Saturday was defined by slow starts for college football teams with high expectations in 2017. Three quarterbacks separated themselves from the pack.
Nine FBS teams started their season over the weekend. Five college football games kicked off the 2017 season in what turned out to be a rather disappointing slate of action to start the year. The Colorado State Rams started things off with a 31-point romping of the Oregon State Beavers, a sub-par effort representing the PAC-12.
UMass came up just short of Hawaii in one of the more exciting games to watch. Hawaii edged the Minutemen by three points. BYU came out with a poor performance against Portland State from the FCS with only a 14-point victory. The Cougars entered the game favored by more than 30 points.
Head coach Charlie Strong and the South Florida Bulls got down 16 points to the San Jose State Spartans early. Yet, quarterback Quinton Flowers and running back D’Ernest Johnson led a comeback resulting in a 20-point victory for USF. San Jose State looked solid, though.
Stanford had the final game of the day against the Rice Owls. The Cardinal actually finished up their 2016 regular season against Rice, defeating the Owls 41-17. Quarterback Keller Chryst and running back Bryce Love led Stanford to a 62-7 victory. Stanford looks to be the real deal in 2017 and put the college football world on notice.
Read Also: 3 takeaways from Stanford’s blowout of Rice
The rest of the Week 1 action continues on Thursday, Aug. 31 including key matchups like Oklahoma State vs. Tulsa and Ohio State vs. Indiana.
For the time being, we have five games worth of highlights to over analyze and nine teams that got the chance at the national spotlight when they might not have had the chance to otherwise.
Now, let’s take a look at three quarterbacks that made the biggest statement after Saturday’s action.