The Original
College Football Czar
Week 4
Week three in review: Well, that'll teach the College Football Czar not to brag about his previous week's accuracy. He started with a record of 0-3 on Friday night, and things got progressively worse from there as he finished at 7-12 for the week. Hopefully, these stupid, disobedient games will be a little more agreeable this week.
After only three weeks, we have our first coaching casualties of the season, with Virginia Tech dismissing Brent Pry after a 45-26 loss to Old Dominion dropped the Gobblers to 0-3, and DeShaun Foster getting let go by UCLA after his Bruins were manhandled by New and Improved Mexico. Pry leaves Blacksburg with a career record of 16-24. Foster had barely started his second season in Pasadena, with a record of 5-10, but the dramatic elevation of the former running backs coach had been a bit of a reach in the first place. Now that the program has invested, perhaps unwisely, in a $4 million-a-year Nico, a greater sense of urgency has set in.
The wussification of football, sports and society in general shows no signs of slowing down, the Czar regrets to report. In particular, he made the following three observations during Week 3:
* Football Wussy Alert #1: Several of last Saturday's late-afternoon games were put on hold for hours, supposedly for lightning delays. By rule, a game may resume once there have been no lightning strikes within eight miles of the stadium for 30 minutes. This needs to be made mandatory, because what is happening now is that after the initial lightning delay, the game is being held up until the entire weather system has passed. This is unjustifiable. If the restarting of games is going to be put off just because of heavy rains, then why is lightning necessary in the first place? Why not just have rain delays in football, like there are in baseball? There's no logical reason not to at this point, except that it isn't the way the game is meant to be played, and how many of us care about that anymore?
* Football Wussy Alert #2: One side of the South Alabama helmets that were worn last week had the words "South Alabama" on them, not in the kind of bold script as in a traditional helmet logo like UCLA, Pitt or Ole Miss, but in a fine, ladylike font that is borderline calligraphy. Yo've probably seen this passive, feminine script on the helmets of other small conference teams in recent years, like Miami Ohio and Akron, and thought that it must be taking a psychological toll on the team. Nobody is going to feel tough while wearing a wedding invitation on his head. It's a wonder old-time Iowa coach and head-game grandmaster Haden Fry never papered the visitors' locker room with this stuff.
* Football Wussy Alert #3: Notre Dame has introduced a new leprechaun logo this year, apparently designed to take the fight out of the Fighting Irish. Instead of putting up his dukes, the new leprechaun is carrying a football, although he does not appear to be running downfield with it. Instead, it looks like he's angrily walking away. If the idea was to placate anyone who was offended that the Irish would be stereotyped as belligerent, somebody should explain to the hypersensitive school officials that George Carlin was only joking when he complained about that. Is it any wonder that the team is underachieving so far this season? Whereas the traditional leprechaun was poised for pugilism, this new one is taking his ball and going home.
For the season, the College Football Czar's record is now 35-27, for a .565 winning percentage.
Sept. 19
Iowa at Rutgers
We're told that Kirk Ferentz just
became the winningest coach in Big Ten history, but how is that being
counted? The great Amos Alonzo Stagg
coached the University of Chicago for most of its years as a member of this
same conference, during which time he collected 232 victories, as opposed to
Ferentz's 206. Are they subtracting all
of Stagg's victories from the years before the league renamed itself the Big
Ten? If so, that's really cheap. The league that began as the Intercollegiate
Conference of Faculty Representatives, and then was known for a time as the
Western Conference, was the same entity that is now called the Big Ten. A couple rebrandings don't change what the
man accomplished.
If Ferentz hangs in there for three
more years, he might end up breaking the record legitimately. If he does that, hopefully it will be in a
conference game against a traditional rival like Minnesota, and not a nonconference
47-7 mugging of Umass, which is what happened a week ago. Even considering the level of competition, it
was an impressive performance. The
Hawkeyes did not allow a third or fourth-down conversion all game long, did not
turn the ball over, and committed only one penalty for five yards.
