7 teams in the top 25 lost this week: Texas, Notre Dame, Miami, Washington State, Kentucky, Missouri and Fresno State.
And it was very nearly 8 top-25 teams losing because USC easily could’ve lost to Arizona. USC is fraudulent. I told you last week that the USC-Arizona game was going to be a bit more competitive than the spread indicated, but I did not think that Arizona would push USC all the way to the brink. They were up 17-0 on them!
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Michigan continues rolling on. There’s clear a difference in the team with Harbaugh back compared to when he was on suspension. However, I think Michigan fans are going way overboard in gassing up their team. Let’s see them beat somebody with a pulse first.
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Here is my power ratings top 25 going into week 7:
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This is a long post, so feel free to skip to whichever section you like. The sections are as follows, in order:
- Miami-Georgia Tech disaster
- Red River Shootout
- Ohio State-Maryland
- Georgia-Kentucky
- Alabama-Texas A&M
- Oregon-Washington Preview and prediction
- UNPOPULAR OPINIONS
Oh no, Mario
Before we even get into the great games from last weekend, we have to talk about that Miami-Georgia Tech game. Specifically the end of it.
Mario Cristobal gave away a game Miami had absolutely no business losing. It may have been the worst game management I’ve ever seen. The players had the game won, the coaches lost it.
And you can say, “Well the running back shouldn’t have fumbled.”
But I can say, “He should’ve never had the chance to fumble.”
His coaches had the choice to give him the ball and risk a fumble, or just kneel the game out and win. And for some reason I’ll never understand, they chose to give him the ball.
But let’s talk about that fumble. Because that’s what Miami fans have kind of been harping on all week. It’s not so much a Mario Cristobal public flogging; it’s a referee public flogging. And I think they have a point.
I don’t think Don Chaney fumbled that ball. From the TV camera angle it looked like his elbow was down before he fumbled the ball. Way before, actually.
But the refs did review it and confirmed the fumble so what can you do?
Mario Cristobal is kind of off the hook a little bit though, right?
Like yeah, he should’ve just kneeled the ball, but if his running back didn’t actually fumble the ball, then he didn’t screw up as badly it seems. I mean, yes, if he just called the kneel then you don’t even have to worry about a questionable fumble that the refs get wrong. But it’s still more on the refs than it is on him, technically speaking.
But we’ll just assume it was a real fumble, and it’s all on Cristobal’s shoulders. Because legit or not, that’s what was ruled on the field and now Miami has a loss on their record. That loss is real, and it’s season-killing. It can’t be undone.
Cristobal lost a game in nearly the exact same fashion when he was at Oregon. The 2018 game against Stanford. I simply don’t understand what Cristobal was thinking there. It was 3rd and 10, under 40 seconds left on the game clock, and Georgia Tech was out of timeouts.
If Miami took a knee the game was over. There was no reason to run the ball. In fact, there was no reason to run the ball for the plays before the fumble, either. People have speculated that Cristobal was trying to run up the score or impress some of the recruits that were in the building. If that’s the case it backfired epically. There is just no good explanation for why they didn’t kneel. It was carelessness, ignorance, recklessness–who knows. But Miami should be 5-0 right now.
And we should have a battle of unbeatens this weekend with Miami at UNC, damnit!
Miami outgained Georgia Tech 453 to 250. That’s including, obviously, Georgia Tech’s last drive, the 4 play, 74 yard touchdown drive to win it.
First of all, how was the game even that close to begin with? Before the fumble, Miami was out gaining Georgia Tech 450-something to 176. And they were only up 20-17!
Well, Miami had 5 turnovers in the game, that’s why.
The most messed up part of this is that Miami is actually a really good team this year. They were flying under the radar a bit but I have them at #8 in my power ratings right now. They’re a legit squad, and now their season just slammed into a brick wall.
You’re about to find out real quickly on Saturday when they play UNC if Mario Cristobal has lost the locker room over that. I could easily see Miami coming out flat in that game and being down 21-0 real quick.
Those players were DEVASTATED after the game, and rightly so. It was ugly.
But really, I think the bigger outrage may be that it did not appear it was a legitimate fumble.
That’s the angle I’d play if I were Mario Cristobal to keep the attention of your players. Tell them they got screwed by the refs. Because I think they actually did.
Obviously Cristobal is not off the hook at all, but if it wasn’t actually a fumble, then it does deflect some blame off of him.
Oklahoma 34, Texas 30
Texas-Oklahoma was the best game of the year, one of the best games I’ve ever seen honestly. The energy, excitement and atmosphere were incredible. That rivalry is all the way back. I cannot say enough about how awesome that game was. The whole time I was watching I was wishing I was there live and in person. I’m going to try to go next year, for sure.
I picked Texas to win the game, so let’s get that out of the way. I just didn’t think Oklahoma would be quite ready for a game of that magnitude. I thought Texas should’ve been the #1 team in the nation going into this game, and I thought Oklahoma was more like in the 7-10 range.
Not to take anything away from Oklahoma, but I think this game was more about Texas maybe not being quite as good as I thought they were rather than about Oklahoma being potentially the best team in the country. I think Oklahoma is really good, but there’s still some things about them I’m not sold on.
But let’s start with the positives: Oklahoma did a good job against that Texas offense, although the stats don’t really reflect that. Texas racked up 527 yards of offense in the game, and was very efficient throwing the ball. But Oklahoma’s defense was a classic case of bend-don’t-break. Texas had so many trips to the redzone but Oklahoma just found a way to get stops. They had some help from turnovers, because Texas had 3 to Oklahoma’s zero, and that’s really what killed the Longhorns in this game.
I almost forgot Texas blocked a punt and returned it for a TD, which means their offense only mustered 23 points on 527 yards of offense. Texas’ average number of yards needed to score a touchdown per drive was about 76 in this game, so if you divided 527 by 76, Texas would’ve been expected to have 7 scoring drives in the game. They only had 5–2 touchdowns and 3 field goals. You rack up 527 yards of offense you should definitely score 35-40 points or more. But the turnovers were just killer.
I wrote on this site that when Oklahoma hired Brent Venables it would turn out to be a great hire. People kind of wrote him off based on how bad they were last year going 5-7, but while there were two really ugly losses last season (55-24 to TCU, 49-0 to Texas), the rest of their losses were all close games. And that’s a program that lost 37 players from the 2021 squad–Venables was dealing with a ton of roster turnover.
I thought Oklahoma would be better this season, but it feels like they’re actually ahead of schedule now. They’re ready to go right now. I don’t think they can win a National Championship this season, but they will definitely be in the mix for a playoff berth for sure.
Overall, I’m not fully sold on Dillon Gabriel as a passer but he’s really good as a runner. He actually led Oklahoma in rushing yards, 113 yards on 14 carries. He’s really good at evading pressure in the pocket and obviously you have to give him major credit for leading that game-winning drive at the end, so I don’t really have anything bad to say about him. But I feel like I just need to see a bit more from him as a passer before I consider him fully stamped and part of the discussion with guys like Michael Penix and Bo Nix and the rest.
Oklahoma’s running backs were not doing all that well–they only had 88 yards on 29 carries against that stout Texas defensive front when you subtract the quarterback runs. But Texas really has a ferocious defensive line particularly the interior guys T’Vondre Sweat and Byron Murphy.
I thought the Oklahoma receiver Jalil Farooq was a real standout player. He made some big plays, had 5 catches for 130 yards. They have a lot of solid receivers overall, though.
I think if these teams played each other 10 times Texas would probably win at least 6-7 times. Oklahoma needed just about everything to go right for them to win that game. The only real miscue they had was the blocked punt for a touchdown. Texas just didn’t take care of the football. Ewers threw a pick really early during Texas’ opening drive of the game, and it was a bad one. He tried to force it to a receiver that was basically being double covered, it just was not a good decision at all by him. Kind of a head-scratcher. Oklahoma then capitalized off the great field position and got a TD.
Ewers’ second pick wasn’t quite as bad, but it was still partly his fault. They were down at the OU 13 yard line going into score and Ewers hit Jatavion Sanders on a quick seam route that would’ve gone for at least a first down inside the 3 yard line, maybe even a touchdown, but he threw the ball high and Sanders had to jump for it, and when he jumped, he got absolutely leveled by the Oklahoma safety, ball pops up in the air and is picked off by Oklahoma. Sanders could have made the catch, it was a tough one, but the issue is that Ewers threw the ball too high. There was no need to throw the ball that high, in fact throwing it low would’ve been much better because Sanders could’ve just sat down and avoided the big hit altogether. It was a really bad throw, and just because it was a deflected ball INT does not mean Ewers wasn’t at fault for it. That throw has to be better.
Now, it wasn’t really that detrimental to Texas because they got the blocked punt TD right afterward, but still, it was not a good throw by Quinn Ewers and he’s got to be better than that.
Texas also gave OU a free first down and kept a drive alive by roughing the punter. They dropped a sure INT in the endzone on a drive that OU eventually got a field goal from. They got flagged for a late hit on a sliding QB on a drive that OU got a touchdown off of (Texas had 9 penalties for 70 yards, OU had 4 for 30).
It was just a sloppy game all around for Texas, really, especially in the first half. They did not look like they came into that game ready to play. Oklahoma was more buttoned-up for sure. And I know Texas is better than that: their game against Alabama they had zero turnovers and only 4 penalties for 40 yards. They were so much more buttoned-up against Bama.
