The Path to the 12-team College Football Playoff Week 6: Nick Saban would never

Week 6 was an excellent reminder to all college football fans, that just because a slate doesn’t look like a great slate, doesn’t mean it won’t deliver. Sometimes the best college football weekends are the ones you don’t see coming and that was the case in Week 6, the week of the upset… mostly. 

The No. 1, No. 4, No. 9, No. 10, and No. 11 teams all lost, and only one to a ranked opponent. No. 1 Alabama, a week after taking down Georgia at home, lost to Vanderbilt for the first time since 1984 as a 22.5-point road favorite, No. 4 Tennessee fell to Arkansas 19-14 as nearly a two-touchdown road favorite, and No. 11 USC dropped its second game of the season, 24-17 after heading to Minnesota favored by 8.5. However, No. 9 Missouri was blown out by No. 25 Texas A&M 41-10, and No. 10 Michigan fell to Washington 27-17, both as a 2.5-point road underdogs. 

So are they all upsets? Sure, because it’s more fun that way, but many of these “surprising” results were expected by Vegas. Though, that doesn’t mean that they weren’t massively impactful and didn’t shake up the 12-team College Football Playoff landscape going forward. Let's dig into it with the 12 most important things that happened in Week 6.

The Statements

The biggest wins of Week 6

1. Nick Saban would never

It’s not entirely clear that Nick Saban would have been able beat Georgia in Week 5 with this year’s Alabama roster. At least not the way that Kalen DeBoer did, 41-34 with Jalen Milroe throwing for nearly 200 yards and rushing for over 100 in the first half alone. DeBoer debuted empty formations with his remarkably athletic quarterback and overwhelming pre-snap motion that took Kirby Smart an entire half to figure out. It is clear however, that Saban would have never let what happened to Alabama in Week 6, happen. 

After leapfrogging Ohio State, Georgia, and Texas to No. 1 in the AP Poll with last week’s win, DeBoer’s Crimson Tide laid an egg in Nashville, losing 40-35 to Vanderbilt, a program that hadn’t beaten his since 1984. Vanderbilt was 0-60 all-time against Top 5 ranked teams until Vandy’s undersized quarterback Diego Pavia, who oozes moxie, led the Commodores to an unthinkable upset. 

It started with a Milroe pick-six that was popped up in the air before it was returned for a score to put Alabama in a 14-0 hole, but there was nothing fluky about this upset. Vanderbilt outgained Alabama 418-394 and possessed the ball for 42:08 of the game. Pavia went 16/20 for 252 yards and two touchdowns with 20 carries for 56 yards. He gained 12.60 yards and generated 1.13 expected points added (EPA) per dropback which is 99th percentile in college football. 

On the final possession of the game, Alabama had a chance to get the ball back for Milroe, but just couldn’t get off the field. DeBoer has become known as one of the best matchup dependent offensive coaches, the type of guy you’d take if you had to win one game for the fate of the universe and trust he had a great gameplan, but Clark Lea outlcassed him and his defensive coordinator Kane Wommack with bold play-calls and unique designs all afternoon. 

There were countless insane stats that flooded the twitter time and SEC Netowrk broadcast: 

• It was only the fourth time that Alabama lost to an unranked opponent as the No. 1 team in the country in a staggering 68 tries. 
• It was the most points Vanderbilt scored against Alabama since 1906
• AP No. 1 ranked teams were 364-2 all-time when scoring 35 or more points

But my favorite of them all: 

Vandy had 40 on Saturday. In four tries against Saban, the Commodores were shut out twice and managed 13 total points. Yeah, field-storming’s are a bit overdone, but if you’re a Vanderbilt fan, you deserved to carry the goallposts down broadway last night. 

Everything is still on the table for Alabama, except of course the No. 1 ranking. The Crimson Tide still have a clear path to the CFP

2. Don’t look now, but Texas A&M is an SEC contender

After Texas A&M lost to Notre Dame 23-13 in a sloppy Week 1 game in College Station and then Notre Dame turned around and lost to Northern Illinois in Week 2, there weren’t many who would’ve predicted the Aggies and the Irish to both make the CFP. But after Mike Elko led A&M to 5-1 and 3-0 in SEC play with a 41-10 win over No. 9 Missouri on Saturday, there’s a very real chance. 

