The Hodgepodge: Ohio State Produces Mixed Results in Week 1 Win, Nebraska Has a New Coach but the Same Results, Colorado Stuns the CFB World

By Garrick Hodge on September 4, 2023 at 11:35 am
Deion Sanders
Tim Heitman-USA TODAY Sports
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It may be Labor Day, but we’re not taking the day off at Eleven Warriors.

Week 1 gave us a ton to think about, so let’s get right to it. 

Ohio State's defense dominates, offense leaves a lot to be desired

Two days hours after OSU’s season opener, the fan discourse surrounding the team is all over the place. 

Some factions are pleased that the Buckeyes finally delivered a truly dominant performance on defense, holding a team to three points or less for the first time since the 2019 season and limiting Indiana to 153 yards of total offense. 

Others are up in arms about the offense sputtering too many times, failing to execute in numerous short-yardage situations and showing some valid concerns at offensive line and quarterback. 

Sometimes, both things can be true. There’s not really a way to sugarcoat the offensive shortcomings, especially considering Ryan Day sounded as harsh as I’ve heard him in a while when critiquing the offense. But, OSU is breaking in both a new quarterback and new offensive tackles at both spots. That combination may take a few games before everyone gets on the same page. 

For now, there’s no harm in letting a few more weeks play out before making definitive assessments. Ohio State’s next two opponents should allow ample opportunity for the offense to right the ship before its first true challenge of the year against Notre Dame. While Kyle McCord left a few plays on the field against the Hoosiers, C.J. Stroud wasn’t perfect in his first few games at OSU either, and I remember him turning out just fine. 

Above all else, the Buckeyes have the most talented receiving corps in college football. It just needs to find a way to get the ball in their hands consistently.

But OSU’s defense continues to give reasons to be bullish that it will be a dominant unit. The depth the Buckeyes feature is evident at all three levels, and despite not generating an abundance of pressure on the quarterback Saturday, Indiana hardly had a prayer of moving the ball. We’ll wait to anoint the defense as a truly elite group until it thwarts an opponent that has a little more oomph in its arsenal, but there’s a lot to be encouraged about. 

Buckeye spotlight of the week: The entire offense

In all likelihood, we’re not going to learn much about the Buckeyes this week facing FCS opponent Youngstown State. But there would be something to be said about getting a little momentum back on your side by accumulating more than 500 yards of offense and turning in a performance OSU fans have grown accustomed to on that end the last few years. 

New coach, same results for Nebraska 

We’re bringing the Nebraska bit back this season, eh? 

In a movie you’ve all seen before, the Cornhuskers turned the ball over four times in a 13-10 defeat to Minnesota, including two backbreaking giveaways in the final six minutes of Thursday’s season opener. With the loss, Nebraska is now a staggering 2-14 in one-score games since the 2021 season. 

If we’re looking at it objectively, it probably shouldn’t serve as a referendum on new Nebraska coach Matt Rhule considering the Cornhuskers were underdogs against a Minnesota team predicted by some to win the B1G West and were in the driver’s seat for the majority of the game. 

But, Rhule’s first impression to Nebraska fans is delivering the exact same type of defeat Scott Frost got fired for after they stacked up time after time over the last two years. There are only so many gut punches you can take as a fan. It also doesn’t help that the Cornhuskers will be back on the road this week to face an old Big 12 rival in Colorado that’s seemingly revived its program.

Ultimately, Rhule is a proven college coach who should steer Nebraska in the right direction eventually. It just might take a little longer than Cornhuskers fans would like. 

Colorado pulls a Week 1 stunner

I’ve never seen a one-win team from the season prior hyped up quite like Colorado was. From television promos to national publications writing frequent features to create a monthslong hype train, Deion Sanders became the most interesting enigma in the sport from the moment Colorado rolled the dice and hired him. 

In turn, it’s also hard to remember a team that was in such disarray turning things around so quickly. 

Sanders arrived in Colorado, purged nearly all of the Buffs’ roster in a nearly unprecedented offseason, then promptly made a statement in his Power Five debut by stunning the 2022 national runner-up 45-42 on its own home turf en route to matching the team’s win total from a year ago with 11 games to go. The oft-maligned Hall of Fame cornerback had (deservedly) been the main focus nationally when speaking about Colorado, but after an improbable Week 1 victory against TCU, the love should definitely be spread out to a couple of Buffs who have earned it.

Quarterback Shedeur Sanders set a school record for most passing yards in a single game by throwing for 510 yards while throwing for four touchdowns and completing 38 of 47 passes. Throwing for 500-plus yards is impressive against an FCS team, let alone the reigning national runner-up.

