Friends, it was a rough weekend out there for road teams. We had 10 home teams in our rankings take care of business, including 8 out of our top 10. That includes the resurgent LSU Tigers taking down Ole Miss inside Death Valley as Brian Kelly enters our rankings for the first time this season.
It hasn’t been a real fun year in this Notre Dame world.
18 Stripes Top 20 Poll
| RANK | TEAM | RECORD | RESULT |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Tennessee | 7-0 | 65-24 W vs. UT Martin |
| 2 | Ohio State | 7-0 | 54-10 W vs. Iowa |
| 3 | Georgia | 7-0 | BYE |
| 4 | Clemson | 8-0 | 27-21 W vs. Syracuse |
| 5 | TCU (+1) | 7-0 | 38-28 W vs. Kansas State |
| 6 | Michigan (-1) | 7-0 | BYE |
| 7 | Alabama (+2) | 7-1 | 30-6 W vs. Miss State |
| 8 | Oregon (+2) | 6-1 | 45-30 W vs. UCLA |
| 9 | Oklahoma State (+5) | 6-1 | 41-34 W vs. Texas |
| 10 | Wake Forest (+2) | 6-1 | 43-15 W vs. Boston College |
| 11 | USC (+2) | 6-1 | BYE |
| 12 | UCLA (-5) | 6-1 | 45-30 L at Oregon |
| 13 | Ole Miss (-5) | 7-1 | 45-20 L @ LSU |
| 14 | Cincinnati (+1) | 6-1 | 29-27 W at SMU |
| 15 | Utah (+1) | 5-2 | BYE |
| 16 | Syracuse (-6) | 6-1 | 27-21 L at Clemson |
| 17 | Illinois | 6-1 | BYE |
| 18 | Penn State | 6-1 | 45-17 W vs. Minnesota |
| 19 | LSU (NR) | 6-2 | 45-20 W vs. Ole Miss |
| 20 | North Carolina (NR) | 6-1 | BYE |
National Storylines
Rutgers snapped a 3-game losing streak by beating Indiana 24-17. The Hoosiers now have their own 5-game losing streak.
No hangover for Tennessee (who would predict such a thing!?) as the Vols score 52 points in the 1st half to cruise past UT Martin.
After such a fun start, Kansas has now lost 3 straight after Baylor won 35-23 in Waco.
SMU scored a pair of 4th quarter touchdowns to scare Cincinnati this weekend. However, a 2-point conversion failed on the last touchdown to preserve the 2-point win for the Bearcats.
Mike Elko continues to impress in his first season at Duke following a 45-21 thrashing of Miami at Hard Rock Stadium. The Hurricanes had 8(!!) turnovers.
Purdue’s 4-game winning streak came to an end as Wisconsin beat the Boilermakers 35-24 in Madison.
LSU piled up 35 first downs in a comfortable 45-20 win featuring a 2nd half performance where the Tigers out-scored Ole Miss 28-0. This win moves Brian Kelly into 2nd place in the SEC West. Next up, Alabama.
Oregon remains unbeaten and atop the Pac-12 standings with a nice 15-point win over visiting UCLA. I was on UCLA’s campus this weekend and people were livid. Just kidding, no one cared.
Memphis was -4 in turnovers which helped Tulane to stay undefeated in AAC play with a 38-28 win.
Texas led Oklahoma State by as much as 31-17 but finished the game with punt, punt, missed field goal, interception, and interception to lose by a touchdown.
Alabama only totals 290 yards in a 30-6 win over Mississippi State. Weird?
Minnesota were without their starting quarterback and got rocked 45-17 in Happy Valley.
Notre Dame is getting a lot of bowl matchups with South Carolina who moved into the no. 25 ranking in the AP poll this week. The Gamecocks are 5-2 after beating Texas A&M 30-24.
A big win for East Carolina who beats UCF by 21 points thanks to a healthy +4 turnover differential.
These Frogs won’t die! After trailing 28-10 halfway through the 2nd quarter, TCU would out-score Kansas State 28-0 to win by 10 points and stay atop the Big 12 standings.
OUT:
No. 19 Texas
The Horns are now 2 games behind TCU for the conference lead and are going to need some major help climbing back into position for a big bowl game.
No. 20 Kansas State
Tough swing for K-State who would’ve been looking at a top 15 ranking and now back out they go.
Opponent Watch
Ohio State (7-0): Iowa could only manage 8 first downs and 158 total yards in a 44-point loss.
Marshall (4-3): In a game that featured 8 combined turnovers it’s a solid win for Marshall to beat James Madison 26-12 on the road.
California (3-4): The Bears drop to 1-3 in Pac-12 play after a 28-21 loss to visiting Washington.
North Carolina (6-1): Off this week with Pittsburgh coming up this Saturday.
 BYU (4-4): Liberty were -2 in turnovers and still murdered BYU 41-14.
Stanford (3-4): That’s a win streak for the Cardinal and their first league win after an explosive 15-14 comeback win over Arizona State.
UNLV (4-4): The Rebels continue to work on their culture.
Syracuse (6-1): Four turnovers helped the Orange take a 21-10 lead at Clemson but only 291 total yards opened the door to a Tigers comeback which happened in the 4th quarter thanks to 17 unanswered points.
