Andy & Ari On3 - Survival Saturday | Utah walks off USC | Ohio State suffocates Penn State | Alabama comes back to beat Tennessee

Episode Date: October 22, 2023

Subscribe to On3! ⬇️ youtube.com/on3sports/Welcome to On3 | The best of college football and recruiting https://www.on3.com/Listen to Andy Staples On3 on podcast! Spotify 🎧 : https://open.spotify.com/show/5AhQ4d2m5TQu5Q2vkwtxjt?si=uLK1rMW7QOmLHcZK9URbOwApple🍎: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/andy-staples-on3/id1695325427Follow Andy Staples on Twitter: https://twitter.com/Andy_StaplesFollow Andy Staples on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/andy_staplesFollow us on Twitter https://twitter.com/on3sportsFollow us on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/on3/?hl=en Like/Follow us on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/On3Sports/ Shop On3 https://shop.outsider.com/Andy Staples and Jesse Simonton discuss Utah's walk-off win against USC on Saturday night and what it means for Lincoln Riley's program.Virginia shocked North Carolina...Duke tested Florida State but fell short....Alabama stormed back in the second half to beat Tennessee...Officials said a fair catch signal negated an Iowa punt return touchdown, and the Hawkeyes lost to Minnesota...Texas survived a rare visit to Houston...Oklahoma survived UCF...And of course, Ohio State beat Penn State by suffocating the Nittany Lions' offense.

Hey, it's Andy, and did you think I'd really not stay up for a game involving a top 10 team where it was on the ropes at home against an opponent that we never thought would have a chance? Of course I stayed up. Washington pulled it out 15-7 against Arizona State in one of the uglier games you will ever see. Michael Pinnock Jr. did not have his best night. Cam Scadaboo for Arizona State continued to amaze. But the Sun Devils fell short. Once again, somebody going for it on fourth and three at Husky Stadium had a bad outcome. In this case, that pick six that gave Washington the win came a couple plays after. Offic officials picked up a flag for defensive holding that was clearly defensive holding because you watched the Washington DB grab the Arizona State receivers jersey in multiple places on multiple occasions. But they picked up the flag and the Sun Devils will just have to wonder what might have been.

The Huskies won ugly. That's what you got to do. Win your stinkers. You're going to hear me and Jesse Simonton talk about winning your stinkers. Win your clunkers, as our friends at the Solid Verbal say. But that is kind of a theme for Saturday. So, a little Pac- 12 after dark cherry on top. Now let's get to me and Jesse talking about the rest of Saturday.

Welcome to Andy staples on three. Happy Saturday. Happy walk off. Happy whatever. Happy walk-off. Happy whatever. This has been an unbelievable day, Jesse Simonton. We have just watched Utah walk off USC 34-32. We started with Ohio State beating Penn State. The game wasn't that great to watch, but man, the stakes were high.

We had Oklahoma surviving UCF. We had Texas surviving Houston. We had Alabama storming back to beat Tennessee. We had the crazy ending in Iowa, Minnesota. We had North Carolina getting stunned by Virginia. We had Duke challenging Florida State. We're currently watching Clemson and Miami in overtime, and they might be headed to double overtime.

And then you got this in LA. Utah walks off USC. I mean, this was, for the most better part of the day, it was kind of the survival Saturday saturday uh for a lot of these teams that you just rattled off i thought the ending there was just bizarre for the trojans you know you rally back you have the big comeback you you kick the field goal when you're down eight but it doesn't matter because you get the touchdown with caleb williams running it in but then the ejection of Bear Alexander.

I mean, today was a really bad day for officials. You were at a game where officiating was questioned by both parties, the Alabama fans in the first half, the Tennessee fans were all of whom I mentioned in the second half, but that call on Bear Alexander, I mean, that turned the game, and that gave the youth fresh life. Bryson Barnes makes the play with his legs. He was always going to get called for roughing the passer. The targeting call was the thing they tacked on at the end. Correct.

They were always going to give him 15 yards for roughing the passer. Right. But to eject him was a huge difference. I mean, it's arguably USC's best defensive lineman. Best defensive player. Yeah. We got to in the chat, Jeff,

Andy, I'm from Western New York and no allegiance to USC, but there's no excuse for not finishing this game. Shame on Lincoln Riley for not fixing the D after last year. Agreed. Agreed. Like you're playing against not cam rising, not a healthy camera. As you're playing, it Cam Rising, not a healthy Cam Rising.

