College Football Live - CFB Live- 7/31- Back to Back Buckeyes?

Episode Date: July 31, 2025

Our crew, Zubin Mehenti, Sam Acho, and Tom Luginbill discuss big expectations... will we see back to back championships for Ohio State? Will Notre Dame make another CFP run? Will Carson Beck be Miami's saving grace? Hear from top head coaches in college football and hear the guys' honest reactions...all this and more on College Football Live! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

When you're flying Emirates business class, sipping your favorite cocktail at our onboard lounge, you'll see that your vacation isn't really over until your flight is over. Fly Emirates, fly better. I'm Zubin Mahendi coming up on college football live as we go out of the tunnel. They open the season with each other, but they both have open questions at the effectiveness of their starting quarterbacks. We'll go inside Notre Dame and Miami. Ryan Day, looking to do something. no Ohio State football coach has ever done.

What is it? He sits down with Reese Davis in just a bit. And big time after last season, these guys under big time pressure after last season. All that more on college football live. And we welcome you inside with Sam Mato and Tom Luginville and Zubin Mahentie. We just had our own little two-minute drill there. We are ready to rock. Miami and Notre Dame about a month away.

Mario Cristobal is thinking maybe for the second straight year he's got a one and done future first round draft pick so far so good on the early impressions on Carson Beck his presence physically is it's really really impressive right and but he has a way about him where he connects with people they see his knowledge they see his football they feel his football IQ I'm super excited to continue to keep working and honestly it's it's all gone by so fast. I can't even believe that I've already been here for seven months. So honestly, just try to enjoy every day, take it day by day and be the best leader I can be, best quarterback I can be. Guys, so many questions here with Miami. Sam, let's start with you.

What's the key to sort of make this thing work? If indeed, just like last year, it's add quarterback stir, hope for the best, send him off to the NFL. The key is Carson Beck's health. I think Carson Beck is the perfect quarterback for this Miami team. Why? Not only is he experience, but he has an opportunity to come in as one of the highest tied of quarterbacks last year and bring that experience to a Miami team that is locked, loaded, and ready to go and try and compete for a national championship. We saw Carson Beck at his best be one of the best quarterbacks in college football.

Then we saw a lull in the middle of the season, and then we saw an injury. And so you're going with a quarterback who has a high ceiling, but he has to go through some adversity, and that's what we've seen. we've seen Carson Bet go through adversity, go through a struggle, go through an injury. I've got a chance I've talked to him over the last couple of months, and they're seeing a sense of maturity in Carson Beck. And so you add him, stir the pot with a little bit of the Miami football team,

and I think he'll be ready to go. Sam, I totally agree with you. You can never, ever discount or devalue experience, maturity, proven play snaps. Two years in a row of back-to-back SEC championship games, a 12-0 regular season two years ago. Now you may say, well, how is he supposed to be Cam Ward? He's not Cam Ward.

Two entirely different players in terms of production and style. And I think that's what's going to lead to a reinvigorized run game for Miami. This is one of the best offensive lines at college football. You got a two-headed monster in the backfield. I think this Miami offense might look slightly different until they get the weapons around Carson Beck a little bit more mature, a little bit more comfortable. That's some of the question marks offensively. But if you can run the ball early, this is a quarterback that knows how to anticipate, get the ball out of his hand, and he's extremely accurate. Now, can you get the help on the defensive side, Sam?

I think that's the other thing, too. Limit the inability to get off the field on defense, then get that Miami offense a couple of extra offensive possessions. That's only going to enhance Carson Beck's production. And to your point on the defense, that's how Miami struggled last season. And we saw when they played Syracuse, it was a high scoring game. What happened? Miami could not get a stop on defense, and Syracuse did. That's how Miami was able not to make the ACC championship

and not to make the college football playoff. And so, yes, even if Carson Beck has success, the defense must get significantly better to match the offense's production. Yeah, they still are looking for that long, elusive first ACC title after 20 years of essentially being in the league and yet to make that first college football playoff appearance all on the table. They're going to open up with Notre Dame, week one. And the bottom line is, if you are, Marcus Freeman, you know one thing and one thing for certain. He's only got one thing on his mind.