Freshman running back Dylan Edwards became the second freshman in Colorado history to ever score four times in one game and the first non-quarterback in school history to tally four touchdowns in his debut. Edwards, a former Notre Dame commit before flipping to CU, had 177 all-purpose yards, with three of his touchdowns coming in the receiving game and one coming on the ground.    

And finally, we’ve buried the lede with the Buffs. Two-way player Travis Hunter is truly special, an athlete capable of being a playmaker on both offense and defense we haven’t seen since at least the Chris Gamble days.

Hunter played 129 total snaps on Saturday, catching 11 passes for 119 yards on 16 targets offensively in addition to making three tackles, a pass breakup and an interception on defense.

It’s only one game, but so far, Hunter looks like the football version of Shohei Ohtani. With the violent nature of the sport, you just hope he can sustain playing that many snaps week after week. 

It’s anyone’s guess how this season is going to play out for Colorado. Perhaps the Buffs pick up wins against Nebraska and Colorado State and set themselves up for incredibly juicy early-season matchups with Oregon and USC. But we’ve also seen Week 1 darlings flame out as the season goes on. 

Either way, Colorado has already been rewarded for its bold hire of Sanders by making its program both far more interesting and set up for success. You have to wonder if his unorthodox way of doing things leading to early results emboldens another struggling Power Five school to consider hiring a head coach it wouldn’t have normally. 

The ACC needs a name change

Can you really call yourself the Atlantic Coast Conference if you import two teams from the West Coast and one from Texas? What do we call it now, the All Coast Conference? 

The ACC finalized the additions of Stanford, SMU and California on Friday, bringing the league to 18 members (17 football members with Notre Dame being an independent) beginning in 2024. SMU was so desperate to be in a power league it forfeited any TV revenue share for the first nine years of its membership. Stanford and Cal are earning only a 30 percent share. 

Regardless, the two Pac-12 remnants needed a place to go, and SMU has been trying to creep back into the national limelight since it was a huge proponent of NIL decades before it was legal. That’s all well and good. I just don’t really understand why it makes any sense for the ACC, since the revenue added to the conference with those schools will be minimal and the travel hassles for its incumbent members will be exponential (though it’ll be three times worse for the newcomers). 

The only thing that really makes sense is the conference leadership knows the writing is on the wall with the likes of Florida State, Clemson, North Carolina and whoever else has its eyes set on greener pastures, and doesn’t want to go the way of the Pac-12 dinosaur. How long it takes for the ACC rebels to challenge the conference’s Grant of Rights that runs through 2036 and announce their exit remains to be seen, though. 

