Week Three sees conference play commence in both the Pac-12, SEC and Big Ten, and, as per usual, there’s plenty going on in the world of college football. Here are a few stories worth keeping your eye on:
Oregon: the Ducks, who lost last week against Michigan State in East Lansing, have Georgia State on deck this weekend, but their opponent isn’t the big story in Eugene this week. Rather, it’s the status of their quarterback, Vernon Adams, who, according to a circulating report, has sustained a broken thumb.
At the moment, Adams’ status for Saturday’s game is far from settled, and the Ducks should take comfort in the fact that they have a veteran back-up in Jeff Lockie, who is more than capable of stepping in and running that high-powered Ducks offense. I mean, this is Georgia State we’re talking about here. If your back-up can’t get you past them – with all apologies to anyone out there from Ga State – then you’ve got bigger problems.
I believe Adams should, and will, play. If not the entire game, at least long enough to work out what happens when he has to make a certain kind of throw. A broken finger can be calamitous for a quarterback, and Oregon will need to know what they have in Adams, because conference play is around the corner, and the Ducks will need the former Eastern Washington star on song considering the cutthroat nature of the Pac-12 in 2015. He may be forced into game action at some stage down the road, and Oregon need to see what limitations there are.
Notre Dame: Touchdown Jesus and Will Fuller really came to the table against Virginia, giving the Irish a remarkable last-gasp win over a Virginia squad that, to be honest, hung tough with Notre Dame for a lot longer than I expected they would.
The Irish have injury problems galore. It was backup quarterback DeShone Kizer, a redshirt frshman, who threw the game-winning pass to Fuller because, a week after losing starting RB Tarean Folston, the Irish lost star quarterback Malik Zaire for the year, a gruesome ankle injury that I never want to see in slow-motion again. Worse, starting tight end Durham Smythe is also done for the season.
In comes Georgia Tech, who’re figuring to be pretty stout in the ACC this year, and I’m really wondering how far Notre Dame can go this weekend and into the future ion what’s an incredibly tough schedule. Sure, Kizer is going to make some plays for the Irish – we saw tht in Charlottesville – but he’s a redshirt freshman and, as such, is going to make some bad plays, too. With no starting quarterback, running back or tight end, there isn’t much wiggle room for the Irish.
In the space of just two weekends’, the Irish have gone from looking a serious chance at making the playoff bracket to staring down the barrel. If Brian Kelly’s men can somehow survive their schedule and get into the New Year’s Six group, it’ll be one of the more memorable coaching jobs in the sport’s long history. I just don’t see it happening. Taking on Clemson and USC in their current form with a redshirt quarterback? It can’t end well, can it?
I’ll be very interested to see how Notre Dame’s mostly-healthy defense, who weren’t great last week, goes against Georgia Tech’s tricky option offense.
The SEC: the nation’s alleged best and most powerful conference had a shocking run last weekend. Arkansas lost to Toledo at home, Tennessee gave up a 17-point lead and lost in 2OT to Oklahoma, Auburn needed overtime to get over FCS squad Jacksonville State, and even Missouri looked pedestrian against Arkansas State.
For many, particularly in the Pac-12, there was plenty of gleeful talk about the state of a conference whose members love to point out is superior – remember a week ago, Arkansas head coach Brett Bielema commenting on the lack of real opponents on Ohio State’s schedule as compared to what SEC teams battle – to all others. We shouldn’t forget that even champions have bad days.
The beauty of football at this time of the year is that your next game is generally less than seven days’ away, and the SEC get a chance to make huge amends for what even their most ardent supporter must have labelled as a ‘down weekend’ with some big conference clashes, including Alabama and Ole Miss and the highly-touted Georgia Bulldogs taking on a South Carolina squad who lost, embarrassingly, to Kentucky last week. There’ll be some bounce back going on, that’s for sure!
As much as I’m a Pac-12 guy, and have a certain amount of love for the Big Ten, it’s hard to generally go past the SEC as being the nation’s most dominant conference. You only have to look at the teams from that group who’ve won national championships over the last decade or so. Answer: a lot of them.
Week Three will probably be remembered as being the return of the SEC. As if they really ever went anywhere.
Brigham Young: The most unexpected start to the year in college football originates in Provo, UT. It looked like dire straits for the Cougars when star QB Taysom Hill was sidelined for the year with an injury in the first game of the year, but back-up Tanner Mangum has stepped in, throwing not one but two Hail Mary passes to ensure BYU notched a 2-0 start on what continues to be a brutal opening month – maybe the toughest opening month in all of college football.
For a guy who hasn’t played a football game since 2012, Mangum is doing pretty well. Of course, he’s making some mistakes, but when you consider his situation, that isn’t a major surprise. The Cougars head to the Rose Bowl to face UCLA on Saturday, and Mangum, incredibly mobile and in possession of a cannon for an arm, faces the toughest defensive unit he’s yet seen.
The thing is, this Cougar squad is riding quite a wave at the moment, so you wouldn’t be surprised to see Bronco Mendenhall’s men really hang with the Bruins on the road. After what we’ve already seen from BYU this year, absolutely anything is possible.
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