You're playing against Bryson Barnes and Utah's offense, which has not been that effective this year. But they just move the ball down the field and set up a field goal. And it is bizarre to me. So USC has now lost two in a row. And you got to watch a little bit of Caleb Williams' magic, but again, the defense let them down. They're going to lose to Utah and Washington, right?

Oh, I tweeted out, I think they're going to lose five games. To our reader's point there, Andy, they let Lincoln Riley, and Lincoln Riley is the head coach, but Alex Grinch, I mean, I think what's going to be put on his tombstone when Lincoln Riley finally has to move on from him is that play when Viaki, the Ute safety, who's playing both ways, had 150 yards receiving, 70 yards rushing. route and then just turns and spins and just walks in for a touchdown. And it's yet another example where USC's defense cannot tackle and has just no awareness in the secondary. I mean, it was a pathetic, pathetic attempt. And that just, I think, kind of punctuates what's been this program's problem the last two years. Caleb Williams, again, wasn't fantastic tonight. He was good enough, but he was not Superman.

And for this team to win, he has to be Superman. And so, like you said, with Oregon and Washington and UCLA still on the schedule, I think this team could easily lose five games. Yeah, Brother Ben in the chat, Caleb Williams is the only reason that USC isn't 2-10. And that's yeah, that's true. Tony, that Georgia transfer Bear hurt USC. No, he didn't.

He was keeping him in the game. He made a couple mistakes, but Bear Alexander's been the best part of this defense, and he'll be out the first half next week. This is a bad, bad defense. What's so weird, too, Andy, is that Lincoln keeps – he did it this week. He did it two weeks ago.

He keeps saying – he keeps kind of getting chesty with reporters during his midweek media scrums, and this week he kept commenting about how we're close you guys don't see what's behind the scenes but we're close and yet it looks it's the same story every saturday we see what's on the field you're far away like that's there there is no spinning this there is no way to There is no way to change what we're talking about here. That defense is a liability, and you're wasting the last year in college for Caleb Williams.

You've already wasted it. Because with a guy as good as Caleb Williams and a place like USC where you can recruit some of the best players in the country, you should be in the playoff. You should be winning the Pac-12, and you should be in the playoff, and you are not going to the playoff again. And that's all there is to it. I have that bet with Ari Wasserman.

When Lincoln Riley took the USC job, I bet him $1,000 that USC would not make the playoff in Lincoln Riley's first three years on the job. I'm one year away from winning now because they're not going to make it this year. And guess what? Unless the defense is a hell of a lot now because they're not going to make it this year. And guess what? Unless the defense is a hell of a lot better, not going to make it next year either. And oh, by the way, they don't have Caleb Williams. Now I trust Lincoln Riley to get a quarterback, but they don't have this one next year. Well, yeah. And you're putting good faith

though, that he's going to get somebody you know on caleb williams requisite scale because again they just allowed a utah offense andy that ranked in the 100s in almost every category this year had just been getting by with duct tape and you know glue had almost 500 yards tonight and i mean and caleb williams is not coming back next season. You let Bryson Barnes, the walk on quarterback run to set up the field goal that beat you. He just ran through your defense to set up the field goal to beat you. Just, just it's,

it's unbelievable. And, and you know what, you know what? Another complaint that USC fans have had with this offense, because as mesmerizing as Caleb Williams has been at times, everything has been off platform. It's been off script.

We talked about it in this very show last week. The offensive line continues to disappoint. But Lincoln Riley continues to not lean on the run game. Marshawn Lloyd had 87 yards on seven carries. He only got seven carries the whole game and they just keep chucking the ball, chucking the ball, chucking the ball.

And it's just, it's not coming with the, with the results requisite to Caleb Williams, his talent and requisite to what this team needs. Tony in the chat Barnes is Matt Saracen. You're you're Friday night, like TV show reference, right?

I'll take it. It's a good one. Grinch is the problem in the chat. Lincoln rally is not one with Alice Grinch on his staff. Also true that, yeah, you're going to have to do something at some point. And I don't know when now Lincoln has made a midseason coordinator change before he did it with Mike Stoops.

Remember how bad Oklahoma's defense was with Mike Stoops in Lincoln Rally's first and second years. And after the Texas game in year two, he fired him. So, you know, perhaps that happens with Grinch. You know, they shared an agent. I realize that they like each other, but you're not doing Alex Grinch any favors either because the longer this goes, the worse Alex Grinch looks too. But you know what hasn't changed, Andy? He fired Mark Stoops, the Stoops brother, in the third season,

midway through the third season. Whether he gets rid of Grinch now or later, it hasn't changed how they fundamentally practice. It hasn't changed how he fundamentally approaches defense as a function of the entire program, not just something that he just says, all right, I'm going to hand that off to somebody else while I'm,

you know, calling the plays. So I, you know, I'm not sure it's going to be like, you know, fire Grinch, new coach, add water. Suddenly you get better results. Yeah. I think you're right about that. I think they are going to practice the way they practice.

