Winners and Losers: College Football Week 5

WINNER: The Big Ten Big Three

https://wolverineswire.usatoday.com/lists/five-takeaways-from-michigan-football-upset-win-over-usc/

Most every season of college football ever, existing as a fan of one of Ohio State, Penn State or Michigan goes very well.

Ohio State has 12-straight seasons of two or fewer losses, the longest such streak in school history (by more than double), Penn State has 10+ wins in five of the last eight seasons, and Michigan is coming off their first national championship since 1997.

So far in 2024, it’s been (mostly) smooth sailing for all three, as Ohio State demolished Marshall and Penn State boat-raced Kent State.

The real stars of this week, however, were those pesky Wolverines who just won’t go away despite a new quarterback, new running back and new head coach.

No. 18 Michigan recovered from a blown 10-point second-half lead against No. 11 Southern California with a Kalel Mullings one-yard touchdown dive to start the year at 3-1 and show the rest of the Big Ten that they’re sticking around no matter the losses.

Big Blue now has a school-record 26-straight Big Ten wins capped off by this three-point W in their first regular-season matchup with USC since 1958.

LOSER: The North Carolina State Schools

James Madison v North Carolina / Grant Halverson/GettyImages

It was a wonderful Saturday for Duke Blue Devil fans as they watched rivals North Carolina and North Carolina State stink it up with back-to-back blowout losses in ugly games.

UNC’s loss is the most puzzling, as they fell 70-50 to James Madison at home - the most points Carolina has ever allowed to any Group of 5 team.

JMU’s quarterback Alonza Barrett III finished with 388 passing yards, five passing scores, 99 rushing yards and two more touchdowns on the ground. That makes him the first Sun Belt player in history with five passing and two rushing scores in the same game. His seven total TDs set a program record.

Even at halftime, this was ugly, as the Dukes already had 53 points (UNC record for most allowed) and 130 rushing yards (6.8 per carry), 288 passing yards and four forced turnovers, including a pick-6!

For the cherry on top, JMU added a punt return touchdown into that mess.

North Carolina allowed more points at halftime on Saturday than the Tar Heel men’s basketball team allowed in any or all of their first halves last season.

Hard to find many teams with 600+ yards of offense and 50 points on the board losing by three scores.

As head coach Mack Brown put it, “embarrassing”.

For NC State, they got blown out by Clemson on the road, an expected loss but allowing 59 was brutal.

Cade Klubnik has quietly carved up defenses - in this game, he threw for 209 yards and three touchdowns, plus 70 yards rushing and another score.

The Wolfpack fall to 2-2, beating FCS Western Carolina and Louisiana Tech by just 10, plus a 41-point loss to Tennessee.

WINNER: Beehive State Boys

Moving west, it was an excellent day for most college football fans in the Beehive State, as both new Big 12 members Utah and BYU earned huge conference wins for their respective programs.

The No. 12 Utes ripped off a 22-0 run after an early No. 14 Oklahoma State field goal first-quarter lead, and despite allowing two eight-point touchdown drives in the final six minutes, the game was well out of hand for any Cowboy comeback.

No Cam Rising, no problem yet again for Utah, winning through the legs of Micah Bernard who rushed for 182 yards (7.3 per rush). He outdueled star OKST running back Ollie Gordan II, who just managed a meager 42 yards on 11 carries.

For BYU, they faced a stout No. 13 Kansas State team who had not beaten the Cougars since 1976 (two BYU wins since).

The Cougs eviscerated their big cat brethren, winning 38-9 with a scoop and score, punt return touchdown and two more through the air by Jake Retzlaff plus a ground six from running back Sione Moa.

The massive swing in momentum came all at once, with BYU scoring a field goal with 2:10 to go in the first half, then a 30-yard fumble touchdown with 1:08 to go, two player later an interception, then a 23-yard touchdown to score 17 in the blink of an eye.

The second half started with another K-State pick, BYU touchdown, then the punt return score.

Not even seven minutes of game time had the Wildcats up 6-0 to down 31-6.