Anymore, the College Football Czar
mentally projects an asterisk next to every unblemished September record he
sees, and this year's Scarlet Knight team is a prime example of why. Yes, the Jersey Boys have started 3-0, but
they've done it against two teams from the MAC and one from Division I-AA. One might think their noggins were red from
embarrassment, but the fact that they're still wearing that "Chop4Change" logo
on the backs of their helmets proves that they are incapable of shame.
With all of the colorful nicknames
coaches had in the old days, you'd think somebody named Amos Alonzo Stagg would
jump at the chance for someone to hang a moniker on him like Weevil, Thud or
Scratchy. If he were a sports figure
today, somebody would cleverly nickname him AAS, which would actually not be an
improvement.
Iowa 24, Rutgers 10
Sept. 20
West Virginia at Kansas
In a 31-24 overtime win against
Pitt, the Mountaineers showed that, unlike the Panthers, they have a roster
that is more than one-deep at the running back position. With Jaheim White out for the season, senior
Tye Edwards went on a Tye-raid for 141 yards and three TDs on 25 carries. This should not have come as a total
surprise, because he had been a 1,000-yard rusher at the Division I-AA level a
year ago, with Northern Iowa.
The Jayhawks only rushed for 31
yards in their 42-31 loss to border rival Missouri, and most of that yardage
came from QB Jalon Daniels. Running
backs Daniel Hishawjr and Leshon Williams combined for just six yards on nine
carries. By comparison, the two of them
totaled 126 yards and a touchdown on 19 carries in their opening win over
Fresno State. The College Football Czar
assumes coach Lance Leipold has noticed the difference.
The Eers have gotten pinned in three
consecutive games away from Morgantown, including a 17-10 upset at Ohio in Week
2. That's a trend that may very well
continue, with upcoming road games against BYU, UCF, Houston and Arizona State.
In Kansas, when trailers are
overturned, it means there has been a tornado.
In West Virginia, it just means it's Saturday night.
Kansas 22, West Virginia 16
Auburn at Oklahoma
It will be interesting to see what
kind of reception Tiger tosser Jackson Arnold gets from his former home fans in
Norman. Last season as a Sooner, his
numbers were pretty good everywhere but the scoreboard. OU ranked next-to-last in the SEC in scoring
next to only Kentucky, averaging an even 24.0 points per game. So far in 2025, Arnold has taken better care
of the ball than his replacement, John Mateer, but he has not been nearly as
productive.
The Sooners, as the name implies,
got off to an early start last week at Temple, where they took a 25-0 lead five
minutes into the second quarter. The
42-3 final gives them one of the more legitimate 3-0 records in the nation, as
it came a week after a convincing 24-13 win over a ranked Michigan team.
This could be the first time since
2017 that AU is a significant factor in the SEC, especially if it can pick off
one of its first three conference opponents: OU, Texas A&M and
Georgia. Hugh Freeze's team, also 3-0,
scored a quality road win at Baylor in Week Zero. This past Saturday (September 13th: Save
the date!) they defeated South Alabama, 31-15.
The Tiger toss is just like a dwarf
toss, except that they use Tiger Woods instead of a dwarf. That must have been one whale of a bet he
lost.
There is no such thing as a John
Daly toss, in case you were wondering.
Oklahoma 42, Auburn 34
Illinois at Indiana
Just in case nobody has done it yet,
the College Football Czar hereby christens this game "The I-Test," between the
happy-go-lucky Hoosiers who have faced little serious competition in the past
twelve months, and an experienced Illini team that might have contended for the
2024 playoff itself, if it hadn't played road games against both Penn State and
Oregon.
Former Cal quarterback Fernando
Mendoza has been lighting it up for the candelabra-heads, with nine touchdowns
and no interceptions through three games.
Of course, those three games have been against Old Dominion, Kennesaw
State and I-AA Indiana State. If he
duplicates that feat over his next three games, then we can talk about him
bringing another playoff bid back to Bloomington.
