The college football season is now in full swing. Following a crazy first week where upsets and blowouts rang supreme, week two is expected to be much more relaxed.
Just two top-25 matchups make up the Saturday slate of games, with a game in Texas being the real show of the day.
But just because there aren’t a lot of star-studded matchups, doesn’t mean that there won’t be some excitement on Saturday.
We have all the top storylines you need to know before the kick-off of the second week of college football.
Texas tries to match Bama
The Texas Longhorns get their first taste of SEC action with a battle against the #1 ranked team in the country in Alabama.
Goodluck.
Fans and draft analysts alike can talk about how good Quinn Ewers could eventually be, but he’s walking into an unmitgated disaster on Saturday at home. Bama has the top quarterback in the country, the top defensive player in the country and is looking for payback from last year’s title game loss. All signs point to Alabama covering the 20-point spread.
On the other hand, a Texas upset would be monumental not just college football, but Steve Sarkisian and his program. Ewers would need to play a near perfect game though, and I’m not even sure that would be enough.
PAC-12 to regroup after abysmal week one
What a disaster for the PAC-12. Utah, one of the highest ranked programs in the country was upset by Florida, and Oregon was laughed off the field by Georgia.
Two top-15 programs were embarrassed by SEC schools. While one could argue that the SEC is the best conference in college football, so losses to any school would be forgiven, the manner in which the best of the conference lost was extremely disheartening.
Oregon gave up over 570 yards of offense to Georgia. The contest was obviously over after the first quarter. Utah on the other hand gave up over 280 rushing yards, and was picked off at the goalline when they could have just send the game to overtime.
USC and UCLA won big last Saturday, but they’ll be in the Big-10 in a few years. With conference play kicking off for the PAC-12, Oregon and Utah will need to regoup and show that opening week was just a fluke.
Where does the ACC lie in College Football?
Clemson was uninspiring in their first contest, Wake Forest is getting their quarterback back but no one knows how good he will be after a blood clot issue, and Pittsburgh won a wild barn-burner in week one in the post-Kenny Pickett era.
The ACC has the usual cast of characters that are expected to be good, but the question is: how good?
Pittsburgh’s game against Tennessee will go a long way to determining the outlook of the entire conference. A win against a good SEC school could be just what the conference needs to bolster college football playoff hopes for the top school, as well as give credence to the fact that the ACC is closer to the Big-10 than the PAC-12.
It’s hard to look past that Virginia Tech loss to Old Dominion though.
Will Cy-Hawk game be any different?
There are some college football games that excite you. There are some that ultimately dispoint you. Then there are those games that make you question the sport, humanity and your own existence.
Welcome to Iowa football.
The Hawkeyes won their first contest against an FCS school in South Dakota State, 7-3. I’ll repeat that: 7-3 was the final score between a Big-10 power, and an FCS program.
I’ll even go further: a Big-10 team did not score an offensive touchdown and was outscored by their defense forcing two safeties in a 7-3 win over an FCS program that has been repeatedly beaten down by rivals in their own conference.
Not a good look from Iowa, but they have a chance to redeem themselves with a matchup against rival Iowa St. The Cyclones offense is far more advanced than the Jackrabbits. There won’t be another 7-3 contest on Saturday.
While Iowa has won the last six matchups, there is little to feel confident about going into tomorrow’s show. One can only hope that the Hawkeyes can at least hold off on stunting the advancement of college football offenses again.
Just how good is the Big-10?
Michigan looked dominant against an inferior opponent. Ohio State’s defense looked the part of a top program against Notre Dame, and Wisconsin looked solid as well.
Yet with Iowa’s embarrassing showing, coupled with Penn State needing every last second to outlast Purdue, there are certainly some questions surrounding the Big-10.
Michigan St. and Wisconsin appear to be teams that make up the second tier with Michigan and Ohio State clearly out in front. But where does the third tier lie? There aren’t a ton of difficult matchups for the entire conference in week two so a strong showing should be expected.
Anything less and the idea of potentially having two teams from the Big-10 making the college football playoff will be wiped away.
