College Football Live - Is Anyone Safe From Upset??

Episode Date: November 13, 2024

Victoria Arlen has Harry Lyles, Tom Luginbill and Pete Thamel join in as they dive into Georgia’s big loss to Ole Miss—28 to 10—and asking the big question: Is this the start of a slide for the Bulldogs, or can they bounce back when they face Tennessee? Also they highlight some exciting under-the-radar games that could shake up the College Football Playoff race. With so much still up in the air, no team is safe as we head into the final stretch. And special guest—Ole Miss linebacker Pooh Paul, joins the show after their huge win over Georgia. Pooh talks about the victory and what it means as the Rebels climb up in the CFP rankings, securing a playoff spot! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome into college football live. I'm Victoria Arlin. Let's go out the tunnel. Now, after falling 28 to 10 to Old Miss, could this be a bounce back weekend for Georgia when they face Tennessee, or is this the beginning of the end for the Bulldogs? Plus, we have a lot of under the radar games coming up this weekend, especially games that can impact the CFP rankings with the who's in and who's out. Because let's be honest, nobody is safe at this point. And Old Miss linebacker Poupal joined. the show after defeating Georgia last weekend and moving up five spots in the CFP rankings to grab a playoff spot. This is College Football Live. Let's go. Welcome to College Football Live, presented by Google Pixel. We've got a jam-pack show for you here, and I've got the best to help me navigate it. All Harry Liles and Tom Luganbell with me from afar, and Pete Fama will be joining

in just a bit. Now, the second rankings were released. by the college football playoff selection committee last night, but we'll get to that later on Champ Drive. Right now, we need to get you ready for this week because, well, the theme of the week is nobody is safe. So let's get to our week 12 slate. We have Texas and Arkansas. They're back at it.

And this series has history. The Razorbacks have had the upper hand lately, winning five of the last seven, including the last two meetings. With a win, the Razorbacks would tie their longest streak over Texas since 1935. Tulane travels to Annapolis to face Navy. The Green Wave is riding a seven-game winning streak looking for its third straight nine-win season,

while Navy is looking for a W in the wind column to keep their playoff hopes alive. And Utah heads to Boulder to face Coach Prime in the Buffaloes. Colorado is making waves off to a seven-and-two start and chasing a Big 12 title for the first time since 2001. And BYU hosts Kansas this weekend where they look to protect its undefeated race. record this season. The Jayhawks just beat number 17 Iowa State. And another upset here would give Kansas its first season with multiple ranked wins since 2007. And we've got the marquee SEC matchup of the weekend. Georgia looks to bounce back this weekend when they host number seven Tennessee. The Vols have lost seven straight matchups all by more than 14 points. And can that

change this weekend? Two top teams in the country getting ready to play. Thank goodness it's at our place we get to come home and play night game should be an electric atmosphere it is every time we play them they've got a tremendous team Josh has done an unbelievable job with this team they're playing at a high level just got through watching a bunch of their special teams and always say you can tell the character of a team and how good a team is how hard they play by their special teams you know you look at them really in every phase of the football game extremely talented coached extremely well they play hard. They play fundamentally sound. They make you earn it in every way. All right. Let's talk about this matchup and bring in Pete Fammel. Now, Pete, we saw Niko

Iamaleava go out last week against Mississippi State with an apparent head injury. What's the latest on his status for Saturday? Victoria, the latest on Niko I. Maliava's status is that it's uncertain right now and undetermined whether or not he'll play against Georgia. sources told me yesterday that he's in concussion protocol right now. You'd obviously have to get through that and get cleared in order to play on Saturday night in Athens. There are some good news breadcrumbs that have been dropped by Tennessee that show that there may be a path for him to play. That includes him both appearing and participating in practice on Monday and Tuesday.

Josh Heipel says Niko is in good shape, just an hour ago on the SEC conference call. He reiterated that he's had a good one. week. We'll see if the doctors clear him for Saturday. Of course, we'd love to see him out there. Now, Tennessee, potentially without Nico, what is the impact of that, Luke's? Well, it's fairly significant. You go on the road and you'd be taking a senior in Gaston Moore that's a reserve, and you'd ask him to not make mistakes. And in order to help him do that, you've got to be able to run the football effectively with Dylan Samson. I think if Nico doesn't play, this becomes a Dylan Sampson game and a defensive effort from Tennessee to try to force more

turnovers, more mistakes from that Georgia offense. Again, you're on the road. It's already a tall order. Rivalry game, inexperienced quarterback. You cannot afford to take negative plays if you're Tennessee on offense. Get behind the change. That's why Dylan Sampson's presence, even with Nico, is so critical in this matchup. Now let's get to the other side of the ball because Georgia had their hands full over the

weekend in a loss against Ole Miss and they haven't had much help from their star QB Carson Beck. Under pressure, Beck has had an SEC worst QBR of four and four yards per attempt. Now, Harry, I've got to ask you, is it fair to place all the offensive blame on Carson Beck? I don't think you could give all of it to Carson Beck. The football is still the ultimate team sport, right? So I think you could give him some of the blame. He's had nine interceptions across his last four games and two of those games. he had three interceptions, and they still won those football games.

