Bold College Football Predictions for Week 3
Week 3 of college football season has a difficult act to follow.
Last week looked dull on paper, featuring less than a handful of highly ranked games, but then it became one of the craziest weeks in recent memory. From Toledo winning at Arkansas to Jacksonville State nearly upsetting Auburn to BYU pulling another rabbit from its hat at Boise State, there was nary a dull moment.
Matching last week's madness will be difficult, but there's enough fodder on this week's schedule to come up with some bold predictions. Double-digit underdogs will pull upsets and games with short lines will devolve into blowouts—it's just a matter of when and where.
Here's our best shot at finding them.
Texas Tech Beats Arkansas
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I'm doubling down on an article I wrote in January, in which I used a series of factors in search of the next TCU or Auburn—the out-of-nowhere national contender—and landed on Texas Tech.
Do I really think the Red Raiders are playoff contenders? Not really. The defense has taken a small step forward when it needed to take a transcontinental flight. There's no way it can hold up for 12-14 games.
It can, however, hold up for 60 good minutes. New defensive coordinator David Gibbs is a master of forcing turnovers—no team forced more the last two years than his Houston defenses—and head coach Kliff Kingsbury, in case we've all forgotten or been distracted by his record or his looks or his charm, can really coach an offense.
And then, on the other side, there's Arkansas. After losing to Toledo last weekend, the Razorbacks are favored by 11.5 points, expected to bounce back with a vengeance. They're supposed to prove last weekend was a fluke, not an exposure of serious issues.
But what if they just have serious issues?
Ole Miss-Alabama Isn't Close
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Ole Miss at Alabama is by many metrics the Game of the Week. It features two top-15 SEC teams. College GameDay is in Tuscaloosa. The spread is Alabama by a touchdown—nothing more.
Give me Alabama by 20.
Ole Miss has earned its ranking and is likely one of the 20 best teams in America. But am I crazy to think it's unprepared for this stage? JUCO transfer quarterback Chad "Swag" Kelly leads the nation in QB rating, but Alabama is not Tennessee-Martin or Fresno State, and a 9:15 kickoff on ESPN is not a noon kickoff on SEC Network.
Part of what's made Kelly so successful, other than playing UT-Martin and Fresno State, has been the strength of Ole Miss' running game. Moving the ball on the ground, where they have struggled the past few seasons, has made the Rebels' offense look fresh and innovative.
Alabama has roughly 10 future pros on its defensive front, so I expect Ole Miss' run game to balk. All-American left tackle Laremy Tunsil remains suspended, and last year, with Tunsil in the lineup, Alabama still held Ole Miss to 76 yards on 32 carries.
The pressure is all on Swag Kelly, who needs to stay composed, exercise leadership and make mature decisions under pressure.
On second thought: Alabama by 25.
The Winner of Memphis-Bowling Green Makes a New Year's Bowl
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This technically betrays the article headline. It's not so much a prediction for Week 3 as a prediction about Week 3.
But whatever. I'm rolling with it. The winner of Week 3's Memphis at Bowling Green game will be the best Group of Five team in the country, and then land in one of the New Year's Six bowls. And it will do so, in large part, because it beat the other in…wait for it…Week 3!
As for the why of this prediction, Bowling Green is 1-1 with a 29-point (but competitive!) loss at Tennessee and a 21-point win at Maryland. Memphis finished last year 10-3 and convincingly won its first two games of 2015 over an FCS opponent and Kansas.
Falcons head coach Dino Babers and Tigers head coach Justin Fuente, who previously served as coordinators at Baylor and TCU, respectively, will not be coaching mid-major programs for long; each could land a power job as early as 2016. In Matt Johnson (Bowling Green) and Paxton Lynch (Memphis), both teams have quarterbacks who belong in major conferences, too.
With Boise State having lost to BYU, but BYU looking worse than its 2-0 record suggests, there's a vacuum atop the Group of Five rankings that one of these teams, along with upstarts such as Temple and Toledo, can fill by the end of the season.
Give this game a watch at 3 p.m. ET.
You'll see the winner again on Jan. 1.
.jpg?w=256 "Ohio State Team Doctor")
Auburn Beats LSU in Baton Rouge
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Auburn nearly suffered a catastrophe against Jacksonville State, needing overtime to escape with a win. The loss dropped the Tigers from No. 6 to No. 18 in the Associated Press rankings, while LSU, fresh off beating Mississippi State in Starkville, rose from No. 14 to No. 13.
LSU spent most of the week as a seven-point favorite and is expected to beat Auburn on its home turf in the SEC Game of the Week—a big-stage scenario where Les Miles' team has typically fared well.
I don't think it will be that easy.
Bill Connelly of SB Nation wrote a good piece outlining A) what's wrong with Auburn and B) how the Tigers can fix it. The whole thing is worth your time, especially if you like advanced numbers, but here is the summation of his thoughts:
"The good news? Most of this is fixable, and luck tends to even out. If running backs get healthy, the offensive line jells and a healthy [Carl] Lawson and newbies like [Anthony] Swain and [Byron] Cowart begin to produce, Auburn could resemble the team it was supposed to be."
Auburn quarterback Jeremy Johnson has been a shell of what people expected, throwing five interceptions in two games, but at least head coach Gus Malzahn isn't trying to hide him. The same can't be said of Miles and sophomore quarterback Brandon Harris, whom LSU trusts to do little outside of handing the ball to running back Leonard Fournette.
Auburn beat LSU by 34 points last season, and since then it has upgraded from defensive coordinator Ellis Johnson to Will Muschamp, while LSU has downgraded from defensive coordinator John Chavis to Kevin Steele.
Especially after watching Louisville hang close with Clemson, which shines a positive light on Auburn's Week 1 win over the Cardinals, I am not ready to surrender on my preseason SEC champion.
Forget the touchdown spread—Auburn wins outright.
South Florida Wins at Maryland
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Bowling Green stayed close against a ranked opponent (Tennessee) in Week 1, then marched into College Park and upset Maryland as a seven-point underdog.
South Florida stayed close against a better ranked opponent (Florida State) in Week 2 and now heads to College Park to play Maryland as a seven-point underdog.
If we don't learn from history, right?
A much better version of Maryland beat a worse version of South Florida by just seven points, 24-17, last season. Now it's lost receiver Stefon Diggs, quarterback C.J. Brown and basically every productive member of the defensive front. Last week's starting quarterback, Perry Hills, has been replaced by Caleb Rowe, who debuted in the fourth quarter against Bowling Green and completed more passes to the defense (two) than the offense (one).
"By making the switch (to Rowe), I think it’s going to allow us to be a little bit more versatile and do some of the things that we would like to be able to do...being able to put more pressure on a defense," Terps head coach Randy Edsall said Tuesday, according to Roman Stubbs of the Washington Post.
That, I'll believe when I see.
.jpg?w=480 "Ohio State Team Doctor")