The Aggies survived while starting quarterback Connor Weigman was out for the past three weeks with wins over Florida, Bowling Green, and Arkansas behind Marcel Reed, but Weigman returned in Week 6 and put any talks of a QB controversy to rest. Weigman completed 18 of his 22 passes for 276 yards before handing the reins and a big lead over to Reed in garbage time. 

Now that Elko has a healthy quarterback heading into the bye week, he can start to look ahead to the rest of his team’s SEC schedule. The remaining road trips are to Mississippi State, South Carolina, and Auburn, three immensely beatable teams, as are two of the three teams still set to make trips to College Station, LSU, New Mexico State, and Texas. If the Aggies can get past Week 9 undefeated in the SEC with a win over the Bayou Bengals, they’ll be right in the mix for a spot in the SEC Championship game. There’s even a scenario where a 10-1 Texas A&M team meets undefeated Texas in the final week of the regular season with a guaranteed rematch on the schedule a week later. 

Whether you think the Aggies are good enough to be talked about among the best teams in the conference or not, their schedule demands it because, with this week’s win, they’ve already passed their toughest test until Texas.

The death penalty

They may not be mathematically eliminated, but with a loss this week, these teams are no longer CFP contenders. 

3. Lincoln Riley can’t fix his defense and solve time zones, it’s one at a time

There is a new geographical reality that the never-ending waves of conference realignment have brought to college sports, and I’m not sure that anyone actually considered the implications of a Big Ten conference that stretches from Piscataway, New Jersey to Los Angeles California. Well, we’re seeing the obvious consequences of the tremendous greed in the sport because there are plenty of reasons that a Lincoln Riley-coached USC team wouldn’t succeed playing Big Ten football, but unmanageable travel is an inescapable one. 

USC has made the trip to “Big Ten country” twice this season, first to the Big House in Ann Arbor Michigan and in Week 6 to Minnesota. They’re 0-2 in the midwest because of course they are. In fact, there’s only one team that has won despite that type of travel. 

No, Riley’s Trojans are not a perfect team, far from it, but the cross-country travel losses keep adding up in the Big Ten, and maybe that’s just always going to be the case. The same thing happened to Michigan in a trip out to Washington, again a team like USC with clear flaws, but the result serves as more evidence that realignment has gotten out of hand and will have a significant impact on the product. 

Next week will be the true test with Ohio State heading to Eugene to play Oregon and Penn State making the trip to LA to face USC. Riley better hope he gets the best of the jet-lagged Nittany Lions because the Trojans are 5-7 in their last 12 games and at some point it’ll be time for a tough conversation about his future. 

4.  Michigan did, in fact, need a quarterback

Sherrone Moore got to 4-1 with the scraps of the Jim Harbaugh era, but eventually Michigan was going to need a quarterback, and there just isn’t one on Moore’s roster. The first-year head coach doesn’t deserve any blame for that fact, he took over too late to land one of the top transfer portal passers, but it’s been even worse than you could imagine. 

In Michigan’s 27-17 Week 6 loss to Washington in a bizarro-world national championship rematch with almost none of the key characters from last winter, Moore benched Alex Orji after pulling off back-to-back three-point wins with the run-first and run-only quarterback. This time, instead of Davis Warren, Moore went to senior Jack Tuttle and the passing game didn’t get any better. Tuttle finished 10/18 for 98 yards with one touchdown and a back-breaking fourth-quarter interception that set up the clinching field goal. 

Michigan’s defense is still one of the best and, after a slow start to the season, even Donovan Edwards found his rhythm on the ground with 95 yards and a touchdown on 14 carries. There are enough pieces on Ann Arbor for a CFP contender, but Moore doesn’t have a QB and that’ll make for a long and frustrating season. 

5. Missouri was a one-year wonder

In 2023, Eli Drinkwitz led his Missouri Tigers to 11-2 with a Cotton Bowl win over Ohio State. Maybe those results were a bit misleading, and maybe a few losses off Drinkwitz's roster this offseason were more significant than anybody expected. Missouri returned quarterback Brady Cook, his top two targets, Luther Burden III and Theo Wease, and replaced running back Cody Shrader with Nate Noel, an App State transfer who has been excellent. 

