
Bonagura: Kansas State vs. Kennesaw State
Schlabach: Kansas State vs. Kennesaw State
Music City Bowl
Nissan Stadium (Nashville, Tennessee)
5:30 p.m., ESPN
Bonagura: Nebraska vs. Missouri
Schlabach: Illinois vs. LSU
Valero Alamo Bowl
Alamodome (San Antonio)
9 p.m., ESPN
Bonagura: Houston vs. Washington
Schlabach: Utah vs. USC
Wednesday, Dec. 31
ReliaQuest Bowl
Raymond James Stadium (Tampa, Florida)
Noon, ESPN
Bonagura: Illinois vs. Vanderbilt
Schlabach: Iowa vs. Tennessee
Tony the Tiger Sun Bowl
Sun Bowl Stadium (El Paso, Texas)
2 p.m., CBS
Bonagura: Duke vs. Arizona State
Schlabach: Pittsburgh vs. Arizona State
Cheez-It Citrus Bowl
Camping World Stadium (Orlando, Florida)
3 p.m., ABC
Bonagura: Michigan vs. Texas
Schlabach: Michigan vs. Texas
SRS Distribution Las Vegas Bowl
Allegiant Stadium (Las Vegas)
3:30 p.m., ESPN
Bonagura: Iowa vs. Utah
Schlabach: Nebraska vs. California
Friday, Jan. 2
Lockheed Martin Armed Forces Bowl
Amon G. Carter Stadium (Fort Worth, Texas)
1 p.m., ESPN
Bonagura: Kansas vs. Navy
Schlabach: Kansas vs. Army
AutoZone Liberty Bowl
Simmons Bank Liberty Stadium (Memphis, Tennessee)
4:30 p.m., ESPN
Bonagura: Iowa State vs. Auburn
Schlabach: TCU vs. Mississippi State
Duke’s Mayo Bowl
Bank of America Stadium (Charlotte, North Carolina)
8 p.m., ESPN
Bonagura: SMU vs. Tennessee
Schlabach: Duke vs. Missouri
Holiday Bowl
Snapdragon Stadium (San Diego)
8 p.m., Fox
Bonagura: Georgia Tech vs. USC
Schlabach: Miami vs. Washington
-
Bill Connelly
Two top-10 teams fell on the road to unranked opponents. A third fell to a lower-ranked team. No. 5 Georgia flirted with disaster, as always, and just because nothing is allowed to make total sense in the ACC, No. 15 Virginia and No. 16 Louisville also thought hard about face-planting before rallying.
Week 10 didn’t give us quite as many absolute disasters as it could have, and the damage was mostly contained to the increasingly chaotic ACC. And with two-thirds of the 2025 college football season done, we now shift into Playoff Hyperdrive.
Let’s look back on Week 10 with help from the construct I used for the Week 10 preview: Playoff Tiers.
Updated playoff tiers
The first College Football Playoff rankings of the season come out Tuesday, and using a combination of the Allstate Playoff Predictor and odds driven by my SP+ rankings, we can pretty easily bunch teams into groups of playoff likelihood. The tiers didn’t change all that much this weekend, though conveniently, each team that lost fell into the tier below.
Tier 1
Indiana (9-0, 99.5% average playoff odds) — def. Maryland 55-10 Saturday
Ohio State (8-0, 99.3%) — def. Penn State 38-14
Texas A&M (8-0, 95.7%)
With A&M off and Indiana and Ohio State winning by a combined 93-24, nothing changed here. These are the three most likely teams to make the CFP, and while the playoff committee could overthink and try to talk itself into ranking Alabama ahead of A&M or something because of ranked wins, the Aggies deserve the edge to me, both because of their road win over Tier 3’s Notre Dame and the extremely important fact that they didn’t lose to a 4-4 Florida State team like the Tide did.
