Maybe we should’ve seen it coming. Penn State, coming off an emotional overtime loss at home to Oregon, had to travel across the country to Los Angeles and probably severely overlooked a wounded UCLA squad with a little bit of talent. As 24.5 point road favorites, that’s exactly what Penn State did as they served up the upset of the year. So far.
Here’s the latest poll from 18 Stripes:
18 Stripes Top 20 Poll
| RANK | TEAM | RECORD | NEXT |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Miami (+1) | 5-0 | BYE |
| 2 | Ohio State (-1) | 5-0 | at Illinois |
| 3 | Oregon | 5-0 | vs. Indiana |
| 4 | Texas A&M | 5-0 | vs. Florida |
| 5 | Ole Miss | 5-0 | vs. Washington State |
| 6 | Oklahoma | 5-0 | vs. Texas |
| 7 | Alabama (+1) | 4-1 | at Missouri |
| 8 | Indiana (+1) | 5-0 | at Oregon |
| 9 | LSU (+1) | 4-1 | vs. South Carolina |
| 10 | Georgia (+1) | 4-1 | at Auburn |
| 11 | Texas Tech (+3) | 5-0 | vs. Kansas |
| 12 | Georgia Tech (+3) | 5-0 | vs. Virginia Tech |
| 13 | Tennessee (+3) | 4-1 | vs. Arkansas |
| 14 | Missouri (+3) | 5-0 | vs. Alabama |
| 15 | Vanderbilt (-2) | 5-1 | BYE |
| 16 | Virginia (NR) | 5-1 | BYE |
| 17 | Arizona State (NR) | 5-1 | at Utah |
| 18 | Notre Dame (NR) | 3-2 | vs. NC State |
| 19 | BYU (NR) | 5-0 | at Arizona |
| 20 | Texas (-13) | 3-2 | vs. Oklahoma |
Dropped Out:
#12 Penn State
#18 Florida State
#19 Louisville
#20 Iowa State
While Penn State’s loss was by far the worst of the week they were one of four teams to drop out of our rankings. Florida State gave it a valiant effort scoring 19 points in the 4th quarter only to fall 28-22 to visiting Miami. That’s back-to-back losses for the Seminoles and the Hurricanes are now through the toughest part of their schedule already. The Noles could be okay for the playoffs (that Alabama win is looking better and better) although their behind the 8-ball in the ACC now.
The turn around in Virginia continues with an impressive overtime victory 30-27 at Louisville. That’s the first loss of the season for the Cardinals whose schedule has been quite poor so far in 2025.
Also, a first loss for Iowa State and in conference play dropping one 38-30 at Cincinnati. The Bearcats are now in a 4-way tie for 1st place in the Big XII, is Scott Satterfield starting to turn things around?
Top Games Recap:
Officially, Penn State loses 42-37 against previously winless UCLA. The pre-season no. 2 (!?!?) Nittany Lions are suddenly 0-2 in the Big Ten and have yet to beat a power conference team in 2025.
Arch Manning threw 2 interceptions, including one late in the 4th quarter, as Florida springs the upset 29-21 over Texas in the Swamp. The Horns are also another team yet to beat a power conference opponent this year.
Vanderbilt was handed their first loss as Alabama pulled away late 30-14. Luckily for the Commodores, they barely fall in our rankings.
Texas Tech continues to look like a problem. They beat Houston 35-11 and on the road, too.
Georgia cruised past Kentucky 35-14.
Previously undefeated Maryland led 20-0 and ended up losing 24-20 against Washington in College Park. That one hurts.
Interesting Games to Note:
BYU 38-24 West Virginia: Bear Bachmeier (26th nationally in passer rating and he can run too) is having a nice true freshman season for the undefeated Cougars.
Michigan 24-10 Wisconsin: The Badgers haven’t won a Big Ten game since 10/19/24 against Northwestern.
Clemson 38-10 North Carolina: I’ve done the math and the Tar Heels have scored 33 combined points against 3 power opponents this year.
Baylor 35-34 Kansas State: The Bears scored 18 points in the 4th quarter in the comeback win. Once ranked in the pre-season, K-State has joined BC, Virginia Tech, Oklahoma State, Colorado, West Virginia, and UCLA in the 4-loss club among P4 programs.
Arizona 41-13 Oklahoma State: The Cowboys haven’t won a Big 12 game since 11/25/23.
Duke 45-21 California: This game was 21-7 in favor of Cal and Duke ended up scoring 38 unanswered points.
Ball State 20-14 Ohio: Last year’s MAC champions suffer their first league defeat since Miami (OH) nearly a year ago.
Opponent Recap:
Miami (5-0): The remaining toughest games per SP+ for Miami include Louisville (28th), Pitt (30th), and SMU (48th).
Texas A&M (5-0): After a sluggish start, the Aggies put away a pesky Mississippi State team 31-9.
Purdue (2-3): Good news, they scored 27 points! Bad news, Illinois scored 43 points and gained over 500 yards.
Arkansas (2-3): The interim Petrino era begins soon, the Hogs were on a bye week.
Boise State (3-2): The Broncos will settle into their Mountain West schedule now with New Mexico coming up.