The two biggest losses, in hindsight, were defensive linemen Darius Robinson and left tackle Javon Foster, both now in the NFL. Missouri massively downgraded in the trenches and even with a narrow win over Boston College and a two-overtime thriller with Vanderbilt, that wasn’t obvious until Saturday’s trip to College Station. 

Cook was pressured on 45% of his dropbacks against Texas A&M, was sacked five times, and completed only 13 of his 31 passes for 186 yards and a touchdown. SMU transfer left tackle Marcus Bryant, Foster’s replacement allowed five of A&M’s 16 quarterback pressures. 

Missouri had no chance blocking Nic Scourton and Shemar Turner up front, but Cook and the Mizzou offense still managed to create five explosive plays. Without them, they generated -0.48 EPA/play with an impossibly low 16% success rate. 

Defensively, the Tigers were even worse. Robinson wasn’t the only loss on that side of the ball, defensive coordinator Blake Baker left to take the same job at LSU, and Corey Batoon, his replacement, couldn’t find a way to stop the run on Saturday. Texas A&M running back Le’Veon Moss went for 138 yards and three touchdowns on 12 carries. 

Before Texas A&M let off the gas, the Aggies were up 31-0 and outgaining Mizzou 440-84 with 17 first downs to four. It’s hard to get beat worse, especially as a top-10 team. Missouri didn’t deserve to be ranked that high, the Tigers were wildly overrated based on a soft schedule last season and beating an Ohio State team without a quarterback in a meaningless Cotton Bowl.

Drinkwitz’s SEC schedule is just as soft this year, but with Alabama still upcoming, I have very little faith that this team can finish the year with only two losses. Even if it does, there may not be any impressive wins on the resume. I’m calling it, it’s over for Mizzou. 

“I promise you one thing…”

With a 12-team CFP, one loss doesn’t end your season anymore

6. Even Nico Iamaleava needs time to develop

We all had a dream of what Nico Iamaleava could do in Josh Heupel’s veer-and-shoot offense this season, but the reality in Knoxville has been an elite defense and a strong Dylan Sampson-led run game. Through the first three games of the season, Tennessee’s offense was unstoppable in blowout wins over Chattanooga, NC State, and Kent State. Since that 3-0 start has been stifled in the SEC with a 25-15 win over Oklahoma in Week 4 and a 19-14 loss to Arkansas in Week 6. 

On Saturday, Tennessee was held scoreless in the first half for the first time since Heupel took over in 2021, and it didn’t get much better after the break. Arkansas limited Tennessee to just two explosive plays and Iamaleava to only 4.21 yards per dropback. Sampson scored both of the Vol’s touchdowns, but despite the Razorback’s selling out to limit Tennessee’s deep shots, Heupel’s offense managed only a 38% rushing success rate and 36% on early downs. 

In a lot of ways, that’s the problem with the veer-and-shoot, it’s based on tempo and explosives, especially on RPOs, but if Tennessee is forced into straight dropback situations with Iamaleava, the offense stalls. On Iamaleava’s 20 dropbacks without play-action, he only completed five of his 14 attempts for 52 yards and held onto the ball for an average of 3.80 seconds which led to a 45% pressure rate compared to a 21% pressure rate and 3.05 second time to throw with play-action. 

Heupel’s offense is designed to give his quarterback the answers to the test, but when a defense can slow the run game, limit the tempo, and force Iamaleava to become a pure dropback passer, the sophomore doesn’t trust his eyes a weakness that was exposed on the final play of the game. With six seconds left and trailing by five, Iamaleava faced fourth-and-5 from the 20-yard line and never even got a throw off, instead scrambling for four yards before stumbling out of bounds with no time left. 

Play-action has another benefit, beyond simplifying the game for the quarterback, it also slows the opposing pass rush, which is important because Arkansas’s Landon Jackson was a force all night with seven pressures against Tennessee’s questionable offensive line. The Razorbacks only brought additional pass rushers eight times, but those timely blitzes resulted in three of their four sacks. 