Tier 2
Ole Miss (8-1, 83.6%) — def. South Carolina 30-14
Oregon (7-1, 75.6%)
Alabama (7-1, 74.0%)
BYU (8-0, 69.3%)
Texas Tech (8-1, 68.5%) — def. Kansas State 43-20
Georgia (7-1, 54.1%) — def. Florida 24-20
With Georgia Tech’s loss to NC State on Saturday, the Yellow Jackets dropped from Tier 2 to Tier 3, but with a surprisingly comfortable road win over a smoking hot Kansas State, Texas Tech jumped from Tier 3 to 2. I’m curious how the CFP committee might view the Red Raiders, a team with eight wins by at least 23 points and a lone loss coming without starting quarterback Behren Morton. Their strength-of-schedule numbers aren’t very good, but they ace the eye test, and if “best” is supposed to matter over “most deserving,” well, they’re fourth in SP+.
Georgia, meanwhile, is uninterested in passing “eye tests.” The Bulldogs once again painted themselves into a corner, this time spotting rival Florida a 20-17 lead and letting them drive into field goal range midway through the fourth quarter. But they rallied once again, stuffing Jadan Baugh on fourth-and-1, immediately driving for a touchdown, then forcing a four-and-out and winning the game. They look impressive for about one quarter per game, but they’re 7-1 with a Tier 2 win over Ole Miss and a lone loss to Tier 2 Bama. The road still features games against Texas and Georgia Tech, however.
Tier 3
Notre Dame (6-2, 41.1%) — def. Boston College 25-10
Virginia (8-1, 37.6%) — def. California 31-21
Louisville (7-1, 37.1%) — def. Virginia Tech 28-16
Texas (7-2, 33.5%) — def. Vanderbilt 34-31
Georgia Tech (8-1, 30.2%) — lost to NC State 48-36
Tier 3 is evidently the transition tier. Of last week’s four Tier 3 teams, one moved up with a win (Texas Tech), and two moved down with losses (Miami, Vanderbilt). Meanwhile, it caught Georgia Tech on the way down and Texas on the way up. And with all the other chaos in the ACC, two one-loss teams that won as favorites Saturday (Virginia and Louisville) saw their conference title odds rise by solid amounts. They also moved up from Tier 4.
Tier 4
Oklahoma (7-2, 27.0%) — def. Tennessee 33-27
Vanderbilt (7-2, 26.8%) — lost to Texas 34-31
Utah (7-2, 24.2%) — def. Cincinnati 45-14
Miami (6-2, 17.9%) — lost to SMU 26-20
USC (6-2, 14.0%) — def. Nebraska 21-17
Washington (6-2, 13.6%)
Missouri (6-2, 10.7%)
Michigan (7-2, 10.5%) — def. Purdue 21-16
Pitt (7-2, 6.9%) — def. Stanford 35-20
Duke (5-3, 6.4%) — def. Clemson 46-45
Iowa (6-2, 6.0%)
SMU (6-3, 5.7%) — def. Miami 26-20
Oklahoma and Vanderbilt both have decent enough odds that I could have slipped them into Tier 3, but since they’ve both lost to Tier 3 Texas, and head-to-head matchups between two-loss SEC teams could matter a lot, we’ll go ahead and put them here. At this point, Tier 4 is a mix of two-loss Big Ten and SEC teams (OU, Vandy, USC, Washington, Mizzou, Michigan, Iowa), two-loss Big 12 and ACC teams that either have impressive wins (Miami) or are simply smoking hot (Utah, Pitt) and three-loss ACC teams that still have a puncher’s chance at the conference title (Duke, SMU).
