I root for storylines. After all, I’m a “Big J” journalist.
When you root for storylines, you root for chaos and intrigue. Apathy is the only thing worth rooting against for someone in my position, though I realize I don’t speak for everyone with that perspective.
For an Oklahoma fan, the best storylines of the year might’ve been watching Brent Venables build a top-5 defense en route to a Playoff berth after losing his 2 best players, as well as watching both Lincoln Riley and Texas miss the field altogether. For a Notre Dame fan, the best storyline of the season might’ve been watching the Playoff and adding hypothetical victories to Marcus Freeman’s résumé.
To each their own.
For me, these were my 10 favorite storylines of the 2025 season:
10. Arch Manning breaks everyone’s brain
One second, he was going to be the best thing since Tim Tebow. Another second, he was the biggest bust in college football history. The following second, he was back to being the sensation that many people thought he’d be. Dare I say, Manning went through some ups and downs that felt in line with most first-year starters. Of course, his last name prevented him from getting the same set of expectations for most first-year starters. The reactions to Manning were all over the place, just like many of his starts in 2025. The consistency lacked, though the promise didn’t. Manning still had 37 touchdowns (26 passing, 10 rushing, 1 receiving) and 3,566 yards of offense during a season in which his Heisman Trophy path faded by early-October. How fitting that we get to do it all over again in 2026.
9. The fightin’ Cody Campbells of Texas Tech seize a golden opportunity
When Texas Tech’s well-documented offseason spending spree unfolded, many wondered what would be considered an acceptable set of expectations. After all, the Big 12 got rid of the preseason poll, so we couldn’t lean on that. It was enough to give the Red Raiders a preseason AP Top 25 ranking for the first time since the Mike Leach era, but was the portal overhaul from a billionaire like Campbell really going to change the trajectory of the program? As it turned out, yes. A Big 12 title came in dominant fashion — defensive line transfers like David Bailey, Romello Height and Lee Hunter all earned first-team All-Big 12 honors — with nothing but 3-score victories in the games in which Behren Morton started at quarterback. And while the program didn’t get on the board against Oregon in the quarterfinal matchup, earning a conference title and a Playoff bye certainly met those expectations. There was no better sign of this being a new world of college football than the likes of Texas Tech, Vanderbilt and Indiana going a combined 38-5.
8. Forrest Gump Alabama continues
Don’t get it twisted. I’m not referring to how Gump ran before, during and after his time at Alabama. Lord knows that Alabama somehow having an even worse ground attack than it had with the 0-10 squad in 1955 would prevent anyone from making that comparison. I mean Alabama again proved to be the ultimate “life is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you’re gonna get” team. The blowout loss to lowly Florida State happened in the opener, as did Alabama becoming the first team in SEC history to have 4 consecutive wins vs. AP Top 25 teams without any byes or extra rest. Of course, we also got the blowout loss in the SEC Championship to Georgia, a historic 17-point comeback in the Playoff win at Oklahoma and the most lopsided Alabama loss of the 21st century to end the season in the Rose Bowl against eventual-national champion Indiana. “Consistency” is not in Alabama’s DNA anymore, which is wild for the program that didn’t lose to an unranked team from 2008-20.
7. Bill Belichick does not, in fact, turn UNC into an NFL team
I’m old enough to remember when UNC was supposed to become the 33rd NFL team under Belichick. That’s what GM Michael Lombardi declared a year ago before Belichick coached his first game. It was bold, especially considering the personnel missteps that doomed the end of Belichick’s all-time run with the New England Patriots. As it turns out, a 4-8 team who beat 3 FBS teams with a combined 8-28 record did not actually remind anyone of an NFL team. It instead reminded us that Belichick in Chapel Hill feels more like cheese in cereal.
6. The emergence of Trinidad Chambliss
If you had told someone at this time last year that Jaxson Dart’s replacement would finish in the top 10 of the Heisman Trophy voting and lead the program to its best season in school history, you would’ve assumed that it was the byproduct of Austin Simmons’ emergence. Instead, Simmons struggled, got hurt and opened the door for a post-spring, Division II transfer like Chambliss to become one of the darlings of the 2025 season. It wasn’t just that Chambliss was in the Lane Kiffin/Charlie Weis Jr. offense. He handled pressure as well as any quarterback in the sport, and it ultimately led to Ole Miss winning a program-record 13 games that nearly included a national championship berth. In a few months, Chambliss went from being a guy that only diehard Ole Miss fans knew to starring in AT&T commercials. One cannot tell the story of the 2025 season without appreciating how special Chambliss was.
