Care: Bo Jackson Has "It"

I wasn't a detractor but was firmly in the "wait and see" camp after the Grambling game when a lot of this board suggested Bo was #1 easily after his outing against an overmatched FCS foe. We'd seen that before with Hayden not even long ago and it screamed confirmation bias and jumping the gun.

I may have been wrong.

Ohio is also an overmatched opponent but nowhere near the level of Grambling. Bo looked like our best RB tonight, though I have to give credit to CJ because he brought the hammer repeatedly (ignoring that one play near the goal-line where he got body slammed by a Safety). But Bo seems to have that "it" factor that you want to find in players. He finds holes quickly and runs with purpose. We are going to be seeing more and more of him and I'm guessing he's firmly #2 on the chart right now for Washington with CJ getting the start.

Don't Care: Our QB is a Freshman and looks like it sometimes

It is really easy to forget that Julian Sayin has only started three games in his career. He's played with impeccable poise this season so far, but our opponents and/or game plan didn't call on him to do much. Texas is both a much worse team than expected (it is not going to be a massive win by the end of the season, my prediction) and we barely had Sayin do anything. Grambling is...Grambling.

Sayin is young and he showed it tonight. He missed a number of open receivers and obvious first reads (JJ Smith on a deep out, Inniss wide open for a touchdown on an early red zone trip at the goal line, etc). He also had a few misfires we hadn't seen. But that's okay. He isn't showing that mistakes rattle him, and he's continuing to learn. It's good for him to mess up right now because he can grow from it. And he's going to. He also had some awesome plays today (TD to Klare, pass to CJ that was a called-back TD, etc). We are going to have to take the infrequent bad with the lots of good this season. Comes with the territory.

Care: Our defense is REALLY good

Again, we haven't played anyone with an offensive pulse at the championship level of football yet. Let's wait and see a bit...Washington will be a good upgrade in competition. But so far our defense is disciplined, tackles with authority (ignoring you, explosive touchdown from tonight), and is playing as a complete unit.

Our seeming lack of pass rush may feel like a weakness but I think it's also a bit by design. We are letting our LBs and stand-up DEs wreck absolute havoc while our linemen occupy blockers and contain. And it's working gangbusters. Our LB starters are the best duo we've had since...I don't know. Arvell Reese is playing himself into an early NFL exit because he's that damn good.

This defense is good enough to lean on when needed, and is only going to get better.

Don't Care: Experiments at punt return

I'm done. Get JJ out of there. If Inniss is the most trustworthy keep him there but he offers almost nothing in terms of advantage. But JJ is done. He is too big and not shifty enough to do what returners need to do, and he's too valuable to risk back there.

Try someone else out that has a punt returner physical ability: shifty, excellent acceleration, and good hands. Oh, and smart enough to make the right calls. I've seen Inniss make too many bad decisions when fielding both punts and kicks. This will hurt us eventually.

Care: Just win, baby

Tonight was ugly and very unfun until later in the game. It was the letdown game many thought we looked like we wouldn't have this year due to our focus. I'm hoping and thinking it's the letdown game we needed. We can't look unbeatable forever and we need to have our flaws highlighted. Tonight was a low-risk environment for that and I'm glad it happened.

Ohio isn't a bad team but it's one that should not be anywhere near within a TD at halftime against us. Part of that seemed to be our clock-draining, run-focused game plan early on but it wasn't great football to watch.

But we won. And it was the most lopsided "close" game for three quarters I think I've ever seen. Outside of one freak play Ohio averaged less than 6 yards per possession. No, not per play. Every drive they had averaged less than a first down. They could do nothing on offense. That's elite defense and our offense just needed to get out of its own head in the red zone. I expect that to be fixed.

The best thing about going 3-0...