What’s changed since preseason for Texas, Clemson and the national title picture
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Bill ConnellySep 21, 2025, 06:45 PM ET
Close- Bill Connelly is a writer for ESPN. He covers college football, soccer and tennis. He has been at ESPN since 2019.
In Friday’s Week 4 preview I wrote that Saturday would basically close the book on the first act of the 2025 college football season. That’s basically what happened.
Some wobbly teams lost further ground and nearly eliminated themselves from playoff contention. Others seemed to right themselves with playoff hopes intact. Upstarts made statements — Indiana humiliated Illinois, Texas Tech won a Utah-as-hell game over Utah, Ole Miss once again hinted at spectacular upside and hierarchies were altered.
Next Saturday, we begin Act II with a loaded week and a pair of epic evening headliners — Oregon at Penn State and Alabama at Georgia. But before we dive into that, let’s take a look at what actually changed over the first four weeks of the season. Which races have been completely scrambled? Which haven’t really been altered all that much? And who in the world is going to step up in the Heisman race?

We have no national title favorite
One of the stories of the offseason was that it felt like the top of the sport was a bit more decentralized, that the best teams maybe weren’t quite as dominant and more teams had semi-legitimate national title shots.
As it turns out, we were underselling it. In the preseason, the Allstate Playoff Predictor gave Texas a 24.7% chance at the title, with four teams over 10% and 17 teams over 1%. Four weeks later, no one is over 12.5%, and 20 teams are at 1% or higher. Eight teams are within three points of No. 1 in FPI, and while Oregon has separated itself a bit in SP+, teams No. 2 through 14 are separated by less than a touchdown. Maybe the Ducks are indeed the best the sport has to offer this season; it’s hard to argue with a combined four-game scoreline of 203-37 (though Indiana‘s 219-33 scoreline is even more garish). But it feels like we know even less about the top of the sport now than we did four weeks ago, and that’s an incredible feeling.
Largest increase in national title odds since the preseason:
• Oregon +8.4% (to 12.3%)
• Indiana +7.3% (to 7.5%)
• Ole Miss +6.4% (to 8.5%)
• USC +4.7% (to 5.8%)
• Miami +3.3% (to 4.7%)
Hello there, Indiana. We live in a world in which Curt Cignetti’s Hoosiers have better title odds than Alabama, Texas or Penn State. That’s how good they’ve looked this year, and that’s the level of statement they made in Saturday night’s 63-10 humiliation of Illinois.
It started in the trenches. The Indiana running back trio of Roman Hemby, Khobie Martin and Kaelon Black combined for 36 carries, 261 yards and 3 touchdowns, and the Hoosiers defense sacked Illinois’ Luke Altmyer seven times while limiting Illini RBs to 2.6 yards per carry. Illinois’ Collin Dixon sprang open for a 59-yard touchdown early in the game, but otherwise the visitors averaged 2.3 yards per play. I mentioned in my Friday preview that it was pretty confusing that Illinois was ranked 10 spots ahead of Indiana heading into the game. The Hoosiers evidently thought that was a little strange as well and did something about it.
Largest decrease in national title odds since the preseason:
• Texas -18.1% (to 6.6%)
• Penn State -5.7% (to 3.1%)
• Notre Dame -4.8% (to 0.3%)
• Alabama -3.6% (to 7.2%)
• South Carolina -2.4% (to 0.0%)
These teams landed on this list in five different ways. Texas lost to Ohio State and has watched its offense stutter and stumble all season. The Horns potentially took a solid step forward in Saturday’s 55-0 blowout of hapless Sam Houston, but they’re still only 44th in SP+, and a lot of margin for error has seeped away.
Penn State remains unbeaten but has seen its odds dinged both by a series of merely good performances against poor competition and the relative rise of upcoming opponents Oregon, Indiana and Ohio State. The road looks a little rockier.
Notre Dame lost two huge games to start the season, and while the computers still like the Irish reasonably well, they’ll have to win out and hope to get a decent strength-of-schedule boost along the way.
Alabama laid the biggest egg of Week 1 and saw its rating fall accordingly (before rebounding a bit in Weeks 2 and 3). And now six of their next seven games are against ranked opponents. That’s great for resume-building, but it’s not great for maintaining a playoff-worthy record.
South Carolina’s offense started the year in neutral, and when the Gamecocks finally got going a bit Saturday, their defense dropped the ball. They averaged 5.9 yards per play against a good Missouri defense but allowed 6.1 and fell to the Tigers 29-20. They’re now 0-2 in the SEC and 2-2 overall.
Clemson is toast
A new week, a new low. Saturday’s 34-21 home loss to Syracuse left Clemson coach Dabo Swinney without all of his typical defiance and defense mechanisms. The Tigers outgained the Orange by 70 yards with a far better success rate (48% to 36%), but big plays, a minus-2 turnover margin and an early surprise onside kick from Syracuse did them in. All of Clemson’s old bad habits (a lack of big plays, a defense less effective than the sum of its parts) have reemerged, and their typical saving graces (an efficient ground game, a masterful middle eight) haven’t saved them.
The Tigers are 1-3 for the first time since 2004. They’ve fallen behind 16-0, 13-0 and 24-7 in their past three games, and while they battled back (at least somewhat) each time, they’re giving themselves too much of a burden to overcome. They’re also 0-2 in ACC play, meaning that even if they turn it on and win out, they’ll still need some help getting to the conference title game.
This has rather predictably redefined the ACC title race. So has SMU‘s 2-2 start, even though both of the Mustangs’ losses were out of conference.
ACC preseason title odds per SP+: Clemson 18.8%, Miami 13.4%, SMU 10.4%, Louisville 8.7%, Florida State 5.8%, Virginia Tech 5.5%, NC State 5.0%
Current ACC title odds per SP+: Miami 26.3%, Georgia Tech 14.2%, Louisville 13.6%, Florida State 10.5%, Virginia 6.8%, Pitt 6.5%, SMU 5.5%, Syracuse 4.8%
Perhaps as you would have guessed, Miami now leads the way, and Louisville is rising, but Georgia Tech and Florida State have gone from also-rans to each having at least a 1-in-10 title chance. Miami knows as well as any team that the race is just beginning — the Hurricanes sure looked like favorites during a 9-0 start last season, too, especially during the first four games before their defense began to wobble. That they missed the title game altogether and lost three of their last four is a pretty clear reminder of how much work remains.
Still, they’ve done all they can through four games, especially on defense. They’ve allowed only one of four opponents to top five yards per play, and in Saturday evening’s methodical 26-7 shellacking of Florida, they hinted at having a lot of different ways to win a ballgame in 2025. They allowed just 4.7 yards per play with seven tackles for loss and eight three-and-outs. Against a dynamite Florida defense, Carson Beck threw for just 160 yards with a pick and a sack, but the duo of Mark Fletcher Jr. and Char’Mar Brown combined for 42 carries, 196 yards and 3 TDs. They had to get really physical to win, and they did so.
