College football recap, week 1: Mad in Texas and Florida

How Indiana fared

Indiana 49, Ohio State 21

With a sold-out crowd in Bloomington the Hoosiers shocked the world by upsetting second-ranked Ohio State-

Okay, fine.

Ohio State 49, Indiana 21

The Hoosiers gave Ohio State all they could handle for 2.5 quarters, even leading at halftime. Mike DeBord was dialing up some great calls, Richard Lagow was throwing darts, and Simmie Cobbs Jr. was looking like Odell Beckham Jr. But the Hoosiers never established a run game and a staunch OSU D-Line, then ran out of gas near the end, which allowed a certain former IU head coach to run the score up a little as the game ended.

Overall, the final result was disappointing - considering how close the game was for a while, along with the many months of pre-game hype - but sadly, not too unexpected. Oh yeah, and Nick Westbrook’s done for the year, so that’s just great.

Around the B1G

Louisville 35, Purdue 28

My love of watching reigning Heisman winner Lamar Jackson play football for Louisville is well-documented. And when I saw they were opening the 2017 season with Purdue, I was excited to watch Jackson dominate.

That’s, uhh, not quite what happened.

While Jackson had himself a great game to kick off his Heisman defense (485 total yards of offense), Louisville made too many mistakes, and Jeff Brohm’s Purdue offense showed flashes of brilliance, even holding the lead during the 4th quarter. Ultimately the Cardinals did enough to pull off a victory, but it’s clear that the Boilers won’t be as much of a pushover this season.

Maryland 51, Texas 41

Oh boy. Oh boy.

For the past 9 months we’ve been force-fed stories about how things were DIFFERENT for Texas football, how this was a CULTURE CHANGE in Austin under Tom Herman, and most importantly, how TEXAS WAS BACK.

Turns out, Texas didn’t look any different than they have during their last few seasons.

Maryland marched into Austin on Saturday morning and thoroughly ruined Tom Herman’s debut. Thanks in part to QB Tyrell Pigrome and WR DJ Moore, the Terps looked far better than their lowly projections coming into the season.

Michigan 33, Florida 17

If not for a pair of early pick-sixes, Michigan would have held the Gators to 3 points. Don Brown’s defense is once again legit.

Penn State 52, Akron 0
Wisconsin 59, Utah State 10
Michigan State 35, Bowling Green 10
Iowa 24, Wyoming 3

Ahh yes, now we get to the normal Week 1 Group of 5 blowout games. At least all the losing teams got paid and got a chance to play in B1G stadiums.

Minnesota 17, Buffalo 7
Nebraska 43, Arkansas State 36
Northwestern 31, Nevada 20

A few uninspiring victories from some the middle-of-the-pack B1G West teams. Especially surprising was Northwestern, picked by many as a dark horse in the division, struggling to put away Nevada.

Washington 30, Rutger 14

Hey well would you look at that, Rutger actually looked kinda competitive for a while and even scored first!

Illinois 24, Ball State 21

n e a t

Elsewhere in College Football

Alabama 24, Florida State 7

In the marquee game of the weekend, Nick Saban once again demonstrated why he is the ultimate boss, methodically destroying his former protege Jimbo Fisher and his Seminoles. FSU quarterback Deondre Francois is out for the year, meaning the Noles will turn to his backup, whose name is...

James Blackmon.

(“Good thing he doesn’t have to play defense am I right?!?” - an IU fan somewhere, probably)

UCLA 45, Texas A&M 44

The Bruins were down 44-10 at one point in the third quarter. Then they scored 35 straight points to win the game, which was basically a microcosm of every Texas A&M season under Kevin Sumlin. Also Gus Johnson was on the call, which made it even better.

Tennessee 42, Georgia Tech 41 (2OT)

The Volunteers won the game, but while some people still are eager to defend him, I’m officially done with Butch Jones. He uses annoying platitudes (“Champions of Life”, “Five Star Heart”), and his continued ability to accomplish less with more talent is incredibly frustrating. This is a team that was holding up a TRASH CAN as a motivational tactic during the 4th quarter last night. Tennessee gave up over 500 rush yards to Tech in this one. They’re lucky to be 1-0.

Howard 43, UNLV 40

Howard is a relatively small HBCU located in D.C. that finished 2-9 last year. The Bison were 45-point underdogs in this game. Yet they traveled all the way to Vegas and proceeded to run the Rebels out of their own stadium. Howard’s quarterback? None other than the brother of Carolina Panthers QB Cam Newton.

Liberty 48, Baylor 45

I was amused to see that Baylor fell to an FCS team, after all the years of Baylor being criticized for their cupcake scheduling and all the awful stuff that happened there under Art Briles. Unfortunately, they lost to Liberty, a school whose leadership has been paying lip service to Trump throughout his campaign and presidency, and whose new AD once held the same role at... you guessed it... Baylor.

Matt Rhule has his work cut out for him in Waco.

IS TEXAS BACK?

Presenting the IS TEXAS BACK-O-METER. Each week, we’ll check on college football’s most burning question: IS TEXAS BACK?!?! Here’s this week’s edition (thanks to blog friend Ben Goren for the graphic):

Coach on the Hottest Seat

It’s gotta be Kevin Sumlin. Ever since Johnny Football left, Sumlin has fallen into a familiar pattern at Texas A&M: Start the season off strong, then lose to Alabama, then suddenly everything falls apart and they struggle to finish 8-5. After Sunday night’s game, one A&M regent even took to social media to express his frustration:

Things aren’t good at either of Texas’s two flagship football programs right now.

Way-Too-Early Playoff Rankings

1. Alabama

2. Ohio State

3. Clemson

4. Oklahoma

Next Week

Indiana at Virginia - it’s Hoosiers vs. Hoos in Charlottesville, as IU takes to the road against an ACC squad. Bronco Mendenhall has a long rebuild ahead of him at UVA, so the Hoosiers might be catching them at the right time, especially with two extra days to prepare.

Oklahoma at Ohio State - After a warmup week, new OU coach Lincoln Riley gets his first big test in the Horseshoe. The Buckeyes had trouble defending the pass at times against IU, and so they’ll need to watch out for the Sooners, who sport a very pass-happy offense under QB Baker Mayfield.

Georgia at Notre Dame - I actually attended a home game at both these schools last year. It’s hard to find two more different blue-blood atmospheres in college football, and the fact that this home-and-home was scheduled seems pretty remarkable. In conclusion, Notre Dame went 4-8 last year. Go Dawgs.