They're going to play. He's, he's established that unless he comes out and says, I'm, I'm going to do a 360 degree evaluation by program. I'm going to talk to coaches, head coaches who play good defense, ask them how they practice, ask them how they train in the off season. That's all you can do. By the way, Miami scored the touchdown and got the two point conversion in overtime number two. So Clemson, uh, you are on the ropes here. Yeah, this is golly, Jesse. This is what a night. Let's go to the shocking, shocking result from the night.

Virginia 31, North Carolina 27. Virginia's one in five coming into this game. North Carolina was six and oh. We were talking about an undefeated North Carolina colliding with an undefeated Florida State potentially. But's the thing if you can lose to Virginia you can lose to anybody left on your schedule every single team the Cavaliers came into this game Andy averaging or they were last in the ACC and rushing 122nd nationally and they had almost almost 240 yards against this Tar Heels defense that turned into a pumpkin. They had been much better in this second season under Gene Chizik.

They'd played really well a week ago against Miami, but this was a really dispiriting loss. This is something that I think has been, it's snake bit Mack Brown's programs in recent years where they continue to lose to lesser teams they did it to Georgia Tech a year ago this loss is even worse Tony Elliott for all that he's done for that program off the field on the field the results have been more worse than anemic they've lost eight straight games against FBS opponents. And to go to Chapel Hill and win, Drake may throw in a late interception. He has not been what I think folks expected him to be this season. He's had his moments, but he hasn't been otherworldly each week. And that cost the Tar Heels in a game they absolutely should not have lost.

Yeah. I'm happy for Tony Elliott because it's been a rough season for them and happy for the Cavaliers. Obviously they've been through something that nobody else has, has been through based on what happened at the end of last year, because they had a former player murder their teammates like there's nothing that prepares you for that there's no manual for tony elliott to try to figure out how to coach through that and deal with it and so to have this win is what a catharsis

for them and and i'm so happy for them but for north carolina i mean this is this is the what the doubters have always said about north carolina that you're not you're just not going to be consistent enough to win at a really high level and that's been north carolina's problem forever that was north carolina even when mac was was really had a role rolling the first time at North Carolina, they would always trip up. They could not sustain it. And you have to win games like this if you're going to sustain it. You have to. If you have aspirations of something bigger than the ACC, you have to be able to win games like this.

You know what? To spin this to a game you were at, Andy, not necessarily apples to apples here, but this is what has always made Nick Saban's team so impressive. This is what has made what Kirby smarts done the last couple of years. So impressive. They don't lay eggs. They may not have their best game on Saturday, but they don't lose stinkers.

They win their stinkers. And you know, these other programs don't do that. Clemson's not doing that now. Other teams in the top, you know, 10, top 15 are not doing that. And so let's go to Tuscaloosa. You were there. That was the tale of two halves, man. Yeah.

I mean, it was crazy because at halftime we were talking about, is this it? Are they really, I mean, it was crazy because at halftime we were talking about, is this it? Are they really, you know, have they fallen off that much that Tennessee can come in here and just dominate? Because remember how the first half ended. You had the Jalen Milrow, you know, Alabama's going in. The ball bounces off Jermaine Burton and bounces into a DB's hands for an interception in the end zone and so that changes

momentum and then Tennessee takes the ball down the field and scores right at the end of the half and so they're winning 20 to 7 you're like they've got it they are dominating this game they are in control and Alabama comes out takes the the kickoff of the second half, scores in two plays. You have that weird fair catch thing where the other return man had his arms out. Nobody was waving their hand over their head, but he had his arms out like the getaway signal,

which would come into play in another game. But so a kick return gets nullified. They get pinned on the four yard line. And yeah, that was from there on Alabama just completely dominated the game. They had a strip sack TD at the end. I mean, it was unbelievable how different Alabama looked, how much better Jalen Milrow looked in the second half, how much better Alabama's defense looked in the second half. And it was stunning. I mean, how quiet was Bryant Denny? It just, from the TV copy, it just seemed like those fans were stunned,

you know, after that Tennessee drive to end the first half. And I tweeted it late in the third quarter, excuse me, but just I want to know what, Saban – somebody release the tapes. What did Nick Saban say inside that locker room at halftime? Because this is, again, we talked about it pre-show. Alabama is not an overly talented – they are overly talented, but they are not an overly impressive team this season. But they are mentally tough.

