There are a few interesting patterns to this week's schedule. One, most of the top teams in the country are playing the absolute worst teams in their conference. Alabama is four-touchdown favorite in College Station. Wake Forest will be a homecoming sacrifice to Clemson. Oklahoma, Penn State, and Georgia are playing the likes Iowa State, Northwestern, and Vanderbilt. They are combined 60-point favorites in those contests.
The week's schedule shines for two things. One, TCU is getting its due for a great season to this point by getting ESPN's College GameDay to visit for its clash with West Virginia. TCU is a two-touchdown favorite but ESPN will draw attention to what must have been a dark-horse-at-best pre-season selection in the Big XII.
Further, stay up a little later than you otherwise would to check out what will be a simulcast rushing duel between Stanford's Bryce Love and San Diego State's Rashaad Penny. Both are No. 1 and No. 2 in the country in rushing yards. Love, in particular, has been spectacular through five games. He averages more than 11 yards per carry and already has 1,088 rushing yards on the season.
Our apologies to Arkansas State and Georgia Southern, which played the season's first Wednesday game last night. Arkansas State won, 43-25.
Let's dive into the schedule.
Thursday
Louisville at NC State (ESPN, 8 p.m.). One of just two ranked matchups this week is on Thursday and involves NC State. The Wolfpack have rattled off four-straight wins after falling to South Carolina by a touchdown in the season-opener. They'll need to figure out Lamar Jackson, though. The Heisman-winner had 431 total yards and four touchdowns in a 54-13 rout last year in Louisville.
Friday
BYU doesn't have the most experienced coaching staff and it shows. (Kirby Lee-USA TODAY Sports)
Memphis at Connecticut (ESPN, 7 p.m.). Last week's Friday matchups were among the best I had ever seen for that day. It even gave us a big Washington State upset of USC. This week will be much milder by comparison. It'll start with Memphis traveling to East Hartford as two-touchdown favorites.
Boise State at BYU (ESPN, 10:15 p.m.). The nightcap for Friday will feature the Broncos traveling to LaVell Edwards Stadium to take on a 1-4 BYU team desperately trying to get things on the right track. Its last game, a 16-point loss at Utah State, particularly stung.
Saturday
Wake Forest at Clemson (ESPN2, 12 p.m.). It's homecoming in Death Valley. Wake Forest (+22) offers itself as a homecoming sacrifice for the defending national champions.
Iowa State at Oklahoma (FOX, 12 p.m.). This will be a recurring theme for the day. The top-ranked programs in the country are all playing some of the dregs of their conferences. Oklahoma will host Iowa State as 28-point favorites in anticipation of the Red River Showdown game next week against Texas.
Penn State at Northwestern (ABC, 12 p.m.). Continuing this trend, Penn State (-14.5) is heavily favored in its second conference road game this season. It does not expect Northwestern (2-2) will take it to the wire like Iowa did.
Georgia at Vanderbilt (ESPN, 12 p.m.). Georgia lost its starting quarterback in the season-opener but has been playing with its hair on fire. The No. 5 Bulldogs will play Vanderbilt as 17.5-point favorites, fully expecting to do to the Commodores in Nashville what Alabama did a few weeks earlier.
Ole Miss at Auburn (SEC Network, 12 p.m.). Remember when Ole Miss was a thing? The Rebels are 2-2 on the season and were thoroughly demolished by Alabama last week. It'll conclude its Yellowhammer State road trip with a visit to the plains as 21-point underdogs.
Temple at East Carolina (ESPNU, 12 p.m.). Both teams are combined 3-7 on the season and you can probably skip this unless every other game is at a commercial break.
Eastern Michigan at Toledo (CBS Sports, 12 p.m.). Eastern Michigan took Kentucky to the wire in a four-point loss and will hope to get back on the winning track against a 3-1 Toledo squad that also took Miami to the wire a few weeks earlier.
Lovie Smith needs some kind of marquee win early into his Illinois tenure. (Mike Granse-USA TODAY Sports)
Illinois at Iowa (BTN, 12 p.m.). The second year of the Lovie Smith project in Champaign looks no different than the first year. There are few metrics on which the Illini can hang their hat to demonstrate progress toward becoming a competitive football team. The Illini will arrive in Iowa City as 18-point underdogs as Lovie Smith looks for a signature win in his collegiate coaching career.
