The Joel Klatt Show: A College Football Podcast - Ohio St & Michigan move toward ‘The Game’, Oregon’s big win, Lane Kiffin’s decision & Klatt’s Top 15

Episode Date: November 24, 2025

FOX Sports’ lead College Football analyst Joel Klatt breaks down Ohio State and Michigan’s wins over the weekend as they head into ‘The Game’ with injury questions for both sides. He then lays out the impact of Oregon’s win over USC as the Ducks pick up a significant resume builder as they close in on a Playoff spot. He also reacts to Dan Lanning’s comments about the SEC scheduling non-conference games in late November while the Big Ten is in the thick of their 9-game schedule. Klatt reveals his latest Top 15 as he ranks the top teams in the country and explains how he ranks the teams right on the bubble for the College Football Playoff. He wraps up the show by sharing the latest he’s hearing with regards to Lane Kiffin’s decision to leave Ole Miss or go to LSU or Florida. He also lays out where the college football calendar is making the situation worse while also explaining the repercussions if Kiffin decides to leave Ole Miss for LSU or Florida. 0:00-2:52 Intro2:53-10:32 Ohio State beats Rutgers without Jeremiah Smith and Carnell Tate10:33-15:46 Michigan beats Maryland15:47-24:54 Oregon beats USC 42-27 to move closer to securing a playoff berth24:55-36:51 Joel Klatt’s new top 1536:52-39:02 Why is the Lane Kiffin situation getting so messy?39:03-44:54 How much is the CFB calendar at fault for awkward coaching exits this time of year?44:55-51:11 Does Lane Kiffin need to leave Ole Miss to win a national championship? Use my code for 10% off your next SeatGeek order*: https://seatgeek.onelink.me/RrnK/KLATT10 Sponsored by SeatGeek. *Restrictions apply. Max $20 discount Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Love this game. I love this rivalry and it's finally here. This is the best week of the college football season for Ohio State. They don't have one player that has beaten Michigan. And for Michigan, they don't have a single player that has lost to Ohio State. How does Lane Kiffin leave Ole Miss in the middle of a playoff run and have any credibility at his next place? Hey, like today is why we love college football. Hey, welcome in everybody. Welcome into the program. This is Joel Clatt show. I'm Joel Clatt. And this show is brought to you by the graduate by Hilton. We thank them for their support. It is finally here. We've got the game week. That's right. I mean, listen, as soon as the clock struck zero, when I'm sitting in the booth at that Ohio State game as they beat Rutgers, I'm thinking to myself, well, now it's Michigan Week. And here we go. Michigan and Ohio State are going to tangle this week. And there is no better rivalry. in college football, there might not be any better rivalry in sports.

And quite frankly, we are what I believe in, in one of the greatest eras of this rivalry that we've ever been in. Now, granted, obviously, Buckeye fans would maybe disagree with that, but you can't disagree with the stakes of the games over the last few years and then the monumental upset a year ago, which did not at least diminish the fact that Ohio State could go on to win the national championship. So a lot on that game coming up.

on last weekend's college football games. My new top 15, remember I've expanded now as we're getting closer to the playoff all the way to 15, some shakeup in the top 15. I've got thoughts on Dan Lannning and what he said after the game when Oregon beat USC. I've got thoughts on Lane Kiffin as well. I've got some new news that I can kind of share with you based on some of the conversations that I've had. I've also got a lot of thoughts based on what others have said and just as I wrap my head around that entire situation. with Lane Kiffin and Old Miss, and now what they're talking about

in terms of his decision post-Ague Bowl. So all of that's coming up right now. Before we do that, just remember to subscribe to the show. That would be awesome. You can like our show. You can throw a comment down below. I try to get down into those comments.

It's going to be a busy week, obviously, with Thanksgiving and the game and everything, but I'll do my best to get down there. Please get down there. But again, please subscribe to the program as well. And then wherever you like to social media, we're there. and you can follow us on any social media that you like.

All of our content lives in shorter forms out there for you to enjoy during the course of the week, the season, the year, whatever you like. That's all for you. Okay, so here we go. Now, both of these teams, Ohio State and Michigan, took care of business and what could be a look-ahead game. Everyone understands that. And I think that they've done this now for so long, even though these are kids that are cycling through every three, four, five years. There's an understanding to go out there and take care of business. and both teams were able to do that.

Michigan on the road against Maryland, Ohio State at home against Rutgers. Now, I was at that Ohio State game. They beat Rutgers 429 without Jeremiah Smith and Carnell Tate. And listen, I'll be bluntly honest. It was not pretty in the first half. It was sluggish. It was slow. And to be honest, I kind of understand, right?

So it's a trap game, clearly. And they played as such in the first half. Now, in the second half, in the third quarter in particular, they came out and basically just said, hey, we're going to play up to our potential. And in the third quarter against Ruckers, they outgained Ruckers 129 yards to minus six. And the game was over. It went from 14 to 3 to, I think, what was it, 35, 3 at that point? It's just over.