So far, the only meaningful game for
either team took place in Week 2, when the Illini went plus-5 in turnovers in a
45-19 drubbing of Duke. Four different
defenders recovered fumbles for them in that game, which just goes to show that
there may be no "I" in "team," but there are eight of them in "Illinois
Fighting Illini."
How's that, in lieu of a
point?
Illinois 35, Indiana 27
Nc State at Duke
The Blue Devils scored 11 points
late in the fourth quarter of a 34-27 loss at Tulane, making the final score
look a little bit better than they deserved.
For most of the game, they were soundly outplayed by the Green Wave,
just as they had been by Illinois a week earlier. So far, their only win on the season has been
against Elon, a man whose own toddler son beat him up for naming him X. That's not much to brag about.
Wolfpack running back Hollywood
Smothers rushed for 164 yards at Wake Forst last Thursday night, but it was the
NCSU defense that suffocated the Demon Deacons in the second half of a 34-24
conference-opening victory. The Pack had
trailed 24-17 at the break, but held WF to four consecutive three-and-outs,
then added an interception and a turnover on downs. Altogether, they allowed only 39 yards in the
second half.
It's a little-known fact that his
name isn't really "Hollywood Smothers"; it's "Hollywood's Mothers." He's just a little reluctant to admit it,
because when he does, people walk up to him and scream, "No wire hangers
EVER." Being too young to get that reference, he naturally finds it really
annoying.
Nc State 24, Duke 16
Michigan at Nebraska
The Wolverines are among the fairly
small percentage of teams that is not padding its record against a
lower-division opponent. In their
three-game nonconference schedule, they defeated New Mexico, lost to Oklahoma,
and moidelized Central Michigan.
Freshman QB Bryce Underwood hasn't gotten things going yet, but even as
a work in progress, he's an improvement over any of the QBs who were in last
year's rotation.
The Cornhuskers have clobbered Akron
and I-AA Houston Christian by a combined score of 127-7. In their only competitive game, they barely
held of Cincinnati, 20-17, in a Week Zero neutral-site game at Arrowhead
Stadium. The Bearcats had gotten into
range to attempt a tying field goal, until safety Malcolm Hartzogjr preserved
the victory with an interception in the end zone.
In a series that was once tied, the
maize and blue have taken command over the past decade, winning all four games
against the N-men, three of those decisively.
When they last met in Lincoln two years ago, the Huskers had to score a
late TD to avert a shutout, in a 45-7 slobberknocking.
Michigan: "You call it corn. We call it maize."
Nebraska: "Really? That's not a very good school you've got
there."
Michigan 15, Nebraska 10
Texas Tech at Utah
This key early Big XII matchup pits
two ranked teams, each of which wears red and black, but neither of which is
called the Redblacks. The Red Raiders
have barely been tested so far, beating Oregon State, Kent State and Division
I-AA Arkansas-Powder Puff by a combined score of 174-35. The Utes are 3-0 against slightly better
competition, scoring road wins against UCLA and Wyoming, and pointlessly
beating the wolly-doodle out of I-AA Cal Poly.
One thing that has been consistent
for Kyle Whittingham's team has been the availability of starting quarterback
Devon Dampier. Unlike last season, the Ute
players and coaches can practice during the week knowing who is going to be
behind center for them on Saturday. So
far, Dampier has shown no signs of the turnover problems that gnawed at him at
New Mexico last season, having thrown seven TDs with no picks through three
games.
On the other side, the one they call
The Red Behren has won a lot of air battles for the Raiders. The fifth-year Tech QB has an outside shot at
compiling 10,000 passing yards, all at the same school. If not for injuries, he probably would have
reached that mark already.
Can you imagine a football team
named the Redblacks? How drunk must a
country be to even think of such a thing?
Texas Tech 34, Utah 31
Syracuse at Clemson
This is generally looked upon as a
dangerous matchup for Dabo Swinney's team, ever since the Orange upset them in
2017. However, the Son of Clem has won
all six games since, including a 31-14 flattening in their last meeting, in
2023.
