‘I’m surprised it wasn’t 101-100:’ How one 1990 game showed the future of college football
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Dave Wilson, ESPN Staff Writer
ON NOV. 3, 1990, all hell broke loose in the Astrodome.
The TCU Horned Frogs and Houston Cougars combined to make history, stunning the college football world in a shootout that defied belief, with Houston ultimately prevailing, 56-35. Seven NCAA records were set, including a combined 1,563 yards of offense and the most combined passing yards in a game (1,253). There were 13 touchdown drives, with the longest one clocking in at 1:39. As in 99 seconds.
The game drew just 25,725 fans and aired on tape delay at 12:30 a.m. the next day on a regional network called Home Sports Entertainment. Yet, 33 years later, its legacy will be felt in the Cougars’ first Big 12 game, which reunites Houston and TCU in college football’s highest levels for the first time since the Southwest Conference dissolved after the 1995 season.
The game became national news with highlights across the country showing footballs flying left and right, more akin to a tennis match than a football game in that era. That’s what happens when a backup quarterback making his first start, TCU’s Matt Vogler, throws for 690 yards and his opponent, David Klingler, adds 563 and seven touchdowns.
Sonny Dykes, then a baseball player at Texas Tech, couldn’t believe what he was seeing. Hal Mumme, then the coach at miniscule Iowa Wesleyan, watched TCU coach Jim Wacker’s weekly show to see what he was up to, jealous of the yardage they piled up.
“Maybe we’re not crazy after all,” Mumme told his offensive coordinator, Mike Leach, as they continued trying to light up scoreboards of their own, with a sophomore receiver named Dana Holgorsen catching passes in their newly christened Air Raid scheme.
Dykes said this week the game was one that piqued his interest in coaching football, despite not playing in college. He grew up in the SWC era while his dad, Spike Dykes, was the head coach at Texas Tech. In the 1986 season, Spike’s first year as the Red Raiders’ coach, Houston averaged 96.6 passing yards per game under Bill Yeoman, the pioneer of the famed veer option rushing attack, while Wacker, a veer acolyte himself, and TCU averaged 109.6. Just four years later, this was a seismic shift.
“I had just never seen anything like it before, in particular two Texas teams,” Sonny Dykes said. “I just remember thinking, ‘Man, if this is what the future looks like, I’m pretty excited about it.'”
Dykes went all in. The record for the combined quarterbacks’ yardage stood until 2014, when it was broken by Washington State’s Connor Halliday (734) and Cal’s Jared Goff (527) for a total of 1,261 yards. The two coaches in that one: Leach and Dykes. In 2016, it was broken again by Texas Tech’s Patrick Mahomes (734) and Oklahoma’s Baker Mayfield (545), both with Air Raid playcallers, Kliff Kingsbury and Lincoln Riley, who played when Leach and Dykes were coaching in Lubbock.
Bob DeBesse, TCU’s offensive coordinator in 1990, who’s now the head coach at Grapevine High School in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, says that long-ago game still feels current.
“It was a glimpse into the future,” DeBesse said. “But who would have ever guessed the future would look like it does?”
JOHN JENKINS ALWAYS believed football should look like it does. He’s a cocky, enigmatic, secretive mad scientist of a coach and the architect of Houston’s version of the run ‘n’ shoot. He coached alongside run ‘n’ shoot guru Mouse Davis for the Houston Gamblers of the USFL, then was promoted to replace Davis as offensive coordinator and got to work tweaking the scheme. In his first game as a playcaller, he rallied the Gamblers and quarterback Jim Kelly from a 33-13 deficit with eight minutes left in the game to a 34-33 win that Sports Illustrated called “The Greatest Game Never Seen” because it also wasn’t televised.
By the time he got to UH in 1987, as offensive coordinator for Jack Pardee, the Cougars were in trouble. In Yeoman’s last season in 1986, the Cougars finished 1-11 and were under NCAA investigation, as much of the SWC was in this era. Jenkins said there was even talk of dropping football.
