The independent ranks have swung and swayed in recent years. As recently as 2022, we had seven of them, but BYU joined the Big 12, and Liberty and New Mexico State gratefully joined Conference USA. With Army joining AAC in football this year, and UMass re-joining the MAC in 2024, we could soon be down to only two: forever-independent Notre Dame and UConn.
For now, however, we sort of have five: three indies and a Pac-2. As you probably remember, the Pac-12 was torn apart last year, with four schools departing for the Big Ten (Oregon, UCLA, USC, Washington), four more leaving for the Big 12 (Arizona, Arizona State, Colorado and Utah) and, out of sheer desperation, two fleeing for the ACC (Cal, Stanford). Despite recent on-field success, Oregon State and Washington State were evidently too geographically remote to draw the Big 12’s attention. It’s unclear what they intend to do for a future conference home, but in 2024 they’re independents. They have scheduling arrangements with the Mountain West for football and the West Coast Conference for other sports, and their games will air on Fox and The CW this fall.
So we’ve got five independent or indie-like teams, all in either the Northwest, Northeast or Northern Indiana. Let’s preview them!
Every week through the summer, Bill Connelly will preview another FBS conference exclusively for ESPN+, ultimately including all 134 FBS teams. The previews will include 2023 breakdowns, 2024 previews and team-by-team capsules. Here are the MAC, Conference USA, AAC, MWC and Sun Belt previews.
Notre Dame and its temporary new indie mates Oregon State and Wazzu had almost directly opposite seasons. The Beavers and Cougars defiantly charged out of the gates after the terrible realignment developments — OSU rose as high as 15th in SP+ during a 6-1 start (in which the only loss was to Wazzu), while Wazzu rose to 20th during a 4-0 run that featured wins over OSU and Wisconsin. But the Cougs lost seven of their final eight, a run that featured four one-score defeats and no bowl bid. OSU, meanwhile, held on a bit longer, reaching 8-2 before a narrow loss to Washington. But the Beavers finished the year losing by a combined 71-15 to Oregon and Notre Dame. Then, to add insult to injury, OSU head coach Jonathan Smith left for Michigan State.
The Irish, meanwhile, were up and down, jumping to fourth in SP+ after a 4-0 start then losing to Ohio State and playing poorly in a loss to Louisville. But they won five of their final six games, losing only at Clemson and overachieving against SP+ projections by an average of 15.8 points per game. They finished eighth in SP+, and were on the rise when the season ended.
ORLANDO, Fla. — Cam Ward made NCAA history in his final college game.
The Miami Hurricanes quarterback threw a record-setting 156th touchdown pass of his college career Saturday, connecting with Jacolby George for a 4-yard score with 4:12 left in the first quarter of the Pop-Tarts Bowl.
That’s the Division I — FBS and FCS — record, one more than Houston‘s Case Keenum threw from 2007 through 2011.
Ward finished with three touchdown passes in the first half, pushing his total to 158. Emory Williams started the second half for Miami.
Ward might not hold the record for long. Oregon‘s Dillon Gabriel — whose team could play as many as three games in the College Football Playoff — has 153 touchdown passes so far in his career, spanning six seasons at UCF, Oklahoma and now Oregon.
Either way, Ward is assured of finishing college with one of the top careers by any quarterback at any level.
He entered Saturday with 17,999 yards — 6,908 at Incarnate Word, 6,968 at Washington State and 4,123 at Miami — for the third-most in NCAA history behind only Keenum (19,217) and Gabriel (18,423).
And when it’s all done, Ward will be on the touchdown list for a while as well.
The all-division NCAA record is 162 touchdown passes by John Matocha from Division II’s Colorado School of Mines from 2019 through 2023.
Tyson Bagent of Division II’s Shepherd threw for 159 touchdowns from 2018 through 2022. Braxton Plunk of Division III’s Mount Union threw for 158 from 2019 through 2023; North Central’s Luke Lehnen, whose team will play in the Division III national championship game next month, also has 158 in his career.
And now Ward has 158, as well.
Ward rewrote Miami’s record book in 2024, his lone season with the Hurricanes. He will leave as Miami’s single-season leader in yards, completions and touchdown passes. He was on pace entering Saturday to leave as the Hurricanes’ leader in completion percentage — for a season (65.8%, set in 2023 by Tyler Van Dyke) and for a career (64.3% by D’Eriq King in 2020 and 2021).