Texas was consistently able to move the ball downfield. Sark had some good plays dialed up, as usual, and they had lots of big chunk plays, but no real home runs that went for TDs. They were able to get those against Alabama, but not really against Oklahoma.
Ewers had another miscue actually, about midway through the third half he took off to run on 3rd and 12, got about 6 yards downfield when the defenders closed in on him. Instead of just going down, he for some reason tried to truck the defender and ended up fumbling the ball. Really poor decision there because even if he did run over that defender he was not getting the first down. So all three Texas turnovers were on Ewers.
Despite those three turnovers and all the mistakes, Texas still moved the ball really well. Running back Jonathan Brooks had a huge day, ran for 129 yards on 5.8 yards a carry. He had that nice run to tie the game up in the 4th quarter. Ewers was 31/37 throwing the ball for 346 yards. And Texas still did fight back to grab a late lead in the game.
The one moment in the game where it really started to feel like Oklahoma was going to win was obviously the goal line stand early in the 4th quarter. Yet another Texas drive to the redzone resulting in no points. Texas marched the ball down the field after Oklahoma turned it over on downs, and Texas got a first and goal from the 1 yard line. You have to punch one in there, no question. You’re down 27-20 at that point, you have a golden opportunity to retake control of the game. But four downs, four stuffs, turnover on downs. It felt like the momentum shifted heavily towards Oklahoma after that drive. When Texas had first and goal from the 1 down 7 points, ESPN had OU with a 56% chance of winning. After Texas turned it over on downs it went up to an 83% chance Oklahoma would win.
Oklahoma did have one serious miscue that nearly cost them the game. Clock was winding down in the first half, OU has the ball deep in the red zone at the 8, with 6 seconds left on the clock they’re able to just run one more play before they have to kick a field goal. It was a little rollout pass to the running back and he was wide open, would’ve walked into the end zone, but he just dropped the ball. There were only 2 seconds left on the clock afterward and so they had to kick a field goal, but they should’ve been up 24-17 going into the half instead of 20-17. And then I thought about that dropped pass at the end when Texas kicked that field goal to go up 30-27–like wow, that 4-point drop drop really might cost Oklahoma this game, huh?
Ultimately of course it didn’t, they end up winning in thrilling fashion at the end. I really don’t know what to make of Texas after this game. They certainly had a chance to win this game even despite all the blunders they committed, and they were averaging a healthy 6.75 yards per play compared to Oklahoma’s 6.0 YPP. Again, I think if these teams played 10 times Texas would win at least 6 or 7 times.
They just did not bring their A game for the one time they actually did play the game.
But the good news for Texas is that there will almost certainly be a rematch with Oklahoma in the Big 12 Championship game. I’d be shocked if there wasn’t, honestly. Oklahoma and West Virginia are the only teams in the conference that are undefeated in conference play, and Texas actually doesn’t have West Virginia on the schedule so they don’t get a chance to give them a loss, but Oklahoma does play them, and I just think there’s very little chance West Virginia finishes with a better conference record than Texas does. I actually don’t think Texas loses another game in conference play–at least they shouldn’t. Then you look at the other teams that have 2-1 conference records: Iowa State, Texas Tech, Kansas. Texas has already blasted Kansas, and the other two have no chance of finishing ahead of Texas. Iowa State lost to freaking Ohio U.
The Big 12 is really just OU and Texas, and then everybody else. There are no divisions so the conference championship game is just the top 2 records in conference. And so because Texas and OU are just so much better than everybody else in conference–TCU is down, Oklahoma State is down, BYU isn’t that great–it would take a shocking upset to prevent Texas and OU from meeting up in the Big 12 Championship game.
Which would be awesome. It would essentially be a playoff game, or a play-in game, I guess, assuming both teams win out. Because if OU is 12-0 they’re in the playoff with a conference Championship, 100%. And if losing to a 12-0 OU is Texas’ only loss of the season, and if Alabama keeps winning, then Texas will definitely be in the playoff if they beat OU and avenge their only loss. No way you can keep them out.
So I fully expect to see a Texas-OU rematch in the Big 12 Championship game. It’s only happened once before, in 2018, although there have only been 21 Conference Championship games played (from 1996-2009, then they scrapped it from 2009-2016, then brought it back in 2017). Plus from 1996-2009 Texas and OU were in the same division, so it was impossible for it to happen.
Overall though, if you’re an Oklahoma fan, you’ve got to be very happy with where the program is now under Brent Venables. The stench of 49-0 is now gone, he’s got that team playing at a top-10, maybe even a top-5 level, and they are going to be in contention for a playoff spot.
I know OU fans were devastated after Lincoln Riley bolted on them for USC, but honestly, when you look at how USC is playing right now with their horrendous defense, is there any Oklahoma fan right now that would rather have Lincoln Riley over Brent Venables? Doubt it.
I told Oklahoma fans back when Lincoln Riley left that although they were really upset, ultimately Lincoln Riley did them a favor. He is not the guy to lead a program into the SEC. He just isn’t. You are not going to get very far in the SEC if your head coach doesn’t believe in defense. Period. The SEC is not a “defense optional” conference. I said back in 2021 that Brent Venables was a much better head coach to lead Oklahoma into the SEC than Lincoln Riley, and I think you’re seeing that now.
This was a statement win for Brent Venables in year 2 of his coaching tenure. Signature win. That’s a program-builder right there. They showed that they are a great football team and that they can compete with just about anybody. That’s a win that shows recruits that Oklahoma is a legit program once again. And what recruit wouldn’t want to be a part of a game like that?
Most importantly, they finally play defense now. Under Lincoln Riley, they had an amazing offense but no defense. Now, they have a legitimate defense AND a great offense. Venables is showing that you can have both.
You have to love where your program is at right now if you’re an Oklahoma fan. Big time win, absolutely massive for the program and in my view will serve as a launch pad game to build even more confidence going forward. Program-changing win.
Ohio State 37, Maryland 17
Right off the bat, this should’ve been a ranked matchup. Maryland should’ve been a top-25 team. Maybe not much higher than like 22-23, but they should’ve been at least ranked. A 5-0 Power Five program should not be unranked no matter how easy their schedule is. LSU had 2 losses and they were still ranked.
But anyway, I want to know why Ohio State’s offense could look like pure crap for much of the first half of this game–and even much of the 3rd quarter, honestly–and then suddenly wake up later in the game and go on a 27-0 run. They were coming off a bye week, too!
Ohio State’s identity this year is that they are a defensive team. They simply are. They still have a ton to figure out on offense. Kyle McCord is very up and down–at times he looks horrible and at other times you see flashes of why he was rated as a 5-star prospect. The offensive line for Ohio State is not good in the run game.
The only way you survive that stuff is if your defense can stop the other team and buy you some time to get things figured out on offense. Ohio State had 3 offensive points in the first half of this game, but luckily for them the score at halftime was just 10-10, because the Ohio State defense did a great job and produced points via a pick-six. Previous Ohio State defenses wouldn’t have been able to keep the game close. Against last year’s Ohio State defense or the year prior, it might have been a 17-3 deficit at halftime, or worse, as opposed to being 10-10. Having a reliable defense just gives you so much more margin for error on offense.
I do think that this win proves that Ohio State’s defense is pretty legit. Maryland is the one team they’ve played this year that could really test their secondary, and Ohio State passed that test. Maryland was not like Notre Dame, who was afraid to take deep shots and test the corners. Maryland was chucking it deep–their approach was to make the Ohio State secondary prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that it was massively improved over last season. Because Maryland had some big success throwing the ball on Ohio State last year, and they weren’t just going to abandon that because the numbers say Ohio State’s pass defense is legit. They were going to find out for themselves by throwing at it repeatedly, unlike Notre Dame who seemed content to not even really try to go at that Ohio State secondary. Maryland tried to call the “bluff,” while Notre Dame didn’t.
Turned out that Ohio State’s secondary is no bluff. Maryland with Taulia was the best passing the Ohio State defense has faced all year, and yes that includes Notre Dame and Hartman because like we just discussed, Maryland wasn’t afraid to throw it deep and Notre Dame was. Plus I think Maryland has better receivers than Notre Dame does.
So Ohio State goes out there and limits Taulia to 191 passing yards on 21/41 passing attempts, 1 TD and 2 picks. They also limit Maryland’s run game to 106 yards on 35 carries, 3.0 yards per attempt. I didn’t think the Ohio State run defense was anywhere near as good as maybe the stats show, however. I thought Maryland ball carriers were consistently falling forward and dragging Ohio State defenders with them for a few extra yards. I thought there was a large stretch of that game in the first half where Maryland was absolutely steamrolling Ohio State on the ground and it looked really bad. It looked SOFT, no matter what Ryan Day or anybody says.
Now, in fairness, stopping the run isn’t just about toughness. It’s not as if soft teams don’t stop the run well and tough teams always stop the run well. A lot of it is about scheme and assignments and gap-soundness. You can be a tough team and still not stop the run well. I don’t think Ohio State’s linebackers have played particularly well this season. I think Tommy Eichenberg, an All American last year, looks like he’s just too slow to really get the job done. Steele Chambers hasn’t been good as well. The linebackers are really the main guys when it comes to stopping the run and filling those gaps at the line. Ohio State’s scheme is a 4-2-5, meaning they only have two linebackers, and one of their three safeties is like a hybrid/nickel safety that can also move down and play linebacker–Sonny Styles, who looks like he’s a much better football player than both Eichenberg and Chambers, the only issue is he doesn’t have that seniority that those two have.