Tier (Group of) 5
James Madison (7-1, 27.7%) — def. Texas State 52-20
North Texas (8-1, 26.4%) — def. Navy 31-17
Memphis (8-1, 15.9%) — def. Rice 38-14
USF (6-2, 13.9%)
San Diego State (7-1, 8.9%) — def. Wyoming 24-7
There’s still a scenario in which, say, SMU wins the ACC at 10-3 but ranks behind a pair of one-loss Group of 5 champions, and the G5 ends up with multiple bids. That said, one G5 bid is still far and away the most likely scenario, and that race remains awfully interesting. JMU impressed enough in San Marcos last Tuesday that the Dukes jumped from 50th to 36th in SP+. They aren’t going to finish with a great résumé — their most impressive performance was a loss to Louisville in which they were tied in the fourth quarter before a fumble recovery touchdown put them behind — but they look the part enough that they should feel good about their chances if they finish 12-1 to win the Sun Belt, and the American Conference champ is 11-2.
Still, it’s clear the American winner, whoever it ends up being, is most likely to score the bid even if JMU’s odds are better than any single team.
What Tuesday’s rankings should look like
For the past couple of years, I’ve been fiddling with what amounts to a BCS-ish formula, derived half from the AP poll and half from a combination of both computer power ratings (SP+ and FPI) and computer résumé ratings (Résumé SP+ and Strength of Record). With a few exceptions — Alabama over Florida State in 2023, SMU over Alabama in 2024 — it tends to adhere pretty closely to what the committee ends up deciding.
Tuesday’s rankings will be the first since the CFP committee began using “enhanced metrics to help evaluate schedule strength,” however. What does that mean in practice? I have no idea. So in anticipation of Tuesday’s release, let’s look at four rankings for the teams most likely to be ranked by the committee: 1) their AP poll ranking; 2) their ranking in this BCS-ish formula; 3) their Strength of Record ranking and 4) their Résumé SP+ ranking.
This obviously adheres pretty closely to the tiers above, but it gives us a good idea of what to look for Tuesday night. If the committee really is taking strength of schedule or strength of record further into account — and for the record, I really don’t think it needed to — then we might expect teams that are more well regarded by the computers to win some arguments. Texas A&M would definitely rank ahead of Alabama in this case, and BYU might rank higher as well. Also, two-loss Texas and Vanderbilt would likely trump one-loss Louisville and Georgia Tech.
All in all, I think the top 11 on Tuesday should end up looking almost identical to the AP poll, while the spots from No. 12 to No. 21 could end up in pretty much any order.
A hypothetical playoff simulation, because why not?
Based on where teams are most likely to rank this week (via the BCS-ish rankings above) and which teams are currently most likely to win their conferences (per SP+), here’s what I’m going to call Week 11’s playoff bracket.
9 Texas Tech at 8 BYU
Winner plays 1 Ohio State
12 North Texas at 5 Georgia
Winner plays 4 Alabama
11 Louisville at 6 Oregon
Winner plays 3 Texas A&M
10 Notre Dame at 7 Ole Miss
Winner plays 2 Indiana
We’ll see a shakeup following Week 11’s Texas Tech-BYU battle in Lubbock, but for now, this gives us Notre Dame’s first-ever trip to Oxford, a potential playoff rematch between Indiana and Notre Dame in the quarterfinals and another Alabama-Georgia playoff game (this time in the quarterfinals). Based on current SP+ rankings, it would also give us these national title odds based on 10,000 simulations:
Hypothetical title odds based on the above bracket:
1-seed Ohio State 30.6%
2-seed Indiana 28.2%
6-seed Oregon 12.4%
3-seed Texas A&M 7.4%
4-seed Alabama 6.8%
9-seed Texas Tech 5.6%
5-seed Georgia 3.0%
10-seed Notre Dame 2.4%
7-seed Ole Miss 1.7%
8-seed BYU 1.1%
11-seed Louisville 0.4%
12-seed North Texas 0.2%
And because odds alone aren’t very satisfying, I grabbed a random simulation from the batch of 10,000. Here’s what’s officially going to happen this postseason. You can stop watching now.
(Please don’t stop watching.)