5. Miami being nationally relevant in December (and January) for the first time in 23 years
Nope, nope, nope. Don’t misconstrue this being on this list as “college football is better when Miami is good” take. Barf. That’s not what this is about. This is about how fun Miami was to watch with dudes like Rueben Bain, Keionte Scott, Malachi Toney and Mark Fletcher Jr. shining on a national stage. Mario Cristobal’s ability to develop that offensive line coupled with the hire of Corey Hetherman to run the defense resulted in a special Miami run. It was such a special postseason run that it quieted Notre Dame fans who felt wronged for the last-minute rankings flip of the 2 teams, even though they did in fact play a game to start the season. Watching this version of Miami, which has invested time and money in the right ways, was indeed a fun storyline because we hadn’t seen it unfold like that since the Canes joined the ACC. While the ACC title drought still exists, poking fun at the program died a painful death in 2025.
4. Diego Pavia and the Vandy encore
I’m not saying that I loved every bit of the Pavia experience. I could’ve done without the constant late-season camera shots of his mom (we get it), and Pavia’s post-Heisman runner-up reaction was as short-sighted of a move as any we’ve seen from someone just hours removed from earning a place on that stage, but still. Pavia stayed healthy and one-upped his breakout season. He was electric, and not necessarily in the same way that his idol, Johnny Manziel, was. Pavia operated within the Tim Beck scheme at such a high level that it made Vandy worthy of Playoff consideration. Unlike last year when he faded in the latter half of the season when he was banged up, Pavia saved his best for last in the regular season. After the calendar turned to November, Pavia racked up 19 touchdowns (14 passing, 5 rushing), 2,245 total yards (1,841 passing, 404 rushing) and posted a 183.4 QB rating. While he didn’t lead another victory against Alabama or earn a spot in the Playoff, think about how insane it would’ve been to predict a 10-win regular season. Clark Lea did a whale of a job, and it helped that he had one the most dynamic SEC playmakers of the 2020s.
3. The instant crash and burn of preseason national title contenders
Between Clemson, Penn State and LSU, there was an unprecedented amount of early turmoil with teams who hoped to be the last team standing. Penn State and LSU fired coaches before they reached November while Clemson kept Dabo Swinney because paying $60 million to fire a coach with multiple national titles within the last decade wasn’t going to happen. But those 3 teams got all sorts of preseason buzz, yet we didn’t even have them in the 12-team Playoff conversation in November. LSU at least avoided that 3rd loss until the last weekend of October — James Franklin got that (and the boot) in Week 7 — but it was still enough to pay $54 million to fire Brian Kelly. Some might include preseason No. 1 Texas in this camp, but the Longhorns at least thought they deserved Playoff consideration at the end of the regular season. It’s wild to think that neither Clemson, Penn State, nor LSU even reached 8 wins in 2025.
2. The Lane Kiffin drama and Ole Miss’s subsequent CFP run
Hand up. I thought Kiffin had changed. I bought into the notion that Kiffin was a different guy than the one who left Tennessee for USC after 1 season on the job. Whoops. The only thing that Kiffin changed was his exercise routine. Leaving Ole Miss after 6 years wasn’t the stunner, but leaving a Playoff-bound program was unprecedented, though I suppose if there was ever a coach to become the first to do so, it was Kiffin. And while there was discourse about whether Kiffin was wanted by the players to stay on board, one thing was obvious. There’s no way he thought Ole Miss could make a deep run. If he did, he wouldn’t have left for LSU. Period. Instead, we got to watch Ole Miss not only dominate Tulane in its first ever Playoff game, but it got the better of Georgia in the rematch. Being 19 seconds away from a national championship berth was beyond what Kiffin ever expected from his squad, at least in his absence. Did Kiffin’s absence fuel that run? Perhaps. Whatever the case, it made for incredible theater.
1. Indiana becomes the ultimate first-time national champion
What Indiana just did is indeed movie-worthy. It’s so movie-worthy that none of the details need to be changed. Indiana became the first first-time national champion since 1996 Florida, and did so with just 7 former 4-star recruits. A program that was 3-9 with the most losses in college football history before Curt Cignetti’s arrival did the unthinkable in Year 2. As recently as 3 weeks ago, IU was just trying to win a bowl game for the first time since 1991. IU’s season concluded with beating the likes of Ohio State, Alabama, Oregon (in a rematch) and Miami (in Miami’s home stadium) by a combined 78 points. We can accept that IU probably wouldn’t beat a team like 2019 LSU or 2001 Miami, but don’t dismiss what type of run it took simply because the program lacked history. There’s no better turnaround in the history of this sport. If you can’t appreciate a storyline that, perhaps this football thing isn’t for you.
Connor O'Gara is the senior national columnist for Saturday Down South. He's a member of the Football Writers Association of America. After spending his entire life living in B1G country, he moved to the South in 2015.
