Ad Disclosure
The BCS is officially in the rearview mirror and the new College Football Playoff is just down the road. Statements were made by several teams this past weekend, but which teams are for real? Here’s the contenders and pretenders after the second week of games.
Contenders
Notre Dame Fighting Irish
Week 2 result: Defeated Michigan, 31-0
The Fighting Irish have one of the hardest schedules in college football and they have looked sharp in their first two games. Granted, they’ve played Rice and an unranked Michigan team, but with Everett Golson at quarterback and with players like linebacker Jaylon Smith and defensive lineman Sheldon Day, they have game-changers on both sides of the ball. Most SEC fans probably don’t know too much about this team, but they’re quietly assembling a college football contender in South Bend. Notre Dame will have several chances to prove itself more worthy of being a “contender” in the coming weeks with games against Stanford and Florida State.
USC Trojans
Week 2 result: Defeated Stanford, 13-10
It’s arguably one of the best wins so far this year of any team. USC went Palo Alto and took down the Stanford Cardinal, 13-10. They may have caught some lucky breaks and the numbers indicate Stanford had the better game, but a sign of a great team is winning the ugly games – the ones they shouldn’t win. It was undoubtedly a gutsy win for USC. With Stanford in the rearview mirror, USC currently only has three games remaining against ranked opponents with two of those at home.
Oregon Ducks
Week 2 result: Defeated Michigan State 46-27
In what was a very convincing win for Oregon, quarterback Marcus Mariota led the Ducks to 21 unanswered points in the second half en route to a 46-27 drubbing of the No. 7 ranked team in the country. There are still questions about if this Oregon defense is good enough to keep them undefeated throughout the regular season, but the offense is as electric as ever. The Mariota-Byron Marshall connection is dynamite and don’t forget about freshman Royce Freeman either. With as good of an offense as Oregon’s, it’s tough to imagine any Pac-12 team containing them long enough to upset the Ducks.
Pretenders
The entire Big 10
Week 2 result: Everyone that matter lost
Yikes. I have to believe the Big 10 would like to redo this past weekend over. The conference’s top two teams – Ohio State and Michigan State – both suffered losses. Their other top team – Wisconsin – lost in Week 1 to LSU. Nebraska narrowly escaped defeat at home against McNeese State and the same could be said for Iowa, who barely beat Ball State. It would take several undefeated teams losing, for the Big 10 to possibly have a shot at getting their champion in the College Football Playoff. The conference depth just isn’t there this season, so it looks possible that the Big 10’s season is over just as quickly as it began.
UCLA Bruins
Week 2 result: Defeated Memphis, 42-35
For the second week in a row, UCLA narrowly won against a much more inferior football team. Quarterback Brett Hundley’s numbers looked better this week – 396 passing yards and one touchdown – but it’s awfully concerning to see a team, considered by many to be a College Football Playoff sleeper, struggling against opponents like Virginia and Memphis. Yes, the Bruins are 2-0, but as they say…where there’s smoke, there’s fire.
Virginia Tech Hokies
Week 2 result: Defeated Ohio State, 35-21
Give credit where credit is due. Virginia Tech went into one of the tougher venues in college football and took down a top-10 team. VT’s defense made the stops it needed to and blew up Ohio State’s offensive linemen for seven sacks. For now, however, I’m putting the Hokies as a pretender. Currently, they don’t play another ranked team on their schedule until presumably a conference championship matchup against Florida State. If they’re able to navigate through the rest of their schedule and beat the Seminoles, they’ll be fully deserving of a spot in the playoff, but I’m holding off on their “contender” status for now, considering they aren’t even the best team in a weak ACC.
Drew Laing will be providing analysis and insight on Florida, Georgia, Missouri and South Carolina.
