Week 3 of college football was the weekend of bad losses. Normally, we look at the “3 Worst Losses”, but there were far too many gaffes to ignore this week.
Let’s begin by looking at some losses that were heartbreaking, but should not necessarily be considered “bad” losses. No. 12 LSU traveled to No. 7 Auburn in a big SEC West matchup. After a questionable pass interference call on the final drive, LSU came away with the win 22-21, on a last-second field goal. While Auburn had the home field advantage, we are quickly learning that LSU may be a playoff contender.
Another game where two Top 25 teams faced off was No. 17 Boise State at No. 24 Oklahoma State. Again, the higher ranked team lost. However, by no means was this a bad loss. The Cowboys straddled the Broncos (get it?) in a 44-21 win. A 23-point difference is pretty big, but many people are suggesting Oklahoma State may be a real contender for the Big 12 title.
Now we will look at a few losses that, although the betting line suggested the winning team should have won, we all know it was just a disappointing day for the losing team.
Again, not that bad, just sad
The Hawaii Rainbow Warriors opened up the season 3-0, with wins against Colorado State, Navy, and Rice. Hawaii, led by sophomore quarterback, Cole McDonald, had to travel across the continental United States to West Point, New York, for a six-hour time zone difference. The noon kickoff meant a 6 am local time start for Hawaii.
The Rainbow Warriors’ offense was averaging 48.3 points per game after their first three games. However, in Week 3, the offense scored a mere 21 points against the Army Black Knights. The game ended in a score of Army 28 – Hawaii 21. The betting lines favored Army by 7 points. I guess that’s why Vegas makes so much money.
Just as the nation was starting to stay up late to watch Hawaii home games, and Cole McDonald began to throw his name in the hat for the 2018 Heisman Trophy race, the Black Knights handed them their first loss. Army is a good team, who will likely earn themselves a trip to a bowl game. But, I think we all expected Hawaii to perform better than they did this week.
How bad is it going to get for UCLA?
After Wilton Speight got hurt in the first half of UCLA’s first game, we knew luck was not on the Bruins’ side. After a Week 1 loss at home to Cincinnati, we had a sense that this was going to be a rough year for the UCLA Bruins. But after a second home loss to Fresno State, we now aren’t sure if UCLA will even win a game this year.
The Bruins fell short to the Fresno State Bulldogs, 38-14 in Week 3. While Fresno State is a talented team, the Bruins had expected to count this game as a probable win prior to the season’s start. The UCLA offense was only able to hold onto the ball for just over 20 minutes of the game, where the Bulldogs possessed the ball for nearly 40 minutes.
Additionally, the Bruins had 11 penalties for 96 yards and turned over the ball four times. This sloppy, undisciplined play is a result of poor coaching and young, immature players. That’s right, I suggested Chip Kelly has been improperly preparing his team to the extent required of a Pac-12 team.
Furthermore, the Bruins are still hoping to identify a quarterback, but one could only imagine UCLA will stick with the freshman, Dorian Thompson-Robinson. Thompson-Robinson, a true dual-threat quarterback, appears to be the future of UCLA football and should fit right in with Chip Kelly’s style of offense.
USC Regresses Against Texas
The No. 22 USC Trojans had many of us believing in them after their decent defensive performance against No. 9 Stanford in Week 2. The Trojans kept the game relatively close against Stanford in a 17-3 road loss.
In Week 3, the Trojans traveled to Austin to face the Texas Longhorns. Somehow, despite losing to Maryland, nearly losing to Tulsa, and USC being ranked number 22 in the polls, Texas was a seven-point favorite over the Trojans. And well, Vegas was right again. USC lost badly, 37-14. The Trojans scored two touchdowns in the first half but never saw the scoreboard change on their side for the rest of the game.
USC true freshman quarterback, JT Daniels, looked good in the first quarter as well. But then struggled to complete even the simplest of passes throughout the rest of the game. To be fair, Daniels was forced to drop back to pass a lot in the game due to the Trojans having to play from behind. Daniels attempted a total of 48 passes on the day.
