Greetings and happy Monday! Last Saturday, we had the feeling of relief when college football finally restarted. While there were only 14 games, there were some pretty interesting storylines. Let’s jump in:
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In the FCS/FCS games, Steph F Austin and Jacksonville St met and the Gamecocks (JAX) trounced the Lumberjacks (SFA) 42-17 in a game shortened by lightning. Alabama St beat Howard 23-13 in a game delayed by lightning. The Mercer Bears stomped on the Morehead St Eagles 63-13. Morehead St was the 258th out of 258 teams in the final GCR ranking, so, yeah. BTW, the SFA coach accused JAX defensive players of faking injuries to slow the game down. Next year, JAX will be moving up to Conference USA, so maybe they are just looking for any advantage they can get.
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In the FCS/FBS games, the biggest story coming into the game was the Florida A&M Rattlers and their 20 ineligible players, either academic or transfer related. In fact, they didn’t fly to Raleigh to play the Tar Heels of UNC until Saturday morning, and only had 6 offensive linemen. There was speculation they would cancel the game, but FLAM left it up to the players, and they wanted to play. If you look at the final, 56-24 UNC win, and even read some of the reports, there is praise for UNC. Ok, the QB put up some decent numbers, but the game was much closer than it should have been, 35-24 after 3. The 4Q looked a lot like FLAM was just worn out and the larger and more rested players did their jobs. Yes, UNC gained over 600 yards, but FLAM gained 335 and had 2 turnovers. UNC tried to score again in the final seconds, but a holding penalty brought them back to the 11 followed by a delay of game. The final play was a 6-yard run to the 10. In another FCS/P5 matchup, Florida St had no trouble with the overmatched Duquesne Dukes 47-7 for a win in the opening game. How bad is Idaho St? The FCS school was 1-10 last year and took on a UNLV team coming off a 2-10 season; they lost 52-21 (it was 45-7 at the half). The Big Sky Conference, as a whole, is pretty good with the likes of Montana, Montana St, E Washington, and Portland St, but the Bengals aren’t one of them. I expect a really long season for the least of the Idaho teams. UNLV, however, showed a little hope. Whether they can play like this against their Mountain West brethren remains to be seen. The final FCS game was much closer than most thought it would be. Last year’s Conference USA Eastern Division Champion, W Kentucky held just a 1-point advantage, 21-20 going into the 4th quarter against the Austin Peay Governors. A 17-7 4th created the 11-point win. but the Hilltoppers had to fight for it. It wasn’t one of those games that looks close: 388 total yards to 327. The key to the game was turnovers: AP had 4 and WKY had just 1.
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In the other games involving Group of 5 teams, UCONN lost but looked like they might win more than one game this year. Leading 14-0 after 1, they collapsed against the Mountain West runner up last year, Utah St, giving up 24 unanswered. The second half saw just 13 points and the final was 31-20, but UCONN showed more promise than they have in a long time. Utah St on the other hand did not look ready to take on Alabama this Saturday. Other all G5 games saw FAU run all over pitiful Charlotte 43-13, North Texas take care of business at UTEP 31-13, and Nevada struggle at New Mexico St, but pull away 23-12. In matchups between the G5 and the P5, Wyoming proved they didn’t have the magic against Illinois falling 38-6 and only gaining 212 yards (1-12 on 3rd downs). The Illini scored at least once in every quarter and took care of business. In the late game, Vanderbilt scored 63 (first time scoring 60+ since 1969) at Hawaii and finished the beat down 63-10 – oh yeah, Hawaii scored first on their first possession and quickly. It looked like another Vandy let down, but they scored 14 in 15 seconds (pass and fumble return) and never looked back. A 35-point 3rd quarter, including a second fumble return TD, set up the blow out. Does this mean they can compete in the SEC? Time will tell, but sooner or later, they will win another conference game (their last win was against Missouri, 21-14, 10/19/19) at some point.
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The only Power 5 matchup was in Ireland where Northwestern just wouldn’t go away vs the Cornhuskers of Nebraska. Twice trailing by 11, the Wildcats just kept pushing. Everybody is talking about Nebraska’s choice to onside kick after going up 11 the second time, but if it had worked, Frost would have been a genius. Momentum was clearly on Nebraska’s side, and he was simply trying to take advantage of it. That wasn’t what I saw that made me question the likelihood of him keeping his job. The entire game, the Wildcats played with more sense of urgency, more energy, more football smarts. Coaches make spot decisions all the time (QB sneak at the goal line that gets stuffed, for example) that armchair coaches question. But I expect a 5th year coach at a program to have his team conditioned, well-prepared, and looking like they want to win much more than I saw. Frost won’t be the first to fail to make it through the 5th and won’t be the last. I know he’s an alumnus, but he isn’t the right coach for them. He is now 15-30 with 21 (yes, TWENTY-ONE) one score losses. That’s player execution (a coaching issue), that’s players knowing what to do at the end of the game (a coaching issue), that’s play calling and game plan (a coaching issue), that’s player conditioning (a coaching issue), and most importantly, that’s a series of small bad coaching decisions. The onside kick didn’t lose the game. It did knock the sails out of the Nebraska players and coaches (no more points in the game and an obvious reduction in playing quality). Good coaches get the team riled up after a play like that (it was in the 3rd quarter – tons of time left and an 11-point lead). Hats off to Northwestern who kept playing the game like they did before scoring twice (the last time with more than 11 and a half minutes left) and taking advantage of the Cornhuskers increasingly lackluster play. If Frost loses his job, and I suspect he will win the payoff drops 50% on October 1, he won’t be fired for a single call that looked bad in hindsight. Rather he will be fired for consistently being underprepared and having a consistently underperforming team. All of that said, it is just one game. It is still possible for Nebraska to have a decent season, but not like they played Saturday.
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That’s it for this week. Please comment if you have feedback, questions, or suggestions, and, as always, forward to others if you like what you are reading. Thanks, G