“The Astrodome was no longer an Eighth Wonder of the World; nobody cared anymore and they didn’t want to see that,” Jenkins said. “Jack Pardee asked me to go talk to half a dozen boosters and I told them, ‘Hey, wait a minute, don’t even think about dropping football at this school. You have no idea what’s fixin’ to happen.’ I’d heard them all — [Baylor’s] Grant Teaff and [Texas’] David McWilliams and Spike and everybody, R.C. [Slocum at Texas A&M], all those guys talking piling up bodies for a 2-yard gain. They have no idea what’s fixin’ to hit them. There’s gonna be some nosebleeds up in the upper deck with balls flying through the air.”
By 1989, Jenkins was right. The Cougars scored 53.5 points a game. They averaged 511 passing yards and 625 total yards (both still NCAA records), culminating in a Heisman Trophy for Andre Ware. Manny Hazard caught a record 142 passes. Chuck Weatherspoon averaged a record 9.6 yards per carry. Houston topped the 60-point mark five times that year, including scoring 95 against SMU and rolling up 1,021 yards of offense (also still a record, as you might guess). Again, nobody saw it, because the Cougars were banned from television because they were on a third NCAA probation because of an estimated 250 recruiting violations at the end of the 25-year Yeoman era, according to the NCAA.
Wacker too had realized that to keep up at TCU, he was going to have to ditch the veer. A few years prior, he installed the “triple shoot,” a variation of the run ‘n’ shoot that utilized more tight ends and backs. Before Leach’s Air Raid offense at Texas Tech made Big 12 teams keep pace, Jenkins was already doing it.
This caught the eye of Stephen Shipley, a highly recruited receiver from East Texas. Shipley has his own deep connections to the evolution of football in the state. He’s the uncle of Jordan and Jaxson Shipley, the former Texas Longhorns wide receivers. But in the late 1980s, his high school, Lindale, was throwing the ball more than most Texas schools did, thanks to the talented Shipley and a strong-armed quarterback named Pat Mahomes. As in the former major leaguer and father of the reigning Super Bowl MVP.
“I remember getting calls from OU and A&M and my first response was, ‘Heck no, I’m not coming to block for your running backs,'” Shipley said. “I wanted to catch the ball. That was the main reason I went to TCU. I knew they had the sanctions, limited scholarships, and it was going to be a tough road, but it was a chance to be a part of the change of the game.”
After the 1989 season, Pardee was hired as the coach of the Houston Oilers (where he unleashed the same offensive assault with Warren Moon across town), and Jenkins succeeded him at U of H as head coach. As his own boss, Jenkins could be as brash as he wanted, like when he unleashed Klingler to throw 11 touchdowns against Eastern Washington that season. When Houston and TCU finally met in Nov. 1990, the Southwest Conference, the laboratory that gave us the Wishbone and the Veer, now saw two dueling all-out aerial attacks.
Marc Dove, TCU’s defensive coordinator at the time, had worked for Emory Bellard, the inventor of the wishbone alongside Jenkins — who was his linebackers coach — at Mississippi State, and said the run ‘n’ shoot was much more challenging to defend. So when it came time to face his old friend Jenkins and Klingler, he knew he had his work cut out for him.
“We tried about everything and found not much of anything that worked,” Dove said of devising schemes to beat the run ‘n’ shoot.
When it came time to face Houston in 1990, Dove tried to mix up coverages, but was also aggressive. Klingler threw four interceptions, though Jenkins said some were bobbled passes and weren’t on him. Still, the machine wasn’t up to Jenkins’ standards at times.
“The expectation was perfection, we expected to score on every play. I remember coming off the field after a five-play drive and Jenks would be pissed, saying ‘What are we doing out there? What’s taking us so long to score?'” Klingler said, laughing. “He was just as frustrated as he could be, because we left three or four touchdowns on the field in five plays and he’d had just about enough of watching it.”
Vogler, meanwhile, was under fire the entire game. Jenkins didn’t believe the backup could stand up to the pressure, so he instructed his defensive coordinator, Larry Coyer, to blitz him relentlessly.
“Oh, [Coyer] was nervous as hell,” Jenkins said. “They all are, all those defensive guys. They always worry like hell, they’re going to get burned on a blitz. Hey, in my opinion, we were ready to go and did not think they could hold up and match us score for score.”
But Vogler did. He stood in there and kept throwing it over the top, including an 80-yard touchdown to Cedric Jackson and an 88-yard score to Kyle McPherson in the first half alone. Klingler, meanwhile, threw four touchdowns passes in the first half as Houston took a 28-14 lead.