College Football Senior Writer for ESPN. Insider for College Gameday.
UConn football coach Jim Mora has agreed to a new contract that includes two additional years that will take him through the 2028 season, the school announced Saturday.
The deal includes a raise to an average of $2.5 million annually over the course of the deal. He made $1.81 million in base salary in 2024, and the new deal will increase that base to $2.1 million in 2025.
Mora’s deal comes after he revived UConn football in his first three years at the school. He took over a program that went 1-11 in the year before his arrival and has led it to two bowl games in three years.
That includes an 8-4 regular season in 2024, which earned UConn a spot in the Wasabi Fenway Bowl against North Carolina on Saturday.
“Three years ago, I tasked Jim Mora with the challenge of leading our football team back to success and through his experience, energy and leadership he has done just that,” UConn athletic director David Benedict said in a statement. “He has taken our program to post season bowl games twice and just guided our team to one of the best seasons in UConn football history, building a momentum to keep this program moving forward. I look forward to his leadership of our football team in the years ahead.”
If Mora leads UConn to a win over North Carolina, it will mark the Huskies’ first nine-win season since 2007 and just the third nine-win season in school history. UConn went to the Myrtle Beach Bowl in Mora’s first year in 2022, the school’s first bowl game since Bob Diaco led the Huskies to the St. Petersburg Bowl in 2015.
Mora is a veteran coach who had two stints in the NFL with the Atlanta Falcons and Seattle Seahawks. He is in his ninth season as a college head coach, as he took the UCLA job in 2012 and had a successful stint there that included a pair of 10-win seasons. UCLA hasn’t won 10 games in a season since Mora left.
He mentioned at the Fenway Bowl news conference Friday that UConn went undefeated against Group of 5 teams this season, with its losses against Maryland, Duke, Wake Forest and Syracuse.
The 8-0 record against teams outside the power leagues, Mora noted, made UConn one of three Group of 5 teams to go undefeated against Group of 5 competition. He said that was a sign of UConn’s growth as a program.
“For this program, we want to start not just competing with but beating Power 4 teams,” Mora said, “and making the statement that we are becoming very relevant again on the football field.”
College football reporter; joined ESPN in 2008. Graduate of Northwestern University.
Georgia quarterback Carson Beck, who underwent surgery earlier this week to repair the ulnar collateral ligament in his right, throwing elbow, declared for the 2025 NFL draft Saturday.
In a social media post, Beck thanked his Georgia teammates and coaches, calling his time with the program “an incredible journey” and writing that he will be around to support the Bulldogs during their College Football Playoff run, which begins Wednesday against No. 7 seed Notre Dame in a quarterfinal matchup at the Allstate Sugar Bowl in New Orleans.
Beck injured his elbow on the final play of the first half against Texas in the SEC championship game Dec. 7. Renowned orthopedic surgeon Dr. Neal ElAttrache performed Beck’s surgery Monday in Los Angeles. Beck is expected to make a full recovery, according to the school, and he will resume throwing in the spring.
The 6-foot-4, 220-pound quarterback is in his fifth year at Georgia, but he had another year of eligibility because of the COVID year in 2020 and appeared in only three games in 2021.
Beck, a native of Jacksonville, Florida, went 24-3 as Georgia’s starter the past two seasons. He entered the fall as one of the top NFL prospects at quarterback. ESPN’s Mel Kiper Jr. listed Beck and Colorado‘s Shedeur Sanders as the top quarterbacks for the 2025 draft entering the season. Kiper’s latest Big Board lists Beck as the No. 4 draft-eligible quarterback prospect, behind Sanders, Miami‘s Cam Ward and Alabama‘s Jalen Milroe.
Beck did not match his 2023 numbers this fall but still finished with 3,485 passing yards, 28 touchdowns and 12 interceptions, 11 of which he threw during a five-game midseason stretch. He had 7,426 passing yards and 52 touchdowns over the past two seasons for Georgia, and he was a two-time finalist for the Manning Award and was a second-team All-SEC selection in 2023.
Redshirt sophomore Gunner Stockton replaced Beck in the SEC title game, which Georgia won 22-19 in overtime, and will start against Notre Dame.