Other possible ACC contenders also looked the part this weekend. Florida State and Louisville beat overwhelmed MAC opponents by a combined 106-27, and unbeaten Georgia Tech handled a semi-spicy Temple team with relative ease. We’ll see who best takes advantage of Clemson’s early collapse (and who avoids a late-season collapse themselves).
Vanderbilt and Florida traded bodies (and so did Virginia and Virginia Tech)
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It’s been a mixed bag for the teams atop this offseason’s returning production rankings. Clemson (No. 1 in returning production) has bombed, Arizona State (No. 2) started the season in second gear again, Illinois (No. 4) looked fine before getting crushed Saturday, and teams like Kennesaw State (No. 5), Rutgers (No. 8) and Baylor (No. 9) haven’t started this season any better than where they finished up.
Others, however, are still defending the honor of continuity. Oklahoma (No. 10) and Texas A&M (No. 7) are unbeaten, Texas Tech (No. 6) looks spectacular, and holy smokes, break up the Vanderbilt Commodores (No. 3)!
Clark Lea’s team is on a revenge tour at the moment. The Commodores pummeled South Carolina by a 31-7 margin last week (a 45-point reversal), and on Saturday against a Georgia State team that upset them 36-32 last September, they were ruthless, charging to a 42-9 halftime advantage and leading by as much as 55 in a 70-21 win. That’s a 53-point reversal. They’re now up to 16th in SP+ — the only time they’ve finished higher than that in the last 50 years: 2014 (14th) — and they have a 16% chance of finishing 10-2 or better, which is the approximate bar for getting into the CFP as an SEC team.
Some schedule strength differences aside, they’ve basically traded places with Florida.
Preseason SP+: Florida 16th (6.8 avg. wins, 5.3% chance of winning the SEC), Vanderbilt 54th (5.0 wins, 1.0% chance)
Week 5 SP+: Vanderbilt 16th (8.3 avg. wins, 5.6% chance of winning the SEC), Florida 40th (3.3 wins, 0.8% chance)
Up is down, left is right, and Vandy’s Florida now.
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Meanwhile, back in the ACC, two rivals have traded places too.
Preseason SP+: Virginia Tech 42nd (7.0 avg. wins), Virginia 74th (5.4)
Week 5 SP+: Virginia 42nd (8.2 avg. wins), Virginia Tech 82nd (2.9)
Tech quickly fired Brent Pry after a dire 0-3 start — interim head coach Philip Montgomery led the Hokies to a 38-6 win over Wofford on Saturday — which made it pretty easy to forget that UVA’s Tony Elliott began the season with a seat even warmer than Pry’s. He loaded up with more than 30 transfers as an attempt to turn the tide, and damned if it hasn’t worked. Newcomers like quarterback Chandler Morris (North Texas), running backs J’Mari Taylor (NC Central) and Harrison Waylee (Wyoming), receiver Cam Ross (James Madison) and defensive ends Mitchell Melton (Ohio State) and Daniel Rickert (Tennessee Tech) have made an immediate impact.
After Saturday’s 48-20 thumping of Stanford, the Cavaliers are 3-1 with three wins by at least 27 points. They have a 14% chance of getting to 10-2 or better, and they’re now firmly in the “dark horse ACC contenders” group. Virginia! Contender! Granted, the thing about throwing a transfer Hail Mary is, once you’ve done it, you have to keep doing it every year. But for now, Elliott has transformed the Hoos’ trajectory.
Texas Tech’s transfer gambit was transformative
With the new most famous booster in the sport, Texas Tech didn’t load up with pure quantity in the transfer portal like Virginia did. But the Red Raiders got some of the biggest names in the portal in an attempt to transform themselves into Big 12 contenders. And my goodness, has it worked early on.
Tech overwhelmed three outmanned opponents by a combined 174-35 to start the season, but Saturday’s performance in Salt Lake City was a statement of a different kind. Against a Utah Utes team that has won plenty of battles of attrition over the years, the Red Raiders let the Utes define the terms of the game — lots of punts, lots of field position maneuvering, lots of popping pads, even an injured quarterback (not exactly uncommon in Utah games) — and blew them out all the same.
The Red Raiders lost quarterback Behren Morton to injury midway through the game, and backup Will Hammond came in and went 13-for-16 for 169 yards, with two touchdowns and a 32-yard run. They made Utah quarterback Devon Dampier‘s fundamentals disintegrate over time, and he finished with two interceptions and 3.9 yards per dropback. Their expensive new defensive front dominated Utah’s extremely well-regarded offensive line for most of 60 minutes.
New coordinator Shiel Wood — an acquisition as important as any that came from the transfer portal — has done an incredible job with an incredibly new unit. Of the 12 Red Raiders with at least eight tackles thus far, eight are transfers, including edge rushers Romello Height (Georgia Tech) and David Bailey (Stanford) and safety Cole Wisniewski (North Dakota State). Tech ranks 11th in points allowed per drive and ninth in yards allowed per play. They’ve finished in the defensive SP+ top 20 only once in 27 years, but they’re currently 22nd and rising.
The performance against Utah was a display of force we’re not used to seeing from this team. And it made the Red Raiders the new favorite in the Big 12 race.
Big 12 preseason title odds per SP+: Kansas State 14.4%, Utah 9.1%, Arizona State 8.8%, TCU 8.5%, BYU 6.4%, Baylor 6.0%, Colorado 5.0%
Current Big 12 title odds per SP+: Texas Tech 28.6% (up 20.7% from the preseason), Iowa State 9.4% (up 2.1%), Kansas 9.1% (up 4.7%), TCU 9.0% (up 0.5%), BYU 8.8% (up 2.4%), Arizona State 7.1% (down 1.7%), Utah 6.0% (down 3.1%), Arizona 5.2% (up 2.0%), Houston 4.9% (up 0.7%)
We can’t say that Tech is an overwhelming favorite by any means — a 29% title shot still means a 71% chance of not winning the title, after all, and TCU, BYU, Iowa State and Kansas have all shown hints of major upside. But Tech’s general approach in the new NIL world is to basically spend like a champion until you become one. And their odds of winning their first outright conference title in 70 years have more than tripled since August. That’s called return on investment right there.
It’s Memphis’ time
We’re going to Dyer’s Burgers! We’re getting a Diver at Silky O’Sullivan’s! We’re grabbing some Germantown Commissary BBQ on the way out of town! Memphis is now the Group of 5 team with the best odds of reaching the CFP!