“I can remember we’re starting to run off the field at halftime and we crossed paths,” Dove said of his friend Jenkins and Coyer, who he also knew well. “I said, ‘You’re gonna get me fired, John!’ He said, ‘Well, that’s the way it goes.’ And then Coyer said, ‘You’re doing better than me!'”
Vogler rallied TCU with a big third quarter, tying the score at 28-28 with a 9-yard TD to Shipley.
“They blitzed more than anybody I’ve ever seen in my life,” Vogler said. “We were shocked, like, ‘Guys, it’s not working. We’re dropping 88-yard bombs on you because you’re blitzing. Keep doing it and we’ll keep doing this and we’ll just see whoever shakes out with the most points.’ That’s pretty much what happened.”
Klingler and Houston, however, rolled from there, including two touchdown passes to Marcus Grant, who was being covered by TCU’s Larry Brown, the future Super Bowl MVP for the Dallas Cowboys. Grant’s final line: 3 catches, 103 yards, 3 touchdowns.
“I don’t remember what the score was,” Dove said, being reminded it was 56-34. “I’m surprised it wasn’t 101-100.”
There was zero reason to expect this result. Vogler had arrived at TCU because Auburn was put on probation and players could transfer. He was looking for a home, but Auburn was on the quarters system and most schools had already begun classes. He knew some coaches at TCU through his family, so he flew in, arrived on the final day of enrollment, and was running the scout team a week later, backing up Leon Clay.
After Clay was injured, Vogler came into the Houston game with no touchdowns and three interceptions on the year. He finished his first start by going 44-of-79 (an NCAA record for attempts) for 690 yards, five touchdowns and two interceptions. The Frogs finished with five 100-yard receivers, each of whom caught a touchdown.
“The stars have got to be aligned to have that many yards passing and that much explosiveness on both sides of the ball,” DeBesse said. “Larry Coyer went on to become a highly successful defensive coordinator in the NFL for years, but when we shook hands at the end of that game, I’ll never forget the bewildered look on his face. All he said was, ‘What the hell just happened?’ I’ll never forget that. I think we all kind of felt a little bit of that.”
KLINGLER COMPLETED 36 of 53 passes for 563 with 7 TDs and 4 interceptions. Hazard caught 13 for 164. Weatherspoon, the 5-foot-7, 230-pound human wrecking ball, had 17 carries for 178 yards and a TD and caught 6 passes for 92 yards and 2 TDs.
“We would throw about 300 passes a day every practice,” Klingler said. “Game day was like a day off. When you look back on that day, and even the day that I threw for 716 yards against Arizona State, I went 40 for 70. I mean, I missed 30 passes. So it was really actually a pretty bad day. But what we did, we did so well that you could miss 30 times and still put up ridiculous numbers.”
Vogler said the Frogs were not prepared for a four-hour game, missed their flight and had to charter a plane home. In addition to those 79 pass attempts, he had 15 of the Frogs’ 21 carries. He said he spent the flight back to Fort Worth lying in the aisle, with an IV in his arm.
“I was cramping, my legs were locking up and I was dehydrated,” Vogler said. “It was an event, man, and I just got home and went straight to bed. I don’t think most of us woke up until midday the next day.”
Klingler, meanwhile, says he didn’t see the big deal.
“Oh, we would’ve played them in a doubleheader,” he said, laughing.
In a presocial media era, with no television, most of the country found out about the donnybrook the next morning in their local newspapers. Jenkins said that’s when the calls started.
“When Matt registered those kinds of numbers and still got beat by three touchdowns, people started asking, ‘What in the world is going on down there?'” he said.
Dykes said he was always fascinated by Jenkins. Mumme said he started out as a run ‘n’ shoot coach, and has spoken at clinics with Jenkins for decades. But they all agree that nobody knows exactly how Jenkins did it, because his offense is complicated, with receivers automatically converting routes on every play based on coverage, and quarterbacks who have to be in sync. Jenkins was notoriously secretive, rebuffing any attempts to come study what he did, including from Joe Paterno who called to say his quarterbacks kept showing him highlights of Houston and he wanted to know more.
“[Jenkins] was ahead of his time for sure. He was the offensive guru in college football. Not only could nobody figure it out, he didn’t let anybody figure it out,” DeBesse said. “He’s very secretive about what he was doing.”
Klingler agreed.