The 6-foot-6 former five-star is dripping with talent and it’s on display in flashes, but when he can’t just read one defender and react, things start to fall apart. The 20-year-old isn’t ready to play big-boy quarterback and SEC defenses are going to dare him to all season.

Now, Heupel has to counter, and finding an effective way to use his quarterback’s rushing ability will be the best way to bring safeties into the box and open up the deep shots that have been missing. If there is one coach and quarterback combination I trust to figure this out, it might be these two.

Welcome to the…

7. Big Ten, Oregon

The Oregon Ducks have technically already been welcomed to their new conference with a Week 5 win over UCLA at the Rose Bowl, but beating the Bruins doesn’t count as a true Big Ten baptism. Oregon’s 31-10 Friday night win over Michigan State at Autzen Stadium, however, was enough to consider the Ducks a true member of the league. 

It wasn’t just that Dan Lanning’s team knocked off Jonathan Smith, who he split two matchups with when the current Michigan State head coach was Oregon State, it was how Lanning’s team won. Oregon played Big Ten football. 

Oklahoma transfer quarterback Dillon Gabriel entered his sixth year of college football and first in Eugene as the Heisman Trophy favorite, but that's not Big Ten football. A true Big Ten team can win with defense and the running game. In many ways, Big Ten football is winning in spite of your quarterback. That’s what Oregon did on Friday night. 

Gabriel finished 20/32 for 257 yards and two touchdowns but threw red zone interceptions on two of Oregon’s first four possessions. So, running back Jordan James took over on offense, carrying the ball 24 times on his 26 snaps for 167 yards and a touchdown with 111 of those yards coming after contact. The 5-foot-10 210-pound junior punished the Michigan State defense with physical runs into the secondary and averaged 6.9 yards a carry. 

Defensively, Oregon constantly harassed former Oregon State quarterback, generating a quarterback pressure on 14 of his 25 dropbacks (56%), with Jordan Burch racking up 2.5 of Oregon’s five sacks. Six Oregon players generated at least two pressures according to PFF: Burch (4), Derrick Harmon (5), Matayo Uiagalelei (3), Blake Purchase (2), Emar’rion Winston (2), and Jamaree Caldwell (2).

The questions on Lanning’s roster were never about the skill players. Gabriel doesn’t have an NFL arm, which is why Michigan State turned him over twice on tight-window throws, but with Tez Johnson and Evan Stewart on the outside, the passing game will be fine. Though, if the Ducks can play Big Ten football like this, with a better game from Gabriel, then they’ll have a shot to beat the most talented team in the country when Ohio State comes to Eugene in Week 7. 

Back on track

8. Georgia rolls in the Deep South’s Oldest Rivalry

Kirby Smart almost never loses, but when he does, he doesn’t make a habit of it. Last week Alabama knocked off Georgia 41-34, ending Smart’s streak of 42 consecutive regular season wins, so it was no surprise that a week later in Athens, his Bulldogs got back into the win column with a 31-13 victory over Auburn. 

Since Smart took over at Georgia in 2016, his Bulldogs are 98-17 in his 115 games, and coming off a loss, Smart is now 14-3. He lost back-to-back games twice in 2016, but only once since, in the 2018 SEC Championship and 2019 Sugar Bowl. 

Against Alabama, despite throwing for over 400 yards, Carson Beck had the worst game of his career, turning it over four times. Against Auburn, Beck finally returned to his 2023 form, hitting open receivers over the middle of the field and getting the ball out of his hands quickly. The biggest reason for his improvement, Georgia finally played complimentary football. 

Georgia’s running game kept Beck ahead of the sticks. Trevor Etienne went for 88 yards and two touchdowns on his 16 carries and for just the second time this season, Georgia had a success rate over 50% on early-down runs. That rushing attack, along with offensive coordinator Mike Bobo’s increased early-down aggressiveness, allowed Georgia to face an average late-down distance of 4.88 yards, a huge improvement from the 7.42 average they faced through their 3-1 start. 

9. Ole Miss dispells the transitive property

If South Carolina beats Kentucky and Kentucky beats Ole Miss, then the transitive property certainly doesn’t state that No. 12 Ole Miss will trample the Gamecocks 27-3 in Columbia, but that’s what happened on Saturday. After last week’s upset loss, Lane Kiffin’s Rebels got a much-needed SEC win, and in dominant fashion.