The College Football Czar has been
explaining since his preseason issue why he doesn't think the Tigers are
national contenders this year.
Nevertheless, he can't believe how many lardheads who get paid to
analyze college football are writing them off from the playoffs already. Granted, at 1-2, an at-large bid looks highly
unlikely at this point, but this team is only 0-1 in ACC play, and they don't
have to face Miami or Nc State in the regular season. Their two losses have been to two of the four
toughest opponents on their schedule (LSU and Georgia Tech). Last year, they made it into the playoff with
three losses, because they won the ACC title game. This same result is well within their reach
as things stand now.
The Cuse must have felt good about
having beaten Uconn in overtime, until the Delaware Fighting Blue Hens did the
same thing a week later. The Husky
defenders can't get that song out of their head ever since SU tight end Dan
Villari beat them for 104 yards on seven receptions.
Not the whole song, of course, just
the one line everyone knows. "Vil-laaa-ri,
O-oh-o-ohh." [repeat until stupid]
Clemson 20, Syracuse 10
SMU at TCU
The Mustangs stank out the joint in
a 28-10 win over Division I-A debutante Missouri State, in which they committed
12 penalties for 130 yards. At least
that gave them plenty of opportunities to say "Doh!," as long as they
were visiting Springfield.
The Horned Frogs hammered North
Carolina on Labor Day, 48-14. A lot has
since been said, probably accurately, about the unrealistic expectations for
Bill Belichick at UNC. On the flip side,
however, this Texas Christian team has not gotten enough credit leading up to
that game or since. If a quarterback
like Josh Hoover, who fell just short of 4,000 yards a year ago, were playing
at an SEC or Big Ten school, we would be sick of hearing about him by now.
These teams play for possession of
the Iron Skillet, which looks like one that had been used on a chuck
wagon. How do the coaches even begin to
explain such a thing to a bunch of guys who have grown up subsisting on
Lunchables?
Contrary to the title, Lunchables
are not able to be lunch.
TCU 44, SMU 30
Arkansas at Memphis
The 3-0 Tigers return home after
taking back-to-back road games against Sun Belt opponents Georgia State (38-16)
and Troy (28-7). With a victory against
an SEC opponent, they would be one of the favorites to get the group-of-five
CFP bid, at least until their American Conference schedule starts to toughen up
in late October.
The Razorbacks tied the game up
against Ole Miss four times, but never led, in a 41-35 setback. Quarterback Taylen Green threw for 305 yards,
and ran for 115 more, the latter being a career-high for a regular season game. The only time the fifth-year former Boise
State scrambler gained more yards on the ground was in the 2022 Frisco Bowl
against North Texas.
A lot of people don't realize that
the FBI has called Memphis "the homicide capital of America." It turns out the carnage consists mostly of
Elvis impersonators, who have died of irritating people until they snap.
Arkansas 39, Memphis 27
Florida at Miami
The 1-2 Gators take on a Top Five
team for a second week in a row, after coming out on the wrong end of a 20-10
tussle with LSU last Saturday in Baton Rouge.
Quarterback D.J. Lagway threw five interceptions, but perhaps the bigger
problem was that he had to throw the ball 49 times in the first place. UF abandoned its ground attack even though
the scoreboard did not require it to do so, and in spite of the fact that RB
Jadan Baugh had gained a respectable 46 yards on ten carries.
You can't always tell much from
common opponents, but the Hurricanes easily handled the South Florida team that
had gotten the better of the Gators a week earlier. Junior RB Mark Fletcherjr rushed for a
career-high 120 yards in the 49-12 trouncing.
Try saying that three times fast: Fletcherjr, Fletcherjr, Fletcherjr. That might be the catchiest name since Tom
Dooley.
