The theme in the SEC West’s first weekend, where five of the seven teams are breaking in a new starting quarterback, is who found one?

In many ways, the story of the week came down to that, especially with the lone established star in the division, Chad Kelly of Ole Miss, not playing until Monday.

Here’s what we learned:

Alabama: It looks like the top-ranked Tide may have found a star for years to come in true freshman Jalen Hurts, who hurt USC with his arm and his legs in a 52-6 rout of USC.

Hurts threw for 118 yards and 2 touchdowns and rushed for 32 yards and 2 more scores after coming off the bench for starter Blake Barnett. Hurts had freshman mistakes but made plays and looked pretty comfortable.

But even without effective quarterback play, Alabama was still completely dominant with Damien Harris rushing for 138 yards and the defense holding Max Browne to 101 yards passing, with a pick-6 from Marlon Humphrey. It doesn’t look like the Tide has missed a beat.

Arkansas: The Razorbacks’ identity has been that of a power run team, but in surviving a 21-20 nail-biter against Conference USA’s Louisiana Tech, the Razorbacks had to lean on the pass.

New starting quarterback Austin Allen passed for 191 yards and 2 touchdowns, one a 4-yard touchdown to tight end Jeremy Sprinkle for the game-winning points with 6:37 left. But the Razorbacks started the post-Brandon Allen era with just 2.7 yards per rush.

The Razorbacks gave up 20 points to a Louisiana Tech offense led by a freshman quarterback (J’mar Smith), who threw for 212 yards in place of the Bulldogs’ suspended starter, Ryan Higgins.

Still, on a weekend where teams like Mississippi State and LSU were upset, Arkansas will take it.

Auburn: Talk about a team trying to figure out its quarterback situation, the Tigers didn’t change quarterbacks once or twice, but changed them constantly throughout the 19-13 loss to Clemson.

The bad news is it didn’t really click. Between Sean White, Jeremy Johnson and John Franklin, Auburn never really found a guy who consistently delivered.

The good news is they were in the game until the end anyways. The defense held Deshaun Watson and company to just two touchdowns, and The Plainsmen had a puncher’s chance at the end when White’s last-ditch Hail Mary fell incomplete in the end zone.

Against an opponent like Clemson, who would have thought Auburn would have been in the game that late without effective quarterback play?

LSU: After Ole Miss’ Chad Kelly, the next two top returning quarterbacks in the SEC were supposed to be Josh Dobbs of Tennseee and Brandon Harris of LSU, but that assumed that both would take strides to be better than they were last season.

That was not the case for either Dobbs or Harris, who was ineffective in the Tigers’ 16-14 loss to Wisconsin that snapped the Tigers’ record 52-game regular-season, nonconference win streak. Harris completed 12-of-21 passes but missed on a lot of passes and had two interceptions, including one in the game’s last minute that killed the Tigers’ chance at a game-winning drive.

One has to wonder if the Tigers have a QB that can win big games, especially on a day where Hurts and Texas A&M’s Trevor Knight looked ready for the spotlight.

Mississippi State: There’s more wrong with the Bulldogs than just not having Dak Prescott.

Damian Williams was more than adequate off the MSU bench, completing 20-of-28 passes for 143 yards and a touchdown and rushing for 93 more in a 21-20 loss to South Alabama.

But the Bulldogs didn’t defend the pass well, allowing South Alabama sophomore Dallas Davis to pass for 285 yards, including the winning touchdown late, in his first career start. The defense looks like it needs work. But then again, Davis looked better than a lot of SEC quarterbacks looked in the opening weekend.

Texas A&M: Trevor Knight has beaten Alabama in the Sugar Bowl, and now he has led Texas A&M to a 31-24 overtime win over UCLA. This year in the SEC, that’s a heck of a résumé.

Never mind that his completion percentage wasn’t great (22-of-42 for 239 yards), he showed the leadership of a former starter for the Sooners and gave the Aggies maturity at the position that didn’t exist hardly anywhere else in the division.

Harris, the lone returning starter starting Saturday (Auburn’s Jeremy Johnson and Sean White are back splitting time as well), struggled. Alabama, Mississippi State and Auburn changed quarterbacks during their games. So having Knight deliver a solid performance against a top 25 team makes the Aggies instant contenders.