As with Miami, of course, we’ve been here before. Ryan Silverfield’s Tigers began last season 3-0 with what felt like a massively important win over Florida State at the time, but a track-meet loss at Navy knocked them down a peg, and an early November loss at UTSA finished off their chances. Still, with Boise State getting its doors blown off by USF in Week 1, and USF (against Miami) and Tulane (against Ole Miss) doing the same in recent weeks, Memphis’ comeback win over Arkansas put the unbeaten Tigers back in prime position.
The Tigers showed some spectacular resilience against the Hogs. They allowed a wide-open 62-yard touchdown pass to Rohan Jones on the third play of the game, then fell behind 28-10 late in the first half. But they outscored Arkansas 22-3 from there, got a 64-yard touchdown run from Sutton Smith with 4:51 left, recovered a shocking Mike Washington Jr. fumble at their 7 with 1:18 remaining, then iced the game with a muscular third-down run by backup quarterback Arrington Maiden.
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Arkansas Razorbacks vs. Memphis Tigers: Full Highlights
Arkansas Razorbacks vs. Memphis Tigers: Full Highlights
This was a big one, both because of the obvious résumé-building effects of beating an SEC team — albeit one that seems to somehow blow games like this every week — and the fact that it basically bought them a mulligan. At this point, only two G5 teams have a greater than 16% chance of finishing the regular season 11-1 or better, per SP+, but Memphis is over 60%.
Odds of finishing the regular season 11-1 or better (Group of 5 teams)
• Memphis 60.6%
• North Texas 37.3%
• James Madison 15.7%
• UNLV 12.9%
• Fresno State 7.2%
• Navy 5.9%
• Texas State 5.2%
• Louisiana Tech 3.5%
• Boise State 2.2%
This is yet another race that is just beginning – among other things, the Tigers must still face fellow American Conference contenders USF, Tulane and Navy (albeit all at home), then maybe face the No. 2 team on the above list, a smoking hot North Texas team that just knocked off defending American champ Army at West Point.
Still, this race felt like Boise State vs. the field heading into Week 1, but after USF and Tulane both stumbled, Memphis enters Week 5 at the front of the line.
The September Heisman goes to … no one
It appears the Heisman race is every bit as blurry as the national title race.
Each week I include a “Who won the Heisman this week?” section near the end of this column, in which I dole out weekly points, F1-style (in this case, 10 points for first place, 9 for second, and so on). Last year at this time, Miami’s Cam Ward and Boise State’s Ashton Jeanty had already asserted themselves in the top two spots, with eventual winner Travis Hunter not far behind. Two years ago, Michael Penix Jr. and Caleb Williams led the way after four weeks. (LSU’s Jayden Daniels would soon take over.) The stars usually don’t take long to emerge from the pack.
This year, after four weeks, your points leaders are … two quarterbacks who have gone a combined 4-3. The guy in fourth place is a backup. We knew this could be a funky season with so few top teams boasting proven quarterbacks, but safe to say, we head into late September knowing very little about how this race will play out.
Before we get to the point totals, here’s this week’s Heisman top 10:
1. Fernando Mendoza, Indiana (21-of-23 passing for 267 yards and five touchdowns, plus 18 non-sack rushing yards against Illinois).
2. Demond Williams Jr., Washington (16-of-19 passing for 298 yards and four touchdowns, plus 111 non-sack rushing yards and a TD against Washington State).
3. Eric McAlister, TCU (8 catches for 254 yards and 3 touchdowns against SMU).
4. Dylan Riley, Boise State (19 carries for 171 yards and four touchdowns, plus 84 receiving yards and a TD against Air Force).
5. Chandler Morris, Virginia (23-of-31 passing for 380 yards and four touchdowns, plus 23 non-sack rushing yards and a TD against Stanford).
6. Jayden Maiava, USC (20-of-26 passing for 234 yards and three touchdowns, plus 31 rushing yards and two TDs against Michigan State).
7. Robert Henry Jr., UTSA (21 carries for 144 yards and a touchdown, plus 76 receiving yards and a TD against Colorado State).
8. Mac Harris, USF (10 tackles, 2.5 TFLs, 2 sacks, 1 forced fumble and a 93-yard pick-six against SC State).
9. Waymond Jordan, USC (18 carries for 157 yards, plus 25 receiving yards against Michigan State).
10. Trinidad Chambliss, Ole Miss (17-of-27 passing for 307 yards and 2 touchdowns, plus 113 non-sack rushing yards and a TD against Tulane).
In his past two games, Fernando Mendoza has thrown nine touchdown passes to three incompletions. He’s gotten help from a relentless run game — four games, four 300-yard rushing totals — but I had to reward him for his near-perfection. Meanwhile, Demond Williams Jr. was nearly perfect in the Apple Cup, and current (Dylan Riley) and former (Eric McAlister) Boise State stars combined for 509 yards from scrimmage and eight touchdowns.
Honorable mention:
• Nnanna Anyanwu, UTSA (5 tackles, 4 TFLs, 3 sacks and a pass breakup against Colorado State).
• Cam Edwards, UConn (24 carries for 194 yards and 2 touchdowns against Ball State).
• Josh Hoover, TCU (22-of-40 passing for 379 yards, 5 TDs and an INT, plus 35 non-sack rushing yards against SMU).
• Jayden Jackson, Oklahoma (five tackles and 2.5 sacks against Auburn).
• Diego Pavia, Vanderbilt (18-of-24 passing for 245 yards and a touchdown, plus 86 non-sack rushing yards and a TD against Georgia State).
• Jadarian Price, Notre Dame (9 carries for 74 yards and three touchdowns, plus a 98-yard kick return score against Purdue).
• Kaidon Salter, Colorado (18-of-28 passing for 304 yards and three touchdowns, plus 100 non-sack rushing yards and a TD against Wyoming).
• Kenny Tracy, Miami-Ohio (16 carries for 104 yards, plus 84 receiving yards and two touchdowns against UNLV).
Through four weeks, here are your points leaders:
1T. Taylen Green, Arkansas; Ty Simpson, Alabama (15 points)
3. Jayden Maiava, USC (12 points)
4. Trinidad Chambliss, Ole Miss (11 points)
5T. Jonah Coleman, Washington; Fernando Mendoza, Indiana; Sawyer Robertson, Baylor (10 points)
8T. Rocco Becht, Iowa State; Gunner Stockton, Georgia; Vicari Swain, South Carolina; Demond Williams Jr., Washington (9 points)
This race remains an absolute mystery. Oklahoma’s John Mateer is the betting favorite, and after a dire 8-for-19 start against Auburn, he completed 16 of his final 17 passes to lead a fourth-quarter comeback. He can score some style points with his legs, too. But he’s 36th in Total QBR, and OU’s defense has been by far the bigger driver in the Sooners’ 4-0 start.
Mateer has yet to show up in one of these weekly top-10 lists. Meanwhile, five guys have made the list twice, and I wouldn’t have predicted a single one of them: Simpson, Green, Maiava, Chambliss and Robert Henry Jr.
