What seemed like a bad week was truly a bad week. OSU dropped 3.2 total point down to 28.0 and is now in 2nd behind Bama. A loss of 2.3 points on defense and .9 on offense based mostly on PSU looking much worse in retrospect. Rutgers actually did much worse than expected against OSU and Nebraska improved but PSU being obliterated by Maryland was really bad for OSU in the rankings. I think OSU is above where they are shown because the PSU that we saw was much different than the one Maryland saw. The bright side is the team isnt peaking in the first month in the same way the 2019 team did and boredom may have a lot to do with the struggles so far. The team was up 35-3 before they started giving up yards and slowing down on offense and against PSU the first half was dominant before they slowed down again. They have looked like unbeatable at times and with 6 games left its ok, if not better, to not be perfect at this point.
Worse thing from this week is OSU at this point is almost guaranteed to have to play Clemson and Bama in the playoff. Either Bama wins out and gets the 1 seed and OSU plays Clemson(who will beat ND in the ACC championship game) in the first round, or Florida beats Bama in the SEC championship making OSU the 1 seed but Bama will then be the 4 seed. Anyways here are some other notes
- #1-Bama, The Texas AM win is looking incredible right now, they destroyed a really good team. Florida is a much tougher matchup for them than UGA would have been. They have 4 garbage games left so for the next month, they are who they are. UF vs Bama should be great.
- #3-Clemson-yes they actually improved in their rating. The offense gained 2 full points after being nearly unstoppable against a really good ND defense. As much as you will hear "they lost without Trevor" DJ Uiagluluaolu was 29/44 for 440 yards and 0 interceptions. Trevor wouldnt be much better than that and his accuracy against good teams has always been his biggest flaw. 10 ypa is silly against ND. OSU's secondary is nothing scary but Clemsons receivers arent all that great either. Clemson averaged only 1.0 ypc behind an obviously bad offensive line. That is arguably their worst position group.
- #5-Florida stays after beating Georgia. They have the #5 offense and could score a lot of points on basically anybody in the country. They arent better than Bama but I have no doubts they could go and score 35+ and crazy stuff could happen.
- #6-BYU-Kind of crazy but Boise was destroyed on Friday. Wish we could see BYU against Pac-12 teams.
- #8-Notre Dame-They actually lost 3 points after upsetting Clemson. First realize while Clemson was #1 in the AP were clearly not as good as OSU or Bama in SP+. Their defense did very poorly, compared to BC were a lot worse. They lost all their points on that side of the ball and stayed neutral on offense. Good win for ND and they will remember this fun ACC season for a long time. A fully healthy Clemson should beat them pretty soundly and if not OSU or Bama will run them off the field. Also to not SP+ has a win expectancy based on team stats and Clemson would win that game 58% of the time with the exact same stats. That is with missing 3 starters in their front 7 and both starting receivers along with Trevor Lawrence.
- #9-UGA-Just plain bad on offense. Not much to say, their season is over they are 3 or 4 in the SEC and are in QB hell for this year and next year.
- #10-UC dropped a spot in the rankings but gained points. A very good team who dominates AAC tams. ND would have to beat Clemson again and Bama would have to beat UF for there to be a conversation about UC making the playoffs but it isnt a 0% chance right now. I think BYU also being undefeated could make it hard to pick one or the other.
- #14 PSU-dropped almost 5 full points. Terrible performance against a bad team. They should keep falling as preseason rankings are phased out
- #18 Michigan-They also continue to drop.
- #29 Indiana-They also continue to drop lol. Statistically they were worse than PSU and a little better than Rutgers and Michigan. Transitive games are making that all look worse and worse.
- #34-Nebraska-The only damn team making OSU's stock improve. They outplayed Northwestern, a solid team, but had just ridiculous things happen in the end zone. They moved the ball well against a great defense and really shutdown their offense for like half the game.
Nothing really changes in my mind after this week. OSU dropped but it had nothing to do with how they played against Rutgers. Bama has its hardest games behind them so we cant see how they perform without their best played(Jaylen Waddle.) Clemson failed its biggest test but because of so many injuries its hard to really get to excited about them not being great. Good news is Maryland and Indiana should both be pretty fun games that help find out alot. Maryland has an explosive offense that could expose some things on the defense. Indiana is physical as hell and if OSU doesnt come to play 4 quarters they are gonna be in trouble. Would love to see two good performances before they coast through Illinois and MSU.
https://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/30278870/college-footba...