But when I think you look at Georgia, one of the things that we've known about this team has been the inconsistency and the injuries in the offensive line. We know Tate Ratledge has missed some games. And then obviously the talent is one thing, but again, the consistency is another. And I think because of that lack of consistency you saw it last game against Ole Miss, where Georgia allowed five sacks against a standard pass rush. That's the most of they've ever allowed against a standard pass rush since ESPN started tracking that in 2011. And then, of course, he faced pressure on 40% of his dropback.

So offensive line is part of it. And then I think you also, again, have to look at coaching. What is Mike Bobo doing for him in this offense? Obviously, Todd Munkin left a couple of years ago. We've seen what he's done in Baltimore for Lamar Jackson. So coaching's got something to do with it too. So there's blame, plenty of blame to go around everywhere, I think, when it comes to this Georgia offense. Well, and you look at those dreadful numbers, Harry, against pressure.

And you have to say, well, why is that? Well, two reasons. I think. Georgia can't run the football. They're averaging 124 yards rushing per game. That's the worst outing per game for Georgia in 20 years. All right. Let that sink in for just a moment.

You look at the designed rush percentage, meaning that this is what they intend to do. Nothing's RPO-based. It is run, run, run. It's not enough. That's the number one thing. The number two thing is, where are the weapons? There's nobody on the perimeter right now

that seems to be scaring off anybody defensively. So what's happened now is these defenses, and it started with Ole Miss last week, and I think it could continue with Tennessee. They smell blood in the water, and the sharks start circling. So they're pinning their ears back, and they're pressuring with five and six more so than they would previously because Georgia can't run the football. Now, a couple things to remember here, too, is that Tennessee seven straight losses to Georgia by 14 points, while Georgia 28 consecutive home wins best in FBS.

So we shall see what happens this weekend. Georgia was handed their worst loss since 2019 with a 28 to 10 defeat at Ole Miss. The dog's offense netted just 246 yards of total offense as Lane Kiffin picked up his first win against a top five team at Ole Miss. Now a part of that defense squad is linebacker Poo Paul. Now, Poo, it's Wednesday. Now, I can imagine it was a wild weekend on campus. And how has the mood been after that big win?

Man, it's just a letcher. It's just something that I can't explain. You can tell that the fans were really happy with us, really happy with the progress that we made as a team. You know, we faced adversity twice early in the season, but it was kind of cool to me to watch those guys bounce back and how hard we fought that Saturday, man. It was, I'm so proud of those guys.

I'm so happy for the fans as well, because without their unconditional support, I don't think we could have done it. Adversity only makes you stronger, and you guys were strong indeed. Now, Georgia had just 246 yards of total offense. So how were you guys able to hold them off? You know, Coach Golden just, he sought us down early that weekend.

He just really just made it simple for us. It's all about who wants it more than the end of the night. You know, Georgia is a great football team. They have a great offense. And Carson Begg, a quarterback. They have a great one game as well as they have multiple weapons out at receiver. So it all just came down to who could make the less mistakes at the end of the day. And I feel like without communication the way that we flew around into the ball, it made it easier for us.

Now, what was that mindset going into that game leading up to, Georgia. It was really just staying on top of the little things, just executing on top of those little things, as well as over communicating and just flying around and just having fun playing football. You know, we wanted to go into this game very confident

and each other. We wanted our coaches to be confident as well, which we felt like we were. And the preparation leading up to that was very successful for us. You know, just dialing in on key details, things that we need to fix from previous games in order to put us over on the edge. And what were some of the biggest things that you guys fixed? It was really just making

sure that we was all on one of court. Coach Golden always said there's no wrong call unless we all on the same call. So we're just really just dialing in on top of the communication aspect as well as, you know, guys were asking questions in the film room, really understanding the concept and why are we running these concepts in these different situations to really just get a better understanding of what Coach Golden wanted to do. Now, you transferred this season and how did Coach Kiffin, otherwise known as the Portal King, convince you to come to Ole Miss? It was really just a vibe that he gave up to me a high-engetic guy who loves football, you know, and Coach Golden in the same way.