They are resilient. And they came out and Tennessee turtled and the tide just kept swinging. And, you know, they made plays, like you said, Milrow, he two plays came out punching. Jace McClellan was some nice runs there in the second half and that tide defense just turned it on. Yeah. So what Nick Saban said at halftime was you have a choice of how you want to respond to this. You can choose to turtle or you can choose to fight back. And they chose to fight back. And Saban said after the game that this team is taking years off his life, but he's having a ton of fun coaching it.

And like after the game, he went out, he runs from where he does the halftime interview with Jenny Dell, runs over to the fans in the far corner and salutes them and sprints back across the field. And they're just giving him a huge ovation. And by the way, the crowd was very quiet at the end of the first half, kind of stunned, super loud at the end of the game. Like even when Alabama was up 14 remember Tennessee had the ball on the nine yard line and you know they could have scored a touchdown would have had an onside kick there so the cigar smoke is already wafting through the stadium at that

point like the air is blue with cigar smoke but they are they are so loud it sounded as loud as any venue in the sec gets and they were they were they were pretty fantastic but the the way alabama responded the way those players responded this is a likable alabama team you know and it's not it's interesting because alabama fans expect more dominance than this this is one of those teams that if it wasn't Alabama, this would be some fan's favorite team. Like 20 years from now, they'll be like, this was my favorite team, my favorite group of Alabama players.

And I think they're limited in what they can do. Like, I don't think they can win a national title. Maybe I'm wrong. They're still in position to play for one if they keep winning. But I don't think they're that kind of team. But I do think they're a very enjoyable team probably to coach because of the personalities and how tight they are and to play with. You know what's funny you say that is that if you crossed off the Alabama logo, crossed out the Alabama name,

there haven't been as dramatic, but this Alabama team has some of the similarities to last year's feel-good TCU squad, which just kept having really nice games in the second half. They would find ways to win. Sonny Dyches was always smiling postgame. To your point tonight, I don't know if you saw it because you were probably heading down to the locker room, but Bell has the interview with Nick Saban, handsome, the cigar. You know, he famously doesn't smoke cigars, but he says, I'll chew it. He dig, it takes a big old smirk to the camera,

sticks a cigar in his mouth and does the run that you're talking about. Heads heads over to the, to the, to the stand. So it'll be interesting. LSU continues to take care of business. Now these two teams enter a bye week, so they're going to have the idle date next week, and then we're going to get that monster matchup, which is going to be for the SEC West, the tiebreaker there, I think. What was kind of the post-game reaction, whether it was with the folks,

the other reporters there, or maybe just, I don't know if you saw Heifels, you know, where he was asked about the officiating. So that was, that was Austin Price from all quest. Yeah. That was my old buddy, my old, my, our, our colleague here at on three, my old tag teammate there. Here, here's that moment. Here's the moment. It seemed like it points in the second half, your defenders were having to play two hand touch and they were allowed to play more

combat out there a little bit i mean did you feel like that it was a bit one-sided next question yeah was that long enough silence that's a pregnant pause baby uh that that pause is pregnant with octuplets so yeah josh heupel doing his best i'm not going to get fined here but yeah like okay i'm not normally a conspiracy theorist i don't think the officials are out to screw tennessee i don't think they're out to help alabama but look jc latham had one of the alabama edge rushers in a choke hold basically yeah when they threw that touchdown pass at the beginning of the second half. You got to call stuff like that. There was a defensive holding call where Tennessee would have been able to get off the field that was a little iffy.

The one in the Penn State-Ohio State game was a great call. You have to call that. This one was a super iffy one. But that doesn't excuse how Tennessee went into its shell in the second half you gotta be better than that I I I I yeah I I agree I mean the officiating absolutely played a role in this game but the way Tennessee Turtle the way Heifel called some of those plays I mean that fourth down you know when they went for it on fourth and one around midfield, and they call a shotgun run, even though Joe Milton is 6'5", 250, and everyone is watching the tush-push work every time for the Eagles,

and you don't even – I mean, it was just – to excuse some of their own self-inflicted mistakes or just how the offense, I mean, Joe Milton was terrible in the second half. He looked like Joe Milton in the Orange Bowl in the first half. They did leave some points on the board on a couple of failed red zone trips where they had to kick field goals. But, I mean, he was really poor, really inaccurate in the second half.

They didn't really open up the run game, the quarterback run game at all until it was way too late. Disappointing. You had an opportunity to win at Tuscaloosa for the first time in 20 years and you let it get away. I didn't think the officiating was that good in a bunch of games today. It was bad. Houston got hosed.