With the exception of Oregon, Washington, and Stanford, the Pac-12 is completely falling apart…which brings us to our next bad loss.
And there goes Arizona State
As I was saying, the Pac-12 is in a downward spiral. The first week Arizona State makes it into the Top 25, they lose to an unproven Mountain West team. Not to speak poorly of the Mountain West…but come on. At least with UCLA losing to Fresno State, we knew the Bruins were not that good.
The Sun Devils came into Week 3 off a big home win against the Michigan State Spartans. The second people started to say, “Hey maybe the Herm Edwards hiring wasn’t so bad”, Arizona State loses 21-28 against the San Diego State Aztecs.
Now you may argue that the loss wasn’t so bad since it was a home game for the Aztecs. The problem with that argument is that the stadium was empty. Okay maybe not empty, but not effective enough for the crowd to be a factor. The SDCCU Stadium had approximately 20,000 empty seats during Saturday’s game.
Regardless, Arizona State was unable to move the ball on offense at all in the second half. The Sun Devils didn’t earn a first down in the second half until four minutes and eight seconds left in the fourth quarter. These kinds of offensive meltdowns are not what you would expect of the number 23 team in the nation.
Two weeks ago, they said the Pac-12 is wide open. This is still true. Except now they are referring to the bottom of the conference.
Before we move into the Big Ten’s losses, we first must acknowledge one of the most unexpected starts to the season.
Florida State’s struggles continue
Willie Taggart still has his job, for now. The Florida State Seminole offense has been quite atrocious thus far into the season. Averaging only 12 points a game is not going to be enough to beat anyone in the ACC.
In Week 3, the Seminoles put up only seven points against a conference opponent, the Syracuse Orange. Furthermore, this touchdown came with just about six minutes left in the fourth quarter. Additionally, Florida State was 1-of-11 on third down attempts. The game ended 30-7, giving the Seminoles their second conference loss of the season.
When Coach Taggart was hired at Florida State he knew he had big shoes to fill. It is also likely Jimbo Fisher got out just as he knew things were getting bad for the Seminoles. But, it’s hard to believe the Seminole’s struggles are a result of a talent deficiency. Florida State faces Northern Illinois and Louisville in their next two games. At this point, it’s hard to say whether these games should be wins or not. But I would not be surprised if these two games do not go well for the Seminoles and the team is left with an intern head coach halfway through the season.
Let’s transition and see what the Big Ten did this weekend…
Akron rallies to beat Northwestern
The Akron Zips came from being down, 21-3 at halftime, all the way back to beat Northwestern 39-34. Although the Northwestern Wildcats look to be in a rebuilding year, there is no reason a, historically decent Big Ten team, should ever lose at home against Akron, especially after leading by 18 points by halftime.
Pat Fitzgerald is the type of coach that coach that puts his team in a position to win, and once they get there, stays there. Frankly, if you look at most of the key statistics, it would seem that the Wildcats should have won the game. Northwestern had 29 first downs compared to Akron’s 15. Northwestern had 491 yards of offense, where the Zips had only 396. AND Akron had 14 penalties for 140 yards! Northwestern only had three penalties for a total of 35 yards! How could the Wildcats have lost?
Well, the Northwestern defense gave up 36 points in the second half. Additionally, the Wildcats had three turnovers. You can do a lot right in a football game, but if you turn over the ball three times, your chances of losing increases dramatically.
This loss was pretty bad, but there were many more from the Big Ten.
What happened to Maryland?
After starting the season 2-0 the Maryland Terrapins completely dropped the ball against Temple. It’s hard to call the Terps lost anything but a complete meltdown. Heading into the game, Temple had losses to Villanova, an FCS team, and Buffalo. Essentially, Temple was having a nightmare of a start to the season.
Maryland hosted the Temple Owls, ready to give them their third loss of the season. However, Temple had other plans. The Owls crushed Maryland, 35-14. Maryland quarterback Kasim Hill completed only 41 percent of his passes for a total of 56 yards and threw one interception. The Maryland offense earned only 196 total yards of offense, went 1-12 on third down attempts, and was unable to score a touchdown. The Terps defense was responsible for both of the team’s touchdowns.