I just wonder if Ohio State will actually pull the plug and bench their two veteran linebackers if they continue not playing well. It’s obviously also a matter of whether or not the young guys behind them can actually play as well, but it’s definitely a question of whether a coach will bench a veteran senior in favor of a young guy. Is the system actually a true meritocracy? I don’t know, all I know is that Ohio State’s linebackers have been the clear cut weakness of that defense. The one unit you can pick on is the linebackers. The Ohio State defensive line is great, the secondary is great–the linebackers are just suspect.
And if you have one weak link, it compromises the integrity of the whole operation. It’s the same thing with the offensive line: you can have 4 guys blocking well but if one guy completely botches his assignment or gets blown up, it ruins everything.
If your linebackers are not gapped-up in the run game, and if they’re bad in coverage in the throw game, then your whole defense suffers. You could have a lockdown secondary, but the offense will just throw at the linebackers over the middle–which is exactly what Notre Dame did. The tight end feasted on those linebackers in pass coverage. And if your linebackers aren’t great against the run, you’re in trouble because the defensive line can’t stop the run every single time. I think Ohio State’s defensive line is really good, and particularly good against the run, but stopping the run is about both the defensive line and the linebackers, and if the linebackers aren’t playing well then it all falls apart.
I think a big part of the problem with Ohio State’s linebackers seemingly getting worse is that last year they were asked to blitz so much more than they are this year. And they were good at blitzing and being aggressive and going downhill. But now that they’re asked to be less aggressive, and sort of sit back, keep everything in front of them, drop into coverage more–I think they’re getting exposed. So Ohio State is going to have to figure that issue out on defense–either the linebackers have to play better, or they need to get yanked.
Now, I will say that Taulia Tagovailoa is a heck of a quarterback, and it’s just tough to deal with him. So many times it seemed like the Ohio State defense had him cornered or surrounded and he would somehow wiggle his way out of it and scamper away. He’s very elusive, and you have to give him credit for that. Going into this game, he was statistically the best quarterback in the Big Ten. I do think people need to put some respect on Taulia’s name because he’s legit. The main reason he isn’t in the NFL right now is because he’s 5’11”, not because he doesn’t have the talent. He’s a damn good player.
Offensively, it didn’t look pretty for Ohio State until basically the last third of the game. Marvin Harrison Jr. definitely came to play, though, and he was the lone true bright spot on that offense, showing exactly why he’s considered the best receiver in the country, a generational draft prospect and all the above. It didn’t look like the Ohio State coaching staff had much confidence in Kyle McCord to throw the ball downfield, but they started to really open it up later in the game.
I think that’s the formula–just let McCord chuck it to Marvin Harrison and whatever happens is going to happen. Don’t pussyfoot around with the jet sweeps and the swing passes and all that stuff–you have the best wide receiver in America, throw him the ball and let him make plays. Even when he’s covered, too–he’ll still make catches when he’s covered. Just let him do his thing. Build up McCord’s confidence in throwing the deeper and intermediate routes–the real “chunk play” stuff that CJ Stroud excelled in. At the very least, forcing the defense to respect the deep passing game will help open things up in the run game a little bit while that offensive line tries to get its head out of its ass.
McCord had a great statline for this game. 19/29 passing for 320 yards, 2 TDs and no picks. But don’t let that fool you into thinking he was great in this game. He led that offense to a grand total of 5 punts and 1 field goal in the first half of the game.
(One of the punts was a botched snap that went to the upback–at first it looked like they tried to run a fake but on the replay it was clear the long snapper just screwed up the snap and sent it right into the dirt bouncing around. It was definitely not a called fake punt. And it gave Maryland the ball on about the Ohio State 30 yard line which set up their first touchdown.)
Until Ohio State got that field goal towards the end of the second quarter, their drives were as follows: 4 plays 5 yards, 8 plays 27 yards, 4 plays -14 yards, 4 plays 13 yards, 5 plays 24 yards. That comes out to 25 plays for 55 yards.
McCord prior to the field goal drive late in the second quarter was 6/13 passing for 49 yards. It was not pretty. Then he got things going with that long shot to Marvin Harrison that went for 58 yards. It was a nice play, but McCord badly short-armed it. Harrison had to completely stop running to wait for the ball. If the ball is thrown even remotely accurately it’s a 90 yard touchdown, easy.
Look at how wide open he was:
But then you can see how much ground the defender makes up because Marv has to completely stop in order to catch the ball:
It was about a 55 yard throw in the air, and you can’t really ask for too much more out of a college quarterback, so it kind of is what it is. It just looked bad because of how wide open Harrison was and then he had to completely stop to catch the ball. And of course because Ohio State was held to a field goal on the drive.
McCord also underthrew Julian Fleming on a long pass that Fleming had to double back and fall down for. If that ball is thrown in stride it’s a walk in touchdown.
The second half was a much different story. Though the Ohio State defense did allow Maryland to march down the field on their opening drive of the second half and take a 17-10 lead, from that point on it was all Ohio State. They went touchdown, field goal, touchdown, touchdown, field goal, and kneel out the game on their six second half possessions.
Marvin Harrison Jr. really stepped up in this game, which is weird because it was his first game post injury, and somehow it was his best game of the season. The dude is just on another level, I guess. I think he’d kind of been coasting a bit to start the season, or maybe just kind of expecting McCord to be able to find him consistently. His numbers weren’t stellar through the first four games. In this game, though, I think once Harrison realized Ohio State’s offense was in some real trouble and they were down 10-0, he kicked it into high gear–routing up DBs, making spectacular catches, and just going all out. Like he realized he needed to make some big time plays for them to get going on offense and win, and he absolutely did that.
He needs to play like that from now on: he’s got to put a serious hurting on opposing DBs and get so wide open there’s no way Kyle McCord can miss him. He has to be spectacular. I think Marv kind of fell into a lull a bit having CJ Stroud as his quarterback last year, where Stroud was such a ball placement specialist, and Marv is such a contested catch specialist, that Marv could run any sort of route he wanted and Stroud would still hit him for a completion. Doesn’t matter if he didn’t get a good release, or didn’t leave a defender in the dust–if there was the slightest bit of daylight, Stroud would fit it in there and it would be a completion. It isn’t like that with McCord. Marv needs to help his quarterback out a lot more than he did with Stroud, and I think he realized that by about the second quarter of the Maryland game. Once Marv decided that he was about to lay waste to the Maryland secondary, the whole Ohio State passing game took off. Suddenly McCord looked a lot better (minus the underthrown balls). Because Marv made it easy for him.
I predicted Ohio State to win the game 41-17, and though it didn’t look like that was going to happen in the first half, they were right about there by the end of it. On one of their drives they kicked a field goal from the Maryland 5 yard line, so if they just converted that into a touchdown I would’ve been right on the money.
The real problem for Ohio State in this game was that they ran the ball 33 times for 62 yards. That is obviously horrendously bad, just 1.9 yards per carry, and there’s no reason Ohio State should be getting stonewalled like that against a team like Maryland.
I have not watched any all-22 film breakdowns for week 6 games, but I really want to watch Ohio State’s offense so I can see what their offensive line was doing. I can’t imagine they were just getting beat by superior football players because they have a significant roster talent edge over Maryland. Plus, they were pretty good in pass protection, so I don’t think it’s a matter of Ohio State having bad players.
There’s just no way that’s the case. I know recruiting rankings are not the be-all, end-all, but you look at Ohio State’s offensive line, Donovan Jackson is a 5 star, Carson Hinzman is a 4 star, Matt Jones is a 4 star, Josh Simmons is a 4 star. Only the left tackle Josh Fryar is a 3 star player, but still, it’s not like these are bad football players on this Ohio State line.
In Maryland’s front seven, their DE Quashon Fuller was a 4 star, their NT Jordan Phillips was a 3 star, their other DE is a 4 star, their JACK position is a 3 star, and both their linebackers are 4 stars. So they have a pretty talented front six (because they play a 4-2-5 defense), but it’s not like they should be dominating Ohio State’s line.
You look at how Maryland has done against the run in their first 5 games prior to Ohio State, nobody they played including FCS Towson and Group of Five Charlotte was worse running the ball than Ohio State was.
That’s just unacceptable if you’re Ohio State. Maryland has been decent against the run this season, but even Towson was able to run for 4.4 yards per carry and Charlotte was able to run for 3.7 against them. For Ohio State to average 1.9 yards a carry is just abysmal, and I think it says more about Ohio State just having a terrible day running the ball than it does about Maryland dominating up front.
I mean, come on: does Ohio State really have a worse offensive line than Towson? Than Charlotte? Worse than Virginia and Indiana and Michigan State? I seriously doubt that’s the case.
What I saw when I watched the game film (TV copy, not all 22) was mostly offensive linemen not being able to get up to the linebackers. Offensive linemen are instructed to double team a defensive lineman off the snap, and then one guy releases from the double team and moves up to take on a linebacker, ensuring the first and second levels of the defense are hatted up. Ohio State’s offensive line just wasn’t doing that.