It was bad in some of these other big games. There was a questionable call at the end of Iowa, Minnesota. We can talk about Iowa, Minnesota. The Clemson-Miami game has gone final too, so we'll talk about that. But first let's talk about Iowa, Minnesota, because the game I covered had a similar moment with the kickoff fair catch call that Tennessee got called on. It was very strange.

There were two return men, not the return guy who caught the ball, but the other one, he didn't put his hand over his head and wave it. He put his two, his both arms out, which if you watch other Tennessee kickoffs, that is how they do it. If they're not going to touch it, if it's going to go back through the end zone, like they'll both put their arms out. And as we learned in the Minnesota Iowa game, apparently the don't touch it signal that arms out or crossing your arms in front of you is considered a fair catch signal and the ball's dead where it's recovered. And this was a punt. Cooper Dejean is returning a punt.

The score is 12-10 Minnesota. Dejean takes it back. Yeah, Dejean takes it back. But they say because he made that motion, it's dead where he caught the ball. And that's the end of it. Now, lost in the complaining about the officiating and the complaints about that call, Jesse, how many yards did Iowa gain in the second half?

I believe they gained one. No. Two. Ha-ha. Two yards. Two yards. The count. Two.

I mean, you can't make – it is a horror show every Saturday with this deal. It is fright night each week. Rattling off the stats in this game, I almost feel like it doesn't even do it justice when you say Deacon Hill was 10 of 28 for 116 yards. The back-breaking interception to end the game, and he averaged a whopping 4.1 yards per attempt. But he would have won your square, our sponsor prize picks, he would have won his square more than 99.5 yards. It's the first time I'd ever seen a quarterback with with a number lower than 100 in passing yards but that i mean so again you can complain about

you can complain about the officiating but it's almost like you want to ask kirk ferentz have you thought about trying to score points on offense? Wouldn't that be more efficient? Well, I'm not sure efficiency is in any sort of vernacular related to the Hawkeyes offense. They've been relying on this, let's hit one or two home runs in the running game each Saturday. Well, Caleb Johnson had 18 yards rushing. They finished with 11 yards rushing as a team when you account in sacks.

So we got 116 yards passing, 11 yards rushing, and two yards total after halftime. Your old friend Scott Dockterman, who covers Iowa as well as anybody for the Athletic, I don't know how his eyes just don't bleed right now. He's been watching this same song for years, and it is getting worse. I think losing does the poor Iowa fans a favor. And if they lose a couple more, like,

because, so I was listening to Will Compton on Pardon My Take, and he was just sort of unraveling a dream scenario. But he concocted a scenario where Nebraska represents the big 10 West in the big 10 title game. It's not as far fetched as you think. If Iowa can drop some more of these, if Nebraska would have to beat them,

of course, but would that prompt change is the question. Well, right. If I were to lose a couple more of these, would that be enough to spur change? Because they're playing Northwestern, they're playing Rutgers, playing Illinois, playing Nebraska.

Rutgers, Illinois, and Nebraska can beat them. If they were to lose all those games, at what point do you think Kirk says, I have to make a change or the, the other option for Kirk would be you just retire. And then I, you know, you call Mark Stoops.

I don't, I promote LeVar Woods to be perfectly honest with you, but yeah, you call Mark Stoops. If, if, if you want head coaching experience and he'll take the job. Yeah, he'll come on home.

He'll come on home. He'll get that reset. In the chat, somebody's telling us that Iowa's OC has a stipulation in his contract this year that requires Iowa to finish the season with 25 points per game. If not, he loses his job. What? Shocking news.

No. Homeslice, we've been covering that all season. what shocking news? No, it does not home slice. We've been covering that. We've been covering that all season. Yeah. The drive for three 25 is the real thing. They'll not, they're not going to make it, but it doesn't say he loses his job.

It says his contract terminates. It doesn't mean they can't give him another one. And if they had gone to the head coach, yeah. If they'd gone 11 and one and won the big 10 West, they would have kept, he would have kept his job. They might've changed the terms of his deal, but he had kept his job. Yeah. If they'd gone 11-1 and won the Big Ten West, he would have kept his job. They might have changed the terms of his deal,

but he'd have kept his job. Agreed. Agreed. Hey, you know, you said they could lose to Rutgers. Bowl-eligible Rutgers. Hmm. Hmm. There you go. Greg Sciano getting it done.

That is... Listen, that bears watching down the stretch. Nebraska won today. Nebraska might be bowl eligible too. Matt Rule says he's not going to talk about it. One game season every week. But we've sort of just forgotten about Nebraska after that Michigan game. We should probably remember them.

