1. Frightening Irish
The transfer portal and NIL cash have brought a touch of madness to college football, that makes it feel almost like free agency, and in a lot of ways it’s something that many fans have wanted for a while. And while some schools have used these tools to completely refashion their rosters on the fly, this weekend Notre Dame showed off an old-school graduate transfer who looked to finally give the Irish some fight.
Wake Forest transfer Sam Hartman went 19-for-23 for 266 yards and 4 touchdowns, and man did he look like a player in control. Perhaps it was his swarthy beard, perhaps it was that Navy couldn’t get close enough to even get him to turn the other cheek, but whatever it was, Hartman looked to be in complete control. As a result, Notre Dame seemed imbued with a command and poise I can’t remember seeing from them in recent years. (I was also impressed with Notre Dame’s defensive performance, limiting Navy to 128 yards rushing on 47 dang attempts. OK, fine, it was Navy. But still.)
At one point Notre Dame was a genuine college football heavyweight, but that slowly faded the last few years. I was in South Bend back in 2018 when the Georgia Bulldogs showed up and the Dawg fans basically bought out every seat and turned the stadium red. But as college football has transformed, so has Notre Dame. These days they have a dude that looks like someone’s Dad playing QB who wears a necklace featuring a piece of his own rib. (Aside: Hartman seems uniquely qualified to teach a creationism class.) The schedule will eventually toughen up for the Irish, but a 4-0 start seems inevitable, as well as talk about conference realignment and where Notre Dame (and their TV money) will or could or should eventually end up matriculating.
We know the Irish will get the benefit of the doubt if they’re even in the mix for the College Football Playoff. But we still need to find out if this Irish team is good enough to finally get a win when on the biggest stages.
2. Stop The Clock
When Major League Baseball introduced new rules to help limit the length of games, they were met with near-universal relief. This had been an issue with baseball for a long time, and while perhaps it wasn’t quite as close to crisis mode for college football, the increasing length of games was certainly noticeable—with all these teams running spread offenses and passing 50+ times per game, the clock was stopped more than it was running.
This offseason, a few rule tweaks were added with the clear intent of shortening games. Saturday was the first time we saw these rules in place, and while they seemed to have some impact, initially it wasn’t nearly as dramatic as Rob Manfred’s measures.
Sure, it’s a small sample size—and the Navy/ND blowout wasn’t even three hours long—but I still think we’ll see an impact, even if minimally, particularly once we start to see teams that pass the ball more than the teams we saw on Saturday.
For now I’m just going to keep betting unders.
3. It Is Time
So, we got Week 0 out of the way, and now the fun starts. Week 1 is here! And for my Georgia Bulldogs, it’s time to see if they can do what hasn’t been done since 1936, when the Minnesota Golden Gophers achieved the last college football three-peat.
When it comes to sports, I’m skeptical by nature, or maybe it’s just by experience, the result of being repeatedly disappointed through the years. You can certainly look at the Georgia Bulldogs heading into this season and poke obvious holes in their chances to do the unthinkable, from losing a dozen NFL-caliber talents to having to replace one of the greatest winners in college football history, Stetson Bennett IV. There are also more nuanced issues at play, from offseason off-field legal issues to what I suspect might actually be the biggest hurdle for the Dawgs, the departure of offensive coordinator Todd Monken.
But here’s what’s so great about college football: Who the hell knows? UGA has an obscenely advantageous schedule, an inexperienced QB (Carson Beck) who is by all accounts more physically gifted than Bennett, a dozen five-star back-ups to plug into those holes across the lineup, and another loaded recruiting class on the way. I mean, UGA could win it all again. Why not?
And at the same time, maybe this is a team like USC’s year? Or maybe a Big Ten team finally gets over the hump? Who had TCU making the CFP Finals last season? What if Colorado is great? What if Clemson figures it out?
Really, at this moment, all we have are questions.
And over the next four months, we will finally get some answers.
Let’s go.