I also didn’t think Chip Trayanum showed great vision, either, so it was partly a matter of Ohio State using their short yardage running back for the whole game when normally they would have their starter, Treyveon Henderson, in there. Chip Trayanum this season is averaging 4.6 yards per carry while Henderson is averaging 6.7. So I don’t think it was just a coincidence that the one game Treyveon Henderson misses, all of the sudden it looks like Ohio State’s offensive line can’t run block a lick. Part of it was just that Trayanum isn’t as good a runner as Henderson is, flat out. I’m sure most Buckeye fans are hesitant to say that because he was the hero of the Notre Dame game but it’s just a fact that he was missing a lot of holes.
There were more than a few runs I saw when I rewatched the game where there was a hole opened up and Trayanum just didn’t hit it, or find it. Sometimes he would just run right into his own guy. On more than a few occasions it was pretty egregious.
People have to realize that running backs vary in terms of vision and conviction in hitting the hole. Running back is not a mindless position where you get the handoff and just run. Vision is extremely important–it doesn’t matter how fast or powerful you are, if you are not hitting the right holes, and you’re constantly running into the backs of your linemen, you’re not going anywhere.
So in my opinion, Ohio State’s run struggles were a combination of poor running back vision and poor run blocking. I’m not trying to pin it all on Chip Trayanum, but the narratives I see emerging in the media are that it’s all on the offensive line being horrible at run blocking, and even that Ohio State just doesn’t have good enough personnel to run block effectively. That’s not what I saw when I rewatched the game. It was a combo of at times bad run blocking and at times, for lack of a better term, bad running back play.
Overall for Ohio State, there’s an element of anxiety that gets introduced when a team starts poorly and finishes strong vs. the other way around. There’s something about first impressions, we know they always stick more than second or third impressions. The over/under on that game was 56.5 and Ohio State was favored by 20. They won by exactly 20, and it was pretty much exactly what the Vegas spread implied. The spread implied a 38-18 Ohio State win, and they won 37-17. Technically, they did exactly what they were expected to do.
So why are Ohio State fans freaking out and acting like the season is over? It’s not because of the final score. Even if they’d tacked on another touchdown and won 41-17 or 44-17, I think the reaction would still be the same and Buckeye Nation would still be despondent.
I think the anxiety stems from how they started slow, were down 17-10 in the third quarter, and then only started to pull away in the fourth quarter. Consider this: Ohio State and Maryland were tied 10-10 in the first half, and then Ohio State outscored them 27-7 in the second half. What if it was flipped? What if Ohio State jumped out to a 27-7 lead going into halftime, and then coasted for the second half playing to a 10-10 draw and still securing the same 37-17 win? I bet Ohio State fans would feel a lot differently.
Ohio State fans need to get used to being a defensive team. It’s okay. Their defense isn’t perfect but it’s the reason they won that game. If Ohio State had their 2022 or especially 2021 defense for this game they would probably have lost in a blowout. But the pick six and the overall way they played was instrumental. They held Taulia to 4.8 YPA. They looked a bit shaky at times early on, and I still don’t really like the way opposing ball carriers seem to always fall forward for a few extra yards when they get tackled. But it’s the little things like that I focus on for big time teams. They still allow just 4.1 yards per play to opposing offenses, 4th best in the nation (and better than Georgia, Michigan, Alabama and Oklahoma).
The Ohio State offense is a work in progress. Like I went over last week, of all the starting quarterbacks on the great teams out there, Kyle McCord is by far the least experienced. It’s him and Carson Beck, although Carson Beck is a year older. You could also throw in Jalen Milroe, too.
It’s unfair to compare McCord, Beck and Milroe to guys like Michael Penix, Bo Nix, Caleb Williams, Dillon Gabriel, Quinn Ewers, JJ McCarthy, Jayden Daniels, Jordan Travis, Sam Hartman–those guys all have much more experience. Some of them (Penix, Hartman and Travis) are in their 6th years of college and were in the same recruiting class as Trevor Lawrence and Justin Fields.
Ohio State fans are probably comparing McCord to CJ Stroud in his first year as a starter (2021) and Justin Fields in his first year as a starter (2019). And that’s a fair comparison. In fact, those guys were both a year younger than McCord when they became starters. It definitely looked like Stroud in particular was much more developed as a passer in his first year as a starter than McCord is. No doubt about it. Stroud threw for over 4,400 yards, 44 touchdowns and 6 INTs in 2021. McCord won’t come anywhere close to those numbers.
But Kyle McCord isn’t as good as CJ Stroud. Are you watching Stroud in the NFL? He’s having one of the best starts to a career for a rookie QB we’ve ever seen. He’s the real deal. If Ohio State fans’ biggest gripe is that Kyle McCord isn’t as good as CJ Stroud, they’re delusional. They may have deluded themselves into thinking that any and every quarterback will put up huge numbers and look like a top-3 quarterback in the country in Ryan Day’s offensive system because Dwayne Haskins, Justin Fields and CJ Stroud were all really good, but quarterbacks do, in fact, vary in talent.
The reality is that it’s a great offensive system, but those three guys were also great quarterbacks. McCord may become great, you can’t just expect him to be great from the jump just because of the system he plays in. He probably isn’t as good as Stroud, Fields or Haskins, and I think Ohio State fans need to adjust their expectations accordingly.
They also need to understand that there are other ways to win football games than just outscoring people. You don’t have to win every game 56-20 and rack up 550 yards of offense. You can win by playing great defense and okay offense just as you can win by playing great offense and okay defense. It looks different, it feels different, and Ohio State fans just need to get used to it. They’re not used to being able to win games by scoring 30 points; they’re used to needing 45+ points to win every week.
Ohio State isn’t even that bad on offense, either. I mean for pete’s sake the way their fans talk about the team you’d think they were Iowa. They’re averaging 6.9 yards per play on offense, 18th best in the country. They’re 17th in the country in passing yards per game. They rank 59th in rush yards per carry at just 4.4, so that definitely needs to improve, but their offense isn’t that far off.
Just wanted to point out one last thing before moving on about this matchup against Purdue on the road coming up for Ohio State: historically, while Ohio State is 41-15-2 against Purdue all-time, they’re only 13-9 in games played at Purdue. And they’re 3-5 at Purdue since 2000, which is a major yikes.
The last time they played at Purdue was in 2018 when Purdue won 49-20 in a stunning upset. That Purdue team finished 6-7. Other Ohio State losses at Purdue: 2011, 2009, 2004 and 2000. The 2011 Purdue team that beat Ohio State in West Lafayette went 7-6, the 2009 Purdue team finished 5-7, in 2004 Purdue went 7-5, and in 2000 Purdue went 8-4.
I believe every Ohio State coach in the past 80 years has lost at least once on the road at Purdue, other than Ryan Day who is going into his first road game at Purdue, so he doesn’t count. Urban Meyer did, Jim Tressel lost twice (2009 & 2004), John Cooper lost once (2000), Earle Bruce lost there in 1984, Woody Hayes lost there twice (1978 & 1960), a guy named Wes Fesler lost in 1947. Every Ohio State coach dating back to 1947 has lost at least one road game to Purdue.
I don’t think Ohio State is going to lose this game because Purdue isn’t very good this year, but I doubt they had good teams all those other years they beat Ohio State in West Lafayette….
Georgia 51, Kentucky 13
I had to keep reminding myself that Kentucky was ranked #20 in the country while watching this game. Georgia was just taking them to the woodshed from the very start. And that’s something we haven’t really seen Georgia do this season–start fast and play well in the first half of the game.
In this game they outscored Kentucky 34-7 in the first half, and 14-0 in the first quarter. Prior to Saturday, Georgia had an aggregate first quarter scoring margin of 17-17 against their first five opponents (UT Martin, Ball State, South Carolina, UAB and Auburn). They have been a slow-starting team this year, but not against Kentucky. So that’s very encouraging.
And most importantly: they were stout against the run, limiting Ray Davis to 59 yards on 15 carries and holding Kentucky to just 2.3 yards per carry overall. Looks like the Georgia run defense is finally getting back to the level it’s normally at, and that’s extremely important because that’s really where it all starts for Georgia.
This game, believe it or not, was Georgia’s toughest test of the year–in terms of opponent quality. I know they had a tougher time winning the South Carolina game and the Auburn game, but those teams were not quite as good as Kentucky is. Kentucky was the first ranked opponent Georgia faced this year. And so it’s got to be encouraging that Georgia was able to get up and dominate this game.
Georgia finally felt like Georgia again. It finally felt like, “Oh, that’s why they’re #1 in the country.” This was the team we expected to see, and have been waiting to see all season. They looked like the best team in college football, finally.
The reason that this game was so lopsided, though, even though Kentucky was the best team Georgia had faced all season, is because of the styles each team plays.
Kentucky is like the knockoff version of Georgia–they play a similar style of football, they just don’t have the caliber of players that Georgia has. Their style is to beat you up physically, ground and pound you, and wear you down over the course of the game. It is a defense-first style of play, and on offense it favors running the ball over passing the ball. Georgia has sort of evolved over the past year or so into a more advanced and prolific offense, but at their core under Kirby Smart, Georgia is a defensively-driven team. They don’t want to throw it all over the yard and overwhelm you with offensive firepower; they would rather pound you into submission with suffocating defense and a punishing, methodical offense.
Michigan plays that way too, and it’s why I don’t think Michigan can ever beat Georgia: because you can’t beat Georgia at their own game, and Georgia just has better players than Michigan does. If Kentucky is like the Dollar Store version of Georgia, Michigan is like the Kirkland version of Georgia.