The Maryland loss was just the second of the Big Ten’s bad losses on the weekend. It only gets worse from here.
Terrible start for Scott Frost
As if a losing the home opener against Colorado wasn’t bad enough for Coach Scott Frost, Week 3’s lost to Troy definitely was. Nebraska lost, 24-19, against the Troy Trojans…at home! The UCF Knights are still undefeated, and Coach Frost has still yet to win his first game.
Can we really blame him though? What Frost inherited is not anywhere close to what he had at UCF. He doesn’t have a quarterback. Nebraska Cornhuskers’ quarterback, Andrew Bunch, threw two interceptions against Troy. Bunch is the backup and started the game due to Adrian Martinez’s right knee injury in Week 1. However, there doesn’t appear to be that big of a talent difference between the two quarterbacks. Both are relatively not very good.
In addition to the offensive struggles, Nebraska committed 10 turnovers for a total of 77 yards. In addition to Bunch’s two interceptions, the Cornhuskers also coughed up a fumble.
Nebraska has only Big Ten opponents left on their schedule. If the entire conference didn’t fall apart this weekend, I would likely say Nebraska is not going to win a game at all this year.
Another Big Ten home loss…
Wisconsin is out
Wisconsin opened up at number four in the preseason rankings and had been winning games convincingly. However, after a complete upset loss at home against BYU, the Badgers will likely not be able to recover. The BYU Cougars stomped into Camp Randall and shocked the jumping Wisconsin crowd in a 24-21 win.
BYU kicker, Skyler Southam, came through for his team in the fourth quarter, nailing a 45-yard field goal. Wisconsin kicker, Rafael Gaglianone, was unable to respond with a kick of his own. After Badgers’ quarterback, Alex Hornibrook, led the team down the field, from their own eight-yard line to the BYU 24 yard line, Gaglianone missed a 42-yard field goal to send the game into overtime.
Sure, nearly every good team has one loss, or a close scare, on the season. This will likely be Wisconsin one loss. They are a good team, with a future Heisman Trophy candidate in Jonathan Taylor in the backfield, and a quality coach. However, the Badgers will not be able to reach the College Football Playoff with this loss on their resumé.
Kansas wins again!
The Kansas Jayhawks just did something that they haven’t done this entire decade: win back-to-back games against an FBS opponent. After losing the Nichols State, a FCS team, in their first game of the season, the Jayhawks have bounce been in the most unexpected way. Kansas went to Central Michigan and dominated the Chippewas 31-7 snapping a 46-road game losing streak.
In Week 3, the Jayhawks beat the Rutgers Scarlet Knight badly, 55-14. Sure we can all agree Rutgers is not a quality opponent. But it’s Kansas! And a 41 point score differential? What made the loss so bad was that most of Kansas’ yards on offense were from rushing. The Scarlet Knights gave up 400 yards on 48 attempts. Rutgers just had no answer to the simple rushing offense of Kansas.
In a weekend of poor performance from the Big Ten, Rutgers had an opportunity to bring some pride to the conference, and prevent Kansas from earning their first win streak since 2011. However, Rutgers failed miserably.
The Embarrassment of the SEC
Arkansas is an SEC school. North Texas is a Conference USA school. The game was played in Arkansas. The score was 44-17. Yup, you guessed it. The Arkansas Razorbacks got blown out at home.
The Razorbacks had a total of six turnovers in the game. Cole Kelley, one of the most talented quarterbacks in the country, threw four interceptions. Sure, the offensive line is atrocious and Arkansas was playing from behind the entire game. But still, this is an SEC team were talking about here.
Chad Morris is in his first year as the head coach of the Razorbacks, and he is not off to a good start. Arkansas lone win came against Eastern Illinois. I didn’t even know Eastern Illinois existed until now. The Razorbacks also lost to Colorado State in Week 2. Can we finally say the SEC as a whole really isn’t that good? No, it’s just Arkansas.
The Razorbacks play Tulsa at home in the middle of October. Other than that game, Arkansas has no chance of winning again this season.