“You’d have a better chance to get something out of a Russian spy,” Klingler said. “I don’t know that anybody today is doing what he was doing — or has any idea what he was doing. That’s the problem. Me and my brother [Jimmy, who followed him as the Houston starter], Andre [Ware] and Jenks are probably the four guys that know what we were doing, and it’ll probably die with us.”
The Southwest Conference was hobbled by infighting and NCAA punishment, mostly affecting recruiting by any school not named Texas or Texas A&M. After a magical 10-1 season in 1990, with a loss only to Texas, Jenkins suffered through two 4-7 seasons and was forced to resign. Wacker finished 7-4 in 1991, but didn’t make a bowl game. He departed for Minnesota. Both programs suffered in the aftermath. Houston won four games over the next three seasons under Kim Helton. TCU went 13-20-1 in the same span under Pat Sullivan.
A Big 12 matchup marks a new era in the rivalry, with two coaches in Holgorsen and Dykes who are students of games like these.
“When I was a sophomore and junior in college I actually went to several clinics to hear John speak and take notes,” Dykes said. “John had his way, his belief of doing things and that had a huge impact on the Air Raid. The shovel passes and the screens that run ‘n’ shoot teams threw were a big part of the early Air Raid scheme. Football is all about six degrees of separation and there’s piles of influence everywhere. All of our philosophies got shaped by people and events that we didn’t really even know would have an impact on the way we think and what we do as a result.”
The 1990 game, a split-second in the grand scheme of football’s history, made a lasting impression. On Saturday night, the Coogs and Frogs will be pitching it around again in a game that means something.
“Houston finally gets to compete with major college competition again, and they open up with TCU to start with,” Jenkins said. “How about that? What a joy to see that again.”
While optimism runs high at most every college football program this time of year, even the rosiest picture has some lurking shadows.
That is true even for the 25 teams in our post-spring Power Rankings. No matter how deep the rosters seem, everyone has some question marks or potential weak spots.
Our college football reporters take a look at the biggest areas of concern for each of the top teams, the potential Achilles’ heel that could keep them from reaching their goals for the season.
Area of concern: Wide receiver
The Nittany Lions addressed the wide receiver spot in the portal with Syracuse’s Trebor Pena and others, but until they actually elevate their production, questions will linger. Penn State has had only one wide receiver rank among the top 10 in the Big Ten in receiving in the past three seasons (Tyler Warren played tight end). Both Warren and top receiver Harrison Wallace III are gone, and Penn State needs its portal haul — Pena, a second-team All-ACC wideout in 2024, as well as Devonte Ross (Troy) and Kyron Hudson (USC) — to give quarterback Drew Allar enough capable targets this fall. Although Allar’s big-game struggles are also concerning, he hasn’t had a great group of receivers at his disposal during his Penn State career. — Adam Rittenberg
Area of concern: Running back
The position group that has been discussed more than any other since the spring at Clemson is running back — the only position on offense that loses the bulk of its production with Phil Mafah off to the NFL. But the Tigers have plenty of depth at running back, and that should help ease any concerns as they move into fall camp. Particularly because running back traditionally has been an area where Clemson has excelled, even when other groups on offense took a step back. (Clemson has had a 1,000-yard rusher 11 of the past 16 years, and that does not include 2023, when Mafah and Will Shipley split the carries nearly evenly and combined for more than 1,700 yards.) It is easy to see true freshman Gideon Davidson as a breakout player, considering the success Clemson has had with true freshman backs since Dabo Swinney arrived. Clemson also has receiver Adam Randall taking reps at running back to help round out the depth in a room that also features Keith Adams Jr. and David Eziomume. Jay Haynes continues to rehab a knee injury. — Andrea Adelson
Area of concern: Offensive line
The Longhorns lost four starters on the O-line to the NFL draft and are breaking in a new quarterback, although Arch Manning made two starts last season, as well as several key receivers with the losses of Matthew Golden, Isaiah Bond and tight end Gunnar Helm. They lost tackle Kelvin Banks Jr., the 2025 No. 9 draft pick, but Trevor Goosby got some key playing time last year at the position when Banks was injured. The Longhorns also lost 56-game starter Jake Majors at center and face Ohio State in Week 1, posing a quick learning curve for an almost completely new offensive line group. — Dave Wilson