Kentucky cannot impose their will on Georgia. They’re not going to be able to push Georgia around up front, and they’re not going to be able to run the ball at will. It just is not happening. So that’s why they got blown out the way they did–they ran into a team that was not susceptible to what Kentucky wants to do.
I think something people don’t fully understand about Georgia is they don’t care about style points in the regular season. Just get the win, use most of your games as practice, get up for like the 2-3 a year where you really have to bring your A-game, but kind of mail it in for the less challenging matchups. When you have a roster as stacked as theirs is, it’s inevitable. Other teams that have been great for a while do it, too.
Plus, with Georgia, there’s inevitably going to be a loss of focus when you’re coming off of two straight National Championships. As much as you try to avoid it, there’s a general sense of “Can we just fast forward to the SEC Championship already?” It’s human nature.
In fact, now that I think of it, I actually think this is a major factor in explaining why some teams that we know, deep down, are kind of fraudulent look great statistically in the first half of the season, while there are teams that haven’t looked super dominant but we know, deep down, are actually great.
I think there are “Tryhard teams” and “Non-Tryhard teams.”
Georgia is an example of a Non-Tryhard team. I think Georgia’s mentality is to just get the win, stay healthy, get some solid reps in, and move on. And Kirby would never admit this, nor would he ever even vocalize it to his team or coaching staff. I don’t think it’s some sort of explicit, conscious decision that “we’re not going to really try our hardest until we play somebody legit.” I don’t think he says that to his team. It’s just more of a combination of a general lack of urgency and an overriding sense of confidence and self-assuredness. It’s like, Georgia knows who they are. They know what they’ve done. They don’t have to prove anything. Kirby and his staff break down the film of their opponents each week and know that pretty much all they have to do is show up and they’ll be able to win comfortably.
Georgia plays South Carolina, they’re down 14-3 at halftime, and everyone’s like, “Oh wow! Is Georgia in trouble?!” No, no they’re not. Once they actually started trying in the second half, South Carolina didn’t score a point. It almost seems like those NBA stories you hear where a guy’s like, “I was defending Kobe [or LeBron or KD or MJ or some superstar player] and I thought I was holding my own in the first half, but then he just kicked it into high gear and dropped like 30 points in the second half, and I realized I wasn’t holding my own against him, he just wasn’t really trying for the first half. Once he started trying, it was over.”
I think Georgia is like that.
But then there are teams out there that I think do feel like they have something to prove. They really get up for these early season games, even against lowly opponents. They want to show everyone how good they are. They have a chip on their shoulders. There’s an element of insecurity there.
The Tryhard teams will go out and obliterate a cupcake and then puff their chests out about it. Non-Tryhard teams don’t really care to do that.
I don’t really know exactly which teams are Tryhards and which teams aren’t, but I feel like Georgia is definitely in the Non-Tryhard category. Without question. Ohio State I think is in there as well–like they just know they have a roster that is absolutely stacked, so they don’t really get up for more than 2-3 games a year.
Michigan is definitely in the Tryhard category. What else would explain how dominant they look as they progress through their cupcake regular season schedule, and then get absolutely pulverized in the postseason, pretty much every year? Jim Harbaugh is 1-6 in bowl games at Michigan. Every year during the regular season, it’s like, “Oh wow! Michigan is so dominant! Look at their stats! They might be the best team in the country this year!” Then they get to the postseason, whether it’s an exhibition of a bowl game or an actual, meaningful CFP game, and just get embarrassed.
I think Oregon is also in the Tryhard category, honestly. They GOT UP for that Colorado game. They were juiced, they were hyped. And Colorado is not a good team. But Oregon was extra motivated to beat the crap out of them and make a “Statement” about it. Oregon also beat Portland State 81-7 in week 1. They were up 50-7 at half, and still scored 31 additional points in the second half. If that’s not the definition of a Tryhard win, I don’t know what is.
You might say, “Well it’s not Oregon’s fault Portland State couldn’t stop them!” Yeah, true, but a lot of other teams would just completely call off the dogs and make a deliberate effort to not run up the score.
Ohio State, for example, played Youngstown State in week 2. They were up 28-7 at half, then just kind of fucked around for the 3rd quarter, added another TD to make it 35-7, then just shut it down and the game finished 35-7. Not a super impressive score against an FCS team, but also Youngstown State is where Jim Tressel came from, and I think there was a very deliberate effort by Ohio State to not run up the score out of respect for Jim Tressel. That’s a former Ohio State coach who led them to a National Championship–I’m sure Ryan Day has a lot of respect for him, and also Jim Tressel was the University President at YSU for a while, I think he stepped down earlier this year if I’m not mistaken.
I don’t mean to get too deep into this idea of Tryhard teams vs. Non-Tryhard teams, but I do think it’s pretty important in explaining a lot of what we see in college football, particularly during the first half of the season.
I just think there are some programs that operate under an overriding sense that they have nothing to prove, while other programs operate under an overriding sense that they have a lot to prove, and you see that reflected in the final scores and stats of their games when they play inferior competition.
I also think fans don’t fully appreciate this, either. Because you have Georgia fans and Ohio State fans freaking out over unimpressive wins early in the season, like “OMG WHY DIDN’T WE WIN THIS GAME 63-0?!?! WE’RE SO FUCKED! WE’RE FRAUDS! IT’S OVER!”
And then you have Michigan fans like, “HAHAHAHA! WE ARE UNSTOPPABLE! WE ARE THE BEST TEAM IN AMERICA BY A MILE! LOOK AT OUR STATS! WE ARE SENDING 20 PLAYERS TO THE NFL THIS YEAR! WE WILL SWEEP EVERY AWARD!”
I mean, I look at Oregon’s stats for this year (more on them later) and it’s like, “Oh, wow. They are unbelievable. How do they not win the National Championship this year? They’re elite at EVERYTHING!”
But, are they actually elite, or do they just try really hard against inferior teams and pad their stats to make it SEEM like they’re this unstoppable machine?
To be clear, I don’t think either approach is right. I think the Non-Tryhard teams put themselves at risk of getting upset by assuming they can always just flip the switch and save the day if they ever get in trouble. Georgia has had some close shaves with far inferior teams both this season and last season. Ohio State was a dropped TD pass away from being down 14-0 early to Maryland on Saturday. I also thought Ryan Day coached that Notre Dame game like he had absolutely zero fear of losing, and it almost cost them the game.
Conversely, I think the Tryhard teams delude themselves into overconfidence and start actually believing their own bullshit. They truly believe they’re the best team in the country, which then gives them a false sense of confidence and preparedness when they play a legitimate opponent that they should instead actually have a healthy respect for.
Like Michigan against TCU last year–I think Michigan went into that game overconfident and believing they’d run TCU off the field in the first half. They ran a fucking PHILLY SPECIAL on their opening drive of the game against TCU, for goodness sake!
If that was not the definition of overconfidence, I don’t know what is. That was Michigan saying, “Fuck a field goal, let’s stunt on these bitches!”
Then it turned out it was not going to be an easy win for Michigan, and I think it caused a crisis of confidence on that Michigan sideline as things unraveled. Very quickly they found themselves down 21-6 to a TCU team they probably thought they were going to dominate.
Alternately, I think when Michigan beat Ohio State in 2021, Michigan prepared for that game like they were the underdogs, and they came out on fire and absolutely dominated. Most of the time, it benefits teams to prepare for a “matchup game” (i.e. relatively close talent levels) like they’re underdogs. It does not benefit you to prepare for a “matchup game” like you’re going to win by 30.
This game against Kentucky, I think it’s the first time we saw the “real” Georgia all season. I think it’s the first time they actually got up for a game. Because people were predicting Kentucky to win. Not everybody, but there were a decent number of people saying Georgia isn’t the same this year, Kentucky might actually do it, Georgia can’t stop the run, Ray Davis is gonna eat, etc.
We have not seen Georgia play like that all season. They were all over Kentucky from the start.
What it made me realize was that Georgia is definitely an elite team this year, they just weren’t really trying for their first 5 games. When they finally woke up and went 100%, they ran Kentucky off the field. And that’s a decent Kentucky team, too. They were ranked #20. People are going to start downplaying Kentucky now after Georgia destroyed them, but going into that game, people were definitely not downplaying Kentucky.
So that’s what I think about Georgia this season: they’re not a Tryhard team, so they’re not going to be overly impressive until they play a team that actually gets their attention.
You finally saw what Georgia looks like when they play an opponent they take seriously, and when they actually get up for a game.
Bama 26, A&M 20
Credit where credit is due: Jalen Milroe had some huge throws that I didn’t think he was actually capable of making, and his arm was the reason Alabama won. The touchdown to Jermaine Burton in the middle of the third quarter in the corner of the endzone (the first one he caught) was especially impressive–I did not think Milroe could make that pass at all, and he dotted it up perfectly.
Texas A&M’s secondary let them down in this game. Burton had an absolutely monster day for Alabama, but the thing is, he’s not some elite level receiver. In that game against A&M, he put up more catches, yards and touchdowns than he had put up all season long. He had 9 catches for 197 yards and 2 touchdowns. On the season he has 17 catches for 386 yards and 4 touchdowns, meaning that going into the A&M game he had 8 catches, 189 yards and 2 TDs on the season.
