Blueboods Michigan, Nebraska and Texas fall on hard times
Penn State beat Michigan 27-17 for its first win of the season, snapping the worst start in program history and dropping the hapless Wolverines to 2-4 amid questions over coach Jim Harbaugh's immediate future.
Those questions may not have any basis in reality: Harbaugh's contract does not expire until after next season, leaving plenty of time for both parties to reconvene and recommit to a longer partnership.
The better question asks whether Michigan a nd Harbaugh believe there is reason to maintain the relationship long into the future given this year's slide into irrelevancy.
Losing to previously winless Penn State feels like the lowest point of this already lost season, which had already surfed through a series of l ow moments—losing to Michigan State, getting blown out by Wisconsin, even needing overtime to rally back and beat Rutgers a week ago.
Barring a miraculous upset win against Ohio State next month, should t hat game be played as scheduled, Michigan will finish with a losing record for the first time since 2009 and just the fourth time since 1968.
As a program, Michigan has ceded enormous ground to the Buckeyes, which have lapped the field, and fallen behind several others in the Big Ten. Is there one missing ingredient that would vault the Wolverines back into the College Football Playoff in 2021? Is the strangeness of this offseason and regular season to blame for the Wolverines' plummet?
Here are the rest of the winners and losers from Week 13, including the games played Friday:
Winners
Buffalo: The Bulls are the class of the MAC and a contender for the Top 25 after beating Kent State 70-41 in a battle of the league's two best offenses. The win moves Buffalo to 22-9 since the start of the 2018 season under coach Lance Leipold, who will be in the running for Power Five job openings. The biggest star of the day: Buffalo running back Jaret Patterson tied the Bowl Subdivision singlegame record with eight rushing touchdowns and ran for 409 yards, 18 shy of the FBS record. Patterson scored more touchdowns Saturday alone than 10 teams have scored this entire season.
Alabama: The Crimson Tide sailed past Auburn 42-13 to win this year's Iron Bowl without coach Nick Saban, who missed Saturday after testing positive for COVID-19. While contributing to a more conservative approach, Saban's absence didn't seemed to play a huge role in the bottom line: Alabama racked up 445 yards of offense, quarterback Mac Jones completed just under 70% of his throws with five touchdowns (two to star receiver DeVonta Smith) and the defense forced two turnovers and held Auburn to 2.9 yards per carry, in the sort of all-around effort that has made Alabama the team to beat in the SEC and in the race for the national championship. Texas A&M: One year after losing 50-7 to LSU, the Aggies flipped the script and suffocated the Tigers in a 20-7 win. The switch illustrates the changed fortunes of these two programs since the end of last season: A&M has soared into the playoff chase as one of the top contenders for the top four while LSU has fallen from 15-0 to 3-4 and, with Alabama and Florida ahead, the strong possibility of a losing finish. The Aggies are sitting at 6-1 with games against Auburn and Tennessee to end the regular season.
Notre Dame: After a fastpaced first quarter, Notre Dame slowed the tempo into its comfort zone against North Carolina and pulled away in the second half to beat the North Carolina 31-17 and remain on track for the College Football Playoff. Another very solid performance on defense — the Irish held UNC to under 300 yards of total offense and held quarterback Sam Howell in check — was joined by the latest strong showing from Ian Book, who threw for 279 yards and added another 48 yards on the ground.
Iowa State: Here are the two latest achievements for the Cyclones under Matt Campbell, who for all his recent accomplishments might remain the most underrated coach in college football. The first: Iowa State has now beat Texas twice in a row for the first time in program history. Like last year's 23-21 win, which came via a field goal as time expired, Friday's 23-20 victory was sealed late in the fourth quarter on running back Breece Hall's short touchdown run and the Cyclones' ensuing defensive stand. And the second likely achievement: Campbell will have Iowa State in the Big 12 championship game, playing for the program's first conference title of any kind since 1912.
Losers
Texas: The pressure is higher than ever on coach Tom Herman after Friday's loss shattered the Longhorns' hopes of reaching the Big 12 championship game. Herman is now 30-18 overall and 21-13 in league play since his debut in 2017 with increasingly diminishing returns since a 10-4 finish in 2018, which was viewed in some corners as the beginning of the program's return to national prominence. Texas should rebound to beat Kansas State and Kansas to finish the year 7-3 and might even sneak into the Amway Coaches Poll, but the 2020 season feels like another missed opportunity.
Nebraska: The Cornhuskers have now lost six straight to rival Iowa, the last three by single digits. Nebraska had a shot in the fourth quarter of Friday's 26-20 loss but failed to capitalize on two scoring opportunities, the first by fumbling away a punt return and the second via an interception. This has become the painful expectation: Scott Frost's teams will surround bursts of energy with long stretches of sloppiness. With as many as three games left to play this season, Nebraska's 19 losses since the start of 2018 tie for the program's most over a three-year span since 1957-59. Northwestern: The Wildcats' unbeaten start ended with a thud, as Michigan State took a 17-0 lead, weathered Northwestern's comeback and notched the game-winning score with more than three minutes left to win 29-20. This is the second significant upset of Mel Tucker's first season, joining an earlier win against Rutgers. For Northwestern, the loss eliminates the odds of a winner-take-all Big Ten championship game against Ohio State with immense playoff stakes, even if the Wildcats remain in firm control of the West division.