College Football: Week 1 winners and losers

College Football is already in mid-season form with a wild opening weekend with upsets, overtimes and epic comebacks by true freshman quarterbacks.

Winners:

True freshman quarterbacks: Bo Nix led an Auburn comeback victory in prime time against Oregon by scoring 21 unanswered points in the second half. Hank Bachmeier of Boise State threw for over four hundred yards on the road against Florida State scoring the last twenty three points

Steve Sarkisian: Sarkisian’s past two jobs has offensive coordinator he was placed in near impossible situations. The last time Sarkisian called plays for the Crimson Tide they lost a ten point lead in the 2016-2017 National Championship game against Clemson (To be fair Sarkisian was thrust into that role after the fallout from the Lane Kiffin fiasco). After a forgettable two year stint with the Atlanta Falcons as their offensive coordinator following a historical offensive run by the Falcons lead by 49er Head Coach Kyle Shannon. Sarkisian was back at the helm for the Tide with the task of maintaining the best offensive team in the storied history of Alabama football. Opening against an overmatched Duke team the Tide only scored fourteen points at halftime; after halftime however the Tide scored four touchdowns before subbing out the starters in the 4th quarter.

Losers:

SEC East: Tennessee Volunteers are pretty self-explanatory here has the Vols lost to Georgia State marking the first time since the program came into existence that Georgia State has beaten a Power five football team; this is also the first home opening loss for the Volunteers since 1983. Adding salt to the wound is the fact that Tennessee had to score a touchdown with two seconds left to make it a one score game. Missouri lost to Wyoming in similar fashion has the Tigers scored a touchdown with six min left to make it a one score football game. Both Tennessee and Missouri were dominated on the ground with Georgia State running for over 200 yards and Wyoming ran for nearly 300 yards per game.

Chip Kelly: After re-watching the 2010 Oregon/Auburn National Championship game and watching Chip Kelly at the height of his offensive prowess utilizing fast athletes in space at a fast tempo scoring nearly at will. I was really pumped to watch what he would do in his second year at UCLA. To say it was disappointing is an understatement. 218 total yards, 156 yards passing, 62 yards rushing and Four Turnovers….ouch. Now granted Cincinnati has the potential to be a really outstanding football team, but wow that was a bad offensive performance. With games against Oklahoma and Washington State on the horizon Chip Kelly has to figure out something or another long season is ahead for the Bruins.

Week One MVP: Jalen Hurts Quarterback Oklahoma.

In a Heisman worthy performance Jalen Hurts totaled 508 total yards (5^th most in school history!) and six total touchdowns in a complete destruction of a Houston Cougar defense. Hurts completed 87% of his attempts for over 330 yards and three touchdowns; Hurts also chipped in 176 yards on the ground with an average of eleven yards per carry. What shows up more than stats is Hurts character throughout his career. After starting back to back National Championship games at Alabama he was benched last season in favor of Tua Tagovailoa (Tua is better). Elected not to transfer during the season and saved Alabama’s playoff hopes after coming off the bench during the SEC Championship game leading the Tide to another SEC title and playoff berth. If Hurts either wins the Heisman (a very real possibility) or wins a National Championship it would make the perfect ESPN 30 for 30.

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