At 20-21, Billy Napier is in danger
of becoming the first non-interim coach at UF to finish with a losing record
since the late 1940s. Compared to his
tenure, those of Jim McElwain, Will Muschamp and Ron Zook were smashing successes. When kids are taught their greater than-less
thans, they are told that the alligator eats the bigger number. If that's true, the gator is now tasting
defeat, and it doesn't like it.
Well, kids used to be told
that the alligator eats the bigger number.
Now they're asked, how does the alligator feel about social justice?
Miami 21, Florida 6
Tulane at Ole Miss
Perhaps the College Football Czar
ought to take the next opportunity to pick the Green Wave to win, lest it
appear that he's disrespecting New Orleans.
TU teed off on Duke last week to take a 24-3 lead, before holding on to
win by a final of 34-27. It has taken
very recent BYU quarterback Jake Retzlaff no time at all to get acclimated to
his new surroundings, passing for 245 yards against the Blue Devils, while
adding another 111 on the ground.
The Rebels have probably been tested
more than any other ranked team at this point in the season, having already won
SEC games against Kentucky (30-23) and Arkansas (31-25). Quarterback Trinidad Chambliss, formerly of
Division II Ferris State, took the wheel against the Razorbacks in a surprise
start, for 353 yards and a touchdown.
If Mississippi State coach Lane
Kiffin were hired away by Tulane, that would make it Threelane. The only reason he would entertain such an
offer is that he lives to annoy people.
Ole Miss 38, Tulane 31
Michigan State at USC
The 3-0 Spartans play their Big Ten
opener against a Southern Cal team that defeated Purdue last week, 33-17 after
a three-hour delay. MSU is looking for
its first road victory in more than a year, having lost four in a row away from
East Lansing to finish the 2024 season.
SC only went 4-2 in the Coliseum
last year, but those two losses were to final four teams Penn State and Notre
Dame. They haven't been beaten on their
home field by a lesser opponent since the barely legitimate Covid year of
2021. Is Sparty still a lesser opponent? We'll find out.
Both teams are named after ancient
warriors, but at least the Spartans are famous historic victors, whereas the
Trojans are famous historic losers. The
College Football Czar has often wondered why teams pick loser nicknames like
the Trojans and Rebels, which only conjure images of defeat. Why not just call themselves the Luftwaffe?
Because this is America. We don't end words with schwas here.
USC 27, Michigan State 14
Brigham Young at East Carolina
With expected starting QB Jake
Retzlaff dismissed on an honor code violation, freshman Bear Bachmeier has
stepped in behind center for BYU. No,
Bear is not a nickname, and it might not even be the strangest thing about him. He wears #47, which of course is highly
unusual for a quarterback, but hey, who's going to argue with a guy named
bear? When he runs a QB-keeper, it looks
as if the Cougars are running the wildcat, but they're not. They're running the Bear! Talk about a trick play.
The 2-1 Pirates could find
themselves walking the plank if they don't learn how to run the ball. As a team, they have only 406 rushing yards through
three games, and that includes one against the Division I-AA Campbell Fighting
Camels. Perhaps asking undersized RB
London Montgomery to carry the load this season is a bridge too far.
The chimpanzee in the 1980-ish TV show
B.J. and the Bear was named after Bear Bryant. The sons of the legendary coach, being
overzealous guardians of his legacy, have probably seen to it that the program
will never be shown again. Either that,
or it's just that nobody puts it on anymore because it was a total stinkeroni. You make the call.
Brigham Young 30, East Carolina 16
Maryland at Wisconsin
The Terrapins have opened the season
on a terr, but it hasn't been much of a challenge to shred Florida Atlantic,
Northern Illinois and Division I-AA Towson.
They are 0-4 all-time against the Madison Reds, losing 23-10 in their
most recent meeting, in 2022 at Camp Randall Stadium.
In spite of their weak early
schedule, the shellbacks are the worst rushing team in the Big Ten, at 116.7
yards per game. They have three running
backs with 25 or more carries, none of whom is gaining as much as four yards a pop. That shouldn't make them much of a match for
the burly Badger defensive front.