South Carolina’s defensive line is one of the most highly-touted in the SEC, but Ole Miss dominated up front, even without Florida transfer defensive end Princely Umanmielen. Texas A&M transfer and former five-star recruit Walter Nolen II, Kiffin’s biggest purchase at the transfer portal market this offseason, proved worth every penny with two sacks, three tackles for loss, and a fumble recovery. 

It was an excellent defensive performance and a crucial one for the Rebels. They allowed just 4.25 yards per play and were situationally sound. South Carolina went 5/16 on third down and had a 0% success rate in the red zone. Ole Miss didn’t bend often, but they definitely didn’t break, and if Kiffin’s team can win when Jaxson Dart completes just 14 passes, then maybe the Rebels can survive the SEC gauntlet and claim a spot in the CFP. 

And the Week 6 Heisman goes to…

10. Boise State running back: Ashton Jeanty

This is getting ridiculous with Ashton Jeanty. The Boise State junior has run for 1,031 yards through five games and on just 95 carries. In Week 6 against Utah State, Jeanty took his team’s first play from scrimmage 63 yards for a touchdown and turned his 13 carries into 186 yards and three touchdowns. He also sat the entire second half for the second time this season. 

The raw numbers are ridiculous, but the efficiency of his season is even more remarkable. Jeanty is averaging 10.6 yards per carry with 16 carries of over 15 yards and 70.9% of his total rushing yardage coming on those "breakaway" carries. He’s a true home run threat on every single attempt, and if not for Travis Hunter, he’d be the clear best player in college football. 

We’ve become so addicted to handing the Heisman Trophy to the best quarterback or worse, the quarterback of the best team. Let’s not make that mistake this time around. Hunter and Jeanty are the clear No. 1 and No. 2. Neither are quarterbacks, and neither are on national championship contenders, and that’s okay. 

Play the fight song!

Whether by a great play-call or just a great play, the week’s most exciting and important touchdowns

11. The Big Zamboni in his bag

Gus Johnson debuted his newest insufferable nickname for the No. 7 Nittany Lions and UCLA at Beaver Stadium, dubbing Penn State first-year offensive coordinator, Minnesota native, and former Zamboni driver, Andy Kotelnicki, “The Big Zamboni.” Well, The Big Zamboni was in his bag again on Saturday. 

Kotelnicki has been known for his creativity with formations and pre-snap motions. Those innovations have jumpstarted Penn State’s offense and have junior quarterback Drew Allar playing the best football of his career, but in Penn State’s 27-11 win over UCLA to get to 5-0, the big men on The Big Zamboni’s offense that took center stage. 

Penn State left guard Vega Ioane started in the slot and motioned across the formation to blow up the UCLA defensive lineman. Kotelnicki went to this play twice on Penn State’s 16-play touchdown drive to open the scoring in Happy Valley. Eventually, Allar punched it in on a quarterback sneak with seven offensive linemen, two tight ends, and 220-pound running back Kaytron Allen on the field. 

With freshman center Cooper Cousins and Wisconsin transfer tackle Nolan Rucci on the field with Kotelnicki’s offensive line, Penn State’s 11-man offensive unit weighed a staggering 2,982 pounds. When you get a ton-and-a-half of offense on the goalline, you can just play the fight song.  

UCF 2017 National Championship Memorial Group of Five Team of the Week

12. Three is not enough options for Navy

Navy has long run the triple-option, but this season, they’ve added quite a few more to their offense. Quarterback Blake Horvath has thrown for 771 yards and seven touchdowns through the Midshipmen’s 5-0 start, including 134 on Saturday in their 34-7 win over Air Force. Still a true-option quarterback, Horvath also ran for 115 yards and two scores on 18 carries, and his offense’s biggest play came on the ground. 

Wide receiver Nathan Kent took the reverse 34 yards to go up 14-0. When your defense has to worry about the triple-option and Navy hits you with a fourth, they’re going to keep playing the fight song all day long. 

After Navy’s win over Air Force and Army’s 49-7 win over Tusla, both are 5-0 for the first time since 1943. If they both keep winning, the Army/Navy game could be for a spot in the CFP.