Honestly, I’d probably give the September Heisman to Maiava at this point. He’s No. 1 in Total QBR, he’s averaging a jaw-dropping 13.4 yards per dropback — only Florida State’s Tommy Castellanos can top him there, and Castellanos attempts far fewer passes — and USC’s offense has been absolutely dynamite during a 4-0 start.
I’d point out that Maiava is only the No. 11 betting favorite at the moment (+2200) and there might be some value there, but September Heismans don’t have the best track record of winning the actual Heisman, do they? I’ll do him a favor and award no September Heisman instead.
This week in SP+
The SP+ rankings have been updated for the week. Let’s take a look at the teams that saw the biggest change in their overall ratings.
Moving up
Here are the five teams that saw their ratings rise the most this week:
• Missouri State (up 6.9 adjusted points per game, ranking rose from 129th to 122nd)
• Delaware (up 6.5 points, ranking rose from 118th to 93rd)
• Vanderbilt (up 5.8 points, ranking rose from 28th to 16th)
• Utah State (up 5.8 points, ranking rose from 99th to 80th)
• Mississippi State (up 5.1 points, ranking rose from 47th to 29th)
With respect to the two rising FBS newcomers (Missouri State and Delaware) and a delightful Utah State team that has lost only to Texas A&M, we’re going to focus on the other two teams here. Vanderbilt is on a revenge tour at the moment, as mentioned above, and Mississippi State is one of eight teams to have overachieved against SP+ projections in every game this season. (The others: Arizona, Bowling Green, Florida State, Houston, Louisiana Tech, Mississippi State and Old Dominion.) The Bulldogs are 4-0 for the first since 2014, and after collapsing to 88th in SP+ last season, they’ve jumped back into the top 30. They remain under the radar in a loaded SEC, but upcoming games against Tennessee, Texas A&M, Florida and Texas will give them massive opportunities to prove themselves.
Moving down
Here are the five teams whose ratings fell the most:
• South Alabama (down 8.2 adjusted points per game, ranking fell from 78th to 110th)
• California (down 7.4 points, ranking fell from 54th to 72nd)
• West Virginia (down 7.2 points, ranking fell from 55th to 75th)
• Tulane (down 6.8 points, ranking fell from 49th to 66th)
• Illinois (down 5.6 points, ranking fell from 18th to 36th)
There were quite a few disappointing performances in Week 4, and these five teams certainly all did their share in that regard. But the two biggest eggs of the week, to me, were laid by Illinois and Cal. Illinois was a slight projected underdog against Indiana, and Cal was a nearly 10-point favorite against San Diego State. They lost by a combined 97-10.
My 10 favorite games of the weekend
3. North Texas 45, Army 38 (OT).
We’ll bunch the three of these together since, in about a 10-minute span early Saturday afternoon, all three featured catastrophic lost fumbles. The college football was almost too college football-like. At this point, Arkansas is going to have its own “devastating late turnovers” section in my year-end Top 100 Games of the Season list. For the second straight week, the Razorbacks were driving for the potential winning points when they lost a fumble. This one, from poor Mike Washington Jr., allowed Memphis to run the clock out after a game with three long touchdowns and an 18-point Memphis comeback.
Oof, Hogs
Meanwhile, UNLV somehow remained unbeaten despite trailing by 14 on three separate occasions and leading for just 15 seconds. As Miami’s Kenny Tracy was charging inside the UNLV 20 to set up the potential game-winning field goal, he lost the ball. UNLV recovered and drove 78 yards in 2:17 to set up Ramon Villela‘s 23-yarder for the win.
At West Point, Army also unleashed a fierce comeback after trailing 21-0 in the first quarter and 38-28 with less than three minutes left. Makenzie McGill II fumbled as UNT was trying to run out the clock, and Army sent the game to OT with a Dawson Jones field goal. But the Mean Green prevailed with a Caleb Hawkins touchdown and a stop in OT.
4. FCS: Campbell 50, Bryant 48 (2OT). FCS gave us quite a bit of overtime nonsense Saturday. In search of its first win of the season, Campbell tied the game with 2:58 left on a 77-yard Kamden Sixkiller-to-Randall King touchdown, then took the lead on another Sixkiller-to-King strike 103 seconds later. Bryant struck back with a 35-yard Aldrich Doe touchdown catch with six seconds left but played for OT instead of going for two points and the win. And in the second OT, they failed on a 2-pointer and Campbell survived.
5. FCS: No. 4 Illinois State 38, North Alabama 36 (2OT). A comfortable home favorite, ISU bolted to a 17-0 lead just six minutes in and led by 10 heading into the fourth quarter, but Ari Patu‘s 25-yard touchdown strike to KJ Fields with 33 seconds left sent the game to overtime. In the second OT, Daniel Sobkowicz caught his second touchdown pass and scored the 2-point conversion, and ISU’s defense stopped UNA’s 2-pointer to salvage the win.
6. No. 11 Oklahoma 24, No. 22 Auburn 17. Killer environment? Check. Wild number of sacks? Check. OU took former Sooner Jackson Arnold down 10 times but still trailed with five minutes left until John Mateer‘s short touchdown run and a safety-sack sealed the deal.
7. Arizona State 27, Baylor 24. Neither team led by more than seven in this one — Jordyn Tyson‘s 19-yard touchdown gave ASU a 24-17 lead with 5:29 left, but Baylor quickly struck back with a 33-yard score from Michael Trigg. A pair of third-down penalties helped ASU inch down the field on its final drive, however, and Jesus Gomez knocked in a 43-yard FG at the buzzer.
8. Troy 21, Buffalo 17. This one seemed pretty straight-forward for the home team: Buffalo took a 17-0 lead early in the fourth quarter. But Troy scored on drives of 75, 66 and 50 yards, and Tae Meadows‘ 20-yard touchdown with 45 seconds left sealed a stunning comeback win.
9. Division II: New Mexico Highlands 48, South Dakota Mines 42 (OT). Do you like track meets and wild comebacks? In front of 3,152 in Las Vegas, New Mexico, these teams combined for 1,063 yards and five TDs of 40-plus yards. That includes a 96-yard fumble return for Mines and a 99-yard score on the ensuing kickoff. S.D. Mines scored three times in the final 13 minutes to erase a 42-21 deficit and force overtime, but the Hardrockers (Hardrockers!) were stuffed on fourth-and-goal in OT, and Tevita Valeti’s 1-yard touchdown sealed a wild Cowboys win.
10. Division III: Coast Guard 92, Nichols 60. OK, but do you like track meets?? In front of 3,054 in New London, Connecticut, Coast Guard scored 64 points in the first half but kept having to score to assure an easy win in a game that featured nine touchdowns of at least 38 yards and 1,412 total yards. My goodness!