The Big Bad Gers should have learned
by now not to mess with an Alabama country boy.
In the second half of a lopsided home-and-home series, they were taken
apart in Tuscaloosa by a final of 38-14.
Quarterback Danny O'Neil, who was forced into the starting lineup by an
injury to Billy Edwardsjr, threw for only 117 yards with one TD and two
interceptions.
At the start of that previous paragraph,
the College Football Czar seems to have gotten two Jim Croce songs mixed up
with each other: "Bad, Bad Leroy Brown" and "You Don't Mess Around With Jim." This is understandable, because they're both
basically the same song, with different lyrics.
Is it any wonder that the little, funny-looking composer penned multiple
hits about big bullies who get their comeuppance?
"Write what you know" is a quote
that's often attributed to Mark Twain, but you can tell that this rule doesn't always
apply because ...
Well, never mind how you can
tell. You just can, that's all.
Wisconsin 13, Maryland 9
Arizona State at Baylor
The Sun Devils, formerly of the Pac
12, easily handled a future member of that same conference last week, with a
34-15 win over Texas State. Jordyn Tyson
is well on his way to a second consecutive 1,000-yard receiving year, with 314
yards and four TDs in three games.
The Waco kids aren't just pulling
your lariat when they tell you they've got an excellent passer in Sawyer
Robertson. You can tell the senior
slinger is a good quarterback, because he's got the requisite two last
names. In addition to that, he passed
for over 3,000 yards a year ago, and is already more than a third of the way
toward duplicating that accomplishment. He
started the season by passing for 419 yards in a tough loss to Auburn, and then
added 440 more against Southern Methodist.
BU coach Dava Aranda has bought some
badly needed good will with that 48-45 double-overtime victory against
SMU. Now, if only he can get through the
weekend without making any disparaging remarks about little red evil people
with bulging eyes and pointy tails.
Baylor 49, Arizona State 41
Bowling Green at Louisville
The Cardinals lost one of their most
reliable defenders to a lower leg injury, perhaps for the season. Linebacker Stanquan Clark must have Zagnutted
when he should have Zignutted, which is obviously not his fault, because
there's no such thing as a Zignut.
BGSU beat its first major college
opponent of the Eddie George era last week, with a 23-13 win over Liberty, but
its plodding offense is leaving too much work for its kicker to clean up. Jackson Kleather (as in "kick leather") is
already 9-for-10 in field goals this season, missing only a 54-yarder in a
34-20 loss to Cincinnati. The Falcons
are only averaging 314 yards per game, and against LU, that amount was reduced
by eight offensive penalties, not counting the two that were declined.
Kleather's club plays its home games
at Doyt-Perry Stadium, which is affectionately known as "The Doyt." It must take a great deal of concentration to
be a kicker in a stadium that's named after a Maddenesque off-the-uprights
sound effect.
Louisville 17, Bowling Green 10
Wyoming at Colorado
CU coach Deion Sanders has announced
the return of Kaidon Salter at quarterback.
His one-game benching in favor of Ryan Staub has apparently been deemed
sufficient to assign blame to him for the clock mismanagement on the final
drive of the Georgia Tech game.
For the first half of last Friday's
36-20 loss to Houston, it appeared as if Staub would be steady enough, but as the
game wore on the lack of protection he was given made his improvisations look
more and more desperate. Perhaps Salter,
having a stronger arm, can back off this Cowboy defense by beating them with a
deep ball or two.
Meanwhile, the Pokes' offense hasn't
been able to punch through a wet paper bag.
In two games against Division I-A opposition, they inched their way past
Akron 10-0, and got tossed around by Utah, 31-6. Even a feelgood win over I-AA Northern Iowa
only increases their average to 15.7 points per game.
Weird Al Yankovic once threatened to
sue Colorado because it looks a little too much like Wyoming. Well, in its countersuit, Colorado is
accusing Weird Al of looking too much like ... um ... never mind.
Colorado 14, Wyoming 5
a sports publication from The
Shinbone