Another week of college football is complete and it was a relatively quiet one in terms of upsets. Well, except for Alabama losing at home as 7-point favorites to the Texas Longhorns. Can we say that Texas is now officially back? Are we seeing an end of an era at Alabama with Tommy Rees along for the ride? Is this going to be a year of SEC dominance again in the end or will we be wondering if anyone can knock Georgia off its perch?
We still have a long season ahead of us though, and here’s the latest poll from 18 Stripes.
18 Stripes Top 20 Poll
| RANK | TEAM | RECORD | NEXT |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Georgia | 2-0 | vs. South Carolina |
| 2 | Texas (+2) | 2-0 | vs. Wyoming |
| 3 | Florida State (-1) | 2-0 | at Boston College |
| 4 | Washington (-1) | 2-0 | at Michigan State |
| 5 | Michigan | 2-0 | vs. Bowling Green |
| 6 | USC (+1) | 3-0 | BYE |
| 7 | Utah (+1) | 2-0 | vs. Weber State |
| 8 | Notre Dame (+1) | 3-0 | vs. Central Michigan |
| 9 | Penn State (+1) | 2-0 | vs. Illinois |
| 10 | Tennessee (+2) | 2-0 | at Florida |
| 11 | North Carolina | 2-0 | vs. Minnesota |
| 12 | Ohio State (+1) | 2-0 | vs. Western Kentucky |
| 13 | Oregon State (+1) | 2-0 | vs. San Diego State |
| 14 | Ole Miss (+1) | 2-0 | vs. Georgia Tech |
| 15 | Alabama (-9) | 1-1 | at USF |
| 16 | Oklahoma | 2-0 | at Tulsa |
| 17 | Duke | 2-0 | vs. Northwestern |
| 18 | Colorado | 2-0 | vs. Colorado State |
| 19 | LSU | 1-1 | at Miss State |
| 20 | Kansas State (NR) | 2-0 | at Missouri |
Out:
#20 Houston
National Storylines
Jalon Daniels returned to the lineup as Kansas looked pretty good in a 34-23 win over Illinois.
Tyler Van Dyke threw 5 touchdowns as Miami defended home field and beat Texas A&M 48-33. The Aggies are 3-9 against Power 5 teams stretching back to late 2021.
A late Hudson Card touchdown run moved Purdue past Virginia Tech 24-27 in Blacksburg.
Holy Cross came up just short of an upset at Boston College. The Eagles were able to hang on 31-28.
Nebraska is one of 4 teams in the Power 5 to start this season 0-2. They overcame adversity in the 1st half to stay in the game but Colorado pulled away late to win 36-14. The Coach Prime hype lives on for another week.
James Madison used a 12-point 4th quarter to defeat Virginia in Charlottesville 36-35. The Dukes went for the 2-point conversion with 55 seconds left and failed but Virginia couldn’t move the ball on their final possession.
Tennessee’s smokey grey uniforms didn’t look great in a 30-13 win over Austin Peay. I’m not sure the Vols deserved to move up 2 spots in our rankings but so it goes.
I should’ve seen this one coming. North Carolina needed double overtime to beat Appalachian State 40-34 in Chapel Hill. I do not feel good about the Heels sitting at no. 11 in our poll.
Oklahoma had to sweat a little bit in a 28-11 win over SMU.
UCF needed a 55-yard field goal as time expired to beat Boise State 18-16 on the blue turf.
Utah came back on the road to beat Baylor 20-13. The Bears are another Power 5 program that has started 0-2 in 2023.
In a wild one, Oregon came back to score 20 points in the 4th quarter to beat Texas Tech on the road. After some underdog hype, the Red Raiders are another Power 5 team sitting at 0-2.
Quinn Ewers threw for 349 yards and 3 touchdowns as Texas beat Alabama 34-24. It’s the first double-digit loss at home for Alabama since…2004! And yet, the AP Poll has Michigan and Florida State ranked ahead of Texas. GTFOH.
Tulane was without star quarterback Michael Pratt and even led Ole Miss at halftime. However, the Rebels came back to win 37-20.
A failed 2-point conversion in overtime allowed Rice to upset Houston 43-41. The well-traveled JT Daniels threw for 401 yards in the win.
For some reason Wisconsin came into week 2 ranked no. 19 in the AP Poll. Well, the Badgers lost 31-22 at Washington State and the Cougars’ fans commemorated the event by storming the field.
Farmageddon witnessed a pair of 2nd quarter touchdowns scored by Iowa. They stopped the excessive offense and limited themselves to just field goals thereafter. The Hawkeyes hung on to beat rival Iowa State 20-13.