Honorable mention:
• D-III: Calvin 40, Heidelberg 37 (OT)
• Eastern Michigan 34, Louisiana 31
• No. 21 Michigan 30, Nebraska 27
• NAIA: Peru State 64, Central Methodist 43
• FCS: San Diego 42, Princeton 35
• San José State 31, Idaho 28
• UConn 31, Ball State 25
• FCS: No. 24 Youngstown State 31, Towson 28
Oh, and if you were curious about the Ferris State-Rio Grande game mentioned in Friday’s preview column, in which Ferris State was a projected 97.2-point favorite per SP+, the Bulldogs led 35-0 after 16 minutes before Tony Annese seemed to call off his dogs a bit. It finished a mere 76-0, and the only reason it probably even got that bad was that the Dawgs scored on a kick return, fumble return, interception return and missed field goal return.
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Ranking the most interesting College Football Playoff and conference races
Published
1 hour agoon
October 24, 2025By
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Bill ConnellyOct 23, 2025, 06:50 AM ET
Close- Bill Connelly is a writer for ESPN. He covers college football, soccer and tennis. He has been at ESPN since 2019.
The signs are everywhere. It’s finally hoodie weather in the Midwest. We’re getting ready to argue all over again about daylight saving time and whether candy corn is good. (It is! I don’t like that it is, but it is.) That’s right: It’s almost November. And November is college football’s greatest month.
We enter this November with far more uncertainty in the air than usual. Sure, it almost certainly looks like Ohio State and Indiana will vacuum up two of the 12 College Football Playoff slots, with Oregon likely nabbing a third. The top-heavy Big Ten should continue to fend off any of the “Has parity taken over college football?” talk en vogue at the moment. But everywhere else, it’s nothing but uncertainty as far as the eye can see.
We know the SEC should land quite a few CFP bids, but we have no idea who will grab them. (Okay, we have some idea, but not a lot!) We thought the ACC (Miami) and Big 12 (Texas Tech) both had teams capable of charging to 12-0 and easy CFP bids, but Miami and Texas Tech lost last week. So did Memphis, which plunged the American Conference race into chaos. And have you looked at the Heisman betting lately? It feels like we still have some major plot twists to come with that.
Per the Allstate Playoff Predictor, there are 30 teams with at least a 10% chance at a playoff bid. Most of what’s ahead appears unsettled, so let’s try to make some sense of it. Here are the 10 FBS races I’m most looking forward to as hoodie weather — the best weather — further takes over our world.

1. SEC title race
Per SP+, we head into Week 9 with eight teams clinging to at least a 5% chance of winning the league title: Alabama (25.8%), Texas A&M (17.6%), Georgia (13.9%), Oklahoma (10.4%), Texas (7.7%), Missouri (7.4%), Ole Miss (7.1%) and Vanderbilt (5.5%). They all have either zero (Bama and A&M) or one conference loss, and there are eight remaining games between them over the next six weeks, including two potential elimination games in Week 9 (Ole Miss at Oklahoma and Missouri at Vanderbilt).
I can tell you how many different teams have a chance, but it’s hard not to think of Alabama as the front-runner. The Crimson Tide moved to 4-0 in SEC play last week with a 37-20 win over Tennessee, and they’ve now played four of the five best opponents on their conference schedule. They’re only up to ninth in SP+, however, thanks primarily to statistically subpar performances in wins over Georgia and Missouri (and, of course, the season-opening dud against Florida State, an increasingly inexplicable result). That means their remaining games against LSU, Oklahoma and Auburn are projected as one-score affairs. Their spot in Atlanta isn’t a gimme just yet. Still, wins are wins, and they’re in great shape.
Even if we give one title game spot to Bama, the race for the other spot is pretty fascinating. Will Georgia continue to spot opponents multiscore leads before scraping their way back? How much will the Bulldogs’ loss to Bama hurt them in potential tiebreaker scenarios? Can unbeaten Texas A&M continue charging ahead as the schedule ramps up with trips to LSU, Missouri and Texas? (You could tell me right now that the Aggies went 0-3 or 3-0 in those trips and I would believe you, no questions asked.) Can Ole Miss clear this week’s hurdle in Norman and take advantage of a reasonably light home stretch? Is Oklahoma really a contender with five remaining top-20 opponents (per SP+)? I’m slightly worried about overbilling this race when the most likely result seems to be yet another Bama-Georgia title game. But there’s still lots of potential weirdness on the table. That also means the jockeying for the other SEC playoff spots will be interesting.
Key upcoming games: Ole Miss at Oklahoma (Week 9), Missouri at Vanderbilt (Week 9), Vanderbilt at Texas (Week 10), Texas A&M at Missouri (Week 11), Texas at Georgia (Week 12), Oklahoma at Alabama (Week 12), Missouri at Oklahoma (Week 13), Texas A&M at Texas (Week 14)
2. American Conference title race
Out-of-nowhere upsets have sent conference title races in unexpected directions since conferences first came into existence, and few were as unexpected as Memphis‘ 24-21 defeat at UAB last week. The Blazers had just fired coach Trent Dilfer, and Memphis was a more than three-touchdown favorite. The Tigers entered the game with a 43% chance of making the CFP, per the Allstate Playoff Predictor. Those odds are now 11%.
Memphis’ loss is our gain. SP+ now gives five teams between a 12% and 24% chance of winning the American Conference: USF (24.4%), North Texas (22.6%), Memphis (19.4%), Navy (17.3%) and Tulane (12.7%). USF, Navy and Tulane are unbeaten in conference play, and Navy is unbeaten overall thanks to a couple of narrow wins in its past two games. But Navy and Tulane have had to pull off escapes in recent weeks and have fallen out of the SP+ top 50. USF has made a nice ascent since a humiliating 49-12 loss to Miami, but the Bulls must play at Memphis and Navy in the coming weeks. If they beat Memphis on Saturday, their spot in the American Conference title game begins to appear secure. But a Memphis win would improve Memphis’ own odds and those of North Texas.
Key upcoming games: USF at Memphis (Week 9), Navy at North Texas (Week 10), Tulane at Memphis (Week 11), USF at Navy (Week 12), Navy at Memphis (Week 14)
3. The current hierarchy of one-loss teams
1:14
Unstoppable force vs. immovable object: Rebels offense vs. OU defense
SEC Network’s Alyssa Lang presents pressing statistics and potential CFP chances ahead of No. 8 Ole Miss’ battle against the No. 13 Sooners.
From a College Football Playoff perspective, this is the most important race. But it’s also the blurriest. If we assume that the Group of 5 ends up with just one of the 12 spots in the CFP — not a guarantee (since we could still theoretically end up with a particularly low-ranked Big 12 or ACC champion), but likely — then that leaves 11 spots for the four power conferences. Among power-conference teams, SP+ projections suggest an average of 5.1 will end up 11-1 or 12-0 heading into championship weekend, likely from this pile:
Odds of finishing 11-1 or better (power-conference teams only): Ohio State 90.1%, Indiana 87.8%, Georgia Tech 49.6%, Texas Tech 46.2%, Oregon 33.1%, Miami 27.5%, BYU 27.3%, Louisville 22.3%, Georgia 16.5%, Ole Miss 16.1%, Alabama 14.9%, Virginia 12.4%.