I think the bigger question coming out of that game is just the status of Carnell Tate and Jeremiah Smith more specifically for next week and for this game against Michigan. Now, Day said Smith and Tate are both day to day after the game. They've been very quiet with information, and rightly so. You're not going to get a ton out of their camp. I would be in the category of optimistic that they would both play. I think that they've been close to getting on the field. And obviously, Smith left that game against UCLA did not play this last week against Ruckers, but Carnell Tate didn't play for a couple of weeks.

I think that they've been close. and both the players and the team and the coaching staff understand that this is a long season and everything out there is ahead of them, you know, that they didn't need these guys against Rutgers and against UCLA or Purdue going back to that first game that Carnell Tate was held out just a few weeks ago. And so there's this understanding of the length of the season. It's one of the reasons why they play so slow, possibly 16 games trying to win through there. You're trying to get ready for a Michigan. you're trying to get ready for a Big Ten title and then a playoff run. And so I don't think it's serious, but again, I don't know for sure.

So day-to-day is what the coaching staff is saying. I would be in the optimistic camp that these guys would see the field, but we'll see what happens on Saturday. Defense has allowed now 7.6 points per game. That's the second fewest through 11 games in the past 35 years. The only team to give up fewer points than Ohio State through 11 games is that 21 Georgia team, which was a historically great team with draft picks. all over the field. That Georgia team gave up one fewer total point than what Ohio State has given up so

far through 11 games. They were totally dominant, in particular in the third quarter. Their pass rush showed up with Caden Curry. You're watching that on YouTube right now. I was saying this during the broadcast, but it's become abundantly clear as now like we've seen the season and we've seen it played out. I get to talk with these scouts that are around the field every single week before the game. They've got four first round draft picks right down the middle of their defense with Caden McDonald up front at defensive tackle, Sonny Stiles and R. Val Reese at linebacker and Caleb Downs at safety. You know, there's no other defense in the country that has four first round draft picks. There's just not.

And in particular, a defense that has them right down the middle of the field. They've also got four, maybe five more guys on the defense on the field with those four that are going to get selected in the NFL draft. Caden Curry being one of them. Now, was he up to 10 sacks, I think, nine, 10 sacks? I mean, he's having a monster year. Even after being quiet in the last few weeks, had a couple of sacks against Rutgers. so that defense continues to be dominant.

The run game, which we've had a lot of questions about up to this point, it got going for 250 yards. Now, I would say this, and I think Bama falls in this camp as well because we've been waiting for Alabama's run game to get better during the course of the year, and they were great against Eastern Illinois. And Ohio State certainly played a better opponent than Eastern Illinois by a factor of a billion, but Rutgers was the worst rushing yards per carry defense in the country.

So they need to run it for $250. So kudos to them. They did that. And I thought that those backs got some good carries, some good run underneath them for this stretch run. Bo Jackson did a nice job for them. Julian Sane was a bit quiet without Smith and Tate. They did have a big threat on the outside with Max Clare.

He went for seven catches, 105, and a touchdown, which you put all that together. Now you put Tate and Smith back on the field whenever they get back on the field. And you're like, okay, you've got a tied in that can go seven for one 5. You got a back that can go for 150 in the backfield. You've got two wide receivers that are both first round picks when they decide to come out. So pick your poison with that offense. Oh, by the way, the quarterback's in the Heisman trophy race. Julian Sane was never going to do anything to hurt his chance. Well, all he could do, I'm sorry, I misspoke there. All he could do was hurt his chances for the

Heisman against Ruckers. He was never going to win the Heisman against Ruckers. Now he needs stages. He needs performance. And those stages are right in front of him with Michigan this week. week on the road, possibly against Indiana in the Big Ten championship game, depending on how Indiana handles their business on Friday against Purdue, their rival, their 28 and a half point favorites in that game. Okay, so now you look at this Ohio State team. They're getting ready for Michigan. Nobody on this team has beaten Michigan.

And clearly the approach of the last few years is not working. And so you starting, I see, and I think if you're watching closely, you're starting to see a bit of a difference in how Ryan Day talks about this game. It's not that he's downplaying it. It's that he's trying to remain more internally focused. This was Ryan Day after the win against Rutgers talking about the Michigan week moving forward. Here he is. You know, this week has got to be the best. We've been working toward this all year. And, you know, we want it. We know that the opponent is different. We know what's at stake. We know we're playing for hardware now. But at the end of the day, it's still about us. We can't all of a sudden change things. And so we want

to keep it as routine as we can, knowing that, you know, again, now we're playing for hardware and not only gold pants, but also an opportunity to get to Indy. I think that's a change. I think that's a subtle change focusing on themselves. You know, I think in past years, you've heard a lot about, you know, physicality and run game and matching and things of that nature. And not what he said right there, which is we're going to focus on ourselves and be ourselves. And that mentality that he just spoke. into, maybe not into existence, but he just spoke right there. That vision for their program is the exact vision that won them the national championship a year ago. After they lost to

Michigan, what did they do? They focused on themselves. What are we? How can we play our best football? I think the best teams in college football, maybe even, you know, at any level, have this unique ability to define who are we, where are we going, and how are we going? And how are we going to get there? I think that that's a simple three-tiered question that is at times hard to answer for teams. But when you answer that, and then you can become maniacally focused and laser-focused on, you know, in particular, where are we going and how are we going to get there, it works out. That was Ohio State a year ago in the playoff. And so, you know, I think that that mentality for this week is a subtle difference, but certainly one that maybe they learned a lot

winning that national championship a year ago. Michigan beats Maryland. They go on the road, 50 or excuse me, 45, 20 against Maryland. Most points Michigan has scored in a big 10 game this season. So now all of a sudden, this offense starts to get cranked up. By the way, with no Justice Haynes, he's obviously had that foot surgery.