We should probably talk about them. But right now we have to talk about what happened at the end of the Miami Clemson game. The, they go to over Clemson was winning this thing. Miami comes back, forces overtime. They both kick field goals in OT.

Miami scores, gets the two point on fourth and fourth and goal in that second OT, Cade Klubnick rolls out and gets sacked. Huge win for Miami. Nothing that will happen this year is going to erase the not taking a knee against Georgia Tech, but Mario Cristobal can build back the people's trust one at a time. Clemson has three ACC losses, Jesse. I dubbed this the anxiety bowl earlier this week in a piece, kind of looking at pressing questions. And I said the loser of this game is going to be staring at some real hard,

dicey existential questions. And in lieu of Davos comments with him whining earlier this week about the bandwagon fans and, you know, maybe we should lose a couple more games. That's not going to be hard for the bandwagon fans to find something else to worry about because they're dropping off already. There's not a lot of faith in where this program's headed right now.

It still is probably a perennial top 25, 30-ish team, but they have three losses now. We're not even to Halloween. They've got to play Notre Dame I think next week or in two weeks. There's some more losses I think left on the schedule for Clemson this season. And so this whole Garrett Riley is going to create an offensive renaissance has certainly not happened. I don't know.

That play call at the end there was terrible, allowing Klobnik to basically run a QB read when you had not run the ball the entire game. I think he was supposed to throw that, Jesse. I think there was a throw there. Maybe it was. I only saw the one play. I didn't see a receiver on the back end angle.

Terrible. And Miami was one with a backup quarterback. Yeah. Yeah. Emery Williams. Emery Williams from the Panhandle of Florida. They liked him a lot in recruiting. They felt like they'd found a gem in him. This is going they'd found a gym in him.

This is going to be good. B in the chat asked, will Dabo adjust to the times slash the new age? I think that's the $64,000 question. Is Dabo willing to do this or he's going to pull a Bob Stoops and retire in his mid-50s and just decide he's done? Of all the coaches, most of these guys I feel like are so psychotic about this

and they need it so bad, they wouldn't do that. I could see Dabo doing that. Well, especially since his shine has waned enough to where everyone for years was penciling him as the successor to Saban. And there's no way that's going to happen. And so if he doesn't modernize, if he doesn't accept the transfer portal, if he doesn't accept NIL, and they are playing the NIL game more than I think people think. It's really the transfer portal that's the biggest sticking point. And some of it just overall program philosophies.

If he does not adapt, Clemson's going to continue to recede to the pack. And you're seeing some of these other ACC teams, you know, climb up. And North Carolina's inconsistent, but they continue to kind of develop and recruit players. We'll see how long Mike Elko's at Duke, but I mean, tonight they pushed with a banged up quarterback that could really not do anything, push Florida State for three quarters. Yeah. I mean, it was a time there when I thought,

you know, when they were leading the Seminoles, Andy, where I thought it was like Mike Elko's agent being doing the whole, you know, yesterday's price is not today's price to Texas A&M. Well, and thank goodness A&M didn't play today, or this might be a completely A&M dedicated show. Like I will tell you right now, Jesse, if Texas A&M loses to South Carolina next week, which based on what i saw

south carolina missouri i don't think that's going to happen but if they do we're not talking about anything else on the show in fact we're going to do like three straight days of texas a&m shows because they will be firing jimbo fisher if that happens i mean i wrote a column that got a lot of buzz this week that basically said whether they pull the plug this season, next season, it's over. How much of a difference now, if you're willing to even entertain $77 million, how much of a difference is $67 million or $50 whatever million? It's going to be a record buyout either way. And right now, the way this thing's trending after six years, it's over. Yeah. And speaking of this, and this is not one you want to see given how likable the guy is, but Sam Pittman, Sam

Pittman may be done in Arkansas. We'll, we'll see. I mean, maybe that maybe give him a little more time, but seven to three loss to Mississippi state on Saturday was ugly. What an ugly game that was. Uh, Danny knows needs to respond to a few more emails about the play calling, uh, maybe actually take some suggestions from the people because the ones he's calling pretty ineffective. Can you remember a quarterback as accomplished as someone like KJ Jefferson regressing this much as a senior other guys, if it has maybe happened midway through their career, but to stick around for four years and to go backwards like this is just, yeah,

it'd be like, it's sad. It's sad. It'd be like the, remember the Phil Dracovic, his first year at Boston college to now, except if it happened overnight, basically.