If we assume for a moment that five or so of those teams will make the field of 12 as they did last year — again, not guaranteed but reasonably likely — that leaves about six spots for multiloss teams, likely from the Big Ten and SEC.
It’s impossible to know where each potential multiloss team might stand six weeks from now, when we don’t know who they might have beaten or lost to — or how the CFP committee will, after pressure, handle differences in strength of schedule — but let’s lay out where their résumés currently stand by combining Strength of Record and Résumé SP+ into one résumé ranking.
Current computer-based résumé rankings:
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Indiana (7-0)
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Ohio State (7-0)
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Texas A&M (7-0)
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Oregon (6-1)
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Alabama (6-1)
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BYU (7-0)
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Georgia (6-1)
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Georgia Tech (7-0)
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Oklahoma (6-1)*
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Miami (5-1)
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Texas Tech (6-1)*
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Vanderbilt (6-1)
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Ole Miss (6-1)
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Notre Dame (5-2)
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Missouri (6-1)
(* Since Texas Tech’s lone loss came without injured starting quarterback Behren Morton, it could get some benefit of the doubt from the committee. And how might the committee handle Oklahoma’s loss to Texas considering John Mateer had rushed back from injury?)
Among current one-loss teams, it seems Oregon, Alabama and Georgia are in good shape to handle another defeat with playoff standing intact. But the number of other spots available could depend on the teams in Provo and Atlanta. BYU and Georgia Tech remain unbeaten, and if either team gets to championship weekend at 12-0, it will be in no matter what happens in the respective conference title games. That’s not particularly likely — BYU must travel to Iowa State (Week 9), Texas Tech (Week 11) and Cincinnati (Week 13), while Georgia Tech finishes against a torrid Pitt (Week 13) and Georgia (Week 14) — but it remains on the table.
Meanwhile, the hierarchy of teams ranked ninth to 15th above tells us quite a bit. Two-loss Notre Dame obviously needs a little bit of help, but considering there are head-to-heads between No. 9 and 13 and No. 10 and 15 this week, the Fighting Irish will likely move up a couple of spots despite being on a bye week. Their strength-of-schedule numbers will only get worse from here, however, so they need to keep looking the part as they have in recent weeks.
Key upcoming games: Ole Miss at Oklahoma (Week 9), Missouri at Vanderbilt (Week 9), BYU at Texas Tech (Week 9), Texas A&M at Missouri (Week 11), Oklahoma at Alabama (Week 12), Missouri at Oklahoma (Week 13), Georgia at Georgia Tech (Week 14)
4. ACC title race
Georgia Tech barely survived at Wake Forest and needed some red zone implosions from Duke — including a 95-yard Omar Daniels fumble return — to survive in Durham on Saturday. But again, wins are wins, and the Yellow Jackets have seven from seven games.
The Jackets are 4-0 in ACC play, so they have their noses out in front in the conference title race. Still, there are seven teams with at least a 7% chance at the league crown right now: Georgia Tech (26.9%), Louisville (16.8%), Miami (13.4%), Virginia (12.9%), SMU (12.9%), Pitt (8.3%) and Duke (7.3%). Considering the closeness of the games that we’ve already seen between these teams, that makes quite a bit of sense.
In terms of the quantity of teams involved, this race could have ranked higher on the list. But somehow we have only five more remaining games between these seven teams. This race could be decided as much by who avoids unexpected upsets as anything. With only one team really standing out from a quality perspective — Miami is 13th in SP+, and the other six contenders are between 24th and 44th — upsets are somewhere between conceivable and quite likely.
Key upcoming games: Miami at SMU (Week 10), Virginia at Duke (Week 12), Pitt at Georgia Tech (Week 13), Louisville at SMU (Week 13), Miami at Pitt (Week 14)
5. The charge to 6-6
We’re constantly told that there are too many bowls and that they don’t mean what they used to. And yet, one of the most enjoyable storylines in a given season comes when a down-on-its-luck program makes a run at bowl eligibility. Here are some of the more interesting names that have a shot at the postseason in 2025:
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Northwestern Wildcats (5-2 record, 80.7% chance at bowl eligibility per SP+): The Wildcats have bowled only once in the past four seasons, and they stumbled out of the gate with a dire 23-3 loss to Tulane in Week 1. But they’ve won four in a row to get to the precipice, and while they’re projected underdogs in each remaining game, they’ll probably snag at least one minor upset.
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Temple Owls (5-2, 77.4%): One of my favorite stories of the season. Temple went just 13-42 from 2020 to 2024 but made a knockout hire by bringing veteran K.C. Keeler to town. Last Saturday’s blowout of Charlotte brought the Owls to five wins, and they’re favorites at Tulsa this weekend. (If they don’t beat Tulsa, however, things might get a little bit dicey, as they’re at least slight underdogs in each remaining game.)
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New Mexico Lobos (4-3, 76.0%): Jason Eck’s Lobos were pains in Michigan’s neck in Week 1 and pummeled UCLA in Week 3. Losses at San José State and Boise State hurt, but as long as they handle their business at home against Utah State and Colorado State, they’re set.
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Wyoming Cowboys (3-4, 37.6%): After stumbling to 3-9 in Jay Sawvel’s first season as Craig Bohl’s successor, the Cowboys have played some entertaining games of late, and their 35-28 win over San José State in Week 7 kept bowl hopes alive. Their odds would hop to around 50-50 with a win over Colorado State on Saturday.
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Ball State Cardinals (3-4, 20.7%): The Cardinals slipped from 5-7 to 4-8 to 3-9 over Mike Neu’s final three seasons, and they’ve suffered three massive blowouts this year under Mike Uremovich. But their 3-0 home record has bought them time, and a win at 1-6 Northern Illinois on Saturday would keep hope alive.
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New Mexico State Aggies (3-3, 43.3%): NMSU isn’t particularly strong (122nd in SP+) and just fell to Missouri State at home, but Conference USA offers plenty of games against similarly iffy programs. They have only one sure loss (at Tennessee) remaining on the schedule. They’re in the hunt.
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Delaware Blue Hens (3-3, 78.0%) and Missouri State Bears (3-3, 44.5%): The FBS newcomers will need help, as they aren’t automatically eligible and would only get bowl bids if there aren’t enough bowl-eligible teams to fill all the slots. Right now it looks like there probably will be. Still, the Blue Hens and Bears have fit in well in CUSA. Delaware has a 14% chance of finishing 8-4 or better, which is always a hell of an accomplishment for a newbie.