I really think the Alabama passing attack caught A&M by surprise. If you go back and watch the highlights, most of Jermaine Burton’s catches were in single coverage, which I think showed that A&M didn’t really respect the Bama passing game. They felt they could get away with single covering the receivers and sending a bunch of pressure at Milroe. They didn’t think Milroe could beat the blitz and make them pay, but he absolutely did. And I think it took A&M too long to adjust to that and play more of a conservative, less aggressive defense.
A&M did great against the run, allowing just 23 yards on 26 carries (including -31 sack yards, which skews it a bit). And A&M sacked Milroe 6 times. But I think this was a result of them loading the box while leaving their DBs on islands, which really burned them. I just don’t think A&M was expecting Alabama to take so many downfield shots to Burton. And honestly it wasn’t just Burton, either: Isaiah Bond had 7 catches for 96 yards and a touchdown. Bond hadn’t really done much on the season prior to this game either, just like Burton. Bond going into this game had 12 catches for 178 yards and one touchdown.
Alabama didn’t have much of a passing game prior to this game. This was the first game this season where Milroe threw the ball more than 30 times (33) and had over 300 yards passing (321). Alabama was averaging the 5th fewest passing attempts per game prior to Saturday. I wrote in my game preview that they had basically turned into a service academy offense. So it was a big surprise to see them throw the ball so much, and so effectively, against Texas A&M.
But Alabama knew that A&M secondary was suspect–we all kind of did, but we didn’t think Alabama actually had the ability to exploit it. It’s the reason I picked A&M to win: I figured Alabama wouldn’t be able to exploit A&M’s one real weakness on defense, and I thought Alabama would have a lot of trouble moving the ball because of it, because A&M’s front seven is really good at both stopping the run and getting to the quarterback. So given how one dimensional Alabama’s offense has been this year, how could they possibly hope to move the ball on A&M?
What I think we saw was Milroe developing as a passer, and this Alabama offense improving and evolving.
And that’s a scary thing for the rest of the SEC because Alabama’s got a really good defense, too. If this passing attack continues to improve, Alabama will be a very dangerous team–fully capable of beating Georgia and winning the SEC, in my opinion.
It might sound like an overreaction because after all, they just beat an unranked team that had already been kind of blown out by Miami earlier in the year. But Texas A&M was an underrated team. My statistical rankings really liked them a lot, and I was pretty confident they were going to win (I bet $100 on the moneyline, yikes).
And A&M did have opportunities to win this game. They were up 17-10 at halftime, they just made too many mistakes to overcome, and we’ll go through them now.
The first mistake was going for it on 4th and 1 from the Bama 19 on the first drive of the game. I thought they should’ve kicked a field goal because everyone knew it was going to be a low-scoring game and points would be at a premium, but instead they went for it, didn’t get it, and came away with no points. I harped on this at length after the Ohio State-Notre Dame game, how I thought Ryan Day made big mistakes by going for it on 4th down and not getting it deep in Notre Dame territory, instead of just taking the points in a low-scoring game. You simply cannot leave points on the field in any game, much less a low scoring game against Alabama. Alabama won this game 26-20. A&M sorely missed those 3 points they passed up on the opening drive, and I can’t emphasize that enough.
There was also a play later in the first quarter, with the game still tied 0-0, where A&M missed an easy touchdown. It was 3rd and goal from the Bama 5 yard line, Max Johnson hung in the pocket for a while in the face of heavy pressure, Ainais Smith got open in the endzone, and Johnson just sailed the ball on him. Should’ve been an easy touchdown, instead it goes incomplete and A&M kicks a field goal. So we’re already at 7 points A&M left on the field in the first quarter alone, in a game they lost by 6.
But overall, A&M was a lot better on offense in the first half than they were in the second half. In the second half they got essentially blanked until late. Their second half possessions were as follows: interception, punt, punt, missed 51 yard field goal, safety, field goal.
It’s tough to blame a kicker for a missed 51 yard field goal, but when you add it on to the other points A&M left on the field in the first quarter, you’re already up to 10 points, which would’ve been more than enough to win the game.
Another killer moment for A&M was when they had a first and goal from the 2 yard line with 3:16 to play down 26-17. A&M got the ball and immediately had a huge catch and run by Ainais Smith that was initially called a touchdown, but upon review the runner was marked out at the 2 yard line. A&M would have to score quickly because they still had all their timeouts and would have to get a stop and then drive for a game-winning field goal.
But they just couldn’t punch it in from the 2. Credit to Bama’s defense for stepping up, of course, but that’s a battle that you have to win if you’re A&M. It didn’t help that the touchdown they appeared to score on second down was negated by a holding flag, which moved them back to the 12 yard line. They then got the ball all the way back to the 2 yard line on third down but opted to kick the field goal to make it 26-20 instead of trying for the touchdown on 4th and goal.
I understood what Jimbo was thinking there taking the field goal, although I’m not sure I agreed with it. Yes, being down 26-17, you need a touchdown and a field goal to win the game, but you’re down at the 2 yard line–you’re probably not going to get that close again after you presumably force a punt on Bama and get the ball back again. It’s a lot easier to get a touchdown when you have the ball on the 2. When you get the ball back again there’s going to be much less time on the clock and you’ll have no more timeouts. What I really didn’t like was that A&M burned a timeout prior to 4th down, so I thought they were going for it on 4th down, but after the timeout they sent out the field goal unit. That was baffling. They just wasted a timeout.
On the ensuing drive, Bama got a really lucky first down that iced the game. It was one of the luckiest plays I’ve seen all year. It’s 3rd and 7 with 2 minutes to go, A&M only needs one stop and they’ll force a punt and get the ball back. They have pressure on Milroe and it looks like they’re going to sack him for like a 10 yard loss, but somehow he gets a pass off to Jase McClellan, who has to squat down for the ball, bobbles it, catches it, turns around and runs for a first down. On the replay they showed that if he had just caught the ball initially, he would’ve been ruled down for a 2 yard loss because his knee was down, but the bobble enabled him to get his knee up off the turf and run. It was just ridiculous. And it ended the game because A&M was out of timeouts and there was only 1:50 left on the clock. Really tough break for A&M, and just overall a really tough game to lose considering how many points they left on the field.
But really, the biggest gripe I have there is that A&M just wasn’t able to get a touchdown that would have made the score 26-24 Bama. It’s just, like I said, a battle that you have to win–no excuses. You have the ball at the 2, you’re down 9 with all your timeouts, there’s still plenty of time left on the clock to get a stop, get the ball back and go down and win the game. And A&M just couldn’t do it. They just couldn’t do it.
To me, that’s one of those make or break moments for a whole season: if you were truly a great team, and you truly had a chance to win the SEC, then you would’ve gotten a touchdown there. You would’ve found a way by hook or by crook. But because you didn’t, it proved that you are not a championship team. A team that was capable of going the distance would have found a way to score there.
So yeah, the loss stings, but in my view, you can’t play the “What if” game after that, and say your whole season would have been different if you had just gotten a touchdown there–no. That’s the wrong way to look at it. A&M came up short in that moment because they are not a championship-caliber team. It was not the reverse. It is not, “A&M will not have a chance to compete for a championship because they came up short in a crucial moment against Alabama.” It’s, “A&M proved they are not a championship-caliber team because they couldn’t do what needed to be done in the most critical moment of the game.”
If A&M truly was an SEC Championship-caliber team, then they would’ve made those plays and won that game. Simple as that.
This is kind of my way of accepting and rationalizing big losses: if you were truly a great team, then you would have found a way to win that game. You didn’t, so you weren’t a truly great team, and you were never going to win a championship anyway. If you’re not good enough to get a touchdown in that moment late in that game, you’re probably just not good enough, period.
There usually comes a time in every team’s season where you play an opponent that really acts as a measuring stick for your team, or a sort of hurdle that must be overcome on the way to a Championship. If you overcome that hurdle, it proves that you are capable of winning a Championship. If you do not overcome that hurdle, then it proves you were never capable of winning a Championship in the first place.
You either overcome that hurdle and keep going towards your goal, or you smash into your hard ceiling, can’t get over the hurdle, and you realize you’re simply not good enough to achieve your goals. The 4th quarter of that game against Alabama was A&M’s hurdle moment, and on that first and goal possession, they smashed into their hard ceiling.
It’s moments like this that really tell you and the rest of the country just how good you actually are.
A great example of this was the Michigan/TCU game in the playoff last year. Michigan made some early mistakes, got down to TCU, and then started clawing their way back before ultimately losing a heartbreaker. I don’t think Michigan fans should be too upset about that game, or have a bunch of regrets, or play the “What if” game. If Michigan was truly good enough to win a Championship, then they would’ve overcome all their mistakes and beaten TCU and gone to the National Championship game against Georgia. But since Michigan couldn’t overcome all their blunders, and couldn’t beat TCU, it was clear that they were never going to beat Georgia, either. They hit their ceiling against TCU, TCU hit their ceiling (hard) against Georgia.
Ohio State, on the other hand, should and probably will for a long time be very upset about the way the Peach Bowl game against Georgia went. They should have a bunch of regrets, and they absolutely will be playing the “What if” game for years to come. Because they didn’t lose to Georgia because they weren’t good enough; it was not a “hard ceiling game” for them. They lost because their kicker screwed up and because Marvin Harrison Jr. got knocked out of the game. Ohio State was that close to winning a National Championship–they were good enough to do it. The kicker just missed.