Clemson (8-0): This week’s win over Syracuse makes it highly likely Clemson will be in the ACC Championship Game once again.
Navy (2-5): The Middies were soundly beaten 38-20 by visiting Houston and are inching closer to locking up their 3rd straight losing season.
Boston College (2-5): Wake Forest quarterback Sam Hartman accounted for 6 touchdowns (5 passing, 1 rushing) in a 43-15 crushing of Boston College.
USC (6-1): The Trojans were off this week and visit Arizona on Saturday.
Week 9 Games to Watch
Now featuring dates, channels, and times eastern!
Ohio State (-15.5) at Penn State
Saturday, Fox, Noon
This should be a night game, but Fox gonna Fox. I think we know deep down absolutely no one is in the same league with Ohio State inside the Big Ten. Penn State’s offense is going to have to show up in a way that it hasn’t proven it can do consistently this season. Smart money would be taking the cover here for Ohio State.
Florida (+22.5) vs. Georgia [Jacksonville, FL]
Saturday, CBS, 3:30 PM
There’s been a lot of reporting about this game location in Jacksonville which ends after next season. This rivalry can do a lot better for a location. I’m not sure Florida can do any better as the Gators are staring at a second straight year where Georgia puts it all over them.
Oklahoma State (+1.5) at Kansas StateÂ
Saturday, Fox, 3:30 PMÂ
I don’t know what to make of this Kansas State team. It does seem like Oklahoma State, despite a ton of personnel losses on defense, are still a legit top team and will continue to challenge for the conference title. I guess I like the Cowboys upset.
Cincinnati (-1) at UCF
Saturday, ESPN, 3:30 PM
Man, such a sneaky bad loss by UCF last week and they turn around and can redeem themselves with a win over Cincinnati. If they pull it off they’ll both have 1 loss in the AAC and attempting to chase down mighty Tulane who are off this week.
Kentucky (+12.5) at TennesseeÂ
Saturday, ESPN, 7:00 PM
Last week Tennessee put to bed any hangover predictions. This week, they’ll battle look-ahead issues with a trip to Georgia awaiting them next Saturday. This Vols offense has overwhelmed just about everyone in 2022. One team that could give them fits is this Kentucky unit. For the second straight week I’m predicting we see some nervousness in Knoxville.
I’ve hate watched a decent amount of LSU this year (and I guess like watched LSU because I just like lsu despite kelly), and they’re pretty darn good. I like daniel’s a lot. live in phoenix but definitely didn’t realize how good he was while at ASU. You do still get some weird bk big game stuff, they’ve trailed by double digits in 5 games already this year.
Can’t say I know much about south carolina or even what bowl nd would play them in but i’m confident it would be a boring game
The most frustrating part of the ole miss game was watching LSU execute simple cohesive offensive game plan. They ran inside zone with a bubble RPO read like 40% of the time and it stretched the ole miss defense laterally. LSU was averaging like 6+ a carry on inside zone and didnt have to get too squirrley with their script; they were always on schedule. WHERE IN THE ACTUAL HELL WAS THIS IN SOUTH BEND?!
The last time Kansas won its first five games (2009) they lost their last seven. With three losses, their remaining games are Oklahoma State, Texas Tech, Texas, Kansas State. Mark Mangino resigned after an internal investigation and the discontent over the results. Their OC, Ed Warinner, became ND’s Offensive Line coach in 2010.
Oregon’s final five games are Cal, Colorado, Washington, #14 Utah and Oregon State. Oregon is the only Pac 12 team undefeated in conference play with USC, UCLA and Utah having one conference loss. Oregon does not play USC in the regular season. USC lost to Utah who lost to UCLA who lost to Oregon.
Don’t you mean “Iowa managed a season high 8 first downs and 158 total yards.”
Sorry, Iowa. But you are the only team whose offense I can make fun of (barely).
Does one of the big sites still do a bottom 10 every week? They would always hold the #5 spot for a major program that had a horrible week.
I feel like IU and Rutgers would tie for that spot this week.
Counterpoint to your PSU/OSU summary: having big games at noon is a good thing, actually.
I love noon games. Nights are too busy with sleeping.
I do enjoy them more as I get older, but Noon vs. a night game for Happy Valley is a big difference.
I acknowledge that more people watch and generally enjoy night games. But all those people can get the heck off my lawn.
Actually some of the highest rated games of the season are nooners! https://www.sportsmediawatch.com/2021/11/fox-big-noon-saturday-most-watched-window-college-football-espn-cbs/
This is a fair point.
But, when I was in college in the mid-aughts, there were big nooners. From 2008 or so until a few years ago, it was weird to have an entire window of the day with basically no nationally relevant games. It’s good to have the day spread out. I’m willing to accept the occasional ND-Wisconsin or loss of a Happy Valley white-out game as part of that tradeoff.
Granted the game is at State College, but back when I lived in Columbus I was told that some B1G schools including OSU specifically requested big games be played at noon to decrease the property damage that occurred in the area when exciting evening games were preceded by ten hours of heavy drinking by their fanbase.