Area of concern: Pass rush
The Bulldogs lost six veteran contributors on their front seven on defense, none more important than edge rushers Jalon Walker, Mykel Williams and Chaz Chambliss. Walker and Williams were first-round picks in the NFL draft, and Chambliss was an unheralded contributor over four seasons. They combined for 18 sacks and 28.5 tackles for loss in 2024. Making matters worse, Damon Wilson, a projected replacement on the edge, transferred to Missouri. Georgia feels good about Gabe Harris Jr., and it added Army transfer Elo Modozie, who had 6.5 sacks for the Black Knights last season. — Mark Schlabach
Area of concern: Quarterback
Quarterback Will Howard was everything the Buckeyes could have hoped for last year in his lone season at Ohio State. He was spectacular during the College Football Playoff, posting a QBR of 97.2 over four games during the Buckeyes’ march to the national championship. With Howard now in the NFL, the Buckeyes will be turning to either former five-star freshman Julian Sayin or Lincoln Kienholz this season, pending who wins the job during camp. Throwing to all-world wideout Jeremiah Smith will bolster whomever the starting quarterback winds up being. But even with Smith and All-American safety Caleb Downs anchoring each side of the ball, it’s difficult envisioning the Buckeyes truly contending again unless Ohio State gets good-to-great quarterback play like it did last season. — Jake Trotter
Area of concern: Offensive line
I don’t know that LSU has to necessarily worry about the offensive line because of moves made this offseason, but it has to be something to keep an eye on just because of the magnitude of the losses. The Tigers had one of the best tackle duos in all of college football last season in Will Campbell and Emery Jones, who were first- and third-round NFL draft picks. They lost four starters across the line in total. DJ Chester and Tyree Adams are back in different spots, while Brian Kelly added Braelin Moore from Virginia Tech. — Harry Lyles Jr.
Area of concern: Tight end
Since 2011, the Fighting Irish have had a whopping 10 tight ends selected in the NFL draft, including last season’s leading receiver, Mitchell Evans, who had 43 catches for 421 yards with three touchdowns. While the Irish feel they’ve upgraded their wide receiver group with the additions of Virginia transfer Malachi Fields and Wisconsin’s Will Pauling, tight end remains a bit of a question mark heading into preseason camp. Senior Eli Raridon has the size (6-foot-7) and hands to excel at the position, but he was plagued by injuries during his first couple of college seasons, after tearing an ACL as a freshman. He had 11 catches for 90 yards with two touchdowns in 2024. The status of another tight end, Cooper Flanagan, who tore his left Achilles tendon in the Sugar Bowl, is in question. — Mark Schlabach
Area of concern: Defensive line
It’s hard to say whether this is an area of concern just yet, but there are question marks with Oregon’s defensive line as the Ducks lost both Derrick Harmon and Jordan Burch from last year (as well as Jamaree Caldwell). Defensive end is a strength with Matayo Uiagalelei holding down the edge, but the rest of the line will require some newcomers to step up, such as USC transfer Bear Alexander and rising lineman Aydin Breland, who could be in line for a breakout season. A’mauri Washington, one of the few returning players, will likely be a fixture of the new-look line as well. — Paolo Uggetti
Area of concern: Pass rush
Alabama finished 13th in the SEC last season in quarterback sacks, and while sacks aren’t the end-all when it comes to rushing the passer, the Crimson Tide need to be more consistent in getting to the opposing quarterback. There’s not a pure edge pass rusher in the mold of Will Anderson Jr. or Dallas Turner on this roster, meaning Alabama will need to get more pressure from its interior linemen and perhaps a breakout season from redshirt sophomore outside linebacker Qua Russaw. — Chris Low
Area of concern: Quarterback
When the season ended, quarterback figured to be an obvious strength for BYU considering Jake Retzlaff was set to return. But with him expected to transfer as of late June, the Cougars are left without an established starter. McCae Hillstead showed flashes at Utah State in 2023, Treyson Bourguet started eight games in two years for Western Michigan and true freshman Bear Bachmeier was a big-time recruit who enrolled briefly at Stanford earlier this offseason before leaving for Provo. The expectation is that all three will have a chance to earn the starting job in fall camp, without a clear-cut front-runner. — Kyle Bonagura
