Winners and Losers from College Football's Kickoff Weekend

I'm sure you haven't already read this opening line on numerous other recaps: Wow. What an amazing start to college football. So much excitement and we're only one week in. Cliche, yes. But you're a lunatic if this wasn't your mindset after such an awesome opening weekend. With so much to look back on, I'll do my best to highlight the set of Labor Day Weekend matchups with the three biggest winners, and the three biggest losers.

Winners

The Big 10 as a whole came out as the B1Ggest winners of the weekend. The most notable achievement out of the conference's weekend came from the Nebraska Cornhuskers honoring their punter Sam Foltz, who tragically passed away from a car accident in July:

Truly emotional stuff, and a genuinely awesome tribute to their fallen teammate as the Huskers took a delay of game penalty by leaving Foltz's spot empty for the punt. And to top things off, Nebraska came out with a 43-10 victory over Fresno State.

In terms of on-the-field performance, the Big 10 impressed by having the best week 1 record of any conference, going 12-2. One of the two losses came from Northwestern being upset at home by Western Michigan in a 22-21 nail-biter. The other loss came from....surprise, surprise: Rutgers! The fake Big 10 team, as expected, got stomped 48-13 by No. 14 Washington.


(Sleeveless guy at the 1 minute mark with the absolute lights out singalong performance. Muscle man spittin' bars!)

The Badger faithful had plenty to jump around about after their boys pulled of a shocking upset at Lambeau Field, taking down No. 5 LSU and Heisman hopeful Leonard Fournette. Wisconsin was unranked in week 1, but this victory shot them up in the week 2 rankings as they now sit at the No. 10 spot.

In terms of the preseason playoff hopefuls from the Big 10, Michigan, Michigan State, Ohio State, and Iowa all won decisively, as expected. It's not much of an accomplishment for top 25 teams to stomp inferior opponents, but the Big 10 seemed to avoid any opening weekend slip-ups. All of this positivity gave me no choice but to grant the entire conference as week 1's biggest winner.




Regardless of if they suit up for weekend gamedays or not, it's always beyond amazing when someone beats the S.O.B we know as cancer. If you're not inspired by seeing someone overcome such adversity, I don't want to know you. So it was really cool to see Pitt running back James Conner play his first game after beating Hodgkin lymphoma. Conner rushed for 53 yards and a touchdown, along with recording 16 receiving yards and a receiving touchdown. Kudos to Conner as he helped the Panthers beat Villanova 28-7.

Sunday night's upset over No. 10 Notre Dame was not only an indicator of how the Longhorns' season may go, but also played a factor in Charlie Strong's job security. It might seem unfair that the third season in a complete revival project for a program in the dumps would be considered a make-or-break season, but fans and boosters of the blue chip Longhorns don't have much patience. The double OT thriller over the Irish allowed Charlie Strong to prove that his positive impact is starting to kick in. I thought Strong did an excellent job in managing his two quarterbacks throughout the game. While on that note, true freshman QB Shane Buechele was extremely impressive. That kid can really sling the ball and I'm looking forward to watching what he can do the rest of the season. Texas is now ranked for the first time under Charlie Strong, jumping up to the No. 11 spot.

Losers

Baker Mayfield and the Oklahoma Sooners have been viewed as a preseason Heisman hopeful and probable playoff contenders, but Saturday's 33-23 loss hurt those chances. The Sooners made some very crucial mistakes, including two fumbles lost and giving up a kick-six on a missed field goal. The kick-six was certainly remarkable on Houston's end, but the Sooners field goal unit was asleep at the wheel while trying to defend it. Sure, this was a non-conference loss for the Sooners and they could rebound moving forward. But that's easier said than done with an already competitive conference schedule, along with Oklahoma's game against No. 4 Ohio State in two weeks. If the Sooners, who are now ranked No. 14 lose two of their first three, they'll undoubtedly catch a lot of heat. Even after the week 3 matchup against the Buckeyes, they then have to play at TCU before hosting Texas. Rough road ahead for Oklahoma, and they better fix their problems quickly if they want a shot at redemption.

Baker Meh-field

— Caleb Blackmur (@CalebBlackmur) September 3, 2016

(Nailed it.)

The Pac 12 finished opening weekend with a record of 7-5, which is overall very mediocre. It's not the mere amount of wins and losses that makes me consider the Pac 12 as a week one loser, it's the magnitude of some games that were lost. Week one is a great time for conferences to flex their muscles and face off against contenders from other conferences. However, the Pac 12 didn't succeed in their headliner matchups. USC got absolutely worked by Alabama 52-6. Now that blowout is partially a product of Alabama being amazing per usual. But it was also an indicator of how far the Trojans are from being a national contender. In the other big time Pac 12 vs. SEC battle, No. 16 UCLA and Josh Rosen dropped an overtime loss to unranked Texas A&M. The Bruins nearly pulled off a crazy comeback after being down 24-9 to start the 4th quarter, but "nearly" just doesn't cut it. Other than Stanford, I think the Pac 12 is a generally weak conference on a national scale, and week one reinforced this attitude.

The aforementioned upset of Wisconsin over LSU definitely caused Les Miles' stock to plummet, as the Tigers' head coach was already on the hot seat last season. LSU rallied around Miles' low job security last year by carrying him off the field in their final home game victory over Texas A&M. It was expected to be long time coach's last game at LSU, but apparently beating an unranked team 19-7 at home is good enough reason to hop back on the Les Miles train. Well as we saw on Saturday at Lambeau, the Tigers are probably in for another disappointing year and Les Miles still can't recruit good quarterbacks. Real estate agents of Baton Rouge: start looking into selling the Miles home.

In terms of winning/losing myself, I went 2-1 for picking the outcomes of the week one Tavern Games of the Week. I was pumped about correctly picking Houston over Oklahoma, but failed to predict the Texas upset over Notre Dame. I correctly picked Florida State to cover the five point spread against Ole Miss, which was an excellent game and a great second half by the Seminoles. Stay tuned for this week's Tavern Game of the Week, which I will preview most likely on Thursday.