Michigan State beat Richmond 45-14 in what may be Mel Tucker’s last game as head coach of the Spartans.
Syracuse scored 45 point in the 1st half against Western Michigan and cruised to a 48-7 win.
Trent Dilfer suffered his first loss as a college head coach as UAB was defeated by Georgia Southern 49-35.
The Rutgers offense exploded in the 4th quarter to beat Temple 36-7.
Dante Moore threw for 290 yards and 3 touchdowns as UCLA breezed past San Diego State 35-10.
In a game no one should’ve watched, Auburn beat Cal 14-10 in Berkeley.
Oklahoma State trailed at halftime then came back to beat Arizona State 27-15 in Tempe.
FCS Fordham upset Buffalo on the road 40-37.
Mississippi State needed overtime to beat Arizona 31-24.
Opponent Watch
Navy (1-1): There is a team called Wagner and they were shutout by the Middies 24-0 this weekend.
Tennessee State (1-1): The Tigers beat Arkansas-Pine Bluff 24-14 for their first win.
NC State (1-1): VMI travels to Raleigh this weekend.
Central Michigan (1-1): Giving up 538 yards to New Hampshire is bad but the Chips held on 45-42 for the win.
Ohio State (2-0): Marvin Harrison Jr. caught 2 touchdown passes in a 35-7 win over Youngstown State.
Duke (2-0): The Blue Devils started slow then took care of business in a 42-7 win over Lafayette.
Louisville (2-0): The Cards shutout Murray State 56-0 and are averaging 8.14 yards per play on offense after 2 games.
USC (3-0): It was never close as the Trojans demolished Stanford 56-10 and led 49-3 at halftime.
Pitt (1-1): Phil Jurkovec was booed by his home crowd after going 1o of 32 for 179 yards in a 27-21 loss to Cincinnati.
Clemson (1-1): It was tied early then Clemson went on a run to beat Charleston Southern easily 66-17.
Wake Forest (2-0): The Deacons held serve at home beating Clark Lea and Vanderbilt 36-20.
Stanford (1-1): Quarterback Ashton Daniels was injured in the 2nd quarter after taking a sack.
Week 3 Games to Watch
All time are eastern.
NOTE: This week 3 is atrociously bad for viewing. I counted only 17 matchups between Power 5 teams and we don’t have any ranked teams playing each other. With Notre Dame set to play Central Michigan this is the best weekend to maybe go do something outside all day and come back to the Irish are your leisure.
South Carolina [+27.5] at Georgia
Saturday, Sept. 16th, 3:30 PM, CBS
South Carolina has been hammered by Georgia over the last 3 meetings (133-36 combined score) and has been struggling protecting Spencer Rattler. That seems like a really bad recipe for facing the Dawgs.
San Diego State [+24.5] at Oregon State
Saturday, Sept. 16th, 3:30 PM, FS1
I think many look at San Diego State as a solid mid-major program. However, they’ve played 3 games so far in 2023 and they’re 82nd in FEI right now. This is potentially a great year for Oregon State but they’ll have to take care of business here before a couple difficult conference games in the next 2 weeks.
Minnesota [+7.5] at North Carolina
Saturday, Sept. 16th, 3:30 PM, ESPN
For a crappy week of football…this is kind of a fun matchup? On the one hand, Minnesota’s offense has looked broken and discombobulated going back to last year and they might have a hard time keeping pace with North Carolina. On the other hand, this is exactly the type of game we’ve become so accustomed to the Tar Heels losing.
Washington [-16] at Michigan State
Saturday, Sept. 16th, 5:00 PM, Peacock
Well, the vibes for this are going to be really weird when the Spartans head coach won’t be there while under investigation for sexual harassment. That’s not great timing with the high-powered Washington offense traveling to East Lansing. However, don’t be shocked if this is a classic weird college football game and it’s close throughout.
Tennessee [-6.5] at Florida
Saturday, Sept. 16th, 7:00 PM, ESPN
Based on nothing but feel, I am predicting the Gators win this game in an upset. Tennessee haven’t won in the Swamp since 2003. That 0-9 record in recent years at Florida looms large for the Vols.
BYU [+9.5] at Arkansas
Saturday, Sept. 16th, 7:30 PM, ESPN2
This game last year in Provo featured a combined 87 points in an Arkansas win. I think we’ll see a lot fewer points this year. This is the start of 10 straight Power 5 games for BYU, so good luck!