FIRST ROUND
Texas Tech over BYU in Provo
Georgia over North Texas in Athens
Oregon over Louisville in Eugene
Notre Dame over Ole Miss in Oxford
QUARTERFINALS
Rose Bowl: Texas Tech over Ohio State
Sugar Bowl: Alabama over Georgia
Cotton Bowl: Texas A&M over Oregon
Orange Bowl: Indiana over Notre Dame
SEMIFINALS
Peach Bowl: Alabama over Texas Tech
Fiesta Bowl: Indiana over Texas A&M
FINALS
Indiana over Alabama in Miami
If you Google Indiana’s Curt Cignetti, as he told you to a couple of years ago, it might soon tell you that he’s a national title-winning head coach.
5 other random thoughts from Week 10
Damn, Mario. By Mario Cristobal’s standards, his late-game management against SMU wasn’t a crime against humanity or anything, but after SMU tied the game with 25 seconds left, Miami got the ball back with a timeout in hand and a quarterback Cristobal paid loads of money for … and the Hurricanes kneeled out the clock to go to overtime. Granted, Carson Beck’s dreadful overtime interception, which set up SMU’s winning touchdown, certainly didn’t help his cause, but it doesn’t matter how much money you shell out if you’re still going to play by “Three things can happen when you pass, and two are bad” rules in the 2020s.
But since Cristobal took over at Miami in 2022, his Hurricanes have lost five games as double-digit favorites; only Alabama can match that total, and (A) Bama has been a double-digit favorite 50% more often and (B) three of the Tide’s five such losses came in a small cluster of games last season. Cristobal has lost at least one such game each year that he’s been in charge. Death, taxes and Miami suffering a catastrophic loss it should have put away.
Holy (whistle) smokes (whistle), Arkansas (whistle). Generally speaking, penalties and penalty yards don’t correlate to wins and losses as much as you might think. Committing a lot of penalties can often signify that you’re properly pushing the limits from an aggressiveness standpoint, and of the 66 teams to have suffered more than 100 penalty yards in a game this season, 38 ended up winning the game.
It’s nice to know there are limits, however. Arkansas committed 18 penalties for 193 yards against Mississippi State on Saturday, the third most for any FBS team in any game over the last 10 seasons. Only Kansas (216 yards in a win over UNLV in 2023) and Northern Illinois (194 in a win over Eastern Illinois in 2017) can top that number. But while those teams still managed to win, Arkansas’ discipline ran out late. Mississippi State scored 17 points in the game’s final 11 minutes to overcome a 14-point deficit and win 38-35. If Sam Pittman hadn’t already been fired, he probably would be now. (And it probably goes without saying that interim coach Bobby Petrino hasn’t shined enough to justify hiring him full time, though I’m sure you can still find an Arkansas booster advocating for it.)
So many close SEC games. We can question whether the SEC has a team the caliber of Ohio State or Indiana this season, but we cannot question its commitment to competitiveness. The league featured six games Saturday, five were decided by one score — including both of its ranked-versus-ranked encounters — and the sixth was within one score with 12 minutes left. For the season, the league has had 43 conference games to date, with 26 decided by one touchdown or less. It’s been close enough overall that Arkansas somehow (A) ranks first in the league in points per drive in conference play and (B) is 0-5 in conference play.
Close games will define the rest of November, too. Texas A&M (5-0 in SEC play) has two road games with a projected margin of less than two points, and despite being pretty close to the finish line the Aggies have higher odds of losing two or more in November (27%) than reaching 12-0 (25%).
Alabama (5-0) has three conference games remaining, and all three are projected within single digits, two within one score. SP+ gives the Tide only a 25% chance of winning its four remaining games, with 26% odds of losing at least twice.
Georgia’s odds, meanwhile, are almost identical — the Bulldogs (5-1) have two projected one-score SEC games remaining (at Mississippi State, Texas), plus a one-score visit to Georgia Tech. The result: a 25% chance of winning out and a 30% chance of losing at least twice.
