For all the change college football has brought, Week 4 gave us a little bit of a throwback.
With 40 seconds left, the world was unrecognizable.
There was Michigan, the defending national champs, battered and bruised and teetering on the brink of a second loss in four weeks to open the 2024 season.
There was USC, in its first game as a member of the Big Ten, ascendant not because of Lincoln Riley’s offensive genius but because of the tenacity of its much-maligned defense.
Even Connor Stalions couldn’t have seen this coming.
Such is the state of college football in 2024, a time when change is the only true constant. Just look around in Week 4, and everything felt a bit topsy-turvy.
In Texas, the headlines were all about the ballyhooed quarterback with the magical name who would lead an undefeated team into battle. Arch Manning got the start for the Longhorns, and people seemed excited about that, too. In fact, Manning was so good Saturday — 258 yards, 2 touchdowns, 2 interceptions — it was almost easy to forget about that other guy as Texas beat ULM 51-3.
In Columbus, Marshall head coach Charles Huff proved that not all tampering is bad, dangling all-you-can-eat biscuits to any Ohio State players who opted to transfer before the game. For some reason, none of the Buckeyes accepted the offer and were left with nothing but a 49-14 win to console them. You can’t eat that.
In Chapel Hill, after North Carolina was steamrolled by James Madison, Mack Brown said he told the players that the loss was his fault and he would step away if he couldn’t get things fixed, ensuring he’ll be the first coach to patrol a sideline after turning 100.
Perhaps most shocking of all, Indiana is 4-0.
These are, indeed, strange times.
But in an era when change comes rapidly, 40 seconds is a lifetime, and it was long enough for Michigan to turn back the clock for at lest one weekend — back to 2023, when the Wolverines were dominant, or perhaps back to 1900, before the forward pass was legal and USC could only play a team from the Midwest after spending a week riding the rails.
Kalel Mullings capped a 10-play, 89-yard drive with a 1-yard touchdown on fourth-and-goal to lead the Wolverines to a 27-24 win over USC in a game in which Michigan threw for just 32 yards. Instead, Michigan relied on the power running game, barreling between the tackles again and again, racking up 290 yards on the ground, including 159 from Mullings. The only things missing were leather helmets and worries about imminent war with the Prussian Empire.
If that wasn’t enough of a time warp, however, then travel with Miami back to the 1990s. The Hurricanes dominated USF, 50-15, behind Cam Ward’s 404 yards and three touchdowns. Ask your parents about how good Miami used to be, and they’ll regale you with tales of Bernie Kosar and Ray Lewis and Frank Gore, but the Canes are a little like having a goatee — cool for so much of the ’90s, but pretty much absent from any meaningful use for the past 20 years. And yet, here we are, with Miami 4-0, bludgeoning each of its four opponents thus far, a clear favorite to win the ACC and make the College Football Playoff. It’s all so retro.
Or how about Tennessee? The last time the Vols looked this dominant was three Mannings ago. But on Saturday, Tennessee’s prolific defense utterly overwhelmed Oklahoma in a 25-15 win. It was a throwback moment for Vols head coach Josh Heupel, who won a national title with the Sooners in 2000. He returned to Norman on Saturday and delivered a dagger to his former team, like showing up for a class reunion wearing a tuxedo T-shirt, rocking out to Three Doors Down then leaving with the homecoming queen.
In Colorado, longtime fans likely felt a wave of nostalgia as the Buffaloes won as a member of the Big 12 for the first time since 2010 by completing a last-second Hail Mary reminiscent of Kordell Stewart’s legendary heave against Michigan in 1994. Unfortunately, no one at Folsom Field on Saturday was aware Colorado had a football team before Deion Sanders was hired last year. Regardless, after Shedeur Sanders sent the game to overtime with a completion to LaJohntay Wester with zeroes on the clock, Baylor finished its collapse by fumbling through the back of the end zone on a first-and-goal play in OT. Colorado fans stormed the field and took down the goal post while the play was still being reviewed, because you can’t miss a chance to celebrate beating a team that has lost 15 of its past 20 games.
This pass by Shedeur Sanders and the catch by Lajohntay Wester in the final seconds of regulation was wild ????????@CUBuffsFootball pic.twitter.com/tKuuBmO1pv
Yes, we’re living in an era when an FCS team could march into a stadium named after Pitbull and remind Mr. Worldwide that nobody owns New Jersey (except maybe the mafia); when Cal played a conference game 2,600 miles away; when Iowa won a trophy of a pig by scoring 31 points. Ultimately, 2024 won’t look much like 2023 or 1993 or 1903. It will be something completely new and often strange and almost certainly surprising.
But for one Saturday at least, some of the newness felt like old times.
That’s the fun of this ridiculous sport, after all. For all the change, there’s always some familiar thread that reminds us why we keep coming back.
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Don’t doubt Dabo |UNC’s woes | Vibe shifts
Midwestern misery | Under the radar
Somewhere in Spartanburg, South Carolina, a guy named Tyler is in his mom’s basement telling the folks on the Clemson sub-Reddit that he knew Dabo Swinney would get things fixed all along.
Indeed, after Clemson’s season-opening disaster against Georgia, it has been a fireworks display for the once-maligned Tigers offense. After exploding for 66 points in a win over App State last week, Clemson annihilated ACC rival NC State Wolf Pack on Saturday 59-35.
Cade Klubnik threw for 209 yards and three touchdowns and ran for 70 more, while scoring a fourth TD on the ground in the win. In 17 drives with Klubnik at QB over the past two games, Clemson has scored 15 touchdowns and punted just once.
Ever understanding of outside criticism, Swinney followed the dominant win by quietly sneaking up behind several reporters, pulling their underwear up to their shoulders and yelling, « That’s what I think about your transfer portal, loser! » before running away whooping and shouting.