No Jordan Marshall. Sharon Moore said he probably could have played, but did not. And they were really efficient. Running the football, they were really good throwing the football. Andrew Marsh has become a real. number one on the outside as a true freshman. And I thought Underwood played one of his better games. Even the game against Northwestern, as big as those mistakes were against Northwestern in the fourth quarter, and they were massive, and they almost cost him the game. He still at times played

the best football he had played in college. You know, so I said it last week, you can kind of ride the roller coaster with young players. And that against Maryland was a more consistent performance from Bryce Underwood, where he played at times elite, at times just very consistent, but it stayed there. So Underwood was 16 and 23 for 215 and two touchdowns. They're never going to ask him to be, you know, a guy that throws for 450 yards because they want to run the football. And they did that with Cuzz doll and they did it with some of those other backs. Underwood was really good. But again, Marsh is excellent, five catches for 76 and a touchdown.

He's averaging six catches for 87 yards per game since being inserted into the starting lineup. That was against Wisconsin seven games ago, a game that Gus and I called. So we've seen firsthand this emergence of Andrew Marsh. And that emergence of a real target on the outside has allowed the run game to flourish, which that continues to do. Bryce Cousdoll, 20 carries for 100 yards and three touchdowns in his first start. So plug and play. It's like the 99 and 2000 and 2001 Denver Broncos.

After Terrell Davis left the Denver Broncos, it was like, plug in whoever. You know, who'd they have? They had, oh gosh, Alandis Gary at one point. They had a guy from Utah. What was his name? Anderson, was something Anderson? Anyways, you guys get the point, right? Like at Witt, Michigan, you can plug and play because the offensive line has played so well.

Sharon Moore, after the game, said that Jordan Marshall probably could have played. Like I mentioned before, they didn't need him to play so that they held him out. I think it's very similar with the Jeremiah Smith and Carnel Tate. Now, in both of these games, were in the Ohio State and Michigan game, there were a couple of injuries that I think are of significance. Lorenzo Stiles, the starting nickelback for Ohio State's defense. He left the game with what appeared to be a shoulder injury. And then in the Michigan game, Max Bredesen left that game and was in a boot and at times on crushes. And Sharon Moore said that it did not look good.

He says, we'll get confirmation when we get back home and get the X-rays. We'll see what it is. It doesn't look great. We're just praying for him. And Max Bredison is a massive key. to that offense. When you watch Michigan's offense, you follow number 44. The ball usually arrives where number 44 is at. He's a threat as a blocker. Not many guys you can say that about. And so he's a huge key to their offense and someone that they'll miss if he's not on the field when they take on Ohio State next week. Just a quick note about each of these teams. For Ohio State, they don't have one player that has beaten Michigan. And for Michigan, they don't have a single player that has lost to Ohio State. And so as we start to build towards this game,

you have to understand that the pressure on Ohio State is immense. And in the Michigan locker room, all they're going to be talking about all week is give us a chance in the second half. All we've got to do is be close. That's all they're going to be thinking about. That's all they've been thinking about for back to 2021 when we went in for meetings before that game. Aidan Hutchinson said that specifically to me. He said, Joel, I just want a chance. I just want it to be a one possession game in the fourth quarter. That's all I want. And they ended up winning. And then subsequently, that's all Jim Harbaugh would talk about in the subsequent years. And hey, we just want to be close. We just want to be close. We just want to be close in the

second half, and that's exactly where this Michigan team is going to be. And then on the other side for Ohio State, they're going to be saying to themselves, focus on us, focus on us, focus on us. Those are the two messages for those teams, for this massive game. I love this game. It's my favorite thing that I get to do in this profession. I love this game. I love this rivalry, and it's finally here.

This is the best week of the college football season. This is, we are experiencing right now, the greatest moment in this rivalry maybe ever, and everything is on the line. I firmly believe, although we'll see what the playoff committee gives us on Tuesday night, I firmly believe that we're sitting here now watching this game where Michigan needs a win to go to the playoff. Ohio State needs a win to go compete for a Big Ten championship. Nobody on Ohio State's team has gold pants or a Big Ten championship. That's crazy.

They haven't been to Indy since 2020. So, you know, a lot on the line, which is exactly how you want it. Another game in the Big Ten, I thought this was a massive, massive win. A massive, massive, massive win. Oregon Beach, USC, 4227 at home. Excellent performance for Dan Lanning and the Ducks. This is a really legit team that I know has that loss to Indiana. And I think because of their location and where they're at, there is a tendency.