Texas (4-1) actually looked the part for most of Saturday’s win over Vanderbilt, but the Longhorns are projected underdogs in two of three remaining games (at Georgia, Texas A&M), and Arkansas is not a gimme. Odds of winning out: 15%.
Ole Miss (5-1) has the most navigable path of any major conference contender, with only Florida and Mississippi State remaining in SEC play. Odds of winning out: 54%. Then again, the Rebels lost to Florida last year, and the Egg Bowl lives for nonsense.
Colorado looks done done. Over its last two games against Utah and Arizona, Colorado was projected to lose by a combined 23.1 points. The Buffaloes instead lost by 81. Last week’s 53-7 loss to Utah was almost understandable in retrospect (the Utes just walloped Cincinnati, too), but they were equally moribund in Saturday evening’s home loss to Arizona. And based on a weighted average of recent performances (where the most recent game carries more weight), they are officially the team that is underachieving the most against current SP+ projections.
There are plenty of other teams staggering and/or falling at the moment – Syracuse, Penn State, Louisiana-Monroe, Delaware, Maryland, Texas State, Bowling Green – but CU leads the pack. And if the Buffs can’t beat West Virginia in Morgantown this coming weekend, a 3-9 finish begins to look awfully likely. Would that increase the odds of Deion Sanders stepping down at the end of the season?
DeSean Jackson was a spectacular hire. Remember in the offseason, when Norfolk State (Michael Vick) and Delaware State (DeSean Jackson) went the Deion Sanders/Eddie George route and hired celebrated former players as their head coaches? Vick was the bigger headline-grabber – he’s Michael Vick, after all – and he has struggled in year one, as you might expect from a first-time head coach. Norfolk State went 4-8 and finished 101st in FCS SP+ last season; the Spartans are just 1-8 and 115th this season. They have a couple of semi-winnable games left against Morgan State and Howard (they will likely get drubbed by N.C. Central this coming week), but it’s been a year of growing pains.
For Jackson and his Hornets, however, it’s been the exact opposite story. DSU went 1-11 and finished 123rd in SP+ last season, and they haven’t finished higher than 5-6 or 83rd over the past decade. Last Thursday’s win over Vick’s NSU, however, brought them to 6-3 and 54th overall. They’ve already upset N.C. Central, and if they can win a tossup game at home against S.C. State in Week 13, they’ll win their first MEAC title since 2007 and score their first Celebration Bowl bid. It’s looking like Jackson was one of the best hires of last offseason’s coaching carousel.
This week in SP+
The SP+ rankings are updated for the week. Let’s take a look at the teams that saw the biggest change in their overall ratings. (Note: We’re looking at ratings, not rankings.)
Moving up
Here are the 10 teams that saw their ratings rise the most this week:
Fresno State: up 3.7 adjusted points per game (ranking rose from 93rd to 78th)
East Carolina: up 3.4 points (from 61st to 48th)
Florida State: up 3.3 points (from 34th to 24th)
Louisiana Tech: up 3.3 points (from 76th to 67th)
Western Kentucky: up 3.1 points (from 88th to 72nd)
Buffalo: up 2.9 points (from 99th to 87th)
James Madison: up 2.8 points (from 50th to 36th)
Arizona: up 2.8 points (from 43rd to 31st)
UTSA: up 2.7 points (from 70th to 65th)
North Carolina: up 2.5 points (from 98th to 89th)
The ACC’s oddities didn’t stop at the games involving ranked teams. Duke’s win over Clemson was the most statistically unlikely result of the week — Duke somehow won despite a mammoth efficiency disadvantage (success rate: Clemson 58.3%, Duke 37.5%) — and in Tallahassee, Florida State somehow transferred all of its bad vibes to its opponent. Wake Forest collapsed under the weight of its mistakes and the Seminoles’ sudden excellence, and the teams basically traded seven points: FSU moved up 3.3 and, as you’ll see below, Wake moved down 3.7.