TCU [-7.5] at Houston
Saturday, Sept. 16th, 8:00 PM, Fox
With Houston losing to Rice last weekend it’s not great and with Sam Houston State next weekend they will still have 9 Power 5 games to play after being a mid-major for so long. It’s also their Big 12 opener. Watch out for TCU, their schedule is pretty friendly for a while and they could be 6-1 before visiting Kansas State on October 21st.
Man what a difference a year makes. Last year at this time, we were all doing the math, maybe 4-8/5-7/6-6. And we hadn’t even reached the nadir of the season (and hopefully the freeman era), but the first half of the cal game was abominable.
Looking at SP+, after this week nd next 7 opponents are all in the top 42, with usc and ohio state being top 6. Gonna be a grind
I went back and tried to re-create the win probability matrix that’s been on here in years past using FPI (as I was able to easily find a game-by-game breakdown that gets updated each week). Current end of year win probabilities are attached **my math/formulae could be wrong**
Wow, so funny. I just got on here with the express purpose of asking whatever happened to the SP+ matrix. Thanks for posting this – I do love the pretty colors!
We’re a visually motivated community… just see murtaugh’s thoughts on ALL the uniforms.
Still surprised he hasn’t written a 3 part series on the gold “C” for captians.
Hah! beat me by 13 seconds!
They look SO GOOD
Disagree. I’d like to see the large gold “C” and then a smaller “C” that’s the same color as the jersey so it would essentially just look like a hollow gold “C”
Let’s see what happens this weekend with the blue jerseys.
I stand by what I said in the NCST review, I like that it brings something different but it looks a bit weird.
I saw the gold captain’s C on our uniforms this weekend and thought “oh, Murtaugh’s going to have thoughts on this!”
Also, I’m surprised that it has us as such a high chance to beat Duke. I know the talent differential is huge, but they look scrappy and seem to be very well coached. I’m kind of scared of going to Durham right after a super emotional OSU game. Ain’t no fans like bandwagon fans (cue nightmare of 2017 at Hard Rock Stadium…)
Win % actually dropped from 89% to the 80.9% from the previous week, per https://fightingirishwire.usatoday.com/lists/espn-fpi-notre-dame-football-irish-nd-college-ncaa/
If I remember correctly, these charts are still heavily dependent on pre-season predictions until around week 4-5ish.
Hey 18s folks, question:
Is there going to be a weekly win probability matrix this season?
The color coding was always so pretty, so I’m curious if that’s an article of yesteryear now
Haha – I just added a homemade version!
You da real mvp
Tell that to my boss, as I spend a few work hours on this
what is the reasoning for UNC being ranked over Ohio State?
From the preseason article:
UNC’s schedule sets up great this year. They dodge both ND and FSU completely and host both Duke and Miami. OSU goes to ND and UM, plus host PSU. On just those two team’s schedules OSU plays all three of the three most difficult games, it’s definitely possible the Buckeyes finish with more losses than the Heels.
but does definitely possible imply more likely?
Also, if UNC has more losses than OSU, that doesn’t necessarily mean they should be ranked higher than them anyway.
If you’re ranking the teams based on the number of recruiting stars then OSU should definitely be above UNC. I’m just saying that if you’re forward looking it’s not a slam dunk.
Also, in a pretend world where UNC finishes 11-1 (losing their one tough road game at Clemson) and OSU finishes 10-2 (losing both their tough road games, ND and UM) then yeah, UNC should be ranked above OSU. We would have played football for three months to see who wins and loses.
But you didn’t make any case for UNC being above OSU, you just made a case for OSU not being higher.
I’m not arguing that OSU should be higher, just that UNC is overrated and it’s more obvious when they are directly above a team with a higher floor and ceiling, that they have done nothing to suggest they are better than.
It’s automatically ranking teams with fewer losses higher than better teams with tougher schedules that leads to schedules like UM and UGA.
Also, do you think that UNC is a better team than OSU? Do you think they’d win head to head?
Based on FPI (2022/current) these would be all the wins for both (current FPI/2022 FPI)
10-2 OSU || 11-1 UNC
#7/#6 PSU || #15/#69 Miami
#35/#29 Wisc || #18/#47 Syracuse
#39/#46 MSU || #31/#30 Pitt
#42/#31 MD || #38/#45 Duke
#49/#21 Minn || #44/#49 S.Car
#54/#101 Rutgers || #46/#39 NC St
#59/#50 Purdue || #49/#21 Minnesota
#66/#85 IU || #62/#80 GT
#73/#48 WKU || #78/#66 App St
Youngstown || #97/#83 UVA
Loss || Campbell
If the current FPI is more reflective of the end of the season, I would rank 11-1 UNC higher than 10-2 OSU. If 2022 FPI ends up being more reflective, then I would rank 10-2 OSU higher.