And if we're really being honest with ourselves in the college football sphere and the media sphere, I think there's a tendency, and I try not to do this, but there's a tendency to lose side of the ducks. There really is. And here's Oregon and they just continue to play well and they continue to get quality performances from their quarterback, Dante Moore. They get Kenyon Sadiq back. He was a monster in this game at tied end. They can run the ball with a real talented stable of backs. They're good on the offensive line. They're really good on the defensive line. That defense has played better and better and better as the season has gone on. And I think that they learned from their loss to Indiana. They've protected their quarterback a lot better. And their resume looks

really good. This was always going to be an incredibly tough November, and they still have a giant, really tough rivalry game against Washington next week. But you look at this resume. They've got a wide out win over Penn State. By the way, Penn State is for plays, plays, individual snaps away from a nine and two season right now. That's what's wild about Penn State. And I think everybody, you know, people that want to trash Oregon's resume are going to look at that win as something that's, well, as something that is not a quality win. I still believe it's a quality win. Again, Penn State, four singular snaps of the football away from nine and two.

I think Oregon should be easily the sixth seed, maybe higher. You know, like I expect them to jump Ole Miss in the CFP this week. They jumped them in the AP poll already, I think correctly so. Will they also jump Texas Tech? I'm not sure. I think that they should. They probably should. Oregon has a better strength of schedule.

They've got a better strength of record. The FBI is better than Texas Tech. So if you're looking at advanced metrics, it's right there. I still think that the loss, even though it's at home for Oregon, is better to Indiana as the number two team in the country, rather than on the road against Arizona State for Texas Tech. So they have a quality resume and certainly the team to go out there and wreak some havoc in the playoff.

That's a really good football team. And even if they're not going to get a buy, which probably is going to be tough for them to get a buy, they're going to host, and they're probably going to be a five or six seed, which means they're going to get either the group of five representative or the ACC representative. They're going to win their first round game.

You know, Tulane or Virginia, go to Otson. Come on, like, stop it. So they're going to play a quarterfinal. They might get to play or have to play, Georgia, that would be a monster quarter final. I just, I love this team. I really do. No Decorian Moore or Gary Bryant, again, didn't matter.

Sadiq, two monster games since coming back from his injury. And then there was something interesting that Dan Lannning said after the game. And we talk about this topic a lot in college football this time of year. He touched on it. Let's hear what he said first. And then I'll kind of give my thoughts right afterwards. Here's Dan Lannning after the game. I think Bruce in the pudding, right?

Played a good team. We beat him, right? All we can do next week is try to do the same thing, right? And this conference is a really good conference. It's competitive, right? We didn't play Chattanooga State today, right? Like some other places, right? We competed.

So, you know, that being said, it's tough playing nine conference games. It's tough playing in this league. And we got to take advantage of playing a good team today and attacking that. I love Dan Laning. I love Dan Laining. I think that he is a star. I said this last year. If I had to buy stock and a young coach, I would buy it in Dan Laining.

And now you know why. I mean, he not only wins, but I love his mentality and I love how honest he is with that answer. Is Dan Lannning right? Yes, of course he's right. Of course he's right. Come on. Come on, come on, come on. Like, of course he's right because the timing of these games matter.

And I know he's taking a specific shot there. and, you know, you've got Chattanooga, you've got Eastern Illinois, and some of these games, the Sanford games, and things like that. And is it beneficial to play them this late and get essentially a buy? Of course, of course. And to suggest that it's not is, I think, disingenuous. Now, having said that, like, if you really look at this, let's not also throw stones and glass houses

because Oregon does have Montana State on the schedule. So it's not that we're just not scheduling FCS opponents. Cupcakes are littered across college football. Everybody plays cupcakes. So it's not about just pointing and saying like, oh, you played this team. Okay, that's fine. Everybody plays that team, that cupcake. Everybody has a bite of a cupcake.

Why cupcakes are delicious. It's more about the timing. And we all understand that. And that is true. There's no doubt. Now, what I think is interesting is as the SEC moves toward a nine conference game schedule, you know, I think that this is going to probably go away because it's just tough. It's tough for the league to schedule these games.

And what you don't want is for only like a third of the league or a quarter of the league to get these Cupcake games late in the season. And then the other teams are going to be looking and they're like, well, that's not fair because it's an obvious buy late in the year. And so we'll see how the competitive balance all swings out and how the SEC wants to navigate their nine game schedule. Maybe it's different. Probably will be. And they'll try to navigate that nine game schedule, probably a little bit different than maybe the Big Ten does. But moving forward, I'm glad that they're going to play a nine game conference schedule. Because here, I will be the first one to sit here and defend Alabama's schedule.

And I understand they just played Eastern Illinois. I get it. Like, I get it. That's terrible. Or was it Indiana? Eastern eye. So whatever. You know, like, it's gross.