Meanwhile, this is the faintest of praise, but since bottoming out at 103rd in SP+ three weeks ago, North Carolina has rallied to 89th, suffering a pair of gut-wrenching losses and finally getting off the schneid with a thumping of quarterback-less Syracuse. The Tar Heels will have to pull at least a pair of upsets to have any hope of bowling, but improvement can be encouraging in and of itself.
Moving down
Here are the 10 teams whose ratings fell the most:
Wake Forest: down 3.7 adjusted points per game (ranking fell from 56th to 68th)
Cincinnati: down 3.5 points (from 23rd to 32nd)
Maryland: down 3.3 points (from 37th to 51st)
Georgia Tech: down 3.2 points (from 25th to 34th)
Boise State: down 3.0 points (from 47th to 55th)
Colorado: down 3.0 points (from 68th to 82nd)
UCF: down 2.9 points (from 51st to 56th)
Rutgers: down 2.5 points (from 63rd to 69th)
Sam Houston: down 2.4 points (no change from 135th)
South Carolina: down 2.4 points (from 54th to 61st)
Georgia Tech entered Week 10 as the lowest-ranked unbeaten power-conference team by a comfortable margin. After getting pushed around by NC State, the Yellow Jackets are lodged between 4-5 Auburn and James Madison in SP+.
Who won the Heisman this week?
I am once again awarding the Heisman every week of the season and doling out weekly points, F1-style (in this case, 10 points for first place, 9 for second and so on). How will this Heisman race play out, and how different will the result be from the actual Heisman voting?
Here is this week’s Heisman top 10:
1. Jeff Sims, Arizona State (13-for-24 passing for 177 yards, 1 TD and 1 INT, plus 228 non-sack rushing yards and 2 TDs against Iowa State).
2. Julian Sayin, Ohio State (20-for-23 passing for 316 yards and 4 touchdowns against Penn State).
3. CJ Bailey, NC State (24-for-32 passing for 340 yards and 2 touchdowns, plus 41 non-sack rushing yards and a TD against Georgia Tech).
4. Jordan Marshall, Michigan (25 carries for 185 yards and 3 touchdowns, plus 25 receiving yards against Purdue).
5. Owen McCown, UTSA (31-for-33 passing for 370 yards and 4 touchdowns against Tulane).
6. Jeremiyah Love, Notre Dame (17 carries for 136 yards and 2 touchdowns, plus 30 receiving yards against Boston College).
7. Arch Manning, Texas (25-for-33 passing for 328 yards and 3 touchdowns against Vanderbilt).
8. Haynes King, Georgia Tech (25-for-35 passing for 408 yards, 2 TDs and 1 INT, plus 113 non-sack rushing yards and 2 TDs against NC State).
9. Darian Mensah, Duke (27-for-41 passing for 361 yards and 4 touchdowns against Clemson).
10. Melkart Abou Jaoude, North Carolina (6 tackles, 2.5 TFLs, 2 sacks and 1 forced fumble against Syracuse).
Jeff Sims is the journeyman prototype for the transfer portal era. He has started 28 career games at three schools (Georgia Tech, Nebraska and Arizona State), and in those, he has produced some duds — 10 games with a Total QBR under 30.0, three under 10.0. But he has also thrown for more than 250 yards five times and rushed for 100 or more yards (not including sacks) seven times. And on Saturday in Ames, Iowa, he painted a Sims-ian masterpiece, throwing the ball reasonably well but ripping off an 88-yard touchdown run in the third quarter and nearly doubling his previous career high in rushing.
Sims is quite obviously not a Heisman contender, but one of the reasons I love this Heisman of the Week approach is that we can celebrate when guys like Sims do something beautiful. He even topped nearly perfect performances from Julian Sayin and Owen McCown and a gutsy, hobbled game from CJ Bailey.
Honorable mention:
• Luke Altmyer, Illinois (19-for-31 passing for 235 yards, 4 TDs and 1 INT, plus 95 non-sack rushing yards and a TD against Rutgers).