Area of concern: Offensive explosiveness
The Illini had a good and efficient offense in 2024, but they weren’t particularly explosive, tying for 64th nationally in plays of 10 yards or longer and tying for 66th in plays of 20 yards or longer. Although quarterback Luke Altmyer and a veteran offensive line return, Illinois needs to replace its top two receivers in Pat Bryant and Zakhari Franklin, who are off to the NFL, and leading rusher Josh McCray, who transferred to Georgia. Offensive coordinator Barry Lunney thinks Collin Dixon, who averaged 14.7 yards per catch in limited work last fall, and incoming freshman Brayden Trimble can spark the offense. “Overall, we’re going to have a little bit more vertical speed in what we’re doing to stretch the defense than what we did,” Lunney told me. “That’s no slight on Zakhari or Pat at all. Those were just kind of bigger, stronger guys.” — Rittenberg
Area of concern: Pass rush
ASU’s late-season surge, from a decent team to one capable of coming within one play of the CFP semifinals, took place primarily thanks to players who are returning in 2025. Obviously losing star running back Cam Skattebo hurts, but the Sun Devils have some of the best overall returning production numbers in the country. We don’t know that they have a pass rush, though. It was an issue last season — ASU ranked just 110th in sacks per dropback — and while both of their sacks leaders (Clayton Smith and Elijah O’Neal) return, that duo combined for just 8.5 sacks between them. Kenny Dillingham evidently thought he had the answers in house, as he didn’t add a single edge rusher in the transfer portal, but while the secondary is sound and experienced, giving QBs too much time to find receivers can bring down even the most seasoned defense. — Bill Connelly
Area of concern: Defensive front
What was perhaps South Carolina’s biggest strength last season could be its biggest concern going into 2025. Gone up front are stalwarts Kyle Kennard, Bam Martin-Scott, Demetrius Knight and TJ Sanders, among others. That left a lot of holes to fill, and the Gamecocks largely addressed them by hitting the portal hard. Rising star Dylan Stewart will be the flashiest player and Bryan Thomas is the lone established senior, with transfers Gabriel Brownlow-Dindy, Davonte Miles and Justin Okoronkwo filling a big void. But perhaps the biggest name to know is sophomore Fred “JayR” Johnson, a rangy linebacker with lauded leadership skills who South Carolina hopes will blossom into the centerpiece of the defense after playing a small role as a freshman in 2024. — David Hale
Area of concern: Wide receiver
With receivers Jaylin Noel and Jayden Higgins both off to the NFL — having been drafted by the Houston Texans in back-to-back rounds — receiver is a good place to start. Noel and Higgins combined for nearly 2,400 receiving yards last season and that type of production will need to be replaced by more than just two players. But even with those holes to fill, the lack of a pass rush last season remains a glaring question mark. If the Cyclones can’t improve upon their conference-worst sack total, it’s hard to see how they can make a run at the Big 12 title, especially given the unknowns at receiver. — Bonagura
Area of concern: Defensive line
One of the most underappreciated keys to SMU’s playoff run last season was the veteran talent up front on defense. Elijah Roberts, Jared Harrison-Hunte and Jahfari Harvey all came from Miami and had multiple years as a starter under their belts in 2024. There won’t be nearly so much experience this year. Add in the departures of Ahmad Walker and Kobe Wilson at linebacker, and there’s a vacuum waiting to be filled in terms of leadership. SMU does return safety Isaiah Nwokobia, who was an All-ACC performer last season, and there’s buzz surrounding East Carolina transfer Zakye Barker at linebacker, but establishing some key voices — and performers — on the D-line remains a question. — Hale
Area of concern: Defense
Does the defensive makeover actually work? The Red Raiders’ D can’t get much worse than what it was in 2024, and that’s not hyperbole. Texas Tech finished 126th in total defense in 2024. The secondary was 132nd in passing yards per game. Shiel Wood takes over as defensive coordinator, and there have been tons of portal additions to this side of the ball. Players such as Stanford linebacker David Bailey and Georgia Tech end Romello Height stand out, along with five transfer defensive backs. There’s really only one way for this group to go, and it’s up. — Lyles Jr.