LOSER: The Revivalry

Getty Images (https://www.texasfootball.com/article/2024/09/21/smu-mustangs-eject-tcu-sonny-dykes-from-hilltop-in-blowout-win)

There’s good news and bad news for TCU and Baylor - they don’t have losing records (yet), they avoided most major injuries (so far), and their seasons are not over.

But man, it’s hard to blame them for thinking otherwise.

TCU is on the loser list in back-to-back weeks now after a historic 21-point collapse against UCF last week, and they managed to one-up themselves after a 66-42 embarrassment at rivals SMU.

The Frogs turned the ball over five times, including a fumble touchdown and pick-6, to lose, allowing the most-ever points the Mustangs mustered against the Frogs in their 100+ year rivalry.

TCU was 10-0 against SMU all-time when scoring 42 or more, most of those games in the last 20 seasons TCU blowout wins. SMU had never scored more than 56 against TCU before this game.

The irony is the Frogs gained around 90 more offensive yards and one more first down than the Pony Express, but it didn’t matter with three touchdowns allowed outside of the SMU offense, who didn’t even manage over 200 passing yards.

For as painful a loss as this was for TCU, Baylor may have them beat only a few hours later up in Colorado, as they fell 38-31 to the Buffaloes in overtime after allowing not one, not two, but three Hail Marys to end halves.

A fair point could be said “well, how can there be three halves?”, and that’s because Colorado dropped a would-be tying touchdown with two seconds left on a Bears blown coverage and then tried again from midfield to chuck it to the endzone, and somehow it worked again and they got the touchdown as time expired.

Baylor’s odds of winning stood at 99.3% with eight seconds to go.

WINNER: Cam Ward and Miami

Miami quarterback Cam Ward (1) scrambles away from South Florida linebacker Jamie Pettway during the first half of an NCAA football game Saturday, Sept. 21, 2024, in Tampa, Fla. (Chris O’Meara - staff, ASSOCIATED PRESS)

Ranked ACC schools had great weekends, with Clemson demolishing NC State and Louisville overcoming a slow start to beat Georgia Tech, the most impressive ACC win might’ve been the second half of Miami over South Florida.

Quarterback Cam Ward continues to lead the Hurricanes on a meteoric rise through the middling 2024 ACC, fueled this week by his 404 passing yards and three touchdowns to top 15,000 career passing yards.

This game wasn’t without struggles, as Miami found themselves down 15-14 in the final two minutes of the first half.

Then came a 76-yard bomb from Ward to Samuel Brown, and the Canes didn’t slow down from there.

Two-point try good, then a 28-0 second half rounded out a 36-0 finish to the game, Miami 4-0 and in the top 10 for the first time since 2016, that season they proceeded to lose four straight after that start.

Given Miami hosts 2-2 Virginia Tech next week, those odds remain fairly low.

LOSER: 4th Quarter Jayhawks

The image above sums up why the Kansas Jayhawks made the loser list this week: they continue to refuse to win after leading in the fourth quarter time and time again.

From 2010-2021, the Kansas Jayhawks had a minimum of nine losses every season, but that quickly turned around with head coach Lance Leopold, who took the 2021 Kayhawksd from 2-10, to a 6-7 season in 2022, to 9-4 last year.

KU finished the season ranked No. 23, the first time they’d finished the year ranked since 2007’s No. 7 ranking, and they follow it up with a No. 22 preseason ranking, which they defend week one against FCS Lindenwood.

Weeks 2-4 have seen three straight losses, all with big fourth-quarter leads.

Kansas held a 21-17 lead with around 10 minutes to go in the game before a two-plus hour lightning delay rolled into Milan Puskar Stadium.

KU forced a quick West Virginia punt, then responded with a touchdown to take an 11-point lead with only 5:39 remaining.

Then, the wheels fell off.

The Mountaineers engineer a nine-play 2:12 touchdown drive to respond, and then force another Jayhawk punt, only letting around a minute off the clock.

WVU then gets back to work, driving down the field and capatalizing on a late pass interference flag to score from the KU 15-yard line and take the lead inside 30 seconds left.

Kansas has one final chance, completing a 36-yard pass to the WVU 39 before a strip sack ends it.

KU hosts TCU next week in a game where a loss for either team would ring major alarm bells.