Texas quarterback Arch Manning runs for a first down in the second quarter oagainst Ohio State at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas, on Jan. 10, 2025. Manning assumes the starting role this season. (Chris Torres, Fort Worth Star-Telegram/TNS)
Has there ever been a more needed Week 1 of a college football season to provide something to pay attention to besides what has popped up around the sport in recent months?
There’s a valid argument for 2020, when the presence of any live sports felt like a respite. But there was still an unseemliness to it, with players getting compensated much less than they are today to play during a global pandemic. And even for those who weren’t bothered by that, it was still just a tapered return; remember, the Big Ten and Pac-12 played partial seasons that year.
The just-concluded offseason offered a stultifying string of discussions about playoff formats, an almost direct result of the SEC realizing that a team with a 9-3 record and a “It Just Means More” slogan slapped on its résumé wouldn’t just be handed an at-large bid in the current 12-team setup.
In mild defense of the SEC - not that it doesn’t have enough partisans to stick up for it — at least it hasn’t delivered nearly as many unintentional yuks as the Big Ten. A 28-team playoff, guys? Really? No one needs to see the seventh-place Big Ten team doing anything more meaningful in December than earning its coach a mayonnaise bath (as Minnesota did last year at the Duke’s Mayo Bowl).
The general premise of the format bellyaching can be reduced to three basic concepts. One, college football power brokers want to extract as much cash as they can. Two, the SEC and Big Ten in particular want to monopolize playoff berths to the greatest extent allowable. And three, no one really is putting much thought (and definitely not too much concern) into the product, both in the regular season and beyond.
And yet the games will be a wonderful respite for the absurdity that fills up the entire offseason, assuming an actual offseason still exists in college football. Iowa State’s Week Zero defeat of Kansas State last week in a Farmageddon relocated to Ireland was a fine enough start, with or without a player’s family members tussling in the car park.
Convoluted playoff plans can wait. Games — the actual fun, gripping, agonizing, delirious part of college football — are back with a full five-day weekend starting Thursday. And not a moment too soon.
Welcome to the big time
The ranks of the Football Bowl Subdivision swell to 136 schools this year, with two additions to the sprawling Conference USA.
(Brief aside: That’s an increase of 17 schools from the 119 that played at college football’s top level in 2005, a bump of 14.3 percent. That same year there were 56 postseason participants in 28 bowls, while there will be 82 participants this year between 12 playoff berths and 35 non-playoff bowls. That’s a 20-year increase of 46.4 percent. The more you know …)
In any case, this weekend marks the welcome of both Delaware and Missouri State to things such as a place on ESPN’s ticker and the occasional opportunity to be thoroughly defenestrated for a bigger pile of cash than a Football Championship Subdivision school could demand. That’s probably the fate awaiting Missouri State (which did go 8-4 a season ago) when it visits Southern California on Saturday.
Delaware won’t play a money game until next week, when it visits Colorado. And besides, the Blue Hens — who were a regular FCS power for years — took a check and a victory from an FBS team as recently as 2022, when they picked off Navy, 14-7. Delaware makes its FBS debut Thursday night against Delaware State.
5 can’t-miss games this week
1. Texas at Ohio State (Saturday, noon, Fox): It’s a rematch of last year’s playoff semifinal, which the Buckeyes won, 28-14, on the way to the national title. Does the Arch Manning for Heisman train get rolling early, or does it even make it to Labor Day? How he and the Longhorns fare against a rebuilt Ohio State defense could provide an answer.
2. LSU at Clemson (Saturday, 7:30, ABC): Brian Kelly is 0 for 3 in season openers since coming to LSU, and the last time the Tigers (purple and gold variety) started 1-0, Joe Burrow was the quarterback. Fair or not, how much credibility Clemson carries into the next couple of months probably hinges on how it fares in Death Valley (South Carolina version) to get the season underway.
3. Notre Dame at Miami (Sunday, 7:30, ABC): On the subject of ACC teams looking for early season credibility, Miami (which needs much more of it than Clemson after closing last season with three losses in its last four games) welcomes last year’s national runner-up to South Florida. What we learned last year is Notre Dame has a mulligan to use to excuse a single loss to anybody in the 12-team playoff era. It probably would rather avoid utilizing it in Week 1.
