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Want to make this a Monday trend following games this season – a conversation about the biggest performances of the weekend. Please feel free to add your picks for players with big performances. *** 2025 Week 1 vs. Ohio State Star #1: Graceson Littleton Perhaps the defensive highlight of the day in Columbus were the back to back pass breakups forced by the freshman STAR. First, the deep crosser on Jeremiah Smith where the closing speed was truly on display, and immediately after on a slot-fade by Brandon Inniss where Littleton was attached to Inniss' hip. Littleton also had a huge tackle on third down on Ohio State's final possession to force a punt. Star #2: Jack Bouwmeester It doesn't really sit well with me that a punter is one of the team's stars of the game, but considering how far the punting game has gone from 2024, I suppose this is a positive. Bouwmeester was spectacular with his four punts. All four were down inside the 20, with three landing inside the 10-yard line. Above all, none of the punts were returnable, the height, directional accuracy and coverage team were all big positives for week one. Star #3: Liona Lefau The unfortunate hands to the face penalty negated a safety forced by Lefau, which ultimately could have landed him at #1 on this list. But Lefau was great, especially in run support. Lefau led the Longhorns in tackles with 9 and recorded the only tackle for loss on the stat sheet for the Horns. HM1: Alex January – Credited with three run stops up the middle, including one of the biggest hits of the day. Good showing from the sophomore defensive lineman. HM2: Parker Livingstone – Two receptions for 47 yards and the only touchdown of the day. Livingstone was on the field for 65 of 67 snaps for Texas was a very willing downfield blocker as well.

The reality is, you don’t play the national champions on the road to a one score game and hold them to 200 yards total offense with a chance to tie the game in your last possession and drop below #5 or 6. And the biggest reason that Clemson must be below Texas and Notre Dame is that they were the one team out of this group that played at home with a senior QB, upperclassmen all over the place, and the crowd in a frenzy to lay that egg.

And not to pile onto you specifically, but it’s the skee-ball analogy. You have the guy that goes for the “100” the whole time and unless he is lucky he may hit it 2-3x, but me, I go for the 50 every time and never lose. I can hit the 50 with my eyes closed bc it is taking the easier points when they are given. Those 50s add up to 500 from 10 balls when the guy going for the 100 only hits that hole 1-3x per game. It’s an all or none philosophy that can win you games but more consistently leads to losses. This game didn’t warrant the all or none mentality at all. We were moving the ball and they weren’t, plain and simple.

Just me … but there were some key coaching changes impacting teams early season Clemson D will be better. Allen is a big upgrade at DC. They were bad last year. They will be competitive this year. But they don’t portal enough … see RB issues. Miami has new DC and multiple new starters at DB from portal. Stud LB from portal too. Bain is healthy too, which helps a lot for a new DC. They have 2-3 NFL draft picks on the DL. Their OL is terrific though IMO. Multiple NFL guys, including 1st round OT. Got one back from injury that missed all of 2024 too. I really like ND long term this season. Big fan of what I saw from CJ Carr in first ever game action. ND has that covered the next three years. They have talent at the right spots IMO, and a tremendous young coach. With that said, everyone will knock each other off throughout the season. And injuries can truly impact teams long term

Exactly

Totally disagree on Miami and ND. It will play out over the season 100% agree on Texas defense. Have been saying that repeatedly. But offense wasn’t just bad Saturday, it was 8-4/9-3 bad because of putrid passing game. Run game has chance to draw 7 to box and help as season moves along. How much Arch improves will tell the story. Hate to put so much on him, but he was that putrid in game one (against a top 5 talented roster)

You must have missed the part where he had guys in purple and gold chasing his ass on every play.

Miami’s OL gives them a shot, and their pass rush. Legit good look for them last night. And I believe ND is a damn good team they beat … that will show September 13 IMO If Miami OL gives Beck time, he’ll have a good year. Where things get dicey with Beck is off schedule under duress - he gets more TO prone … but will that happen in the ACC? Not like the SEC IMO

I was a little afraid to click the link for this tread. Thought I might end up chained in a basement forced to watch Arch miss easy passes on a loop until my eyes bleed

Not having a gadget back who runs a 4.4 is an issue. We’ve had Blue or Robinson to get explosives and we don’t have that this year. We have one receiver who can strike fear in people because of his speed. But that guy doesn’t seem to get open deep very much. Who on this offense scares a DC? Who do you have to gameplan for?

Gerry we get it YOU ARE SALTY it’s going to be ok. Go take a mayo bath and breathe my guy!

Too small a sample size. Ask the question again in 6 weeks.

Yeah I corrected myself in another comment, couldn't edit that one for some reason.

I disagree. This was Joe Burrow’s first start against Miami at LSU, in Baton Rouge, with JJ and JaMar Chase to throw to. We don’t have a JJ and JaMar to throw to, and Miami finished 7-6 that year. Point is, development takes time. Even for a guy who would go on to have the best and most accurate season ever

Listen im as frustrated as anyone with the game but this just feels like over correcting on Texas because you watch them more closely. Klubnik was horrendous at home against a worse defense. Horrendous. Not since Quinn vs UGA have I seen a QB navigate a pocket that poorly. plus Miami and ND are both average. I’d put us behind Ohio st and lsu. Comfortably 3rd but could make an argument for 4th if you want to put us behind Miami because they won then fine. and if you want to use random facts it’s also the fewest yards Ohio st has gained since 2015. Unless we’re only ranking these teams based on offense.

Of those guys only Worthy and in limited snaps before injury bond looked explosive. No one expected AD or Golden to be as fast as they were at combine because they didn’t look explosive.

I'd bet 100k that Arch is in the film room this very minute looking at what he did wrong.

He's injured. He forgot all about footwork and mechanics. He imploded. After fifteen years of QB training he forgot how to throw. You guys will buy anything if it's on the internet.

This was great and educational. One other take away is OSU is good.

150 LB sow.

Gerry is now on the "we don't know about Arch" bandwagon too. He warned against it all off season, and now he's jumped right on to it. Couple of quarters makes the Ger jump ship too. Gerry would rather talk up CJ Carr and Marcus Freeman while they were getting beat by those chumps in Miami.

This is what we call an overreaction. How quickly do we forget what Xavier Worthy, Adonai Mitchell, Matthew Golden, and a healthy Isaiah Bond looked like in this offense.

He is a guard it's what he does when he moves to the second level or pulls, end of convo..

I've been public land hunting for mule deer in New Mexico, Wyoming and Idaho. I had two hunts in New Mexico (2008-2009), one in Wyoming (2011), and one in Idaho (2014). I also called coyotes all four times and took about a dozen total. I got one muley in New Mexico in 2009 and one in Idaho in 2014. Won't go into the details unless you want to know about mule deer hunting. Going out for wild hogs on my place here in east Texas in about two hours. I haven't taken one since I think May. Only have about twenty pounds left in the deep freezer anyway.

In the analytical power rankings (e.g FPI and SP+) we're going to move *up* after the game vs OSU. We significantly out gained them not only in total yards but also per-play. We lost because of a few 4th downs and penalties, which an analytics person would call bad luck. I do think Arch obviously has to play much better but the team around is pretty damn well positioned. And we have 3 weeks of patsies to tune up the passing game on. Personally I'd put us #2 of this group. Neither Clemson nor LSU was particularly great last year, so I'm not a believer on them yet. Remember how pathetic that Clemson defense was? Notre Dame lost a lot and doesn't recruit like OSU and Texas. Do we really believe Miami has a good defense now, or was ND just a bit limited themselves? We'll see how it plays out.