It's gross. But it's gross any time on the schedule. Now, more gross late? Of course. Of course. And you can't argue that. You really can't. However, Alabama has Florida State on their schedule and Wisconsin on their schedule.

Well, they didn't know that Florida State and Wisconsin were going to totally nose dive this year. They were trying to schedule what they thought were really good. programs. And so they have 10 power five games on their schedule. So do I lament the fact that Alabama has Eastern whatever on their schedule? No, that's fine. Is it beneficial to play them November 22nd? Of course. Of course. Same thing with Georgia. You know, Georgia, they've got games on the schedule that you look up and you're like, okay, like are those soft games? Yes. But do they have other tough games? Yes, of course. Of course. So I'm not shredding the schedules. The timing of these, I think, is beneficial. Oregon played Oklahoma State. So don't tell me like, oh, Oklahoma State sucks.

Oklahoma State had won 10 games in three consecutive years the year that they decided to agree to this game. They scheduled this game at the beginning part of 2018 after Oklahoma State had just had three straight 10 win seasons. So they're trying to schedule a game against a really good opponent. This is part and parcel to the issue with in college football making these schedules this far in advance because inevitably it doesn't end up working out. So is Dan Laining right? Yes. Should it get fixed? Probably. Will it get fixed? I hope so. In particular with the SEC moving to that nine conference game schedule. What's up, Klaz show fans? If you're looking for something fun to do or a great holiday gift idea for your friends and family, look no further than

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to download the app and you can have that code automatically added to your account. So you can use it later on in that app, Seat Geek. And thank you to Seat Geek for sponsoring today's show. Okay, let's get into the top 15. My new top 15 here in college football, remember I expanded to 15 just because as we get closer to the college football playoff in these final rankings, I thought it would be important to have these teams, how I see them near the bubble line.

And remember, the bubble line really is 10 because we're going to get a team that's not inside of this top 15, two of them, into this playoff, into the 12-team playoff with the group of five champion and potentially the ACC champion. or a second group of five champion. We'll see who wins those two conferences. So here we go.

Let's start at number 15 as Vandy. Vandy beat Kentucky 4517. Pavia went off. Diego Pavia has been a bright spot in college football. I've loved watching him play. I really have. I think he's going to be up for some of these awards nationally. But listen, this is a guy that has given his heart and soul

and changed the game in a lot of ways with that lawsuit for former junior college players, which, by the way, helped out a lot of players throughout the country. Almost every one of these games that I call, there's a player that benefited from the ruling that Diego Pavia championed, getting that extra year. And so he's taking advantage of that. Vanderbilt has been terrific under Clark Lee.

Miami at 14. They beat Virginia Tech, 3417 on the road. Virginia Tech's now 3 and 8. Beck through for 3.20 and 4 touchdowns with only his 5 in completion. So he was efficient. He was ready to go. The defense had 5 sacks. they had nine tackles for loss.

They did not defend the run particularly well. 235 sack-adjusted rush yards over seven per carry against Votech. That's not great. They've won three straight by at least three scores, so they're making their CFP case. I just don't know if it's going to be enough because I think we all realize if we watch the games and watch the film, like they're not as good as Notre Dame.

And that's the team that they're going to be trying to argue against, but they're too far from Notre Dame right now in the rankings in my rankings and in the CFP. At number 13, it's Texas. They rolled on offense 5237. Arch had a big day and the offense got going. And that could be problematic for Texas A&M. However, however, what happened to their defense?

Like, you look up and Texas defensively has given up 38, 31, 35, and 37 in their last four. What happened to this defense? I know Michael Taft has been in and out of the lineup, but what? I don't understand that. So Pete Kukowski is, he's got to figure something out because on that trajectory,

Marcel Reed and A&M will eat them alive. And they'll have to win that game against Texas A&M like it's a 2016 Big 12 game. And it's going to be like 57, 52. You know, their defense has got to improve. they have not played well over the last four. I already talked about Michigan. They're at my number 12 team.

They continue to get better and better. Like I said, more balanced and those young guys getting a lot of experience. At number 11, I'm going to go with BYU. BYU played an impressive game on the road at Cincinnati. Cincinnati was still alive. They controlled their own fate towards getting to the Big 12 championship game and potentially going to the CFP. But BYU ended that with a dominant performance at the line of scrimmage.

LJ Martin was unreal. 200 rushing yards. I think it was like 220 something, but over 200. BYU held the ball for 38.5 minutes. Kalani Satake, by the way, he's 21 and 3 over the last two years. Like this is a really good sound, fundamentally tough program. Now, they've got a lot of older guys, but when you watched LJ. Martin, those Cincinnati Bearcat defenders wanted no part of him.

All game long, he was just bad. battering that team. The offensive line was battering that. The 38 minutes, time of possession. And they win that game and are one step closer towards going back or going to the Big 12 championship game with a rematch with Texas Tech. And that's a team that is very good, but you never know. The ball bounces BYU's way, and they could wind up into the playoff. At 10, I've got Alabama still. That's where I had him last week. They beat Eastern Illinois. It was Illinois, not Indiana. There we go. At number nine, Oklahoma, I moved them down one.