Consistency is the number one criteria for any position because I'm a firm believer in consistency builds trust. And coaches are going to play players they trust. At the end of the day, no matter how athletic you are or how highly recruited you are, if the coach doesn't trust you, we can't put you out there consistently. And so that's the number one key to being on the playing field is being consistent every single day, every play in terms of what you're asked to do. You know, speaking of consistent, I mean, they've had guys that have consistently hit a million reps, whether it's Riley, Leonard or Sam Hartman, and now Tom, they step into a situation where whoever starts is going to be green and wet behind the east. years, that is a concern. Is it your biggest concern? Well, I think some of those comments by Marcus Freeman, and yes, it is my biggest concern, are pointed directly at the quarterback

position. And he's focusing on decision making. This is the first time since 22 that there's been a true quarterback battle in South Bend. So you've got CJ Carr, you've got Kenny Minchie, both of them have limited experience, but here's the good news. You have the best offensive line in all of college football. You have not a two-headed, but a three-headed monster at the running back position. What the quarterback position for Notre Dame has got to do this year is they have got to create more explosive plays. They ranked 101st in the country in plays of 20 yards or more, and they were 114th in the country

of explosive plays total. So in order for this offense to advance, and, you know, they bring in Malachi Fields from Virginia, who I think was a huge Transraportal Edition. One of these two quarterbacks has got to find a way. way to create more explosives with the offense to complement the run game. But inexperience is going to lead to probably some potholes in the road. And we're going to see that across college football with multiple marquee programs. Also on that graphic you just saw, a year ago, plus 18 in turnover margin for Notre Dame,

that is an extremely high number and also one that's difficult to duplicate. Let's just say they're half that and they're at plus eight and they add some more explosive plays offensively. I think Notre Dame's got a shot to be really, really good. I think Notre Dame has a shot to be really, really good, regardless of who the quarterback is early. We talked about some of the lack of explosive plays on offense, but the explosiveness happened on defense.

Notre Dame was one of the best teams when it comes to interception return yards or interception return touchdown, special teams touchdown. So even with non-explosive offense, their defense carried the way. And we know that because Marcus Freeman was a former defensive coordinator at Ohio State, former linebacker. He understands how to do defense. So for me, even if you're questioning quarterback early, the defense and the run game will carry the load.

Tom, I want to go to you on this. I think maybe the single greatest play in the entire 12-team playoff last year was on night one when Jeremiah Love went 98 yards to the house in the first playoff game ever played on campus. I'm getting the sense here that whoever Notre Dame's quarterback is going to be from what you guys are saying. The best thing that an inexperienced guy needs is a big-time guy. He can just turn and hand it.

off to and take some pressure off. I know love was banged up last year. What are you expecting to see out of him this year? ESPN has been ranked as the top running back in the country and a Heisman trophy candidate. Well, he's going to be the leader in the stable,

but it's not going to be just him. And I think the ability to spell guys in the backfield, particularly at running back position, with the physical nature of the position, gives Notre Dame great advantages because what it's going to do for the young inexperienced quarterback is, hopefully, rely on what I like in, again, the best offensive line in college football that can really

lean on people on early down. The last thing you want to do with an inexperienced quarterback is put him in second and third long situations consistently. So that's where the run game comes into play. Turn around, rely on those guys, and then make good decisions when it comes to put the football in the air. But I think that's why the run game is so important for Notre Dame is staying ahead of the change, particularly in the first third of the season. And the great thing about having multiple backs is that it provides multiple styles of play for a defense to try to defense. So though Jeremiah Love has his style, very physical and also explosive, when you put a different back that's capable in the backfield, it forces defenses to somewhat change their

style of play based off who they're going against. And so Notre Dame does have a stable of backs. It's to their benefit, not just to spell guys, but to change the pace for defenses. Think about this. You got Miami, you got A&M right after that, early October, first week of October, you got Boise. It is going to be an absolute slog for the Irish to see if they can get back to where they were a year ago on the cusp of the title. On the way, of course, they lost that

championship game to Ryan Day and Ohio State. No Buckeyes team has ever gone back to back. No coach has ever pull that off. Can Day do it? We'll talk to him next. At Desjardin, we speak

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Well, ever since the college football playoff era started in 2014, Ohio State has never, not once, finished outside of the top. 10 of the final rankings. Ryan Day has 10 losses and 70 wins. But as Reese Davis found out, as he continues to crisscross the country, meeting the top coaches in the land, the pressure is always on. But Reese tried to give him a respite. Come on. This is your refuge, Ryan, the Ty Tucker Tennis Center. What drew you to tennis to blow off some steam? Well, during COVID, you couldn't do much in the facilities. And I drove by one day and Ty was out here, and I stopped by and watched them.

And I watched them again. And then the third time, he says, why don't you get out here and grab a racket? And I did, and I started hitting a few balls, and it's just kind of gone from there. I'm touching a racket first time in 25 years. You're working on stuff. Okay.

You're just trying to get some work in. You don't have to run up the score. Okay. Although I know you, you probably will on me anyway. Who on the coaching staff can beat you? Nobody. There you go. He's got it.

