The college football season is finally here and a week of action is in the books. What could the Week 2 AP Top 25 look like on Tuesday?
What a week of college football we witnessed to kick off the 2022 season.
To start things, we got Week 0 action which nearly saw the end of the Scott Frost era at Nebraska but his future in Lincoln is still up in the air.
Following that debacle in Ireland, Week 1 kicked off on Thursday night with an epic Backyard Brawl between West Virginia and Pitt that went down to the wire. The Panthers came back from down seven in the fourth quarter to win by a touchdown.
On Friday, Michigan State was the only ranked team to play and it took care of Western Michigan by 22 despite playing a sloppy game.
And then Saturday got wild. Georgia slaughtered Oregon in one of the three ranked games of the weekend, 49-3. It was an absolute massacre and it showed that the defending champs still have it. The other two ranked battles were closer as Ohio State held on to beat Notre Dame 21-10 and then Arkansas took down Cincinnati by a touchdown in Fayetteville.
Utah also played in a classic, losing at Florida and I think this will get the Gators into the AP Top 25 for Week 2.
Sunday also had a classic battle between LSU and Florida State that was decided by a blocked extra point but thankfully we won’t see either of those underwhelming teams in the AP Top 25.
What will the Week 2 AP Top 25 look like?
I’ve been saying it all offseason, but BYU is underrated and Jaren Hall is one of the best quarterbacks in the country who no one is talking about. The Cougars won 50-21 on the road in the opener and Hall threw for 261 yards and two touchdowns on 25-for-32 completions. Don’t be surprised when BYU shoots up the rankings this season.
UTSA gave Houston a run for its money in the opener and it looked like the Cougars were about to fall and watch their New Year’s Six hopes crumble in Week 1. The Cougars held strong and pulled off an impressive second-half comeback to send the game into overtime — although UTSA’s final drive to tie was also wild. Dana Holgorsen’s team has a lot of work to do.
No Sam Hartman in the opener? No problem for the Demon Deacons. Wake Forest is easily a top 25 team and with Hartman it’s probably closer to that 15-20 range but it kicked the year off right with a 44-10 blowout of VMI on Thursday night. Mitch Griffis looked solid in place of Hartman, passing for 288 yards and three scores, and Christian Turner looked great at running back after watching Kenneth Walker III and Christian Beal-Smith transfer in back-to-back years.
The Portal King (aka Lane Kiffin) kicked off his 2022 season with Troy and he got to see his offseason work finally take the field. Jaxson Dart led the way at quarterback with 154 yards, a touchdown, and a pick so there’s more for him to prove moving forward. Zach Evans does look to be that dude at running back, however. A lot of growth should be coming for Ole Miss.
I see Oregon taking a pretty healthy stumble this week after losing 49-3 to Georgia. The size, speed, strength, and talent difference was obvious as the Ducks just couldn’t keep up with one of the top teams in the SEC. Oregon may be a top 25 team but I just don’t see the Ducks flirting with the top 10 like they were to start the season. Maybe it’s time to move on from Bo Nix.
Before the season, I honestly wasn’t buying Florida beating No. 7 Utah in the opener, but the Gators really impressed against the Utes. Winning against the Pac-12’s best team was a good step in the right direction for Billy Napier and Anthony Richardson is really living up to those sky-high expectations. I see the Gators jumping all the way up to No. 20 after being unranked in the preseason.
Kentucky struggled early with Miami (OH) but ultimately pulled away. The Wildcats were up just 13-10 at halftime and then ended up going on a 24-3 run in the second half to seal the win behind Will Levis’ 303 yards and three touchdowns. Maybe Kentucky isn’t just a basketball school after all — or maybe it was just Miami (OH) that made the Wildcats look good. Either way, Kentucky moves up a spot.
I’ll be the first to admit that I didn’t see Graham Mertz passing for over 200 yards and a touchdown on just 16 attempts with a whopping two incompletions, but maybe he’s turning a corner. Or maybe it was just the result of playing Illinois State. Braelon Allen had a huge game with 148 rushing yards and two scores and Wisconsin got the shutout.
After all of the talking he did in the offseason, you would have thought Pat Narduzzi’s team would have dominated a lesser West Virginia team in Pittsburgh in the opener. That wasn’t the case as Pitt and WVU went down to the wire and escaped with a close one. Kedon Slovis passed for over 300 yards in his first game with Pitt, but will he be enough to replace Kenny Pickett?
The Mario Cristobal era started with a bang in Week 1 as Miami dismantled Bethune-Cookman and scored the most points of any team in the AP Top 25. The Hurricanes won 70-13 and Tyler Van Dyke had an impressive outing, passing for 193 yards and two touchdowns on 13-of-16 passing. It’s hard to really tell anything about these ranked teams when they play FCS squads.