Right. And I mean, it's, it's crazy, but that, that job may, may come open. They may be the first to market with a firing for stuff that happened on the

field and, you know, Northwestern or Michigan state or off-field ones. Speaking of Michigan State, 49-0 Michigan. Michigan State has apologized for a Hitler-related trivia question that appeared on the video. Can't believe it. I thought it was an onion. I thought it was an onion i thought it was an onion deal is there any school that is worse at public communication than michigan state

oh i don't know like yeah they said it was from a third party source it's a third party trivia source like it was i guess a question about hitler's home country like why are you asking that of the football game wait did he's taking it to the field so that no one gets fired here uh except for the folks at michigan state did you see what jim harbaugh did at the end of the game? He gave the Spartans a nice little FU touchdown. We remembered what happened in the tunnel last season. Up 42 to nothing, eight seconds left, doesn't call a timeout or kneel. We're going to run this thing in.

Let's add another. Jesse, I think we're in for about six more weeks of Michigan against the world. Yeah. We're going to see middle fingers just nonstop from the Wolverines. It's going to be their people against everybody else. Because once this sign stealing accusation thing started, they feel like they are just being hounded, oppressed, you name it. And the NCAA does seem like they are going to try to get Jim Harbaugh on something.

And none of this is going to change anything about this season. This team is the best team Jim Harbaugh has had. And it might be the best team in the country. They're ragdolling teams. I mean, they're just body bagging teams every single week. And I guess, you know, we haven't talked about the biggest game of the day really today. Well, now's a good time to talk about it.

Yeah, if we want to spend it. I mean, I certainly think based off watching those two teams play and everything we've seen from the Wolverines, Michigan should feel very good about their chances of winning the Big Ten for the third year in a row based on what I saw at noon today. I have no faith in Penn State to beat them. Penn State's not going to be able to score on them unless something drastic changes.

But Penn State does not have dynamic receivers. They can't get open. Drew Aller wasn't very good, but it's awfully hard to throw to people who aren't open. So that the Penn state is the word I would use for him. He was skittish. Yeah. The Penn state defense is fine. Like it's a really good defense, but it is, it is hamstrung by an offense that, that has no chance. And the difference in that game, in the Ohio State-Penn State game, was Marvin Harrison Jr. I will correct.

We do our trio or our top 10 Heisman lists every Sunday. I will correct and put him in my top three. He deserves it, and I'm sorry. I'm just going to say I'm sorry I didn't already have him in there. But Ohio State had him, and Penn state didn't have anybody dynamic. And, and remember, Ohio state didn't have a Mecca Buka didn't have Trey Henderson, the version of Ohio state.

That's going to play Michigan probably will be better than this version that played Penn state offensively. Cause basically in the past game, it was Marvin and Cade Stover. And that was it. Yeah, I wrote a column after this game, basically distilling it down to that, exactly. That one team had 18 and the other team didn't.

And it was annoying that Gus Johnson kept calling him Maserati Harrison. But the truth is, is that he gives Ohio State a gear that Penn State just didn't have. He had a career-high 11 catches today, 160-something yards, and he was involved in arguably the biggest non-call of the game. As you alluded to earlier. The biggest play of the game was Kalen King holding Marvin Harrison. It was a good call. It was not a BS call. And it wiped a scoop and score off the board.

Because I think if Penn State gets that scoop and score, they might win the game. Perhaps, yeah. I mean, you know, James Franklin kind of continues to turtle and coach extremely conservatively in these big games. He's now 3-16, Andy, against top 10 teams, 1-9 against Ohio State. Penn State, as much as we have kind of harped on USC being unserious defensively, Penn State is unserious offensively. You know, everyone wondered, were they playing possum?

Were they holding stuff back? They're 120-something in explosiveness coming into this game. No, they can't create separation downfield. They can't pass protect long enough. They don't trust Drew Allard to kind of make explosive plays. They're going to go 10-2, and their fans are going to be disappointed again because this was a season build where they could finally bust through that glass ceiling.

Let's burn through some other games. Texas, we know why they don't like playing at Houston. We know about Bleachergate. Years ago, remember, they were going to put temporary seats in at Houston, so they sold tickets against having the temporary seats. They didn't pass inspection. And all of a sudden, 4,500 Texas fans didn't have tickets. So they swore they'd never go back. Of course, the Big 12 adds Houston in Texas' last year in the Big 12

and forces Texas to go there. Texas goes up 21-0. And then the Cougs storm back, and Texas struggled through the end of this one. Yeah, Quinn, yours was fantastic in the first quarter, getting eyes on that early. He threw a dime to Xavier Worthy, another great pass. I may be confusing. One to A.D. Mitchell, one to Worthy.