Area of concern: Defense
Despite the fact that talented defensive end Mikail Kamara is returning, the transfer-heavy unit that allowed the fewest rushing yards per game in the Big Ten last season lost some key contributors. Gone to the NFL are CJ West and James Carpenter, and while Indiana did not hesitate to dip into the transfer portal to reload with players such as Hosea Wheeler (Western Kentucky), Stephen Daley (Kent State), Dominique Ratcliff (Texas State) and Kellan Wyatt (Maryland), one of the Hoosiers’ strongest position groups last year has a lot to prove and live up to in 2025. — Uggetti
Area of concern: Stopping big plays
K-State’s offense was delightfully explosive last season, but the defense often gave up as many big plays as the offense created. The Wildcats blitzed a lot and harassed QBs well, but they ranked 110th in Total QBR allowed and 107th in completions of 10 or more yards allowed. That’s a concern considering the defense lost both leading pass rusher Brendan Mott and four of last year’s five starters in the secondary. Defensive coordinator Joe Klanderman might have to fiddle with the risk-reward balance to get the most out of this defense and help the Wildcats contend in the ultracompetitive Big 12. — Connelly
Area of concern: Wide receiver
One of the reasons Florida is expected to improve in 2025 is because of the talent that quarterback DJ Lagway brings. But the Gators’ top receivers from last season, Elijhah Badger and Chimere Dike, left for the NFL. Eugene Wilson III is back, but also coming off season-ending hip surgery. It will be up to Vernell Brown III, Dallas Wilson, Naeshaun Montgomery and J. Michael Sturdivant (UCLA transfer) to help establish themselves. — Lyles Jr.
Area of concern: Wide receiver
The Wolverines ranked 129th last season with just 1,678 passing yards. Quarterback play was part of the issue, as Michigan cycled through three quarterbacks (Davis Warren, Jack Tuttle and Alex Orji) in its first season after losing national champion JJ McCarthy. But Michigan’s receivers collectively didn’t make enough plays, as no wideout caught more than 27 passes or totaled more than 248 yards. The onus will be even greater on Michigan’s receivers with tight end Colston Loveland — the Wolverines’ only reliable target last year — now playing for the Chicago Bears. Instant impact from transfers Anthony Simpson (UMass) and Donaven McCulley (Indiana), combined with internal improvement from the likes of Fredrick Moore and Semaj Morgan, will be paramount if Michigan is going to threaten opposing defensive backfields in 2025. — Trotter
Area of concern: Linebacker
The Hurricanes did another fantastic job shoring up positions across the roster in the transfer portal, especially considering how much turnover they had from last season. But if there is one position that still has some questions, it is linebacker, mainly because depth may become an issue as the season wears on. Miami returns three key veterans in Wesley Bissainthe, Jaylin Alderman and Popo Aguirre, and signed NC State transfer Kamal Bonner and Rutgers transfer Mo Toure. Miami often looked slow and out of position at linebacker last season, but the new scheme from defensive coordinator Corey Hetherman should help. The player to keep an eye on here is Toure, whom Hetherman coached while he was at Rutgers. Toure is coming off a knee injury (his second torn ACL in three years), but his potential to fit into this defense, considering his past with Hetherman, is huge. — Adelson
Area of concern: Defensive end
For the past three years, Louisville was able to rely on a genuine star off the edge in Ashton Gillotte, who racked up 21.5 sacks from 2022-24. Gillotte is off to the NFL now, a third-round pick by the Chiefs. That leaves a major void at defensive end. Louisville has a couple of transfers — Wesley Bailey from Rutgers and Clev Lubin from Coastal Carolina — hoping to fill the void, but the strength of the D-line will certainly be on the interior, where the Cards have much more established depth. As Louisville works to remedy issues defending the pass, finding someone — or, ideally, a few guys — who can get after the QB will be one of the most critical jobs for the defense as it prepares for 2025. — Hale
Area of concern: Wide receiver
Just like last season, a big question for the Aggies’ potential is how their wide receiver room will shake out. The Aggies lost Noah Thomas, a bright spot in an otherwise spotty position for A&M and new offensive coordinator Collin Klein, to Georgia after Thomas caught 39 passes for 574 yards and eight touchdowns last year. No other player caught more than two TDs or eclipsed 400 yards on the season as the Aggies fought through a QB change from Conner Weigman to Marcel Reed. This year, the Aggies are looking toward NC State transfer KC Concepcion (71 catches, 839 yards, 10 TDs in 2023, 53-460-6 last year), Mississippi State transfer Mario Craver (17-368-3 as a freshman), as well as returners Ashton Bethel-Roman, 6-2, 220-pound freshman four-star recruit Jerome Myles and dynamic 2024 five-star recruit Terry Bussey, who played something of an all-purpose role last year. As this group goes, so will Reed and the offense. — Wilson
Area of concern: Quarterback
Austin Simmons seems like a talented individual — we’re talking about someone who is athletically gifted enough to play baseball for Ole Miss as well. But anytime you are replacing one of the better quarterbacks in your conference, in this case Jaxson Dart, who was a first-round NFL draft pick, there has to be some level of concern. But from what we’ve seen out of Simmons, there’s promise. His drive against Georgia last season, where he led a 10-play, 75-yard touchdown drive to tie the game while Dart was injured, should give the Ole Miss faithful something to be excited about. — Lyles Jr.