Michigan State didn’t play all that well against Western Michigan and still won by 22 points and covered the spread. Payton Thorne didn’t have his best game and still threw four touchdown passes and Jalen Berger looks like that next transfer portal star in the backfield. Jacoby Windmon showed out on defense with four sacks, but the losses of Darius Snow and Xavier Henderson hurt.
Lincoln Riley, Caleb Williams, Jordan Addison. No program saw as much change this offseason than USC and the Trojans turned that into a 66-14 season-opening win against Rice. It wasn’t the toughest opponent, but the Trojans still looked impressive on both sides of the ball. Williams was a star and Addison had two touchdown catches as well.
Arkansas will see the second-biggest jump this week after beating No. 23 Cincinnati at home. KJ Jefferson looked like a dark horse Heisman candidate in the win and threw the game-winning touchdown pass to Trey Knox to put the game out of reach in the fourth quarter. Sam Pittman has turned this program around in a big way rather quickly.
Is NC State just a little overrated this season? If the season opener was any indication, I think the answer is yes. The Wolfpack will move up to No. 12 this week but they can’t feel great after just barely sneaking by East Carolina. Devin Leary had a very disappointing opener and the Pirates out-gained NC State, but the Wolfpack won by a point.
I don’t think we’ll see Utah drop too far in the rankings after the loss but the Utes will no longer be a top-10 team. Cameron Rising played a decent game but it just wasn’t enough as Florida was able to pull off the upset in The Swamp. Utah should still be the favorite to win the Pac-12, but opening 2022 was a loss was disappointing.
I’m honestly not entirely sure that I’m buying Oklahoma State as a top-10 team, but with Utah and Oregon both losing and likely dropping out of the top 10, this is the only ranking that truly makes sense. I can’t see anyone else jumping the Cowboys into the top 10 after Week 1.
Oklahoma State narrowly beat Central Michigan while giving up an astounding 44 points which just isn’t going to really cut it for a Big 12 contender. Maybe they just had a bad defensive game, but the Cowboys were supposed to have one of the Big 12’s best defenses this year.
The Cowboys did get a solid game from Spencer Sanders which was a breath of fresh air, passing for 406 yards and four touchdowns on 28-for-41 passing. Seven different receivers caught at least two passes, led by Braydon Johnson who had six for 133 yards and a touchdown.
The run game, however, was underwhelming with just 125 yards on 32 carries.
Oklahoma State has more questions than answers after Week 1.
How did Dave Aranda and the Baylor Bears follow up a Big 12 title-winning season? By opening the 2022 campaign with a 69-10 win of course.
Albany really stood no shot against the Bears and Baylor’s offense was far more impressive than anyone could have expected — granted, it was Albany. The Bears saw Blake Shapen live up to sky-high expectations at quarterback as he passed for 214 yards and two touchdowns on 17-of-20 completions. His backup, Kyron Drones, had 100 yards on 5-for-7 passing and had a 99.3 QBR.
The run game also showed out, accounting for 259 yards and seven touchdowns on 6.3 yards per touch. Four rushers had over 40 yards on the day and it just felt like the offense could do no wrong all afternoon long.
As for the defense, things picked up right where they left off last year. Baylor allowed just 237 total yards and a single touchdown.
The Bears are pushing Oklahoma for that top spot in the Big 12.
I’m not entirely sure if Notre Dame was truly that solid or if Ohio State was just that underwhelming in the opener. It honestly could have been both.
I think Marcus Freeman did a really good job of having his Irish ready for Ohio State and they weren’t burned much on the defensive side of the ball. His fingerprints were all over this team as his Irish held Ohio State to just 21 points and Jaxon Smith-Njigba nor CJ Stroud really went crazy.
Besides the defense showing up, I was impressed with Tyler Buchner and I think he could have a really strong future in South Bend. He’s one of those young dual-threats who is taking over college football. He completed his first eight passes of the game before struggling to a 2-for-10 finish but he was still impressive overall.
Fans are not happy with the run game, however, and the creativity — or lack thereof — on offense. That needs to change if this team wants to contend for a playoff spot or New Year’s Six berth.
The Brent Venables era got off to a roaring start as Oklahoma’s offense looked Lincoln Riley-esque after a quarter as the Sooners raced out to a 21-0 lead.
UTEP made things closer before halftime, scoring 10 points in the second quarter to Oklahoma’s seven but the Miners didn’t cross the goal-line again. Oklahoma’s pass defense could use some work as it gave up 288 yards through the air but it also did see 51 passes but that’s not acceptable against UTEP.
Oklahoma saw Dillon Gabriel take the field for the first time and he lived up to expectations, passing for 233 yards and a touchdown on 15-of-23 completions. He has so much to give this offense and I think this will be a nice fit. It also seemed like Gabriel and Marvin Mims have a nice connection, teaming up three times for 81 yards. Brayden Willis had three catches for 40 yards and two scores.
