Over-reaction Tuesday: Separating the best from the rest

Already, we're starting to see results that put the contenders and pretenders into clearer focus. But we're still waiting for a truly dominant team to emerge

Photo by Dave Adamson on Unsplash

So, we’re still learning things. It’s kinda how it is at this time of the college football season, when teams aren’t quite there in terms of being fully formed versions of themselves.

But certain games and results start to give you bigger hints, a better idea of who just might be a contender — or is an overrated pretender. We saw a little bit of that in Week 4, which promised a handful of juicy matchups (spoiler alert: this weekend is even better) that would, at the very least, give us some compelling football to watch.

Um, not quite.

Ranked on ranked meant blowout for the most part last weekend, and in perhaps slightly surprising fashion. But it’s all part of the deal in terms of separating the best from the rest.

As always, we have observations and thoughts. Here’s a few of the things that were front of mind by the end of the night …

This year’s Indiana is … well, Indiana

You’ll recall how the Hoosiers caught the sport by storm last season, rolling to a rather surprising 11-1 record behind coach Curt Cignetti, and a College Football Playoff berth. Not that these guys didn’t have their detractors or doubters.

The narrative — one that folks from certain parts of the country (you can probably guess where) used against Indiana in trying to paint them as not playoff worthy — was that Indiana racked up all those wins against a schedule that wasn’t exactly challenging. And that the Hoosiers got routed by the one very good team on the slate (that would have been eventual national champion Ohio State).

No doubt many of these same people believed the Hoosiers to be one-hit wonders, that they’d come back down to earth. Then came Saturday night, when Indiana toyed with and flat out humiliated then-No. 9 Illinois 63-10 in the evening showcase on NBC. And reminded all of us that they are very intending to stay with the big boys in the Big Ten.

Quarterback Fernando Mendoza tossed five touchdown passes and Indiana also rolled up more than 300 yards on the ground. And the Hoosier defence completely smothered the Illini offence. It was all highly, highly impressive stuff.

The path is tougher for the Hoosiers this season. A huge road test awaits at Oregon next month. Indiana also must play at Penn State in November. But it’s fair to suggest Cignetti’s crew has shown already it’s got what it takes to hang with both of those squads. And the CFP is certainly on the table for this team again.

Sooners’ defence is nasty. It’ll need to be even better now

Oklahoma head coach Brent Venables, a noted defensive guru (whose handiwork helped turn Clemson into a national title winning outfit), has taken charge of the Sooner stop troops this season. And in short order, he’s got them playing some of the best defence in the country.

They limited Michigan to 13 points in Week 2. Then came last weekend’s 10-sack show against Auburn. It’s the kind of unit that can and will be needed to travel far and wide in the rugged Southeastern Conference. And with transfer quarterback John Mateer at the controls of an improved offence, the Sooners seemed poised to perhaps make a run at the playoff.

All of that is about to get a major test, especially after word leaked out earlier today that Mateer suffered an injury to his throwing hand against the Tigers and will need surgery Wednesday that will keep him out for a month (Michael Hawkins, who overtook Jackson Arnold as the start for a chunk of last season, gets the call again).

All of this won’t matter right away. The Sooners are off this week, then should breeze past Kent State on Oct. 4. But then the meat grinder starts to spin. Red River Shootout vs. Texas on Oct. 11, followed by this SEC gauntlet: at South Carolina, home vs. Ole Miss, at Tennessee, at Alabama, then home games against Missouri and LSU.

Mateer should return in time for the back half of that schedule, but the defence will have to hold the fort in the meantime. With Venables pulling the strings, they just might be able to do that.

The ACC is already looking like a two-bid playoff team

Wind back the clock to last season, and the storyline most of the way was that the Atlantic Coast Conference might land only one spot in the first 12-team playoff. Then a three-loss Clemson upset SMU in the conference championship game, and suddenly the ACC had two.

We’re not quite a month into this new season, but it’s sure looking like the conference isn’t going to need that kind of magic to put a pair of squads into this season’s CFP. That’s because both Miami and Florida State, at least to this point, appear to be among CFB’s elite teams.