Okay, so this is where like OU fans are going to get all upset. Let me take a drink of water. All right, here's what OU is. OU is an unbelievably good defense. They really are. Love watching them on defense. And they're a really bad offense. And so you know what Oklahoma is?

They're a souped up version of Iowa. That's all they are. And, you know, in some circles, people will be like, oh, well, that's an insult. I don't view it as that because I've respected Iowa for a long time. You know, before Colin Coward was calling them the fake idea of college football, like, I have loved Iowa for a long time because they do the right things to win games. And that's what Oklahoma is. So this is a compliment, but it's also a ceiling because we've known for a long time, even those of us that have been Iowa backers, that there's a ceiling on the level that Iowa can get to playing that way. And in particular, playing with an offense that can't generate points.

And OU is in that boat. They're a souped up version of Iowa. They've got eight offensive touchdowns over the last four games, and they are hugely reliant. I mean massively reliant on big plays and field position to do it. Like massively reliant. So it's not like they're scoring a lot of touchdowns anyways. And in order to score those touchdowns, they either have to have a short field or totally reliant on giant explosive plays

in particular for touchdowns versus Missouri, two offensive touchdowns, an 87-yard catch-and-run versus Missouri. And the other TD was when they got the ball in the Missouri 35, The defense forced Missouri to punt out of their own end zone, and so they got a short field, defense creating points. Those were the two offensive touchdowns versus Alabama. One offensive touchdown. They got a defensive TD, the only offensive TD.

The drive started at the Bama 31. Tennessee, two offensive touchdowns. They got a defensive touchdown. Both offensive touchdowns, they got the ball about midfield. So basically a short field. Against Ole Miss, they scored three times on offense. two touchdowns of 65 plus and one TD when they started on their own 40. It's like big plays in field position all over the place.

And all I'm saying is like there is a ceiling on that because someone will prevent that. And at some point, someone will score 20, 24, 27 on your defense. It just happens. Even the great defenses of, you know, yesterday year, even you think about some of these great defenses that Alabama had, that Georgia had. When you get into a playoff run, you'll get into a moment where it's like, oh, no, we're all of a sudden in a shootout. And I've always said, like, you have to have the ability to win both. You've got to have answers. Oh, you doesn't have those answers because

they can't score enough, generate enough points. That doesn't mean I don't like them. I love Oklahoma. They are earning their way into this playoff in a massive way. I love watching their defense, but their offense gives me pause, gives me some concern, which is. is why I moved them to nine. I moved Notre Dame to eight. I moved Notre Dame to eight because this Notre Dame team is dominating. Now, I get it. Like, this score got out of hand. I don't know what's happening at Syracuse. It's not good, though. Clearly, something's going wrong at Syracuse. They were down 210 before Notre Dame took an offensive snap. How's that even possible? Like, what are we doing? Now, granted, you know, Syracuse is starting a kid that's a true freshman that's basically a lacrosse kid,

not his problem, and I understand there are injuries, but Notre Dame was insane. Jeremiah Love in the first half had like eight carries for 171 and three tugs, four tugs, five tugs, six tugs, whatever it was. But this is why I moved Notre Dame up, is since week four, the D has basically been as good as Oklahoma's defense, and the offense has been light years better. In the last eight games, Notre Dame's defense, number three in the country. Their offense, number four in the country, scoring the football. Over that same span, Oklahoma's offense has been 73rd, their defense 15th. I totally get that the schedules have been different.

I'm just saying like that is a huge difference, though, a massive difference in particular on the offensive side. So just something to chew on as I move those two teams around in my top 15. At number seven, I've got Ole Miss. They were off this week. More on Lane Kiffin in a moment. I'm going to finish out the show with my thoughts on Lane Kiffin. So stay tuned for that.

Texas Tech is at six. They were off this week. Oregon moved up to five. I've moved them over Texas Tech. If you look at the most advanced metrics and even the resume, I mentioned it earlier. Oregon's resume better than Texas Tech's. So Oregon goes to number five. I moved them up after that really impressive win over USC. And then my top four is going to stay the same that it did last week. So I've got Texas A&M at four, Georgia at three, Indiana at two, and Ohio State. at one. I know people were very upset with my Georgia over Texas A&M, but I just think Georgia is better than Texas A&M. I think Georgia is the best team in the SEC. I think that they've proven that out, in particular, that win over Texas was huge. They are done in SEC play. Maybe they get to Atlanta. We'll see. I'm not sure. But that's how I see it. And I still have Ohio State up there at number one in Indiana. And number two, Indiana was off this last week. They will play Purdue. They win. They go to Indy. Ohio State. wins against Michigan, they go to Indy and we could have one and two versus each other in the

Big 10, excuse me, championship game in Indianapolis. The team's just on the outside that just didn't quite get into my top 15. I start with Utah. They had that huge comeback, but man, they allowed like 500 yards rushing. Now, that was a massive comeback. And Bird Fickland was running around. And man, their offense has been lights out the last four or five games. You know, they had fourth and one inside of two minutes and they get a big old run. You know, it's 47, 44. The place is going crazy. They got the black uniforms on.