Area of concern: Tight end
It’s been a struggle at tight end for the Sooners, and there’s again uncertainty around the position heading into the 2025 season. Granted, there was plenty of blame to go around for Oklahoma’s struggles on offense last season, but finding more consistency at tight end in both the receiving and blocking categories would be a big boost for an offense that has tons of new faces. There isn’t a definitive starter at tight end entering preseason camp. Transfers Will Huggins (Kansas and Pittsburg State) and Carson Kent (Kennesaw State) are expected to battle with converted linebacker Jaren Kanak for the job. — Low
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Adam Rittenberg
FRISCO, Texas — Big 12 commissioner Brett Yormark is “doubling down” on the so-called 5+11 future College Football Playoff format, while acknowledging that it might benefit his league more in the future than currently.
The Big 12 and ACC have pushed the model, which would award automatic bids to the five highest-rated conference champions, plus 11 at-large bids determined by the CFP selection committee. The 5+11 model gained some support at the SEC’s spring meetings, while the Big Ten has focused more on a model that would award four automatic bids to Big Ten teams and to SEC teams, plus two apiece to the Big 12 and the ACC.
Yormark, his fellow commissioners and Notre Dame athletic director Pete Bevacqua must determine the CFP format for 2026 and beyond by Dec. 1.
The Big 12 had only one representative, champion Arizona State, in the inaugural 12-team CFP last year. Arizona State lost to Texas in two overtimes in a CFP quarterfinal matchup at the Peach Bowl.
“Five-11 is fair,” Yormark said Tuesday in his opening address at Big 12 media days at The Star. “We want to earn it on the field. It might not be the best solution today for the Big 12 … but long-term, knowing the progress we’re making, the investments we’re making, it’s the right format for us. And I’m doubling down today on 5+11.”
Yormark added that he expects ACC commissioner Jim Phillips to take the same position when that league holds its media days this month in Charlotte, North Carolina. The ACC sent two teams, champion Clemson and runner-up SMU, to the 12-team playoff last year. Yormark touted the Big 12 as the “deepest football conference in America” and said he believes the league will have multiple CFP entries this season.
“I have a lot of faith in the selection process,” Yormark said. “They are doing a full audit of the selection process to figure out how they can modernize and contemporize and how they use data and how certain metrics can be more heavily weighted.”
Yormark told ESPN that he’s “relatively confident” that the CFP will go to 16 teams in 2026 and laid out the next steps to making it happen.
“The first step is we got to figure out, with the selection process, we’re kind of doing a deep dive,” he said. “Where can we improve it? Where can we modernize it? Are we using the right metrics? Are things weighted appropriately or not? So we’re going through that conversation, and I think on the heels of that, we’ll move into the format because I think for the room people need to get confident, more confident, in that selection process. And assuming they do, which I’m confident they will, we’ll be able to then address the format that makes sense.”
In March, the CFP named a Big 12 athletic director, Baylor’s Mack Rhoades, as the chair of its selection committee. Yormark said that in addition to schedule strength, “new metrics” will be added to the selection process to ensure fairness to all conferences.
The Big 12 will have the Week 0 stage as Iowa State and Kansas State renew their rivalry in Dublin. Other key nonleague Big 12 matchups include Baylor-Auburn, Baylor-SMU and Iowa State-Iowa.
“I’m confident we’ll get to the right place,” Yormark said. “And ultimately, I’m confident we’ll go to 5+11.”
ESPN’s Pete Thamel contributed to this report.
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