6. Conference USA title race
Yes, there’s a lot of dead weight in this conference, but a tight race is a tight race, and heading into Week 9, four teams had between a 20% and 23% title chance — Jacksonville State (22.7%), Louisiana Tech (21.7%), Western Kentucky (21.0%) and Kennesaw State (20.7%) — with a fifth contender (Liberty) at 8.6%.
On Tuesday, Western Kentucky knocked off Louisiana Tech in a genuine game-of-the-week candidate, while Kennesaw State pulled away from Florida International. That will shift the odds in those teams’ favor, but with so much evenness in this conference, advantages will likely shift again in the coming weeks. Kennesaw State’s presence in the race makes things even more fun; the Owls face-planted with a 2-10 FBS debut last season, but under Jerry Mack they nearly beat Wake Forest in Week 1 and have won five straight.
Key upcoming games: Kennesaw State at Jacksonville State (Week 12), Liberty at Louisiana Tech (Week 13), Western Kentucky at Jacksonville State (Week 14), Kennesaw State at Liberty (Week 14)
7. Heisman race
First it was Texas’ Arch Manning and Clemson’s Cade Klubnik. Then LSU’s Garrett Nussmeier. Then Oklahoma’s John Mateer. Oregon’s Dante Moore had his turn at the top of the list. Miami’s Carson Beck was up there. The mantle of Heisman Favorite has been a hot potato this season. No one has held on to it for very long.
After the past few weeks of action, with Indiana’s Fernando Mendoza shining for an unbeaten team, Ty Simpson providing a slow drip of heroics during Bama’s run of four straight ranked wins and Julian Sayin completing what feels like 100% of his (mostly safe) passes against mostly overwhelmed opposition, we head into Week 9 with a clear upper tier in the race.
Current ESPN BET Heisman odds: Mendoza +300, Simpson +350, Sayin +400, Texas A&M’s Marcel Reed +1100, Vanderbilt’s Diego Pavia +1400, Moore +1800, Georgia’s Gunner Stockton +1800, Notre Dame’s Jeremiyah Love +2000, Ohio State’s Jeremiah Smith +3500, Ole Miss’ Trinidad Chambliss +3500.
If that’s the favorites list we end up with, so be it. At the end of championship weekend, Mendoza, Simpson and Sayin should all have between 3,300 and 3,600 passing yards with about 33 to 39 touchdowns. Solid work. But if you’re a believer in “Heisman Moments,” they might not have many marquee opportunities between now and the conference title games. The door could be open to Pavia or Reed, if they continue leading their respective teams to unforeseen heights. Maybe Stockton keeps bailing his team out with fourth-quarter heroics. Maybe Love produces a couple more 200-yard rushing games and captures the imagination. Maybe in the lack of some obvious 4,000-yard passer, conventional wisdom begins to home in on a defensive player like Miami’s Rueben Bain Jr. or Ohio State’s Caleb Downs. This would be a fun year for a change-of-pace pick. Regardless, I don’t feel like our current favorites list is quite what we’ll have a month from now.
8. MAC title race
There are currently five teams with between a 12% and 25% chance of winning the league — Western Michigan (24.6%), Toledo (19.1%), Miami (Ohio) (19.1%), Buffalo (18.7%) and Ohio (12.3%) — and Miami plays every team on the list besides itself. The RedHawks could play for the crown themselves, but either way they’ll directly decide who gets to play for it. They host smoking-hot Western Michigan this weekend, then play a fellow contender in each of the first three weeks of November’s midweek MACtion slate.
Miami and Western Michigan have each rebounded from 0-3 starts to now stand at 4-3. Western Michigan has overachieved against SP+ projections by an average of 21.3 points per game during this winning streak and has jumped 32 spots in SP+ (from 124th to 92nd) in just three games.
Toledo, meanwhile, has beaten projections in five of seven games this year and ranks seventh nationally in points allowed per drive; the problem, as it usually is under Jason Candle: random duds. They lost as projected 18-point favorites to Western Michigan, then blew a 21-point lead (as a 22-point favorite) against Bowling Green. They’re favored by at least eight points in every remaining game, but another MAC dud would almost certainly eliminate them from the list.
Key upcoming games: Western Michigan at Miami (Ohio) (Week 9), Miami (Ohio) at Ohio (Week 11), Ohio at Western Michigan (Week 12), Toledo at Miami (Ohio) (Week 12), Miami (Ohio) at Buffalo (Week 13), Ohio at Buffalo (Week 14)
9. Biletnikoff Award race
The preseason watch list for the Biletnikoff Award, given to the nation’s best wide receiver, tends to feature approximately a million names, give or take. But among the six current per-game receiving yardage leaders, only three made that initial list: USC‘s Makai Lemon, Louisville’s Chris Bell and Arizona State‘s Jordyn Tyson. San José State‘s Danny Scudero and Texas A&M’s Mario Craver had to be added to the list on Oct. 1, and Illinois’ Hank Beatty was added on Oct. 15.
Of the nine wideouts listed in our preseason Top 100 players list, none are in the nation’s top 10 in receiving yards per game, and only five are in the top 50. The only reason Ohio State’s Jeremiah Smith, the No. 1 player in the country on that preseason list, is even in the top 15 in yards per game is because he had 272 combined yards against Grambling and Ohio. In five games against power-conference opponents, he’s averaging 66.0 yards per game and 9.4 yards per catch.
A lot of this lack of production comes from the fact that, aside from a season-opening dud against Texas (six catches, 43 yards), Ohio State hasn’t needed him to shine brightly yet. Buckeyes games haven’t been remotely close, and it’s fair to assume Smith will be just as ridiculous in their likely upcoming CFP trip as he was last year. But to win the award as the nation’s best receiver, shouldn’t you actually have to do something in-season? Will voters lean toward Lemon (108.3 yards per game), Bell (106.3) or a new star like Craver (95.4)? Will they vote for someone like Smith or Alabama’s Ryan Williams (60.4 yards per team game) based on what we all assume they are instead? It’s an interesting philosophical question.
10. Big 12 title race
Heading into Week 9 last season, Arizona State was 5-2 but only 52nd in SP+, having wobbled through a series of close games and having suffered a mid-October upset loss without injured quarterback Sam Leavitt. As you probably remember, the Sun Devils caught fire, winning six straight, winning the Big 12 with a rout of Iowa State and all but beating Texas in the CFP quarterfinals.
ASU has certainly lined up a lot of parallels heading into Week 9 of 2025. Same record? Check. Same September mediocrity? Check. Same mid-October loss sans Leavitt? Check. Another SP+ ranking in the 50s? Check (55th). Despite a 3-1 conference record, and despite last week’s upset of Texas Tech, ASU has only a 4.8% title chance at the moment, per SP+. From a statistical standpoint, a conference title run would be just as unexpected as last year’s. It would be one hell of a story if they caught fire again.