Hurricane fans who have lamented their favourite team’s inability to play shutdown defence when it counts in recent years should love what they’re seeing so far this season. While Florida’s stop troops keep their team competitive on Saturday — it was 13-7 in the second half — the Canes’ Carson Beck and Co. eventually tacked on a few scores for a comfortable 26-7 final margin.

Florida State, meanwhile, opened plenty of eyes with a season-opening takedown of Alabama. Boston College transfer QB Tommy Castellanos has helped revive the Seminole offence, and there’s a lot to like on the other side of the ball, too. A tricky test awaits on Friday night at Virginia, but this aggregation seems ready to do a complete 180 on the 2-10 disaster that was 2024.

The race for the national title appears wide open

A few weeks back, we asked the question about whether the SEC had one of its usual monsters this season. I think by now it can be suggested that it’s a query that applies to their entire country.

Simply put, there are a number of very good teams out there. But labelling any of them “great” is something that might be difficult to do at this point. There are a couple of huge matchups this Saturday (we’ll get to them) that might point the winners further in that direction. But if you’re looking for that dominant outfit that destroys everything in its wake … not sure we’re going to find one of those.

But that might not exactly be a bad thing. More teams in the conversation for the playoff and the national title means we could be headed for one heck of a tournament down the road. And given that was something that didn’t exactly happen a year ago, it would be something surely worth waiting for this time around.

Looking ahead to Week 5

Remember the heavyweight display we got on the opening weekend of the 2025 season? This Saturday might just bring us something worthy of comparison. It might take awhile to get going, but the buildup to a pair of super showdowns in the evening will be a sight to see.

• No. 21 USC at No. 23 Illinois (12 noon, Fox)

• No. 4 LSU at No. 13 Ole Miss (3:30 p.m., ABC)

• No. 6 Oregon at No. 3 Penn State (7:30 p.m., NBC)

• No. 17 Alabama at No. 5 Georgia (7:30 p.m., ABC)

Some thoughts …

• Very quietly, the Trojans have gotten off to a 4-0 start with one of the nation’s top offences directed by Jayden Maiava. But as always, defence will be a big factor for this team and Michigan State — the best team USC has faced so far — hung 31 points on that unit last weekend. The biggest question surrounding this game, however, is how the homestanding Illini (3-1) will respond to last week’s shellacking at Indiana. The Luke Altmyer-led offence is going to need to generate many more points in this one if it wants to pick up a bounce-back win.

• One of the SEC’s oldest rivalries resumes this Saturday, and that should have The Grove hopping in Oxford. LSU (4-0) got a lot of early season love for its comeback win over Clemson, but the orange Tigers’ backslide since then has devalued that victory in a major way. Their biggest win since then was a 20-10 home triumph over Florida and while that might not seem like much, the Gators can play defence in a big way. It’s the improvement of LSU’s stop troops that have elevated opinions about this team, but they’ll be tested by the Rebels (4-0) this week. In the wake of an injury to starting QB Austin Simmons, the Ole Miss offence has found some new juice behind Ferris State transfer Trinidad Chambliss over the last two weeks. But the Tigers’ defence should provide a step up in class. This should be a fun one.

• It’s a whiteout Saturday night in Happy Valley, with the high flying Ducks (4-0) rolling into Beaver Stadium to take on a Penn State (3-0) team that has yet to face a real test (or opponent) this season. So this figures to be a bit of a prove it moment for both sides who are frontrunners in the Big Ten race with national title aspirations to boot. Oregon’s offence doesn’t appear to have a lost a beat under the direction of new QB Dante Moore, who’s already totalled 11 TD passes and nearly 1,000 yards. This is supposed to be THE year for the Nittany Lions, with offensive stars such as QB Drew Allar and RBs Nick Singleton and Kaytron Allen, among others, bypassing the NFL Draft to chase a national title. These are the kinds of tests they’ll need to pass if they’re going to have a real shot at that lofty goal.