Wild game. Both coaches crying after the game. I will wait, you know, until it's official to give, you know, kind of my complete thoughts about Kyle Whittingham. I will just tell you, like, I am really glad for Kyle that he got that win, which feels like the last time he's going to coach in Rice Eccles Stadium. And so like, and you could kind of sense that. You could kind of sense that.

So Utah was just on the outside. It couldn't put them in after that defensive performance. Virginia was right on the outside. Tennessee was right on the outside. Hey, impressive. A win in the swamp first time since like, what, early 2000s? Congratulations. Congratulations to Tennessee.

I think it was 03 was their last win in the swamp. So they go in there and beat basically a dead program. So way to go. Way to beat a dead horse, Tennessee. Congratulations. Miss Becky, I'll be waiting for your email. So there's Tennessee just on the outside. All right.

I got to give Lane Kiffin thoughts. I've got a little bit of news and some thoughts. So that's going to be our weekend check-in. It's time for that weekend check-in. Presented by graduate by Hilton, hotels made for fans. in all your favorite college towns. I love them. I love staying in them everywhere I go.

These are, they make college football better. You go into town for a college football game, your hotel stay feels like college football. It's awesome. All right, here we go, Link. Where to start? Let me start with just some news, and then we'll get to finish things out

with the entirety of the situation. I've been all over the map, and partly because the information has been all over the map. There have been moments when I thought he's definitely going to stay at Ole Miss. There's been moments that I have been told he's definitely going to Florida.

And now there's been moments that I've been told he's definitely going to LSU. That's kind of where the information stands. Pretty reliable that LSU is the frontrunner. And obviously this is coming to a head because they're announcing like when the decision is going to be made and the announcement. It's after the egg bowl. You know, so this is becoming, and I mentioned this weeks ago. I said, you know, this is going to become a distraction.

Lo and behold, it has. And this is not a knock against Lane because Lane is in a tough position. But it's also not going to be a defensive lane. Because regardless of the position you're in, you still have control and agency over your own decisions. So before we get into like this, I thought I would just quickly recap. Nick Saban had a really good, really good, and you can go check it out on social media, kind of comment about the situation that we're in and the predicament that Lane finds himself

in that is frustrating, I'm sure, for him and for everybody involved. And that is that the structure of our sport is in a lot of ways broken and certainly not suited to allow people to make decisions that are best for all parties. We don't have that. So what Nick Saban was saying on Game Day was absolutely correct. It's like, and granted, I don't know if it was a defensive lane or if it was just a, I think it came more out of the vein of he's frustrated by the calendar in college football. I'm sure he has a lot of frustrations about some of the things that he feels like.

are broken in college football. And the calendar is one of them. And here's what's broken, is that we are trying to build rosters through early signing day and early December. Season's still going on. In fact, it's conference championship game week, which is like so dumb.

Then we're going to have the transfer portal open up when some teams are still trying to play in the playoffs. Now, we tried to, quote, fix it with a bandaid over a bullet wound by moving the transfer portal from December to January, but they didn't fix it. And it's just part and parcel to the frustrations that a lot of us have with the people in college football that make decisions.

And it's not even an individual because it's always some giant committee and these coaches have their say and these ADs have their say and so on and so forth. But the calendar is broken. And so here we have programs trying to hire their next. coach and they feel like they need their coach in order to build the roster because the roster building is taking place starting the first week of December. But the season doesn't end until potentially January 20th. Well, that's broken. Clearly, guys, we have been seeing this train come down the tracks for some sort of incident like this for a long time. We've all known that

this was broken. Bula had to make this decision. Preston Stone had to make this decision where they were players last year in the expanded college football playoff. And the portal opened up and they had to transfer. Now, some of them were saying, I'm going to transfer. I'm going to stay with my team. Others said, well, I'm going to transfer and have to leave now. I mean, it was a mess. It was a mess because we were forcing players and in some cases coaches, but mostly players to make these decisions that they shouldn't have to make because those two things should never coexist. We should never be in a position where roster building and competition coexist.

That's the dumbest thing in America. And Saban made an excellent point. In the National Football League, there are specific times when you can and can't talk with a coach. If you're an organization trying to hire a coach, even if you fired your coach, there are times that are specific to when you can talk to players to try to get and recruit them towards your franchise, whether it's in the draft process and or in free agency. Well, now we have essentially the same thing in high school recruiting.

You can call that the draft process, even though that's a recruiting thing. And then you have free agency, which is called the transfer portal. There is no reason, none, absolutely no reason why we should have the competition of the season coexist with roster building. It's asinine. It's crazy. And we need to change that. And I think Nick Sabin was saying that on Saturday on game day. And that's exactly what I would say right here. And I will tell you, I can fix it in 30 seconds. You don't need to lament it for 10 minutes or 15 minutes. We don't need a committee. We don't need a subcommittee. We don't need to talk about it over five different meetings. I don't need 18 zooms. Here's how you do it. Finish the football season. Then sign. your high school players, then open the transfer portal, period. It is not that difficult. Not that difficult.

