The recap of the college football weekend! Grab your WCE shirts for the season here.
Is the SEC that bad? Who takes over the Pac 12 after USC loses? Are we headed to Alabama / Clemson III?
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Let’s start with my Top 10, and then go more in depth into some of the more interesting topics.
Gary’s Top 10
- Alabama
- Clemson
- Oklahoma
- Penn St
- Georgia
- Washington
- TCU
- Wisconsin
- Michigan
- Washington St
Alabama beat Ole Miss like a JV team. 66-3. That makes 5 straight regular season SEC games that Alabama has not given up a touchdown. In that span, they’ve beaten LSU 10-0, Miss St 52-3, Auburn 30-12, Vandy 59-0, and Ole Miss 66-3. On top of that, their starting linebacker gave their performance a 5/10 and said they had a lot to improve on. Jeez. Good luck, Texas A&M.
I don’t believe anyone has played a tougher schedule that Clemson, to this point. Auburn, at Louisville, and at Virginia Tech… and all wins. I think their biggest chance at a loss this season will be Nov 4th at NC State.
Oklahoma had a bye week. Penn St beat up on Indiana 45-14, and the most surprising thing out of Happy Valley was Barkley ended up with 20 rushes for 56 yards… not a great showing, although he did have a 96 yd KO return for a touchdown to help his Heisman campaign. Georgia beat the brakes off of Tennessee in Knoxville 41-0. Washington beat up on Oregon St 42-7. TCU was off.
Wrapping up the Top 10, Wisconsin had a closer than expected 33-24 win at home over Northwestern, after giving up 14 points in the 4th quarter. Michigan had a bye week, and Washington St jumps up after a 30-27 win over USC – I don’t have them higher because it took a slew of USC injuries for Washington St to get this one, and I don’t know if they would have gotten the win without 3 starting offensive linemen being out for the Trojans.
Butch Jones has lost his team, his fanbase, and his job
Georgia’s 41-0 beating of Jones’s Vols pretty much ends all doubt about whether or not Butch would be able to win enough to keep his job.
The offense has been absolutely dreadful. It’s been rumored that Butch Jones is playing Quentin Dormady at QB because one of his best friend’s daughters is engaged to him.
Tennessee doesn’t have an identity, and after the Florida game, where coaching cost them the game, they flat out quit on Butch Jones and that staff. The team has just looked like they don’t care for the last two weeks.
John Currie, Tennessee athletic director, doesn’t want to have to fire Butch Jones right now. But when the fans and the team have quit on the program, is there another option? How long does this have to go before a change is absolutely necessary? This week, Tennessee is off, but then South Carolina comes to Knoxville, and then they travel to Tuscaloosa in a game that could get really ugly, so long as Alabama stays on this tear that they’re on.
So for the next head coach, who would Tennessee go get? It’s going to cost money, no matter what they do. Would they go after Chip Kelly, who had NCAA trouble when he left Oregon? Is Bobby Petrino worth the PR headache due to the past issues in his personal life? Jeff Brohm has a $4M+ buyout if he leaves Purdue after this season. Where do you go? Ole Miss is looking for a new coach. Texas A&M might be looking. Do you go after Mike Norvell from Memphis? Scott Frost from UCF? Do you gamble on a coach of a smaller program again?
Tennessee has to have a gameplan before they fire Butch Jones. You have to have a target, and you have to go all in on it. The biggest requirement is to hire the best coach, if you’re going to fire Jones, who has done a decent job of building the program up from the rubble that was left after Fulmer/Kiffin/Dooley. Don’t take chances due to money. Go get the best guy. Otherwise, it’s pointless to fire a coach with a buyout.
Alabama hasn’t allowed a TD in their last 5 regular season SEC Games
Alabama beat Ole Miss 66-3 Saturday. That’s after a 59-0 win over Vandy. In their last 3 regular season SEC games last year, they beat Auburn 30-12 (4 FGs), Miss St 52-3, and LSU 10-0.
Now, they did play Florida in there, and gave up 2 short touchdowns in a 54-16 win in the SEC Championship game, but this defense is serious, and they’ve had a billion guys play.
Auburn could provide a difficult test for Alabama on Nov 25th…
…but until then, looking at the schedule, the only competition for Alabama is themselves and the injury bug. The Tide have opened up as 25 pt favorites in College Station this week. Anyone want to take A&M with the points? Not me, with how Alabama appears to be rolling right now.
Washington St’s win over USC throws the PAC 12 up in the air
Washington St beat USC 30-27 on Friday night in Pullman, WA. USC was the darling of the offseason, with QB Sam Darnold the preseason favorite to win the Heisman. But with 3 OL going out, losing their 2nd leading receiver, and having to play a late game in Wazzou, you could see this one coming a mile away. It took a dynamite effort by Luke Falk to win this game, and it throws everything in the Pac 12 up in the air.
There are 3 undefeated teams in the PAC 12 right now – Washington, Washington St, and Utah.
So, aside from Washington and Washington St… who in this conference is good? USC could come back and still get to the conference championship game, but you have to wonder who will be good enough to get to the playoff from this league.
LSU can’t score, and Joe Alleva is in trouble
Troy beat LSU 24-21 on Saturday night.
Let’s preface this by saying Derrius Guice was out for this game… but Troy outrushed LSU 206 to 162.
LSU lost 2 fumbles, they played 2 QBs, and both of them threw an interception. That’s 4 total turnovers to just 2 from Troy.
The funny thing is that Troy should have won by more than this. Troy went up 24-7 with 8 minutes left in the 4th quarter, gave up a touchdown to make it 24-14, and then drove the ball all the way to the LSU 8 yard line before they fumbled, allowing LSU to make a desperation drive to get it within 3.
This is the stat of the game: Troy was 10/18 on 3rd down and 2/2 on 4th. LSU was 2/3 on 4th down… and 0/9 on 3rd down. Troy’s lines bullied LSU’s.
This is not a good LSU team. Chris told me last week that LSU may not win an SEC game this season… but it’s gotta make Tiger fans feel better that LSU still has Ole Miss and Tennessee on the schedule.
Remaining P5 Undefeated teams
SEC
- Alabama
- Georgia
Big 12
- Oklahoma
- TCU
Big 10
- Penn St
- Wisconsin
- Michigan
ACC
- Clemson
- Miami
PAC 12
- Washington
- Washington St
- Utah