• A year ago, the Crimson Tide and Bulldogs clashed in epic fashion in Tuscaloosa, in which Alabama raced out to a 28-0 lead in the first half, saw Georgia roar back to take the lead in the fourth quarter before pulling out a 41-34 win. At the time, it was considered to be a showdown of two top playoff contenders, but the Tide stumbled its way completely out of the picture by season’s end, while Georgia was bounced in the quarterfinals. This time around, we see an Alabama squad that has largely been forgotten after being whipped by Florida State 31-17 (a loss that doesn’t seem nearly as bad now). Georgia, meanwhile, hasn’t played since pulling out a 44-41 win at Tennessee two weeks ago in an early season game of the year candidate (that Bulldogs coach Kirby Smart admitted his team was fortunate to win). Not entirely sure what we’re going to get here — lots of points are likely on the table — but given the game above, I’d highly suggest setting yourself up for some double screen time.

• Other games of note: No. 1 Ohio State at Washington (3:30 p.m., CBS); Auburn at No. 9 Texas A&M (3:30 p.m., TSN+); No. 15 Tennessee at Mississippi State (4:15 p.m., TSN+).

The Playoff Four (plus eight more)

At last, some guesses at ranking teams CFP style. A quick summary of what we do here. This is our effort at picking a 12-team field every week, if the season happened to end on that date. There are a couple of tweaks to this year’s format. Firstly, the top five conference champions all get automatic bids into the field. However, unlike a year ago, a conference title doesn’t guarantee a top four seed and first-round bye. Those seedings will be determined simply by the CFP committee’s rankings (and that’s how we’ll do our rankings here). So yes, two teams from one conference could land byes. Got all that?

On that note, here’s our first crack at this. There are no fancy metrics or anything like that here. Largely, we’ll do this via the eye test, but head-to-head results will get the heavy weight that they deserve.

First Four: Ohio State, Miami, Oregon, Florida State.

Next Eight: Penn State, LSU, Georgia, Oklahoma, Texas Tech, Indiana, Texas A&M, Iowa State, Memphis (G6).

First four out: Texas, Georgia Tech, Ole Miss, Tennessee.

Some explanation …

• Even though there hasn’t been a ton to see since the season-opening conquest of Texas, this Buckeye team does give off the aura of being the nation’s best at this point in time. Saturday’s visit to an always raucous Husky Stadium in Seattle should be an interesting test. While Jeremiah Smith and Co. are getting it done through the air in a big way, we’re especially liking the way the Ohio State defence (which lost many starters) has performed under the direction of new co-ordinator Matt Patricia.

• For now, we’re rounding out the top four with Miami, whose improved defence has this version of the Hurricanes looking more like one of the top national title threats (also kudos to Georgia transfer QB Carson Beck); Oregon, which still looks as speedy and feisty as ever under coach Dan Lanning; and Florida State, which showed very quickly against Alabama that this is far, far from the team that went 2-10 a year ago. Miami’s visit to Tallahassee on the night of Oct. 4 is already a mouth-watering matchup … Penn State will move into this group if it handles Oregon this week. Again, we’re waiting to see the Nittany Lions face someone with a pulse. It happens Saturday night.

• Among the next eight, the breakout teams here are Oklahoma and Texas Tech. The Sooners field one of the nation’s best defences and transfer QB John Mateer had injected some real life into the Oklahoma offence. Now we’ll see what happens without him for a month. Last week, we alluded to the spending binge in Lubbock that has elevated the Red Raiders into the role of Big 12 favourite. A transfer-laden front four manhandled Utah a week ago, with the offence pulling away in the fourth quarter for a 34-10 triumph. These guys are the real deal.

• A few other thoughts about what we’ve done … Texas A&M got its landmark win at Notre Dame two weeks ago, and now the Aggies should get a bit of a test at home against Auburn … Iowa State is off to a great 4-0 start and the Cyclones should be in the hunt to play for the Big 12 title … Right now, we’re giving Memphis the edge for the Group of Six berth that exists in this field, especially in the wake of their big comeback win over Arkansas. It’s already very apparent that the G6 playoff berth is coming from The American, which also counts teams such as Tulane, South Florida and Navy among its membership.