Texas Tech at Kansas (FS1, 12 p.m.). Texas Tech came tantalizingly close last week at home against Oklahoma State. It'll have little difficulty with Kansas on the road.
West Virginia at TCU (FS1, 3:30 p.m.). ESPN's College GameDay is coming to Fort Worth for a game on a FS1 telecast. It's largely a reward for the kind of season the Horned Frogs have had to date, scoring marquee wins over Arkansas and Oklahoma State, both on the road.
TCU is a 13-point favorite, with reason. Its defense is smothering and its offense is more than capable. Still, WVU can put points on anyone. The QB-WR combo of Will Grier and Gary Jennings is one of the better duos in the country.
Miami at Florida State (ABC, 3:30 p.m.). This was supposed to happen a few weeks ago, but Hurricane Irma delayed this game.
That might have been for the best for the Seminoles. Deondre Francois, and perhaps the departed Dalvin Cook, masked how mediocre-at-best Florida State's offensive line is. The first game without Francois was a home loss to NC State. It didn't improve too much against Wake Forest. There were even important stretches where the Demon Deacons were pushing around the much bigger and much more heralded Florida State linemen. The Noles won but resemble are at best an empty shell of the team we thought they would be in the preseason.
Miami is a three-point favorite on the road even as most of ESPN's simulations favor the Seminoles. This promise to be a barn-burner, however ugly, that harkens back some of the finer moments in this rivalry.
Notre Dame at North Carolina (ABC, 3:30 p.m.). The Tar Heels made the ACC Championship Game last year and had a quarterback taken No. 2 overall in last year's draft. You would think those metrics portend a competitive program in Chapel Hill.
Instead, they signal a depleted roster and a listless direction. The Tar Heels are 1-4 this season with just a 30-point win over recently-FBS Old Dominion to its credit. They'll be 14-point underdogs at home against an all-right-at-best Notre Dame team.
LSU at Florida (CBS, 3:30 p.m.). Arguably the SEC's best inter-division protected rivalry game lost a lot of shine last week when Troy upset the Tigers in Baton Rouge.
Maybe Orgeron is the same coach he was at Ole Miss. (Stephen Lew-USA TODAY Sports)
That's not to say there weren't already reasons to question how good LSU was. That 30-point loss in Starkville has not aged well. Mississippi State has lost both games since by a combined score of 80-13.
Meanwhile, the best comment I've read about Florida this season portrays the Gators as a natural experiment of how bad a football team can be and still win the SEC East. You've seen the results to date. The Gators are 3-1, but Michigan ran it over in Arlington. It needed a Hail Mary against Tennessee, outright defensive idiocy from Kentucky, and even made Vanderbilt look like Georgia last week in the Swamp.
Florida is a three-point favorite, largely because this game is in Gainesville.
Minnesota at Purdue (ESPN2, 3:30 p.m.). Purdue had a week to think about how it lost the Michigan game and will try to get back on the winning track as the Gophers come to town.
Air Force at Navy (CBS Sports, 3:30 p.m.). The first installment of the Commander-in-Chief's Trophy series is Saturday. Air Force has the trophy right now and will secure it in case of an intransitive (i.e. "rock-paper-scissors") outcome in this three-team rivalry.
Charleston Southern at Indiana (BTN, 3:30 p.m.). It's Week 6 and we still have a Big Ten team playing an FCS team. Weirdly, I'm kinda digging it.
Maryland at Ohio State (FOX, 4 p.m.). The Buckeyes are back on FOX for your personal game of the week. Stay tuned to Eleven Warriors for comprehensive coverage of this game.
Oregon State at USC (Pac-12 Network, 4 p.m.). USC should be smarting after its upset loss in the Palouse last week. Expect it to take out all its frustrations on a hapless Oregon State team that's almost assuredly the worst team in the league.
Tulsa at Tulane (ESPNU, 4 p.m.). The 1-4 Golden Hurricane come to take on a 2-2 Green Wave squad that's more competitive than you would think from the overall record. The two losses were at Navy (23-21) and at Oklahoma (56-14).
Arkansas at South Carolina (SEC Network, 4 p.m.). Says a lot about the SEC East that Arkansas can be a two-point favorite on the road in this game.