• Alonza Barnett III, James Madison (12-for-18 passing for 264 yards, 4 TDs and 1 INT, plus 102 non-sack rushing yards and a TD against Texas State).
• Tommy Castellanos, Florida State (12-for-16 passing for 271 yards and a touchdown, plus 18 non-sack rushing yards and a TD against Wake Forest).
• Evan Dickens, Liberty (22 carries for 217 yards and 4 touchdowns against Delaware).
• Caleb Hawkins, North Texas (33 carries for 197 yards and 4 touchdowns, plus 9 receiving yards against Navy).
• Kevin Jennings, SMU (29-for-44 passing for 365 yards and a touchdown, plus a rushing touchdown against Miami).
• Jayden Scott, NC State (24 carries for 196 yards and a touchdown, plus 11 receiving yards against Georgia Tech).
• Danny Scudero, San Jose State (7 catches for 215 yards and 2 touchdowns against Hawai’i).
Through 10 weeks, here are your points leaders. I’ve bolded the guys who are also in the top 12 in the current Heisman betting odds.
1. Ty Simpson, Alabama (29 points)
2. Taylen Green, Arkansas (27)
3T. Trinidad Chambliss, Ole Miss (25)
3T. Julian Sayin, Ohio State (25)
5. Demond Williams Jr., Washington (21)
6T. Fernando Mendoza, Indiana (19)
6T. Gunner Stockton, Georgia (19)
8. Luke Altmyer, Illinois (16)
9. Diego Pavia, Vanderbilt (14)
10T. Haynes King, Georgia Tech (13)
10T. Jeremiyah Love, Notre Dame (13)
We might be approaching a “Winner takes the No. 1 seed, winning QB takes the Heisman” game between Sayin’s Ohio State — the current Heisman betting favorite, per ESPN BET — and Mendoza’s Indiana in the Big Ten championship game in four weeks. Simpson, Chambliss and Stockton still have clear paths to impress, however, and with Love shifting into fifth gear over the past two games (a combined 41 carries for 364 yards) he might catch voters’ eyes if he keeps ripping off 94-yard touchdown runs.
My 10 favorite games of the weekend
1 and 2. SMU 26, No. 10 Miami 20 (OT) and Duke 46, Clemson 45. Obviously, Miami was the main character in Saturday’s loss, but what a performance by SMU. Kevin Jennings nearly landed on the Heisman of the Week list with 365 yards, a TD pass and a TD run, and the Mustangs’ defense, much improved of late, allowed just one gain of more than 25 yards, forced Miami to go the length of the field and pounced on mistakes. A great performance in a frustrating season.
Meanwhile, because Manny Diaz is a soccer fan, I can confidently say he’ll know what I mean when I say Duke pulled an absolute smash-and-grab in Death Valley, overcoming a massive efficiency disadvantage with a kick return score and not only a 5-for-5 performance on fourth down but 29 points scored after a fourth-down conversion. The Blue Devils remain in the ACC title race, and Clemson has only about a 39% chance of bowling, per SP+.
3. Division II: No. 7 CSU-Pueblo 24, No. 6 Western Colorado 21. I love it when one of the Smaller-School Showcase games in my Friday preview lives up to its billing. Unbeaten WCU bolted to a 21-0 lead in the second quarter, but CSU-Pueblo had tied it by the end of the third quarter, with help from an 88-yard Roman Fuller-to-Marcellus Honeycutt Jr. touchdown pass. In the end, the Thunderwolves won with special teams: First, Jusiah Sampleton blocked a 47-yard field goal attempt with 4:01 left; then, after a 20-yard pass on third-and-16, Jackson Smith knocked in a 32-yarder as time expired.
4. FCS: No. 25 Abilene Christian 31, No. 2 Tarleton State 28. Tarleton State was the best FCS team not named North Dakota State heading into the weekend, and after entering the fourth quarter down 28-10, the Texans rallied to tie it with 56 seconds left. But a 38-yard pass from Stone Earle to Bryan Henry set up Brandon Perez‘s 47-yard buzzer-beater. TSU is unbeaten no more.