But the real thing with the ranking is what are the chances UNC actually goes 11-1? I’d think around 10%. While I imagine OSU finishing 10-2 or better would be around 75%
UNC could legitimately be better than OSU. But there is nothing anything that suggests this is really the case. I guess they currently have the better win, simply because they have played a better team. But they also have the worst win (and almost loss) to a team comparable to IU.
Michigan and Georgia are wasting everyone’s time this year.
What does this mean? That they are clearly 1 and 2 and are shoo-ins for the title game?
More by absolutely refusing to challenge themselves. You’ve got a team going for a threepeat national title and another team going for a threepeat B1G title that barely travel (UGA travels the fewest miles of any FBS team), play no interesting OOC games, and will be tested maybe twice in conference.
In UGA’s defense, they didn’t know they’d be 2 time defending champs when this year’s schedule was finalized. In Michigan’s defense, screw Michigan.
I’m looking forward to when Michigan leaves the confines of the House to travel to the West Coast – for conference games. Will Wolverines whine about winning travel games with respect to Georgia’s?
More likely they’ll lose every time they go out west and whine about how having to travel isn’t fair.
“Well that road loss to UCLA didn’t count because it wasn’t the Ohio State game”
Or they’re playing nobodies for a while – both only play 2 ranked teams and the first of those for each team isn’t until 11/11
That makes perfect sense.My hatred for michigan and their newfound success blinded me from the obvious
No Oregon in the twenty? I do like how the poll is dynamic and prove-it while FCS wins are minimized. Last week’s PAC schedule was heavy on P5 while this week is more West Coast mid-majors. Overall, the PAC is 20-3 for the first two weeks.
Comparing PAC and BIG last week, the BIG played five games against P5 teams and went 2-3. Illinois (Kansas), Nebraska (Colorado) and Wisconsin (Wash St) lost while Iowa (Iowa State) and Purdue (Va Tech) won. As far as the latter game, I can’t imagine a 5 1/2 hour rain/lightning delay with 4″ of rain. PAC 2-0 vs BIG.
The PAC played seven games against P5 teams and were 4-3. Wash St (Wisconsin), Colorado (Nebraska), Oregon (Texas Tech), and Utah (Baylor) won. The Arizonas (Miss St and Oklahoma St) and Cal (Auburn) all lost. Fans at the latter game should have gotten their ticket price money back. Mercy Rule? Auburn beat Cal by four. Ten thousand Auburn fans traveled 2000 miles to watch. Arizona and Miss St went to OT.
Outside of Stanford (and Colorado) the preseason poll picks for the bottom five PAC teams were the Arizonas and Cal. Auburn and Miss St may be towards the bottom of the SEC. When was the last time that after two weeks Alabama, LSU and A&M were occupying the bottom of the SEC West?
Who watches the Big Ten Network? Prison inmates with no choices? Last week’s games were Delaware at Penn St, Youngstown St at Ohio State, UNLV at Michigan, and Charlotte at Maryland. Woof.
Honestly these first three weeks are helping me turn into a conference realignment accelerationist. Have the Power Conference schools consolidate into their own league of like 64 teams and only play each other. It’s an inevitability that we get there eventually; that would make all the games that much more valuable to networks and a higher percentage of games that actually matter imho
This may be below the level of football acumen many of you possess but as a guy that never played I find these “Coaches Caviar” summaries quite good: he breaks down 4-5 plays from ND-NCST in this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eauCem1bDk8
The second play he shows is the Estime 80 yarder where he talks about how ND has an athlete in Estime who can outrun those DBs to the end zone. The other interesting thing to notice is when Estime makes that final break up field between the corner and safety Merriweather is disengaging from his block behind the play, and then he ends up being the closest player to Audric as he steps into the end zone. Great block on the play, and the much hyped Merriweather speed is very real.
Now, take the speed from merriweather here, and the known speed of tyree:
BOTH of them were tackled on their respective long catches by NCSTs middle linebacker (#11) 40 yards down the field. That dude is a DAWG.
Yeah, i think i remember them saying during the broadcast that #11 ran a sub 4.5 40. Not many LBs are gonna be able to run Merriweather down.
Tyree’s catch and run was way different. At least 3 defenders were 20 yards farther down the field than Tyree and thus didn’t have to chase him down. Although i think Tyree could’ve cut left and housed it.
i thought they said he ran a 4.4. 40 actually.