What was fun and what was wacky about Week 1

Week 1 had a lot of things that were fun

  • Michigan State fans had to be cussing under their breath Sunday after watching transfer wide receiver Keon Coleman shine for Florida State, thinking what could have been. Coleman had nine catches for 122 yards with three touchdowns on 12 targets, setting a single-game career-high in touchdowns, tying a career-high in receptions and tallying the second-most yards he's ever recorded in a college game.
  • What an impressive win for Florida State, dominating LSU and winning by 21. It's hard to not see a prominent path to the College Football Playoff for the Seminoles, considering they manhandled the second-toughest opponent on their schedule (arguably the first, depending on how you view Clemson).
  • Hard not to be impressed by Utah and Kyle Whittingham, man. Starting quarterback Cam Rising is ruled out only a few days before the season opener against Florida, and the Utes hardly miss a beat against an SEC opponent. Backup Bryson Barnes threw a 70-yard bomb for a touchdown on Utah’s first play from scrimmage and finished 12-of-18 for 159 yards and one touchdown while the Utes outrushed the Gators 105 to 13. Maybe this is why Florida hadn’t played a nonconference opponent on the road since 1991 until Thursday.
  • Utah has a wide receiver named Timothy Patrick, the brother of Denver Broncos wide receiver Tim Patrick. As someone who is named Garrick and has a brother named Garrett, I feel that man’s pain. 
  • In the latest edition of JUST HOW THEY DREW IT UP, I present whatever the hell this is from Nebraska.
  • JUST HOW THEY DREW IT UP, part two.
  • Another entry to the Hodgepodge all-name team: Virginia QB Tony Muskett. 
  • Been a long time since I’ve seen a guy somersault into the end zone.
  • A big part of Nebraska’s collapse was made possible by Minnesota’s Daniel Jackson, who made one the best catches of the week in a clutch spot. Trailing by seven and facing fourth down with just more than two minutes remaining, Gophers quarterback Athan Kaliakmanis owes Jackson a steak dinner after bailing him out with a circus catch on an overthrown ball to a wide-open target.
  • UCF’s John Rhys Plumlee keeps climbing up my list of favorite college quarterbacks to watch. The dual-threat signal caller’s stat line against Kent State: 22-of-30 for 281 yards, three touchdowns, two interceptions, eight carries for 90 yards in a touchdown.
  • The majority of Michigan State vs. Central Michigan was a snoozefest full of Mel Tucker contract jokes for more than a half. But MSU wideout Tyrell Henry making a sick one-handed grab almost made that dreadful taffy pull worth it.
  • A perfect example of a team’s social media team taking a shot at the other that ends in hilarity. 
  • Hard not to smile after seeing how electric Laramie, Wyoming got after upsetting Texas Tech.
  • BYU’s mascot, Cosmo, has officially set the standard for mascot entertainment and has a future working for Nitro Circus.
  • Throws like this are why Tennessee’s Joe Milton is a must-watch for me every week (even if the receiver lets him down on this beautiful throw). 
  • North Carolina could be a sneaky ACC contender. The Tar Heels are most known for boasting an elite quarterback prospect in Drake Maye, but it was incredible to watch them manhandle the Gamecocks’ offensive line for a whopping nine sacks. UNC has the benefit of not facing Florida State in the regular season and gets to take on Clemson late in the year. There’s a long way to go, but the Tar Heels made a hell of a first impression.
  • There’s a non-zero chance Drew Allar establishes himself as the best quarterback in the Big Ten this year, or at least close to it. In his season opener against West Virginia, Allar completed 21 of 29 passes for 325 yards with three touchdowns for Penn State. 
  • Oregon scored 81 (!!) points against poor Portland State. I went and looked it up, Oregon men’s basketball scored 81 or more points only five times in a 36-game season last year.
  • Washington quarterback Michael Penix Jr. has to be the happiest man on the planet he left Indiana. His Week 1 stats against Boise State: 29-of-40 for 450 yards, five touchdowns, zero interceptions. 
  • The opponents have been Navy and Tennessee State, but nevertheless, Notre Dame has outscored its opposition 98-6 through two weeks. 
  • In two games, Caleb Williams has completed 36 of 50 passes for 604 yards with nine touchdowns and zero interceptions. Oh, and he’s still out here making plays like this.

Week 1 had a lot of wacky things too

  • After an offseason of salivating for the return of college football, fans turned their TVs on Thursday night at 8 p.m., likely to ESPN to watch Florida take on Utah. Well, you were SOL if you were a Spectrum customer, as Disney channels were removed from the cable company. I don’t envy those customer service representatives, who received some choice words all day Friday. 
  • Horrible day for nearly every Texas team in the Big 12 not bolting the conference at the end of the year. TCU reaches a national championship in 2022 then starts the next year getting gashed by Colorado. Texas Tech and Baylor took L’s from two Group of Five teams in Wyoming and Texas State. Yikes.
  • Maybe it's just me, but I can't remember there being as many drops in a top-10 matchup as there were in the Florida State vs. LSU matchup. 
  • Trailing 7-3 in the second quarter, Florida has Utah stopped. It’s 4th-and-3, the Gators are about to get the ball back. Then two dudes each wearing No. 3 jerseys trot onto the field for punt coverage. That equipment malfunction results in a penalty: First down, Utah. After being given a free set of downs, the Utes score on a 27-yard touchdown run. Oof.  
  • While Utah deserves praise for its performance, it’s pretty hard to fathom just how atrocious Florida looked. Quarterback Graham Mertz, who any Big Ten fan will tell you struggles from a terrible condition named one-readitis, threw for more than 300 yards and yet somehow left a lot to be desired. More alarmingly, the Gators tallied a measly 13 rushing yards and were vastly outplayed by a team without its starting quarterback. For the cherry on top, not only was Florida bad in all facets, but it was so checked out late in the game that it only sent EIGHT players to block a field goal. But hey, Utah missed it, so maybe Billy Napier is playing secret chess while everyone else plays checkers on special teams. In all seriousness, if things keep trending this way, Billy Napier better hope Scott Stricklin is a fan of national recruiting rankings.
  • What a start to the season for Arizona State. A few days before the Sun Devils’ first game, the athletic department self-imposes a one-year bowl ban for Herm Edwards trying a little too hard off the field playing to win the game. Then, Arizona State has a lengthy weather delay in the middle of its contest against Southern Utah after the Sun Devils go up two touchdowns. When play resumes, ASU almost blows it to an FCS team but hangs on to win a game that ends at 4 a.m. Eastern Time. At least Jaden Rashada looks fun?
  • Uh…UConn? Sadly can’t put this in the prestigious “just how they drew it up” category. 
  • Look at this first-half summary of Nebraska vs. Minnesota. Just revel in it. 
  • Central Michigan’s attempt of going for it on fourth down early against Michigan State ending with quarterback Bert Emanuel Jr. slipping for no reason made me legit belly-laugh.
  • We officially had a SQUIRREL DELAY in the West Virginia vs. Penn State game.
  • A perfect example of a team’s social media team taking a shot at the other that ends in disaster, considering the context of who they're playing.
  • Taking the Ohio State and Michigan rivalry aside for a second, didn’t it seem kinda weird Michigan players were memorializing Jim Harbaugh with T-shirts and a wacky formation when he’s serving a brief three-game suspension that was imposed by the university?
  • Speaking of Michigan, this touchdown throw that ended up standing seems justtttttt a bit past the line of scrimmage. 
  • If you’re going to run a fake punt, at least make sure the route run is deep enough to net you a first down, Northwestern. 
  • Oklahoma beat Arkansas State so badly it made Butch Jones cry on the sideline before the game was over. This is what a 73-0 beating does to a guy. 
  • Chip Kelly is speaking for all of us regarding these new cash grab clock stoppage rules.
  • Isn’t there a better time for West Virginia to break out the Chiefs’ Ring Around the Rosie play than on a two-point conversion attempt trailing 31-13 with 3:34 left?
  • Which was the only conference to not lose a non-conference game this week? The one that’s going to be extinct in a year, the Pac-12. 
  • Purdue lost its season opener to a Group of Five school, so naturally, tradition says it’s on pace to upset a nationally-ranked team later this year. 