Ah. Oh, look at you. Why are you spinning it like that? Make them run a little bit? That was good, Rees. When you're out here, do football thoughts ever come into the brain or are you locked in? And this is the hour, whatever, that I'm putting it away.

It gets you out of the building when you're kind of in the weeds. You're sweating. And then by the time you walk in the building, take a shower, and get back in a meeting room, you just have a different perspective. And it's allowed me to reset. You're hit a few more? Yeah, sure. All right.

It's good. I think I'm calling this triple match point. All right, I'm going to try to give you a hard one now. All right, all right. See if we got this one. Okay, let's play running clock second half. I know when I've been whipped. Let's talk some ball.

Sounds good. It's Ohio State together at the Mountain Top, champions of college football. I've heard that this year's team wanted a lot of the championship memorabilia and reminders taken down. What does that mean for a team when a lot of the reminders are gone? You have guys who are big parts of it, yet you have a huge core on your team, especially this year. That'll be new.

When you have a culture that has that mindset, it's, you know, they get tired of hearing them all last year's team. I think they want to win back-to-back championships in a big way. And I think they've had a mindset that they were going to win multiple national championships. And I think they want to step up into that role because that's what they envision themselves being. What will you put Julian Cee in and Lincoln Keynes through to determine who's going to be the quarterback?

Oh, it'll be. You can ask them when you see them. I mean, every day. What are you going to do? When you walk in the building to when you leave, I mean, you are going to get pressed in a big way when you're a quarterback at Ohio State. Give me an example with that.

I get on these guys all the time about their cadence. You should be able to hear the cadence from the other parking lot across the street. If you're not, get back in the huddle, and we're going to do it again. Let's say I'm one of your quarterbacks. I didn't do the cadence right, and you're going to give me an example of what it should sound like. Give it to me. When they get up there and our cadence, white 80, white 80, you know, whatever, you know, they got white 80, and they're coming from their throat.

You can't come from your throat. You have to speak from down here. So it's whitey! I mean, you've got to hear it from all the way across the stadium. And if you don't, like, you're not in control. I don't want to go out like I just went out earlier. You're pretty good. You're sure you want more?

Yeah, let's go. I shouldn't, but let's do it anyway. Okay. Next time Chris Fowler sees Reese on the road like in week one, we'll give him some tennis tips to get him ready. Reese is in Florida all year round now, so he's got all sorts of time to practice. That's the schedule outlook.

As always, Michigan, November 29th, as we know Day's history there, it is never looms too far away for anyone at Ohio State. or, as they say, the school up north. Tom, by last count, Ohio State, Reese mentioned it. They're going to have a new starting quarterback, a new DC, a new OC, and they're replacing their top two running backs, both of which are going to be playing on Sunday.

So that's a lot to replace. What's your biggest concern right now with the Buckeyes? Well, first of all, ever the veteran true move by Reese Davis to, before they even swings the racket, to throw in there, I haven't touched one of these in 25 years. I mean, you've got to preface the performance so you back yourself up. Hey, listen, I think Ryan Day kind of, you know, gave us a little glimpse into the quarterback position and how important it is

and how heavily scrutinized it's going to be from within the building. Everything from cadence to voice inflection to their charting. Did you make the right read? They're taping your video on your helmet. They're going to see and watch your eyes. Did you have a drop? Did you overthrow a ball? Did you turn the ball over? How are you on third down? How are you on the red area? They're going to do everything they can to chart to make the most educated decision on who should make that first start based off performance. You go back to the spring. He made the quarterbacks live. So he forced them to play with live bolts flying by to see what they would do. So he's trying to prepare them the best he can. The good news is, and this is very similar to what we talked about with Notre Dame and whoever their quarterback is going to be. Ohio State is absolutely loaded with personnel. The quarterback doesn't have to wear a cape.

What the quarterback has to do is run the offense, manage his emotions, and make good decisions with the football, avoid negative plays, and avoid turning the ball over. And as you do that and grow and you become more comfortable, they're going to put more on your plate. They're going to trust you a little bit more. The team's going to start to buy in. So I don't think this is an overnight wave of Magic Wand process.

This thing will go long into training camp for all. Ohio State. Yeah, I'm not so much worried about the quarterback as I am with everybody else. Ohio State lost 14 players to the NFL. They were drafted in the NFL. So you might have, there's 11 players that start on offense. We lost some offensive starters, some defensive starters. And when you lose those starters, you also lose your culture.