SMU at Houston (CBS Sports, 7 p.m.). Houston is a competitive 3-1 squad even as that home loss to Texas Tech took off the luster the program had for the past two seasons. Don't sleep on SMU, though. It took two full seasons, but the Mustangs are 4-1 to start 2017 and finally showing the signs that made Chad Morris the guy SMU wanted to hire away from Clemson.
Kansas State at Texas (FS1, 7 p.m.). Texas has looked impotent on offense and its No. 40 total defense can only do so much to keep the Longhorns from careening toward disaster. Texas will host Kansas State as four-point favorites but they're playing toward Oklahoma next week more than anything else.
Alabama at Texas A&M (ESPN, 7:15 p.m.). The first installment of this series as SEC conference game was an instant classic. Johnny Manziel had a classic outing, handing Alabama its only loss in what would later become a national championship season.
Every game thereafter has been even less competitive than the one that preceded it. Texas A&M, nominally 4-1 but still garbage, is a 26.5-point underdog at home to the No. 1 team in the country.
Virginia Tech at Boston College (ESPN2, 7:15 p.m.). Virginia Tech was thoroughly outclassed by Clemson, surprising this commentator who expected Virginia Tech to be in the same position for an upset it was in last year's ACC Championship Game.
Playing Boston College should help. The Eagles will be 16.5-point underdogs to the visiting Hokies.
Michigan State at Michigan (ABC, 7:30 p.m.). Michigan fans needed to wade through the Rodriguez and Hoke tenures before Jim Harbaugh could finally allow the fan base to reclassify Michigan State from "certain loss" back to "little brother."
Michigan is a comfortable favorite (-11) at home but don't lose sight of what happened the last time these two played in Ann Arbor.
Missouri at Kentucky (SEC Network, 7:30 p.m.). That Kentucky is 4-1 this season should tell you everything you need to know about how bad the SEC East is.
Wisconsin at Nebraska (BTN, 8 p.m.). BTN's prime time game this week is the Barry Bowl. Barry Alvarez, Wisconsin's celebrated coach and current athletic director, is a Nebraska alumnus.
This became one of the marquee games in the Big Ten after Nebraska joined the fold in 2011. The series has favored the Badgers, though. Nebraska has won just once (2012) and Wisconsin later spoiled that win by kicking its ass, 70-31 in the Big Ten Championshp Game that same season.
The Badgers are 12-point favorites on the road.
Washington State at Oregon (FOX, 8 p.m.). Is Washington State that good or were the wins over Boise State and USC flukes? Is 4-1 Oregon that good in Willie Taggart's first year or has it just played garbage teams like Nebraska and Southern Utah? We'll get an answer to both on Saturday night.
UCF at Cincinnati (ESPNU, 8 p.m.). Want to check on how Luke Fickell is doing in Cincinnati? You'll get your chance on Saturday night. The Bearcats host a red-hit UCF team that could credibly challenge for a New Year's Six invite at this clip.
Arizona at Colorado (Pac-12 Network, 8 p.m.). The 3-2 Buffaloes aren't playing like a team that could repeat as Pac-12 South champions, but they'll get their opportunity for the first league win in 2017 as touchdown favorites against Rich Rodriguez' Wildcats.
Stanford at Utah (FS1, 10:15 p.m.). Watch this game if only for Bryce Love. Bryce Love averages 217 yards rushing a game and is already over 1,000 yards for the season. He averages 11.10 yards a carry. He has a full 265 yards over my other rushing crush, San Diego State's Rashaad Penny.
In other words, keep an eye on Bryce Love and root for him if you want someone other than Lamar Jackson to win the Heisman this year.
Hawai'i at Nevada (CBS Sports, 10:30 p.m.). You'll have a lot of Saturday night viewing options, including this one in Reno between a 2-3 Rainbow Warriors program and a 0-5 Nevada team still looking for the first win on the season.
California at Washington (ESPN, 10:45 p.m.). California had a great start to the Justin Wilcox era, but the losses to Oregon and USC have muted what was otherwise a marquee win over an Ole Miss team (despite how bad Ole Miss promises to be in SEC play). Washington is a big (-27.5) favorite at home against California, but it's conceivable the Golden Bears will play the Pac-12 champions close.
San Diego State at UNLV (ESPN2, 10:45 p.m.). Bryce Love has outshined San Diego State's Rashaad Penny, but Penny has the win over Stanford from earlier in the season. Basically, watch this game and flip between ESPN2 and FS1 to watch the nation's top two rushers do their thing.