But two touchdowns early. Texas could not run the ball against one of the worst run defenses in the country until late. And then C.J. Baxter and Brooks finally got going. Malik Murphy having to play. I got to say, my funniest takeaway from this game, Andy, is all the preseason scuttle and narratives and scaremongering from fans that, you know, we're going to get screwed. Big 12 is going to screw us with officiating

because they don't want us to win. Brett Yarmark told Joey McGuire at Texas Tech, you got to beat them. And then what happens? Houston gets hosed with a terrible non-call that should have given them a first and goal. Instead, it's fourth and inches. Dana dials up for some reason a damn rollout play, and it was a poor pass,

and that was, you know, blouses there for their upset bid. So they survived. It makes them feel like everybody else in the Big 12 to have a story where they feel like they got screwed by the officials against Texas. There you go. There you go. Oklahoma survived too. They slept a lot coming out of... It certainly

seemed like they had read their press clippings for two weeks and spent a lot of time getting tattoos and t-shirts instead of maybe focusing on their next opponent. Yeah, and UCF, they're going to win that first Big 12 win eventually. Eventually. But they can't seem to break through.

They played very well. You know, they had a two-point conversion to tie the game and just couldn't make it. Trick play. John Rice Plumlee looked good. Yeah, they're a little cute for that. A little cute. But, man, this is what a what a Saturday oh we do need to talk

about Duke Florida State this is one that that I I thought for a second would be the one we'd lead with because Duke was playing great when Riley Leonard was in there unfortunately and and you worried with him going back in that soon after the high ankle sprain, whether there was something was going to happen. And there was a play where about five guys converged on him. Now he got his helmet ripped off. They called a face mask on it, but it was more what happened. His legs got tangled up with everybody.

And that was in the end for him. And that was the end for Duke. That was, I want to make one, I guess I want to have a big picturepicture comment about Riley Leonard and another quarterback after we wrap up on this game because I want to ask you a question. But in terms of this game, I was really impressed with Duke

on the line of scrimmage for a couple quarters, but then their depth just wilted. Florida State proved just the deeper, more talented team. Jordan Travis was not very good, but he found some running room with his legs. He was able to hit on a couple of explosive plays to Keon Coleman and Florida State's defense just once Leonard went out there. They really bottled up Duke's rushing game,

which was good, again, early, but just kind of wilted late. Jesse, do you want to just stay up through the second half of Arizona State-Washington? Because Arizona State's beating Washington 7-3 at halftime. Are you serious? I got to do this AP. I'll be up. I'll be up.

I got to do the AP. We may have to come back. We may have to come back. At any rate, if there's a shocking upset in that game, I will at least come back and record a new start to the podcast version of this show that you can hear on every podcast platform tomorrow. But what a Saturday. Yeah, go for it.

Let me ask you this one thing. So we've spent some time talking to folks, and it's been kind of a popular subject about should we have these injury reports? Should college mandate it because there's so much gambling now and all this? It was very interesting today that for two top 25 teams, both in the primetime game and then at the noon slate, that there was two quarterbacks that everyone said was not playing. Pete Pham was all on game day before, you know, early this morning saying,

Riley Leonard's doubtful. I don't, you know, not expected to play. Riley Leonard comes out and starts, kind of stuns everybody. Air Force, all week, Troy Calhoun says, oh, our starting quarterback's out. Not only is he out, people thought he might be out not just for Saturday, but maybe for multiple weeks. Right. He then starts the game.

Zach Lerner threw a 94-yard touchdown pass, which it's Air Force. They don't do that. Completely change it. The betting line goes haywire right when that announcement is made. I'm just curious what your thought about if you think that we need to go to the NFL-mandated injury reports. They've got to figure out how to standardize it across the conferences. And so, as you know, the NCAA can never do anything easily.

The ACC actually used to have a standardized injury report, and coaches took it very unseriously. They did not do much with it and no there was no real penalty for not handling it correctly and like the air force thing troy calhoun are we really surprised there was a point a few years ago where the man spent months refusing to admit whether he had hired a defensive coordinator or not. Spoiler alert, he had. Oh, crazy. It just added to the wackiness of today. It was just a crazy, crazy Saturday.

Might not be done with the craziness yet. We will find out after the halftime of Arizona State and Washington. If you were listening in podcast form, if you did not hear anything about the Arizona State-Washington game at the beginning of the show, it's because Washington came back and won. Otherwise, you did, and please let me know how that went because I can't wait to see it. Jesse, this has been a lot of fun. We'll do it again next weekend.

But college football, I say it every week, college football always delivers.