Nepotism tracker 

Why is a nepotism tracker necessary, you ask? Why, it’s because Iowa offensive coordinator Brian Ferentz has it written in his contract Iowa needs to average 25 points per game and win seven games to keep working for his father. Can he do it? 

The goal: 325 points across 13 games, an average of 25 points per game. 

Last game: Iowa 24, Utah State 14. 

Points tallied this season: 24

If the season ended today: Iowa would finish averaging 24 points per game. Close, but not going to get it done, son! 

Up next: Iowa faces Iowa State, who allowed nine points in a 30-9 win over Northern Iowa.

Game of the Week

Texas (1-0) vs. Alabama (1-0), 7 p.m., ESPN

My pick: Alabama -7.5

Breakdown: This one just feels like a Nick Saban game. Alabama’s head man will tell his team all week that nobody believes in them, and for once, it may be somewhat true given the Crimson Tide’s quarterback situation. He’ll tell them how close they were to losing to Texas a year ago. Inevitably, this all probably ends with Alabama winning by double digits. If it wasn’t in Tuscaloosa maybe I’d feel different, but Saban doesn’t lose there often. 

Who I like tonight 

Clemson (0-0) vs. Duke (0-0), 8 p.m., ESPN

My pick: Clemson -13

Breakdown: I hope this one is more entertaining than I think it’s going to be. Along with Florida State, Clemson is a heavy contender to win the ACC this season, with quarterback Cade Klubnik drawing rave reviews in fall camp. Some teams just have your number, and Clemson has dominated Duke en route to winning 25 of the last 30 games in this series. I’ll pick the Tigers to cover, but don’t feel great about it. Duke is coming off a respectable 9-4 year and has a talented quarterback in Riley Leonard. It’s just difficult to expect the Blue Devils to rise to such a tall task in a season opener. 

Hodgepodge team tiers after Week 1

We love rankings here just as much as anyone else here, but instead of a top 25, what if we break things down into separate team tiers instead? Like Top 25 ballots, these labels are sure to change frequently every week once more data presents itself – and also get roasted to no end. 

CFP contenders: Ohio State, Michigan, Penn State, Clemson, Florida State, Georgia, Alabama, Notre Dame, Texas, USC, Washington, Oregon, Utah

Better win out if you want to be in the CFP: LSU

New Year’s Six bowl contenders: Texas A&M, North Carolina, Oregon State, Wisconsin, Iowa, Minnesota, Maryland, Kansas State, UCLA, Tennessee, Oklahoma

Fun Group of Five teams: Tulane, Fresno State, Toledo, Wyoming, Texas State, Jacksonville State, Western Kentucky

Could be a fun year for them: Colorado, Washington State, Kansas, UCF

Could be a long year for them: Texas Tech, Baylor, South Carolina, Nebraska, Arizona State, Florida 

Might be looking for a new coach at the end of the year: West Virginia, Boston College, Indiana, Northwestern (that one’s a given but so what)

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