NC State (4-2): The Wolfpack smoked a team called Campbell 56-10 before coming to South Bend, and interestingly their first bye week comes after this weekend.
USC (4-1): A bye week and a chance to beat visiting Michigan. It’s a big one this weekend.
Boston College (1-4): The Bill O’Brien era is struggling after a 48-7 loss to Pitt. That’s 4 straight defeats.
Navy (5-0): Throw out the records when they play, Navy won a wild shootout against Air Force 34-31 to remain undefeated.
Pittsburgh (3-2): A switch to true freshman quarterback Mason Heintschel worked out pretty well (30/41 for 323 yards and 4 TD) as Pitt blows out BC.
Syracuse (3-3): A second straight loss for Angeli-less Syracuse as they fall 31-18 at SMU.
Stanford (2-3): Speaking of SMU, that’s where Stanford travels to this weekend following a bye week.
SEC shorts went back to the emergency room this week for a DOA Penn State. If you remember, about this time last year they featured Notre Dame on the gurney after the NIU upset. Worth going back to watch that now, especially the part where they called our playoff chances dead.
With Okl. Ga, & aTm , still to play, Texas looks cooked. Penn St. with tOSU and Ind. (yep, Ind.) does too.
The Big10 letting in the west coast teams was a mistake. I don’t think Penn State will be the last team to unexpectedly drop a game after flying across the country. Michigan is apparently leaving a day earlier to try to acclimate.
While I think the cross country travel is a factor, it’s a factor in the same way that weather is a factor. ND has been traveling across the country for decades and they typically just deal with it
Ramblers.
My man!
Yeah, and it was all by train to boot! They used to bring volunteer, unpaid tutors on the trains, my granddad told me.
Free trip to L.A.
Yeah, and we have a pretty poor winning percentage in the Coliseum. It’s one thing to do it once every two years to play a rival (plus or minus a Stanford) and 2-3x a year for conference play.
@ spider-man for a century!
@ Football was a verb 21-24-4 at a rival’s home stadium isn’t that bad
Chatgpt lied to me. It told me 5-10.
Yeah Chatgpt wasn’t even accurate for the last 15 games there, close, but ND is 5-9-1 in that span which conveniently starts right after 5 straight ND wins in the Coliseum. However, before that wasn’t good as both Parseghian and Devine didn’t fare well in LA.
Most teams didn’t fare well in L.A.
Looking at the teams ranked above us, I think we would beat a lot of these teams on a neutral field. With High, Medium and Low confidence levels I would slot them in the following order. High Confidence is we would win 9 or more times out of 10. Medium confidence would be 7 or more times, and low confidence is basically 50/50 or worse.
High: Vanderbilt, Viginia, Missouri, Georgia Tech, Texas Tech, LSU, Oklahoma, Arizona St.
Medium: Miami, Texas A&M, Ole Miss, Indiana, Alabama, Georgia
Low: Ohio St, Oregon
Don’t have a chance to prove any of that in the regular season, but I think we should be a top 10 team by the end of the regular season. I think Miami has to win out and win/ play competitively in the ACC championship game, and texas A&M can lose one regular season game and play in the SEC championship game to keep our credibility high enough to make the playoffs. This assumes of course, we take care of business for the rest of our schedule.
That all sounds spot on…but i’d also like to see Boise and hopefully Navy win their conferences. Maybe even USC makes a run, knocks off Michigan and Oregon and gets to the B1G championship game.
You think ND would beat Miami and A&M 7 out of 10 times?
You think ND would beat Texas Tech and Oklahoma 9 out of 10 times?
You think there are only 2 teams in the country that would beat ND at least half the time?
I need whatever you’re smoking!
Must be the eternal optimist in me. Miami and A&M we lost to by a combined 4 points, not playing our best football. (I know this goes both ways). I believe that defensive side of the ball has a much higher ceiling and was closer to their floor in those games.
Oklahoma is not as good as the rankings suggest, they have a great defense, but I believe the offense is questionable. They have a 10 point win over MI and a 7 point win over Auburn, scoring 24 in each. If the ND defense is on equal footing of MI or Auburn, and the offense is the strength of the team this year, then yep, 9 out of 10 times.
Texas Tech is undefeated and beat UH 35-11, and Utah 34-10, one of those is their best win, but then when you look at UH’s best win, it’s Colorado and Utah’s best win is WV. These aren’t championship fights. TT probably ends up in the playoffs as the Big 12 Champions, but I think their road isn’t difficult in what seems to be a struggling Big 12.
Of course the whole thing is subjective judgement by me. But I think by the end of the year, we will all be pleased with the recovery of the team from the first two games.
I do think we’re a very good team, and I do think the defense is trending in the right direction, but a 90% winning percentage would be better than basically any coach in the history of the game. Doing that against teams that are likely in the top 15-20 in the country? Optimism is underselling it; this would be an all-time elite ND squad if we could do that!
Texas Tech’s wins aren’t super impressive, but ND hasn’t exactly beaten a murderer’s row either!
For reference, 90% win probability would translate to a spread of around 20 pts, 70% would be around 7 pts.
*according to ChatGPT.