Right now, three teams have at least a 17% title chance, per SP+: Texas Tech (34.8%), BYU (25.1%) and Cincinnati (17.5%). Utah (6.6%), ASU (4.8%) and Houston (4.1%) are still in the hunt, and if Iowa State (2.6%) regains its early-season form, the Cyclones could beat some contenders down the stretch — including unbeaten BYU this weekend — and insert themselves in the race as well.
Key upcoming games: Houston at Arizona State (Week 9), Cincinnati at Utah (Week 10), BYU at Texas Tech (Week 11), BYU at Cincinnati (Week 13)
Sports
Reaves’ fight with Rempe fires up Sharks in win
Published
1 hour agoon
October 24, 2025By
admin

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Associated Press
Oct 23, 2025, 08:24 PM ET
NEW YORK — Warming up to play hockey in an arena that has hosted some of the best boxing matches in history, from Muhammad Ali versus Joe Frazier to Evander Holyfield against Lennox Lewis, Matt Rempe skated over and asked fellow heavyweight Ryan Reaves if he wanted to fight on Thursday night.
“Yeah, maybe,” Reaves said.
Rempe tried again off a faceoff early, and Reaves wanted to hit somebody on the New York Rangers first. He did just that to Juuso Parssinen, and two of the toughest customers in the NHL dropped the gloves for a knockout, drag-out, old-school hockey fight at center ice at Madison Square Garden on Thursday night. Reaves and the San Jose Sharks went on to win in overtime for their first victory of the season.
“It was unbelievable,” said Sharks center Will Smith, who scored in OT. “It got us all going and can’t say enough about him.”
After sizing each other up and grappling, Reaves’ helmet fell off, and then he was able to knock off Rempe’s with his next right. The two exchanged blows for more than 20 seconds with the crowd buzzing.
Rempe got Reaves’ jersey over his head and was striking at Reaves’ head when linesmen Shandor Alphonso and Matt MacPherson broke it up.
“He’s a big boy and you have to fight guys like that a little bit differently,” Reaves said. “I’ve seen him fight, so I know what he’s good at, what his weaknesses are. It was a good tilt.”
Reaves went to the penalty box to serve the 5-minute major, while Rempe went down the tunnel with training staff.
Fans chanted, “Rempe! Rempe!” as he exited. Rempe did not return for the second period, and the Rangers announced the 23-year-old was out for the remainder of the game because of an upper-body injury. Coach Mike Sullivan said afterward Rempe was still being evaluated.
The league in recent years prevented players from removing their helmets prior to fighting. Reaves, who is 6-foot-2 and 225 pounds, is one of just four players left without a visor after they were grandfathered in more than a decade ago.
“Most of the guys coming in that fight have to wear visors, so if anything, I’m at a disadvantage,” Reaves told The Associated Press after the Sharks’ morning skate earlier Thursday. “I miss fighting guys with no visor because I cut my hands a lot more, and they’re able to protect themself a little bit more. I find I’ve got to get through an extra layer to get to the face.”
Fighting has drastically decreased from a time when there was one roughly every other game. Fisticuffs are down 200% since the 2000-01 season.
Rempe, who is 6-foot-9 and 261 pounds, became an instant fan favorite and popular teammate in 2024 for his willingness to fight some of the sport’s most established enforcers. He spent time on the ice that summer with retired tough guy Georges Laraque getting technique tips on how to better use his reach and protect himself.
Sports
Sources: SEC suspends Georgia-Auburn referee
Published
1 hour agoon
October 24, 2025By
admin

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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
Oct 23, 2025, 06:12 PM ET
The Southeastern Conference has suspended longtime referee Ken Williamson for the remainder of the season in the wake of his crew’s performance in Georgia‘s 20-10 victory at Auburn on Oct. 11, sources confirmed to ESPN on Thursday.
Williamson, who was the crew chief in that game, told SEC officials prior to the opening game that he was going to retire after this season, sources said.
The SEC declined to comment Thursday. “The SEC does not comment on personnel matters,” a league spokesperson said.
Williamson didn’t respond to a text message from ESPN.
There were two controversial calls in Georgia’s come-from-behind win at Jordan-Hare Stadium. With the Tigers leading 10-0 late in the first half, Auburn quarterback Jackson Arnold tried to score on a sneak on third-and-goal from the Georgia 1.
As Arnold reached for the end zone, Georgia linebacker Raylen Wilson punched the football out of Arnold’s arm. Bulldogs safety Kyron Jones recovered the ball at the 1, and officials ruled that Arnold fumbled before reaching the goal line.
After a lengthy delay, replay officials upheld the on-field ruling, giving the Bulldogs possession.
Georgia kicked a 29-yard field goal with 13 seconds left to cut Auburn’s lead to 10-3 at the half.
As Williamson made his way to the locker room, he was confronted by Auburn athletic director John Cohen and football coach Hugh Freeze.
“I have no clue how that doesn’t break the plane, no clue,” Freeze told sideline reporter Molly McGrath at halftime. “We’re due a break, maybe, one of these damn times.”
Williamson also missed a targeting penalty against Auburn cornerback Kayin Lee with 1:07 left in the first half. A review was initiated by the replay crew, and Lee was ejected from the game for a helmet-to-helmet hit.
With the Bulldogs leading 13-10 in the fourth quarter, Georgia coach Kirby Smart ran toward the side judge and appeared to call timeout with his hands. The official stopped the clock, and Smart argued that he was only telling the official that Auburn players were clapping their hands to mimic Georgia’s signals, which should warrant a penalty.
After a brief discussion, Georgia wasn’t charged a timeout, and the play clock was reset to 25 seconds.
“Go lip-read, because I’m screaming, they’re clapping,” Smart said after the game. “They’re clapping. I didn’t need a timeout because we were going to get it off before the shot clock. It was 2,1. We’re going to get it off before the play clock ended, and I didn’t need a timeout. It was the fact that they were clapping. I wanted him to call it because it’s a penalty.”
Longtime NFL official Terry McAulay, a former coordinator of football officials for the Big East and then the American Athletic Conference, told ESPN on Thursday that he believed Williamson’s punishment was too severe.
“I think this does set a very dangerous precedent,” said McAulay, who now works as a rules analyst for NBC Sports. “I mean, it’s basically succumbing to the masses who want every official’s head on a post after a difficult loss where there were maybe some controversial calls.
“I know the world doesn’t think they’re accountable, but they certainly are. They work the whole season for postseason [assignments] and when they have situations like this, they don’t get postseason assignments. They sometimes are not renewed. If they felt this rose to the level of a required punishment, there are certainly lesser punishments that may have been more appropriate than to basically end somebody’s career.”
Williamson’s suspension was first reported by Yellowhammer News.
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