The Maryland-Ohio State game on Saturday was a hard ceiling game for Maryland. They were 5-0, there was some buzz about whether this was the year Maryland finally took the leap and beat one of the Big 3 in their division, could they actually have a chance against Ohio State? For a quarter or two, and even into the third quarter, it looked like they had a chance, but then Ohio State just blew them away. And it became clear that Maryland had met their hard ceiling–they’re not yet good enough to compete with the Big 3 in the Big Ten East.
There’s a difference between giving a game away–losing a game you should’ve won–and running into a hard ceiling. There is some strong evidence A&M gave that away–I went over it in detail above–but when I think about that goal line sequence where Alabama kept them out of the end zone, I just can’t shake the feeling that it was a hard ceiling moment. They simply were not good enough to score on Alabama’s defense when the stakes were the highest.
So that’s how I rationalize that loss for Texas A&M. I thought if they could win that game against Alabama then they would have a real shot at winning out, winning the SEC West and going to the SEC Championship against the most beatable Georgia team in 3 years. The path to an SEC Championship, a playoff berth and a National Championship would have been clear and straightforward for the Aggies–if they could beat Bama.
But they couldn’t. They came up short. And so now I have to conclude that they were never good enough to win a Championship in the first place. Because if they were, they would’ve found a way to beat Alabama.
Texas A&M found out where their ceiling was on Saturday afternoon.
Now, does this then mean Alabama is capable of going the distance? Well, technically, I guess you have to say they are. They cleared their toughest hurdle in the conference slate, so they should win the SEC West and get a chance to win the SEC and go to the playoffs. But there are still a lot of red flags with this Bama team.
14 penalties for 99 yards. I think at one point they had like 3 false starts in a row? They also let up a half-dozen sacks, ran the ball for 0.9 yards per carry, and had 2 turnovers.
I’ll say it again and again: Alabama is no longer as buttoned up as they once were. Penalties are still a massive issue for them, just like last season. That really hasn’t been cleaned up.
So I don’t really buy Alabama as a National Title contender this year. I think they could make the playoff, and honestly just because the whole field is flawed and there’s no one true runaway favorite, there’s no reason to think that Alabama is incapable of winning the whole thing. But I think their offensive limitations give them a lower ceiling than some of the more complete teams out there, like Georgia, Michigan, Texas and Oklahoma.
I pretty much buried them after the Texas game, figuring it was a sign they’d lose at least 3-4 games this year, but now I don’t see that happening. They really did a great job in arresting their own freefall after the South Florida game, and now Jalen Milroe looks to be taking some real steps as a passer. They definitely have issues on the offensive line–they can’t run and can’t protect the quarterback. And I still think Texas is a better team than they are–by a decent margin, too.
But overall Bama just feels like a much better team now than they were early on. Now that we have some clarity in the SEC West and can pretty confidently project a Georgia vs. Bama SEC Championship Game, the SEC as a whole just got WAY more interesting. The SEC is always way more fun when two behemoths are on a collision course for Atlanta–typically it’s Georgia in the East and Bama in the West. We didn’t get that last year, but it looks like we’re going to get it this year and I’m 100% here for it.
Oregon-Washington Prediction
This is the marquee matchup of the weekend. We’ve got an afternoon kickoff in Seattle between Michael Penix Jr. and the Huskies and Bo Nix and the Ducks. Well, technically in local time, it’s a noon kickoff.
With USC looking fraudulent, this is probably the game of the year in the Pac 12.
I have more faith in Oregon because I think their defense is better. Colorado might not be a great team, but there’s one thing they can do really well, and that’s throw the ball. And they could not throw the ball at all against Oregon’s defense. Oregon held Shedeur to 4.8 yards per attempt, just 159 yards passing. That was pretty impressive, even if I don’t put much stock into that win overall.
However, while I think Bo Nix is a good quarterback, I do trust Michael Penix more. Not a ton more, but I think it’s just undeniable that Penix is a better passer. Penix is the Heisman front-runner right now, he’s got the best passing stats in the country. If Washington wins this game, he really propels his Heisman case. And he is such a good passer, too. If anyone hasn’t watched him play, he is the real deal–the accuracy and ball placement is simply unreal.
Although when I dug into the numbers between him and Bo Nix:
Penix is definitely the better passer, but Nix is close. Nix is better as a runner although neither quarterback really runs all that much. Penix barely runs at all.
The main thing is that “Bo Pix” is a thing of the past. He don’t shine shoes anymore. One pick this year.
And another thing: Oregon ranks #1 in the nation in rushing yards per carry on offense. 7.1 yards a carry, almost a full yard more than Tennessee, the next best team (6.2 YPC). Oregon doesn’t rely on Bo Nix as much as Washington relies on Penix. Washington isn’t horrible running the ball, 4.7 yards a carry good for 46th.
Washington does lead the nation in overall offensive yards per play at 8.8, but Oregon is in third place with 8.1.
So these are some elite offenses. Oregon is more balanced, while Washington is more skewed to the passing game, definitely.
Defensively, though, is where Oregon really separates themselves from Washington. They’re 3rd in the nation in yards per play allowed at 4.0, while Washington is 36th at 5.1 YPP allowed. Oregon is much stronger against the run, allowing 3.2 yards a carry (25th in the nation). Washington allows 3.8 a carry, 58th in the country. So Washington doesn’t have a bad defense, but it’s definitely not on the same level as Oregon’s.
Overall, I think you have to say Oregon is the better team. Or, more accurately, the more complete team. They’ve got a much more talented roster.
In fact, let’s just get into my matchup breakdown table:
Oregon has a clear advantage in talent. It’s really not even close. Oregon has a top-10 roster in the country, Washington has a top-30 roster. Oregon has 53 combined 5 and 4-star players, Washington has zero 5-star players and 27 4-stars.
Statistically, Oregon is elite in just about everything. They’re #2 in the nation in my power ratings right now behind only Oklahoma, and it’s mainly because Oregon’s played a soft schedule. They rank 106 in strength of schedule. But their numbers are just incredible. Let’s run through them quickly.
Oregon is #1 in the nation in net points per play, #1 in net yards per play, #5 in net yards per passing attempt, #2 in net completion percentage, #1 in net rushing yards per carry, #2 in net first downs, #12 in net third down percentage, #1 in net tackles for loss, #1 in net explosive plays, #21 in net red zone touchdown percentage and #7 in average in-game win probability. That is an incredible statistical profile, and if I didn’t factor strength of schedule into the equation they would be clear and away the #1 team in the nation.
I can’t emphasize enough how statistically dominant they have been on both sides of the ball this year. Normally, Oregon is not known for their defense, but with Dan Lanning at the helm and his Georgia defensive background, he’s really got that defense leveled up–at least it seems that way.
But the strength of schedule factor is what rains on the parade. They just haven’t played anybody legit. They beat the brakes off of Colorado, but Colorado isn’t a very good team.
The best team Oregon has played is Texas Tech, who I have ranked 41st in the nation (Colorado I have 75th).
And that Texas Tech game is the one I can’t just get out of my head. I feel like nobody watched it because everybody was watching Texas beat Alabama that night. For whatever reason, that Oregon-TTU game didn’t get a lot of discussion, and it still doesn’t, but Texas Tech was in it until the end and could’ve won. They had the ball down 31-30 just shy of midfield with under a minute left, but threw a pick-six to lose the game. They were maybe 20-25 yards away from being able to kick a game-winning field goal.
There was a moment early in the second quarter where Tech scored to make the score 15-13 Oregon. Tech went for two, didn’t get it. And then at the end of the game, they were down 31-30 trying to drive down the field with a minute to play. So the game may have actually swung on that 2 point conversion.
In the second quarter, Tech lost a fumble when they were in the red zone and completely squandered a golden opportunity.
Oregon got very lucky early in the third quarter, too. They were punting from their own 21, down 20-18, and Texas Tech blocked the punt. But they didn’t fully block it, they just kind of got a piece of it and it still was able to fly past the line of scrimmage and land around the Oregon 41. If Tech was able to actually get a full block of the punt, and that thing went backwards towards the endzone, it would’ve been a disaster. Because Tech actually got no points out of the block: they threw a pick on the first play of their ensuing drive. Oregon was very fortunate to not give up any points off of that.
To be honest, Texas Tech easily could’ve won this game. They had so many opportunities. Go and watch the highlights and see for yourself. I’m not going to say Tech was the better team but it did not look like they were truly inferior to Oregon.
Texas Tech moved the ball on Oregon: 456 yards of offense, they actually had 27 first downs to Oregon’s 21. Tech was 7/12 on third down, ran the ball for 174 yards on a healthy 5.4 yards per carry. The reason they lost is because they turned the ball over 4 times and Oregon didn’t turn it over at all.
Tech held Oregon to 3.6 yards per carry, too–and Oregon now is statistically the best run team in the nation. You look at the score of that game and it looks like a close one with the 38-30 score, but then you actually go underneath the hood and look at the box score and the numbers, Texas Tech really was right there with them.
I’ll put it this way: it does not seem like Texas Tech was that close at the end by accident. I don’t think that game was a fluke.
So that really concerns me. If there’s any reason to believe Oregon’s incredible stats thus far are a fugazi, it’s the Texas Tech game.
It’s very possible that Texas Tech exposed Oregon as fraudulent in week 2, yet not a lot of people realize it because nobody was actually watching that game.
