Big Ten trends down in early going
The Big Ten had a historically bad day. Outside of Ohio State, which asserted control in the second half to beat TCU 40-28, the league’s performance has been ordinary at best. Akron’s 39-34 win at Northwestern won’t have any impact on the College Football Playoff race, but it continues the well-established narrative that the middle of this league is exceptionally mediocre. This week, it was BYU coming into Madison and punking Wisconsin 24-21. It was Troy upsetting Nebraska 24-19. It was 0-2 Temple going to Maryland and dominating for a 35-14 victory. And it was Missouri coming away with a last-second field goal to beat Purdue 40-37. The Buckeyes are very good and well-positioned to make the Playoff. But this isn’t a one-week trend. Michigan State melted in the desert a week ago Saturday night. Michigan’s loss to Notre Dame in Week 1 erased the Wolverines’ margin for error. The Buckeyes can carry the banner for the Big Ten all the way to the semifinals, but it would be hard to draw up a worse start for the league than what it has experienced.
The team of the day is Oklahoma State. What a revelation the Cowboys were in a 44-21 drubbing of Boise State. Certainly nobody knew what to expect from this team going into the year after losing quarterback Mason Rudolph and receiver James Washington, and blowout victories over Missouri State and South Alabama to open 2018 didn’t tell us much. But Mike Gundy just keeps putting a great product out on the field, and Oklahoma State really looked good in all three phases of the game against Boise State. The defensive front looked aggressive and fast, and a couple of blocked punts really set the tone for a comfortable win. The schedule sets up really well for Oklahoma State to be 9-0 going into Bedlam on Nov. 11 in Norman.
Team of the day, Part 2, is BYU. The Kalani Sitake regime looked like it was trending the wrong direction last year at
4-9, but the Cougars scored one of the signature wins of the season Saturday with a 24-21 upset at Wisconsin. Bringing in Jeff Grimes as offensive coordinator has made a world of difference.
Shout-out to Troy coach Neal Brown. In consecutive years, he’s guided the Trojans to wins at LSU and Nebraska, an accomplishment worthy of celebration regardless of the circumstances. Troy found a way despite just
253 yards of offense. That’s a big-time performance for a Sun Belt team.
Two years in a row, Auburn has blown a double-digit lead against LSU and Ed Orgeron. That’s a tough one to swallow for Gus Malzahn, whose team seemed to have complete control early in the third quarter Saturday when it went ahead 21-10. After that, however, Auburn ran 20 plays for just 87 yards with one turnover and a missed field goal try. Whether that’s Malzahn getting too conservative or Auburn not executing doesn’t really matter. LSU did what it needed to do to hang around, didn’t commit a turnover and was more opportunistic down the stretch. It’s still unclear how good LSU really is because there really does seem to be some offensive limitations, but Orgeron just seems to have Malzahn’s number. We will know a lot more about LSU on Oct. 13 when Georgia comes to Baton Rouge in an early Game of the Year candidate.
Clay Helton’s seat at Southern California is getting really hot after a 37-14 loss to Texas. Following a loss to Stanford in which the Trojans scored three points, they needed to rebound with a strong effort in Austin to turn the narrative a little bit. They didn’t get it. Rebuilding year or not, this isn’t what USC fans were looking for. The Trojans got manhandled in the second half by Texas, which scored 34 consecutive points in a 37-14 win. To say Helton’s job is safe because USC won the Pac-12 last year seems shortsighted. This doesn’t look like an elite program in any way, and it’s hard to imagine how the Trojans get there. If they’re not seriously competitive at that top level under this staff, they need to consider their options. Athletics director Lynn Swann, who didn’t hire Helton, surely has ideas on what he’d do if USC had an opening.
No surprise Arkansas lost to North Texas. The Mean Green are one of the better Group of Five teams, and firstyear Razorbacks coach Chad Morris didn’t inherit much from Bret Bielema. But a 44-17 beatdown in Fayetteville wasn’t part of the blueprint. The standout moment from that game came early when North Texas’ Keegan Brewer faked out the entire Arkansas team by pretending he was going to fair-catch a punt. When the Razorbacks stopped playing, Brewer took off, having never given the fair-catch signal, and rumbled for a 90-yard touchdown. It’s one of the great fake outs ever in football, though obviously embarrassing for Arkansas. But that wasn’t why Arkansas lost. This just isn’t a good team.
We can go ahead and stop talking about whether Jalen Hurts is going to redshirt. It’s not happening, folks. Alabama coach Nick Saban put him in Saturday after Alabama took a 35-7 lead in the second quarter over Mississippi, and he promptly led the Crimson Tide to another touchdown in a 62-7 victory. But that’s beside the point. Under the new NCAA rule, Hurts could play up to four games and still retain his year of eligibility, transfer as a graduate student, and have two years to play at a new school. But it’s clear by this point that Saban plans to use Hurts in every game this year, even if it’s just mop-up duty or as a change of pace. Whether you agree or disagree, that’s what is happening and Hurts doesn’t seem to be too bothered by it.
No need to get much more indepth on the Florida State issues beyond what I wrote here. Obviously coach Willie Taggart isn’t going to get fired after one year. Beyond the money, it would seem hasty to pull the plug after one year given the issues in the program (particularly with the offensive line). Even when first-year coaches have a bad record, you can see something worth building on. That has not yet emerged for FSU. It wouldn’t be a surprise if we looked back in a year or two at Saturday’s loss to Syracuse as the moment we kind of knew how this would go.