4. Auburn at Baylor (Friday, 8, Fox): A sneakily interesting game by the Brazos River, mainly because there is the potential for high entertainment value from Auburn fans regardless of outcome. If the Tigers win, it should fuel some more bullish elements of their fan base because Baylor has plenty of continuity after going 8-5 last year. And if Auburn stumbles, well, that’s a hint it might not be too much better than the Tigers teams that rolled up seven losses in each of the past four years.
5. Utah at UCLA (Saturday, 11, Fox): It’s a Pac-12 reunion as the visiting Utes look to shake off an uncharacteristically bad season. As for UCLA, mum has been the word around Westwood as Coach DeShaun Foster has severely curtailed media access. If things go sideways for the Bruins, a thoroughly reasonable postgame question for Foster would be just how bad things could have gotten had his team been photographed and interviewed more in the past few weeks.
Last week’s top performers
1. QB Maverick McIvor, Western Kentucky: What a fine Hilltoppers debut it was for McIvor, who threw for 401 yards and three touchdowns and tacked on a rushing score in a 41-24 defeat of Sam Houston. McIvor didn’t take a snap in three years at Texas Tech, then spent the past three seasons at Abilene Christian, where he was a finalist for the Walter Payton Award as the best player in the FCS.
2. QB Jalon Daniels, Kansas: The veteran Jayhawk threw for 176 yards and three touchdowns in a 31-7 defeat of Fresno State.
3. QB Rocco Becht, Iowa State: The Cyclones’ third-year starter threw for 183 yards and two touchdowns, rushed for another score and engineered a drive that drained the final 6:23 off the clock in a 24-21 defeat of Kansas State in Ireland.
4. K Kansei Matsuzawa, Hawaii: Make a game-winning field goal as time expires in Week Zero when there are only five games involving FBS teams, and earn a nod on this list. Matsuzawa connected from 38 yards to secure the Rainbow Warriors’ 23-20 defeat of visiting Stanford. He also made a 37-yarder to tie it with 2:01 to go.
5. RB Jai’Den Thomas, UNLV: Needed only 10 carries to rumble for 147 yards and three touchdowns as the Rebels rallied past Idaho State, 38-31.
6. WR Matthew Henry, Western Kentucky: Henry left Week Zero as the FBS leader in receiving yards, piling up a seven-catch, 148-yard day with a touchdown against Sam Houston.
Heisman watch
1. WR Jeremiah Smith, Ohio State. Smith amassed 1,315 yards and 15 touchdowns in 16 games last season, and he was probably the best player in the first two weekends of the playoff. Yes, history suggests “quarterback on a top-five team” is the most likely Heisman-winning archetype, but wide receivers — even some that don’t also play cornerback — have been known to win it from time to time.
2. QB Cade Klubnik, Clemson. The Tigers need to be better than last year to make this happen. But the thing is, they probably will be. Klubnik threw for 36 touchdowns and six interceptions, and similarly gaudy numbers coupled with Clemson reclaiming a spot as a top-five regular should at least get him invited to New York.
3. QB Sam Leavitt, Arizona State. The Sun Devils’ backfield has a Cam Skattebo-sized hole, which means more responsibility will rest on Leavitt’s arm. He did a stellar job in November and December making superb decisions. (Granted, that often meant just handing the ball to Skattebo). But in a wide-open Big 12, he’ll be a familiar name to keep tabs on.
4. QB Arch Manning, Texas. The Longhorns should be good, the Manning lineage is famed, and recruiting savants fell over themselves when Manning was picking a school a few years back. Still … the guy has thrown 95 passes at the college level, effectively playing two full games and a good chunk of a third in two seasons. Maybe expectations should be tempered just a little more; even this placement is a bit high for someone with oodles of potential but (through no fault of his own) a modest college track record.
5. RB Jeremiyah Love, Notre Dame. He rushed for 1,125 yards and 17 touchdowns last season and scored in 15 consecutive games before the national championship. He averaged 6.9 yards a carry, but never had more than 16 carries in a game. A Heisman run is contingent on a workload increase — not to Ashton Jeanty levels, but more than the 11.2 attempts per game last season — and the Irish retaining attention. Well, more than they did much of last season, anyway.
6. RB Nick Singleton, Penn State. If the Nittany Lions have a deeper postseason run in them, it’s probably going to stem from their impressive running game. Singleton averaged 6.4 yards a pop last season, piling up 1,099 yards and 12 touchdowns. The reason for pegging Singleton so low is a good one for Penn State; the rugged Kaytron Allen, who rushed for 1,108 yards and eight touchdowns, also remains in the backfield mix in Happy Valley.