The counterpoint to that may be: Didn’t Washington struggle on the road at Arizona a couple of weeks ago? They only won 31-24!
Fair point, although that game was not nearly as close as the Oregon-Texas Tech game. And maybe Arizona is actually a pretty good team, considering they took USC to triple overtime and played Washington within 7.
But I think it’s important to point out that that Arizona-Washington game wasn’t as close as the final score. It wasn’t a blowout, but Arizona never actually had a chance to win that game. Washington was up 14-0 after the first quarter, then up 21-10 at halftime, then stretched it to 28-10 in the third, went into the 4th quarter up 28-17, tacked on a field goal and were up 31-17 for most of the 4th until Arizona added on that late TD with 1:08 to play to make it a one-score game.
If Arizona would’ve recovered the onside kick, and had the ball with a chance to either tie or take the lead late, then we could talk about this game being in the same category as the Oregon-Texas Tech game. But they didn’t, so we can’t. There was never any moment in the second half of that game where Arizona had the ball and the score was within one possession.
To me, that’s what defines a close game: was it within one possession with 5 minutes or less remaining and the team that was losing had the ball with a chance to tie or take the lead?
For the Oregon-TTU game: yes.
For the Washington-Arizona game: no.
Also, I have Arizona rated as a better team than Texas Tech, too. I have Arizona at 31 and TTU at 41.
Another real issue for Oregon that I haven’t even discussed yet: 14 penalties for 124 yards against Texas Tech. Oregon has a penalty problem. They beat Hawaii 55-10 and still racked up 9 penalties for 76 yards. 9 penalties for 80 yards against Colorado, too.
Oregon actually is the 8th-most penalized team in the country this year.
So that might be a major issue for them in this game against Washington, especially on the road. Penalties are absolutely killer.
Except…. Washington is even worse. Washington averages 8.8 penalties a game, 3rd most in the nation.
I guess we should expect this game to look like this:
But if one of these teams is able to limit the penalties and the other can’t, then that will prove to be a big advantage.
It’s impossible to predict penalties, so I’ll just leave it at that. I’m assuming both coaches are drilling into their players’ heads to be disciplined and not commit penalties, but I don’t expect a sudden departure to take place. I think we see lots of flags. It’s just who those teams are by this point.
Anyway, if there’s really one area you want to nitpick Washington on, it’s not the Arizona game. Yes, they never really truly put Arizona away, but Arizona might be a better team than people think.
For me, the reason I can’t pick them is the talent disparity. Yes, the more I dig into that Oregon-TTU game, the less confident I am in Oregon.
But I just can’t ignore a 62% blue chip ratio vs. a 33% blue chip ratio.
I can’t ignore Oregon’s 53 combined 5 and 4 star players vs. Washington’s 27 4 star players and no 5 stars.
Washington hasn’t played anybody good and they still rank pretty mid on defense across the board. I think they’ll be able to score some points on Oregon’s defense, but I trust Oregon’s defense to get a stop more than I trust Washington’s.
I think it’ll be a high scoring game, but Oregon will just get one or two more stops in the game and that will be the difference.
Washington’s offense is slightly better than Oregon’s, but I think Oregon’s defense is pretty clearly better than Washington’s is. That seals it for me. Plus the talent disparity.
I’ve got Oregon winning 38-35.
Does it give me some pause that Vegas has Washington -3 even though all indications point to Oregon winning, and it feels like everyone and their mother is predicting Oregon to win?
Yeah, it does. I don’t like to be on the same side as everyone else when it comes to making predictions for big games–especially when Vegas is on the other side. Action Network lets you see what percentage of the bets are on each team, but not which percentage of the money–you have to be a subscriber for that. Right now, 56% of the bets are on Oregon +3.
I would love to see if there’s a higher percentage of the money on Washington, because usually when there’s a divergence like that–more bets on Oregon but more money on Washington–it means the sharps are lining up against the public. The percentage of the money tells you what the sharps are on. The public generally bets small, the sharps bet big. There’s way more people in “the public” than there are sharps, but one sharp is generally going to bet as much as like 50 “public” bettors. It’s like if there’s 100 people betting on something, and 95 people bet $10, but then 5 guys bet $150 each, those 5 guys are the sharps, and that’s who Vegas will look at when they move the lines.
When Vegas sees a big bet come in on one side, they check and see who placed the bet–they want to know the track record of that bettor to see if he’s a sharp, because if so, then they have to move the line. They know that the sharps must know something they don’t. The sharps are ALWAYS looking for mispriced lines–they don’t bet the teams they like, they bet the lines they like.
The difference between us regular joes and the sharps is the sharps know what the line SHOULD be, and when they see a discrepancy between what they think the line SHOULD be and what the line actually IS, they hit it hard. We average joes bet on the teams we think are going to win. The sharps just play the line.
Like say this game opened up at Washington -3, and a known sharp comes in quickly and places a $25,000 bet on Oregon +3, you’re going to see that line move to Washington -2.5 or maybe even Washington -2. Vegas is always monitoring the sharps to see if the sharps are sniffing out a mispriced line. Vegas will move the line to discourage the sharps from piling onto one side, because if a large majority of the money is on one side, and that side ends up winning, Vegas loses a bunch of money.
The line is considered “settled” once the sharps stop hammering one side, pretty much. If the sharps are hammering Oregon +3, and still hammering Oregon +2.5, but they stop hammering Oregon +2, then the line will probably stay at Oregon +2.
Vegas is always trying to balance the action, not accurately predict the final score. Technically it’s the free market that predicts the game score. It’s the sharp bettors that do. Because if Vegas sets the line at Oregon +3 and the sharps are all over it, what the sharps are saying is, “No way, Oregon is not three points worse than Washington on the road.” And the Vegas sportsbooks say, “Okay, we believe you. Oregon +2 now.” And by not hammering that line, the sharps send a message to the sportsbooks, “You got it right.” When the sharps back off, it means they think the line is pretty much correct.
Vegas wants to balance the action (i.e. the total amount of money bet on a given game) pretty much 50/50, because then Vegas is still winning on the vig (which is the fact that you have to bet 110 to win 100). They do not want large imbalances in the action, because that represents risk.
The thing about this Oregon-Washington game is, the line has been sitting at Washington -3 all week. It’s Thursday night right now and that line really has not moved much at all. So it’s possible the sharps think Vegas has it priced correctly.
But watch the line movement on Saturday morning, and up to kickoff. If the line starts moving one way, that means the sharps are piling in. If, for example, you see on Saturday a few hours before kickoff, the line starts moving heavily towards Oregon–if it suddenly becomes Oregon +2.5, then Oregon +2–then you know the sharps are coming in heavy on Oregon. The sharps move the lines, period.
Anyway, keep an eye on the line. Washington -3 just feels off to me, which is why I won’t be surprised if Washington wins the game. If a bet feels like a no-brainer, it’s probably a trap. Vegas does not have this line mispriced. It’s the biggest game of the weekend, possibly the biggest game of the year thus far. That line is extremely dialed in.
But the thing is, if I pick Washington to win, I would be doing it only because of the betting line and only because I just don’t want to be on the same side as everyone else here. My gut is telling me Oregon, my research and analysis of the game is telling me Oregon–I have to pick Oregon.
I’m just a little wary because of that line.
Unpopular Opinions
New section I’m adding to the CFP recap articles.
I’ve already gotten a lot of my unpopular opinions out in the many, many words above, but if you can believe it, I’ve got even more unpopular opinions:
- I would take Brent Venables as my head coach over Lincoln Riley 10 out of 10 times. Lincoln Riley has been a head coach for 7 years now and has never had a defense. Guy’s a lightweight. He just is who he is at this point.
- Notre Dame is still a really good team. They’re just in the midst of an insanely difficult schedule stretch. Four straight night games against ranked teams–Ohio State, at Duke, at Louisville, USC. It was inevitable that they had a letdown game, which is what the Louisville game was. They easily could’ve won the Ohio State game, and I think they’ll beat USC.
- Notre Dame is better than Michigan. Yeah, I said it.
- Penn State is overrated as fuck. Their defensive numbers are inflated by that Iowa game.
- I still don’t really believe in Alabama. I think they’re good, but they can’t run the ball and can’t protect the QB. They aren’t winning a Natty this year. Or ever again under Saban.
- Florida State is overrated as fuck. They’re flying very under the radar despite having a questionable win over a terrible Virginia tech team. They were up 22-0 and I think people just assumed they were going to continue at that pace and it would be like a 49-3 win or something like that. But it wasn’t. VT got back in the game. It was 22-17 just after halftime. And this was a home game for FSU too. They still won it 39-17 but still. Couple this with the fact that LSU is clearly no good and anybody can score 40+ on their defense—it might be time to reevaluate Florida State. Almost blew the game to Boston College too.
- Texas should be favored if and when they rematch with Oklahoma. I don’t know if this is an unpopular opinion, though.
- Neither Washington nor Oregon will end up making the playoff this year. I just think the Pac 12 will cannibalize itself–and more to the point, I don’t think either of those teams are truly great enough to get through that conference slate with a playoff-caliber resume.
- USC is suspect as hell on defense and can lose to anybody, as was evidenced Saturday night.
There you have it, folks. 16,000+ words about college football. I hope you got your fix, because I’m doing the same thing again next week!
Fade the Public 