It takes time to rebuild. We saw it with Michigan. Two years ago, Michigan, after winning a national championship, they lost 13 players to the NFL. And they didn't have as great of a season this year as they did last. So my concern is really with everyone else who's leaving, it's going to be hard to replace that production, especially when it comes to what it took to win a national championship, whether it's Jack Sawyer, his strip sack against Texas, JToo and Malowal, Cody Simon, all these guys are now playing professionally. That's my concern. The production is now gone.

It's hard to repeat. Real quick on both of you, Tom, let's start with you. Ohio State, of course, famously has a back-to-back Heisman trophy winner, but they've never won back-to-back national championships and program history. himself said with the way college football is moving these days, he doesn't see that happening for any team for a long time. You on board with that theory? Well, I think

what he's assuming is if you were in a position to do that, you would have to not only retain everybody that became a great player for you and afford all of them, you'd then have to go out and add some more pieces that you paid a lot of money for and then expect those pieces to play

at an extremely high level. I think Ryan Day is correct when he looks around the landscape of college football and the transactional nature that it's become, it's hard. We've thinned the herd, right? We have spread talent all over the country, and now games are going to get tighter. You're going to have one more one possession, more one possession games, and who can finish games is going to probably determine who's going to be there at the end. But Penn State is one team that did return a lot of that production. They're returning their starting quarterback, returning both running backs, returning a lot of their

players on defense. So there are teams that are keeping their production. as long as teams keep their production, they can continue to win championships. We will see what happens. They've got the big one against Texas with Reese and the Game Day guys there. Week one, Sports Center will have Marcus Freeman chat with Reese tomorrow as he continues to move around the country. And they're playing cards, a little less labor intensive than hitting the tennis court, under pressure in a good way for SMU, while other coaches and programs have to dial it up to dial down the pressure from their fans. basis. We'll hear from them next.

Top coaches around the mic. Mike Norvell knows the stakes this fall. When it's one-on-one, somebody's going to win, somebody's going to lose. And what you're willing to pour into it, what you're willing to take from the experience. I mean, you know, there's nobody ever wants to face, you know, disappointment, you know, in those, with those opportunities. But then I also got to see the response. I got to see the, you know, the edge that was brought when things were good for

somebody and then you know at times whenever it wasn't. Okay, Tom, so how are they going to respond? Well, listen, there's really nowhere to go but up. I think they made better decisions in the transfer portal. Quarterback Tommy Castellanos has played with Gus Malzon before. I think it's a nice fit offensively. But the bottom line is when you're embarrassed, that's the greatest motivator. This was a team that was embarrassed a year ago.

I do think they will be better. How much better remains to be seen because we don't know how this unit's going to gel together just yet. Worst season to season drop off in 50 years. Rhett Lashley wanted to clear some things up about a conference he criticized. I've got a lot of respect for the SEC and a lot of experience with the SEC. As you pointed out, I played in it for three years and I coached in the SEC for seven and three conference championship games, two national championship game appearances. And so I got a lot of respect for the league. All I said was a comment.

And it's unfortunately, it's a factual comment that the same six schools have won that league for the last six. years. And, you know, it's just hard to argue parity if that's the case. Sam, does coach have a point? He absolutely has a point. Coach Lashley is right. Let's just go back since 2011 or so, it's pretty much been Bama, Georgia, LSU. That's kind of been the teams. Go back before that. You add a little bit of Auburn, and now the Texas and the SEC, a little bit of Texas. And so for me, Rhett Lashley makes a solid point. The LSU, I would argue, or excuse me, SEC is top heavy. The same team.

are winning it, but they are still winning it and they're still in the SEC. Yeah, a lot of Florida in there, too, just want to mention them. Lincoln Riley knows the heat meter is at like 10. At some point, that expectation has got to go through the roof where they know they're going to win and they know exactly what to do. And that's obviously a big emphasis point for us. You know, all these little things show up throughout a game and they show out throughout the year. And the better job that you do with being consistent and demanding that out of the guys,

a better job that the team really accepts that and understands that every little thing is going to matter, the faster you become a championship team. I mean, that's the, that's the route to do it. So this team is hungry and eager to go prove that. Tom, you got 15 seconds. Go for it. Well, I'll tell you right now, this one's pretty simple. Win, one possession games. Five of the six losses a year ago for SC were by a score, and they led in the fourth quarter in four of them. If you flip that around, SC will see significant improvement in the win-loss column. Great stuff, of course. One of SC's big rivals, Notre Dame, you can see Marcus Freeman sit down with Reese on SportsCenter tomorrow as our coaching caravan series continues.

Thanks for being with us today on college football live for Sam Macho and Tom Luginville. I'm Zubin Mahenty. We are less than one month away from Week Zero.