No sport is more prone to overreaction than college football, given the scant sample size we have to work with. Given that we’ve now seen at least 8 percent of every team’s regular season, it’s time to leap to conclusions!!
AND NOW, WE OVERREACT TO COLLEGE FOOTBALL’S WEEK 1
TO THE TAKES MACHINE!
Photo by Tom Pennington/Getty Images
We don’t have as many OVERREACTION-worthy games as we’ve had in recent years, but there’s still room for plenty of overly confident adjustments to the conclusions we all just spent the past nine months agreeing on.
Add yours in the comments below.
Hawaii’s already won twice as a big underdog and will never lose ever again. MAHALO.
by Jason Kirk
While your slacker team has probably played one game, likely either winning comfortably or getting blown out in a choreographed FBS-over-FCS snoozer, Hawaii’s won upsets as a 13-point and 17.5-point underdog. Nick Rolovich’s Rainbow Warriors are fun, rolling out a modern version of the Pacific Ocean’s beloved run-and-shoot offense. Being the country’s only 2-0 team (along with FCS North Carolina A&T) means TOWERING statistical advantages such as this one:
cfbstats.com
That will continue. Hawaii will finish 24-0, with Cole McDonald throwing for 3,000 more yards than any other QB. I promise.
Maryland three-star true freshman receiver Jeshaun Jones is the new Braxton Miller and future Biletnikoff/Davey O’Brien/Doak Walker Award winner.
by Alex Kirshner
He ran for a touchdown!
He caught a touchdown! (And near the end of it, he turned and stared coldly into some Texas DB’s face without doing quite enough to get penalized for taunting. I am swooning.)
He threw for a touchdown!
Jones was the first frosh to do all three in a game since Marcus Mariota in 2012. His final Week 1 stats: 1-for-1 passing for 20 yards and a touchdown (a 598 rating), one run for 28 yards and a touchdown, two catches for 73 yards and a touchdown. And he disrespected the Longhorns in the process. I’m excited to see him clean up national awards in December and step onto the NFL draft stage in three years.
Ole Miss is going to go 12-0 while averaging 45 points per game.
by Bill Connelly
Ole Miss lived up to its end of the bargain in the Saturday game with the most shootout potential. In a 47-27 win over Texas Tech, the Rebels scored four times in their first three possessions, thanks to a kick return score, and they gained 546 yards in just 60 snaps. The only reason they scored a mere 47 is that they didn’t have the ball much — with a couple more possessions’ worth of plays, they’d have threatened 60 points and 650 yards.
But that wasn’t the half of it. Yes, quarterback Jordan Ta’amu threw for 336 yards with a nice combination of a 69 percent completion rate and 178 passer rating. What might be the nation’s best receiving corps looked like what might be the nation’s best receiving corps, but for approximately the first time since Benjarvus Green-Ellis was in uniform, the Rebels also ran the ball like crazy. Scottie Phillips needed just 16 carries to gain 204 yards.
Okay, yeah, sure, it was the Tech defense. But we were told all offseason that it would be decent now! Some nerd even wrote it!
And I mean, the defense wasn’t terrible! Sure, Tech was breaking in a new QB, but the Landsharks gave up just 5.1 yards per play and forced four three-and-outs and three turnovers on downs. When your offense is looking like a top-five unit, that’s more than enough.
It’s obvious that Ole Miss is the best team in the SEC West and is about to rip off a 12-0 run and claim a share of the national title despite a bowl ban. If you disagree, allow me to present this picture of Matt Luke wearing a cowboy hat.
Case closed. 12-0.
FIRE WILLIE TAGGART AFTER ONE GAME.
by @Moragoth
LSU will win the national championship.
by Richard Johnson
Did y’all see what the Tigers did to Miami on the ground last night? A transcendent rushing performance like this means there will be no problem replacing Derrius Guice.
The Matt Canada debacle is long behind the program, there is nothing to see there, and the ship is righted on that side of the ball.
A 30-point lead built with this statistical performance late in the third quarter?
That’s just a style of dominance feeble minds can’t comprehend — ignore the fact that starting every drive at basically midfield makes it hard not to win.
The Tigers are for real, and two quarters of football before Miami woke up and nearly kinda sorta made a game of it are the only things you need to use to evaluate the program.
Actually, Notre Dame will win the national championship.
by Harry Lyles Jr.
Notre Dame came into the season with somewhat of a “quarterback controversy” that was not nearly as blown up as the one going on in Tuscaloosa. Much like Tua Tagovailoa did, Brandon Wimbush pretty much took care of any questions anybody had.
Look at this throw and Moss-y catch by Chris Finke:
Also, imagine one game boosting your clout enough to empower you to do this:
The Irish looked better than Michigan from start to finish. Perhaps that’s not saying a ton since Michigan has failed to finish better than third in the Big Ten East in the Jim Harbaugh era, but it’s not for nothing.
Notre Dame’s schedule includes games against Stanford, at Virginia Tech, against Florida State, and at USC. Those are all very winnable games. Then, they pretty much just need to be better than Alabama for 60 minutes. That’s a tall ask, but crazier things have happened.
How about you? Give us your hottest instant take.
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