Oklahoma’s run game, too, was impressive with 259 rushing yards and four scores on 6.8 yards per carry.
Oklahoma looks like the Big 12 title favorite early on.
Surprisingly, there’s some turmoil in Ann Arbor after a 51-7 win over Colorado State.
The quarterback battle that has raged into the first couple of weeks of the 2022 season is starting to get a little ugly. After the win and his first start of the year, reigning QB1 Cade McNamara told reporters that he was shocked by Jim Harbaugh’s choice to let the battle carry over into the season. He also felt like he had a strong enough camp to win the job.
Hours later on Instagram, JJ McCarthy posted a cryptic meme about letting go of ego and someone’s inability to do so.
Either way, Cade had a rough first game despite getting the win while JJ had some juice off the bench, rushing for a touchdown and looking much more accurate.
The run game carried Michigan to the season-opening blowout win and now Harbaugh has some controversy on his hands.
Texas A&M survived an hours-long rain delay to beat the Sam Houston State on Saturday evening. The game was set for noon and didn’t end until 6-7 at night because of the long weather delay and that may have had something to do with the sleepy finish to the game by the Aggies.
Jimbo Fisher feels that he has a playoff team this year and the young stars on this roster are impressive. Will they be enough to carry the team to the playoff or will their inexperience hold the team back?
Haynes King won the starting quarterback job and he had a chance to really pad the stats against Sam Houston State but he didn’t exactly wow anyone with two interceptions. He did have 364 yards and three touchdowns but he needs to work on his turnover issues, especially against lesser opponents.
The Aggies’ defense is going to be the strength of this team and that was obvious after the opening win.
All offseason long, we’ve been hearing about how Clemson is going to bounce back and get back to the playoff. Dabo Swinney lost both of his coordinators and hired within the program to replace them so I wasn’t exactly ready to buy stock in the Tigers, but they have won two national titles over the years for a reason.
Clemson has been a staple of the College Football Playoff under Swinney and that might just continue after a disappointing 2021 season.
The Tigers opened the 2022 season with a Labor Day showdown against Georgia Tech which was a more than favorable matchup.
Clemson’s offense didn’t look much improved but DJ Uiagalelei looked like he gained confidence throughout the game. The defense was solid again and the Tigers cruised to a win over Georgia Tech after a shaky start.
Swinney’s team has a long way to go if it wants to get back to the playoff.
CJ Stroud and the Buckeyes were expected to run the score up on Marcus Freeman and Notre Dame in the opener but they didn’t exactly impress. The Buckeyes were actually losing at halftime and there were doubts as the time was ticking off the clock in the second half, but Ohio State ended the game on a 14-0 run to win by two scores.
Stroud didn’t exactly have his best game, passing for 223 yards and two touchdowns on 24-for-34 passing but maybe Notre Dame’s defense is a little better than people truly expected.
TreVeyon Henderson had 91 yards on 15 touches and while Jaxon Smith-Njigba struggled and was apparently battling an injury, sophomore Emeka Egbuka stepped up and looked like the next breakout star at receiver for the Buckeyes.
Ryan Day has a lot to work on after this win. But he still has to feel good that his team didn’t play well and he still beat the No. 5 team in the country by 11.
Are you surprised to see Georgia jump Ohio State despite the Buckeyes beating a top-five team in Week 1? You shouldn’t be because the Bulldogs dismantled the No. 11 team in the country by 46 points — think about that for a second.
The Bulldogs looked like the best team in the country in the first game but I don’t see them taking over that No. 1 spot just yet. I do, however, see them getting more first-place votes and jumping over Ohio State.
Stetson Bennett had a monster game and really proved all of his doubters wrong, passing for 368 yards and two touchdowns against the Bulldogs’ old defensive coordinator who felt he had the game plan to stop him. The Bulldogs’ offense was impressive with Bennett leading the way and the defense picked up where it left off last year.
Georgia has to love seeing Bo Nix lined up on the other side of the ball.
College football’s runner-up from the 2021 season got off to a nice start against Utah State in the opener, smashing the Aggies 55-0.
Bryce Young had a decent game but wasn’t exactly otherworldly, passing for 195 yards and five touchdowns. He got his Heisman repeat campaign off to a solid start with his 18-for-28 passing night and he also led the Crimson Tide in rushing with 100 yards and a touchdown on five carries.
Jahmyr Gibbs also had a huge game for the Tide in his first game, rushing for 93 yards on nine carries. The Tide as a team had 278 yards and a touchdown on 32 carries and it looked like things were very balanced. We saw just why Alabama is the No. 1 team in the country.
The defense also stood tall, holding the Aggies to under 150 total yards and just over 2.0 yards per play. A shutout to start the year was impressive.
No shot the Tide surrender that No. 1 spot despite how well Georgia played.