I remember when I first came, man, man faced lit up. My mom, my mom was very excited. She was happy. He made sure that my parents were good. But the thing that really stuck out to me the most was when I got around those guys, man, they didn't treat me any differently. This was before I even, you know, really committed. I ended up committing later on that night.

But they accepted me as if I was already on the team, as if I was already a rebel. And that really just did something to me. You know, those guys were just sitting down, just getting to know me. outside of football things in my interest. And I feel like it made it easier once I signed and came here, you know, got around those guys. We really just started bunning even more on and off the field, man. It was very nice.

And there's no other place I'd rather be. Well, it's really special watching your squad out there. So good luck the rest of the season, poo. Thank you so much for joining us. I thank y'all. Y'all, y'all have a blessed day. You as well. Thank you.

After a chaotic week 11, let's take a look at this week's college football playoff rankings brought to you by Prudential. Oregon and Ohio State take number one and two respectively. Indiana cracks into the top five for the first time in the CFP era. And Georgia drops out of the top 10 since Kirby Smart's first season as their head coach in 2016, while Army climbs to a program best 24th overall. Coming up with just five weeks left before the playoffs begin, what teams control their own destiny?

We tell you what our guys think next. And Luz is here to share his top freshmen of the week and reveal which freshman stands out among the rest. That and much, much more coming up next. College Football Live is presented by Google Pixel and in part by Elka Seltzer Plus. Bounce back fast with fast, fast, busy relief from Elka Seltzer Plus. Welcome back to College Football Live. presented by Google Pixel. After Colorado defeated Texas Tech 41 to 27, they come in at number 17 and the newest CFP

rankings. This comes after debuting at 20 last week. And if they win their final three regular season games against Utah, Kansas, and Oklahoma State, they will play for the Big 12 Conference Championship. Now, the Buffaloes have started off this season seven and two and look to keep up the hot start. Their upcoming opponents were all ranked in this year's preseason poll. However, now the Buffaloes are favored to win all three matchups against them. Now, Coach Prime promised Ms. Peggy a bowl game, and now he's wanting to get her to the game. And some might say that they are in control of their own destiny. But Harry, how far do you think this team can go?

I think that they can make it to the Big 12 championship. And I think that they can win that and make the playoff. Now, once you get to the playoff, I am less certain about their chances against anybody that they might see. just because I think we've really got the most parity in such a talented field. But with Colorado, I think when you look at this schedule, obviously Utah, we know that they've got some injuries offensively. I still think that Kyle Whittingham defense, it's hard to bet against them. I still think that they could present problems to Colorado.

As long as Shador Sanders continues to not turn the football over, I think that helps them. But also that Kansas game, I know the record is perhaps not the sexiest when it comes to Kansas, but their losses are close losses. They obviously had a really good win there last week as well. So I don't think that this is going to be. easy for Colorado to win out by any stretch, but I do think that they ultimately will reach the Big 12 championship game. And then, of course, we've got Dion Sanders playing for a championship

game in Jerry World. It's all perfect for storylines. Yeah, what a remarkable story, Harry. I mean, seriously, you look at the North Dakota State game, the Nebraska game, and you're going, wow, what would happen if you took 12 and 2 off of this team? I think that's what stands out about what this team has developed into. It's not about Chador. It's not always a about Travis Hunter. Look at this defense. If you looked at this defense a year ago, their point differential margin was minus 6.7 per game. Look at it this year. Almost 10 points a game in the positive collar, meaning that defensively, Colorado is really making strides. And you referenced the quarterback issues at Utah. Well, if Colorado is any better on defense, and I think they are,

that's going to help Colorado at home. And I just find the schedule fast. because just about every team that was scheduled to compete in the Big 12 this year has failed to meet expectations while Colorado has continued to improve and exceed expectations. It really is incredible. And Harry, you mentioned it briefly, but Pete, I want to talk to you on the other side. What can you tell us about the Utah QB situation? Well, the Utah QB situation has just been one of the worst luck rooms in all of college football this year, Victoria. they obviously had another they've had three quarterbacks who could have started games for them lost for the

season this year. The latest one is Brandon Rose. He suffered a season ending injury in that BYU game. He had just taken the job from Isaac Wilson. They obviously lost Cam Rising again for the season earlier this year. Luke Hewerd's been out for the year. So they go into this game

with really just two healthy quarterbacks on their roster. So Isaac Wilson, Zach's little brother, has started some games for them this year. He's had some nice moments. He's had some moments of struggle. We'll see if he can carry the torch for that room, which is among the most beat up in the sport.