Move the championship game as close to January 1st as you possibly can. Why not? Don't give me this crap about we've got to protect finals in December with the players that are playing in the playoffs. Like, give me a break. Give me a break. Now that we pay these guys a lot of NIL, a lot of them never even take on-campus classes to begin with. They're all online. Like, you know, like that is a, that is a farce and an excuse.

We need to move the championship game as close to January 1st as possible. Stop trying to protect all these bowl games. That's all they're trying to do is protect bowl games and contracts. And it's like, well, fix that. Fix it. Then let's not sign high school players till at least January, maybe even February, like it used to be, like it used to be. It used to be better than this. It used to be better than this. And I wouldn't open the transfer portal until April. They debated January or April, and a few coaches pounded the table for January, like a bunch of whatever, and it should have been April. But finishing the season before roster building is how you fix this. And these rules about when you can talk to coaches and when you can't talk to coaches,

that would obviously help as well. So now we start thinking about this specific situation with Lane. Is the calendar broken? Yes. And are there consequences to the decisions that you make? Yes. You see, the two can be true at the same time. And that's life. And there are a lot of times in life for all of us that we are asked to make tough decisions. And they're not always the most comfortable decisions. They're not always the decisions that we want to make, but they're the decisions that we have to make. And I firmly believe this is one of those cases. You know, football is hard.

It's really hard. I loved it. My dad was a football coach for 30 years at the high school level. I loved playing it. Part of what I loved about it was it really is the quintessential team game. And you're asked to be selfless and you're asked to play a role. And you're asked to do that by a coach. And that coach is essentially asking you to lay down yourself for the benefit of the group.

and the teams that do that the best typically win. And that's why it's a great sport. You got to do your job. You got to work hard all year round. You got to care about your teammates. You got to hold them accountable. They have to hold you accountable. You know, like it's a great environment.

I miss it. I love it. I absolutely love it. And the person setting that standard is always the head coach. You know, and that head coach, the ability of his ability to get players to buy into that type of culture is directly tied to his credibility and how much his players trust him. And I know that college football has gone more transactional than when I played.

And I understand that. And so I don't want to sit here and lament like, well, back in the date. No, no, no, that's not how it is. Because it's even this way in the NFL. And those guys are getting paid and they can leave when they're free agents. and yet typically the best teams are the teams that the guys understand their roles and they lay down themselves for the group, for the benefit of the group. That doesn't mean that some don't become stars. Of course they do. It's football. We're going to shine lights on the people that are excelling. But the coach is the one that's trying to set that culture and his credibility is paramount.

And the trust that the players have in him is paramount. And here's all I would say is that your credibility is your currency. as a coach. How does Lane Kiffin leave Old Miss in the middle of a playoff run and have any credibility at his next place? I don't think that he would. I don't think that he would. And so we can sit here and lament the calendar and realize that like, hey, man, this is not a great position for Lane to be in. I totally agree with that, but it's also still up to him. And, you know, if you say yes to everything, how can you be committed to anything? I don't think he has to go anywhere to find success.

This is not like it used to be. You see, it used to be like LSU would come open and you're like, I got to go there if I want to win at the top end. But guess what? The proof that you don't have to do that is Lane. at Ole Miss. He is the proof that you don't have to do that. He is winning at the top end at Ole Miss. He doesn't have to leave.

Kurt Signetti is proving that at Indiana. He's number two in the country. Number two could win a national championship this year. Joey McGuire is proving that at Texas Tech. You don't have to go there. You can win in this era, in the modern era of college football. The fit is more important than the logo on your hat. Because you can win if you've got the support, which they do at Old Miss.

This is not a money thing. And maybe is his family definitely going to be happier in one of those other two places? I mean, is the grass really that greener? I don't know. They don't have, I don't know. And listen, I'm not going to, I'm not going to sit here and say, like, he can't do it or this or that. I'm trying to stop as close as I can to that. But I am concerned for what that would mean for college football, because this would be like a car accident of epic proportions.

If he were to leave and then not coach the CFP, he is destroying the Ole Miss football team. Those kids committed to him as much as they did committed to Ole Miss. Then they committed to each other to achieve something great. They will not excel in the playoffs without him as their play caller. And if he leaves them, it's not just the calendar's fault because he has agency. He has agency. And he doesn't have to leave. So I would just say like your credibility as a coach is everything.

And your credibility is tied to your character. And, you know, the biggest threat to your credibility and life, all of us, is ourselves. That'll do it for the Joel Class show. I appreciate you watching. Tuesday night will have more rankings, reaction to those rankings coming on Tuesday night. We'll have picks and previews getting you all set for the huge game. I'll be there in Michigan. Gus, Jenny, and I will have the call.

We've got a three-hour edition of Big Noon kickoff. That's coming up straight from Ann Arbor as Michigan and Ohio State Tangle here in 2020. I cannot wait for that one. Thanks for watching everybody. We'll be back on Tuesday. Have a great week.