5. No. 5 Georgia 24, Florida 20. This game would rank higher if Georgia hadn’t been involved, but the Bulldogs have pulled the football version of the “Call the ambulance … but not for me” meme too many times, falling behind and then winning with perfect late execution. Regardless, it was a fun, tense way to spend an afternoon even if I didn’t doubt the outcome.
6 and 7. FCS: Idaho 35, Northern Arizona 32 (OT) (Friday) and Idaho State 38, No. 6 UC Davis 36. Drama in the Big Sky! On Friday night in Flagstaff, Arizona, Idaho watched a 26-7 lead turn into a 29-26 fourth-quarter deficit, but Owen Adams nailed a 42-yard field goal at the buzzer, and after forcing an overtime field goal, the Vandals walked it off with a short Hayden Kincheloe touchdown.
On Saturday in Davis, California, Idaho State, which has felt pretty close to an upset win all season, got one thanks to a 219-yard rushing performance from Dason Brooks and a 50-yard, final-minute field goal from Trajan Sinatra, the best-named kicker this side of Florida’s Trey Smack.
0:26
Trajan Sinatra makes 50-yard field goal
Trajan Sinatra makes 50-yard field goal
8. Mississippi State 38, Arkansas 35. After heartbreaking losses to Texas and Florida extended MSU’s SEC losing streak to 16 games (and more than two calendar years), it would take something special to end the streak. Like a game-ending 17-0 run, 193 penalty yards from Arkansas and a monstrous 18-yard catch and touchdown run from Anthony Evans III.
9. New Mexico 40, UNLV 35. If you watched this one as I advised, you were rewarded. New Mexico played catch-and-release, losing leads of 21-0 and 34-21, but with the game on the line, the Lobos executed a perfect, eight-play, 75-yard touchdown drive, taking the lead on a 13-yard D.J. McKinney run, then making two late stops to move to 6-2 and secure bowl eligibility. It’s hard to say enough about the job Jason Eck has done there in Year 1.
10. Division II: West Texas A&M 53, Texas A&M-Kingsville 48. There should always be room for a nutty track meet on this list, and if you missed the first eight minutes of this one, you missed (1) a 74-yard return on the opening kickoff, (2) a 26-yard touchdown on the first offensive play, (3) a sack-and-strip fumble, (4) a 99-yard kick return, (5) two turnovers on downs and (6) a 43-yard touchdown pass. West Texas A&M took a 22-6 lead from all of that, Kingsville responded with a 22-3 run to charge ahead, and we got six more lead changes from there. Goodness.
11. NAIA: No. 14 Indiana Wesleyan 56, Taylor 48.
12. No. 20 Texas 34, No. 9 Vanderbilt 31.
13. No. 18 Oklahoma 33, No. 14 Tennessee 27.
14. Oregon State 10, Washington State 7.
15. FCS: Central Connecticut 10, Long Island 7.
16. NAIA: Cumberland 40, Cumberlands 37.
17. Minnesota 23, Michigan State 20 (OT).
19. Division II: Chowan 34, Erskine 30.
20. Division III: Wesleyan 34, Williams 28 (OT).
The midweek playlist
Here’s your quick reminder that the CFP rankings are only the second-biggest landmark of the coming week. That’s right: IT’S MIDWEEK MACTION TIME. And we start with a doozy.
Miami (Ohio) at Ohio (Tuesday, 7 p.m., ESPN2). Miami has won five straight since an 0-3 start, and Ohio, the defending champ, has won four of five. The winner of this one will be your odds-on MAC favorite.
UTSA at USF (Thursday, 7:30 p.m., ESPN). USF needs to win out to keep AAC title (and playoff) hopes alive, and UTSA is coming off by far its best performance of the season.
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