That is a rough one for sure. Thank you so much, Pete. We appreciate you. Now, we're nearing the end of the season, which means clinching scenarios, and this is an important one. Boise State clinches a spot in the Mountain West Championship game with the win at San Jose State

and UNLV lost versus San Diego State. Now, reminder, the five highest conference champions get an automatic playoff bid. So Lugues, why is this a sneaky game for the Broncos? Because San Jose State has been flying under the radar with a six and three record under Coach Ken Neumato Lolo. They almost beat Washington State, took them to the wire. But when you look at how San Jose State's been successful,

they have forced three or more turnovers in four games this year. Boise State has been prone to turn the ball over multiple times in a game. this year. Offensively, San Jose State can score. Nick Nash, the wide receiver is an explosive vertical threat already has 86 catches on the season for 1100 yards. I think this is a sneaky trap game. In Boise State, there's a lot of talk about the Broncos and rightfully so right now. You cannot have a hiccup here against San Jose State. I'd be worried about this one. Like we said, nobody is safe. Nobody is safe. But don't forget to vote for which team you think will be the Dr. Pepper one final team by using hashtag one final team.

Now, it was a weekend to remember with a few freshmen to remember. So Lug's, who were your top freshman of the week? Well, we've got a couple of familiar faces. Let's start off in Boulder, Colorado, with freshman Jordan Seton. For two games in a row now, he has not allowed a pressure on Shador Sanders. Playing from his left tackle position as a freshman, learning on the fly. he just continues to improve, and as he continues to improve, he continues to gain confidence. And he's keeping the quarterback clean, on the blind side for Shador Sanders, been very, very impressed with his progress throughout the entirety of the year to this point.

Dylan Stewart, pressure, pressure, and more pressure. And you may say, well, he's only got five and a half sacks and, you know, two, fours, fumbles. But it's not the statistical number. It's how he affects the quarterback. He gets opposing offenses off schedule. He gets the quarterback off platform. And the next thing you know, you're out of rhythm, and he's creating that havoc in the backfield.

How about Wayshon Parker? Out west at Washington State, the freshman running back, 11 carries for 149 yards, now has over 550 yards on the season. Two touchdowns last week for the Cougars who've had a really, really nice season. And he's kind of become their bell cow. at running back.

Move over to the linebacker position. Take a look at Sammy Brown at Clemson. The first half didn't go maybe as scheduled for Clemson in Blacksburg last week, but it did in the second half. It was because of the defense. Eight tackles, a sack, tackles for loss for Sammy Brown.

The true freshman, former top 10 overall player in the ESPN 300, has had a really nice, slow burn development into being a key cog in that football team. Now, Cash Cleveland, This one's great. This is a freshman center that had to fill in on the road in Lubbock for an injured center

for Colorado and he really played well. So you're looking at Colorado with two true freshmen in the offensive line. One of them is the center. So you've got snap issues, you've got cadence issues, and he handled it with a lot of poise, very impressed with those two freshmen at Colorado up front in the offensive line. Now, Loux, is there somebody you're watching for this week to have a breakout or are multiple folks to have a breakout this week. Yeah, one guy comes to mind. It's Boo Carter, the defensive back for Tennessee.

He's played really well and he keeps getting better and better and better, taking on more of a significant role. In the way that Georgia's been playing offensively, putting the ball at risk, don't be surprised to see Boo Carter, the freshman defensive back and make a play for the volunteers. And Harry, how are you projecting that game to play out? I'm going to go with Georgia. I think we've seen really good and we've seen really bad. I think that they are going to recover. We're going to see really good Kirby Smart is going to straighten them out this week.

And Luke, do you agree with Harry that Georgia is going to have a bounce back? Well, listen, I look at them very similar to the way I look at Alabama. When they don't beat themselves and they play clean, it's very difficult for anybody to match up with them. You know, there's been a lot of debates

since Tuesday night about the college football playoff and where Georgia dropped. And I understand the positive side is the schedule, right? You look at who they've played, one of the, the most difficult schedule in the country. The problem is, is they have failed the eye test. And they have. They have not looked good.

And I, listen, I told you guys earlier today, I said, if you watched these two teams for the last three weeks, and you had to say, which team's playing like a playoff team? Would you say it's Georgia or would you say it's South Carolina? South Carolina. What about you, Harry? Yeah, I would agree. I think the thing that is so frustrating about Georgia is we've seen them play up. down to their competition. Decide who you won't beat.

Because when you're great, you can beat anybody in the country. But then we see what you do against a team like Kentucky. And it's like, you guys remember who you are, right? So I think it's going to be really interesting to see who they decide to be against Tennessee. Or Florida. Or what we saw with Florida in that game. And they were on their third string. And you're like, what are we doing here?

And so I think that's where it's going to get very interesting. Now game day is going to be there. And so I think, look, if Georgia has a bounce back, I think that's going to be very fun. And we're actually going to be talking more playoffs.