COLLEGE FOOTBALL IS BACK.
We spend eight months taking in every little morsel of information we can get. We project who will win and who will lose, who will have a successful season and who will not. After all of the talk and hype, the first week of games should make things a little more clear about how the season will go. Did it though?
Most people thought TCU would be really good and Minnesota would be just OK. After what happened on Thursday, it seems we know less now than we did before they played each other. Does Minnesota miss its departed players on offense that bad, or were they simply stymied by a TCU team that traditionally has one of the best defenses in the country? Is TCU going to struggle to move the ball despite bringing everybody back from an offense that was nearly unstoppable last season, or is Minnesota better than we thought? Is this going to be one of those "good" Northwestern teams that sneaks up on people, or is Stanford just inept?
That's just one example. These kinds of questions can be asked after most of the games we've seen this weekend. Sweeping proclamations will be made - as college football fans it's something we just can't resist. However, we've only completed the first chapter of a book that's still being written. I think that instead of affirming answers that we thought we knew during the offseason, we've only discovered the questions that we didn't yet know to ask about this season. We don't know how this will end - or maybe we do.
Highlights:
Lowlights:
PATs (Points After Tweets):
We spend eight months taking in every little morsel of information we can get. We project who will win and who will lose, who will have a successful season and who will not. After all of the talk and hype, the first week of games should make things a little more clear about how the season will go. Did it though?
Most people thought TCU would be really good and Minnesota would be just OK. After what happened on Thursday, it seems we know less now than we did before they played each other. Does Minnesota miss its departed players on offense that bad, or were they simply stymied by a TCU team that traditionally has one of the best defenses in the country? Is TCU going to struggle to move the ball despite bringing everybody back from an offense that was nearly unstoppable last season, or is Minnesota better than we thought? Is this going to be one of those "good" Northwestern teams that sneaks up on people, or is Stanford just inept?
That's just one example. These kinds of questions can be asked after most of the games we've seen this weekend. Sweeping proclamations will be made - as college football fans it's something we just can't resist. However, we've only completed the first chapter of a book that's still being written. I think that instead of affirming answers that we thought we knew during the offseason, we've only discovered the questions that we didn't yet know to ask about this season. We don't know how this will end - or maybe we do.
Highlights:
- CORN, NOOOOOO!!!
- Fat Kicker!
Where have we seen him before?
- The best hit you probably didn't see... Zach Dumas would be proud:
Lowlights:
- This guy:
- And this guy:
- I missed you, college football. You're crazy, and you're the best:
PATs (Points After Tweets):
- M*ch*g*n: they are who we thought they were... again.
- I'm not sure I've ever seen a college football player get worse to the extent Christian Hackenberg has. Now, I was never on the bandwagon during his freshman year when he was supposedly the next big thing, but he was at least serviceable and had the potential for growth. Instead, he's become quite possibly the worst QB in college football. In the season opener against Temple (!), Hack was 11 of 25 for 103 yards and an interception, which is bad enough, but he was also sacked 10 (TEN!) times. It certainly doesn't help that O-line in front of him offers less resistance to opponents than a wet paper towel:
- It also doesn't help that he went from being developed by and NFL-grade coach to having to try to get by under the tutelage of an overgrown frat bro who selects his assistants by checking out their wives. James Franklin is on the same trajectory as Brady Hoke - a great recruiter who is not competent enough to coach a Pee Wee team. As Hoke found out, the recruiting will start to tail off as the on-field problems start piling up.
- Wisconsin will pound a lot of teams into submission, but the Badgers simply don't have enough elite athletes to to compete with elite teams. Ohio State (59-0) and Alabama (35-17) are proof of that. Who are their playmakers? They'll look formidable again when they're giving 45 carries to Clement against a directional school, bet we know their level, and it's not the one that the rest of the B1G West will make them look like they're on.
- Last year's refrain was "the B1G is irrelevant." The same is not entirely true this year, even though things have started in a similar manner. The B1G will still be relevant as long as there are two teams in the top five, with one of them being the defending champs and unanimous no. 1. The B1G does stink though, and it's clear that the the new proclamations that the B1G was back, that it had quality and depth, were misplaced incorrect. Last season's November, December and January were good for the conference, but it was more of a matter of the stars aligning temporarily than a true return to form. It's not just about postseason performance. Until the other name-brand programs can stop embarrassing themselves the narrative is not going to change. The next best thing we can hope for is that the Buckeyes' winning ways will mostly insulate them from the criticism that the rest of the conference deserves.
- Laquon Treadwell is back for Ole Miss. Not that there was any doubt that he would be, but it's nice to see after a gruesome and heartbreaking injury like the one he experienced. Ohio State fans can look forward to something similar for Noah Brown.
- A lot of people around here have been paying attention to the splash Tom Herman is making at Houston, and with good reason. Don't forget about Chad Morris at SMU though. In a couple years' time those two teams could be the new TCU/Baylor.
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