CFB Sunday Summary: Seeing Through the Mirages

The first few weeks of the college football season routinely leave us with some surprises that challenge our rational thinking. But eventually the mirages disappear, and we learn that we didn’t always see what we should have seen. Sounds normal and logical. And then we remember that this is college football and normal and logical have no place here or in the Sunday Summary.

Not a Cyborg

Clemson head coach Dabo Swinney is not a cyborg. It’s true. He said so himself after his Tigers fell, at home, 34-21, to Syracuse Saturday. “Disappointed, painful, hurt,” he said. “I’m human. I’m not a cyborg. This is my life. I’ve been here 23 years. I love this place. I give this place the best I’ve got every single day.”

Let’s not pretend Swinney is just some other coach. He isn’t. Another coach would be in trouble with a 1-3 start that includes a 0-2 conference record. And Swinney is not in the least bit of trouble. But Clemson was a near-unanimous selection to win the ACC championship. Many thought they were a contender for the national championship. Now, Clemson fans are waking up to check out ticket prices for the Pop-Tarts Bowl (not that that would be a bad trip).

Credit Where Credit Is Due

And while today’s college football agenda will include throwing dirt on the Clemson grave, let’s not overlook the job Fran Brown did with Syracuse on Saturday. The Orange were 17.5 underdogs as late as Friday afternoon. And then they lost starting quarterback Steve Angeli late in the game. Backup quarterback Rickie Collins engineered a late scoring drive to secure a win in which Syracuse was rarely threatened.

There will be a lot of questions about Clemson quarterback Cade Klubnik. But the Clemson offense racked up 503 yards of total offense. Klubnik was 37 of 60 for 363 yards, three touchdowns, and one interception.

In what world is a Clemson quarterback having to throw 60 passes in a game to keep them competitive? And what happened to the Clemson defense, so full of pre-season All-Americans?

Speaking of Clemson’s Defense

Brent Venables (remember him in Death Valley?) got a big 24-17 win at home over Auburn in a battle of two ranked teams. It wasn’t pretty. Neither team could show anything resembling a running game. The two teams combined for 99 yards rushing. And Auburn is certainly going to still be spending its Sunday ruminating over an Oklahoma touchdown that maybe should not have been.

In the second quarter, Oklahoma receiver  Isaiah Sategna III appeared to be causally trotting off the field. The replay appears to show Sategna was subbing out. But he remained in formation just steps away from the Oklahoma sideline. He then ran his route and caught the touchdown pass from John Mateer that put the Sooners up 10-3.

Auburn defensive coordinator DJ Durkin had a meltdown. And understandably so. We spent too much time late Saturday night looking up the NCAA rule book. There actually is a section on unfair tactics. It’s even really called that. “No tactic associated with substitutes or the substitution process may be used to confuse opponents. This includes any hideout tactic with or without a substitution.”

The NCAA even issued a statement after the game, a true rarity, where it admitted that game officials should not have allowed the touchdown. “The officiating crew did not properly interpret the action as a hideout tactic. If properly officiated, the second down play should have resulted in a team unsportsmanlike conduct penalty of 15 yards assessed from the previous spot.”

Since it was in the second quarter, there is no way to know with certainty how it would have impacted the final outcome. But the outcome that matters the most is that Venables and the Sooners are 4-0 on the season and 1-0 in SEC play.

Mirage Removed

When the Florida Gators won their last four games of the 2024 season, including the Gasparilla Bowl, there was a thought process that they had turned the corner, that quarterback DJ Lagway was a potential Heisman candidate, and that head coach Billy Napier was no longer on the hot seat. The 2025 answer to those three questions is no, no, and no.

Florida took a 26-7 beating at the hands of the Miami Hurricanes Saturday night. No surprise there. Miami is undefeated and has not had to face the consequences of Mario Cristobal in-game decisions yet.

But Florida is 1-3, with the only win coming over Long Island University. Lagway has thrown fewer than 700 yards over four games and has more interceptions than touchdown passes (five touchdowns to six interceptions). Saturday’s stat line for Lagway: 12 of 23 passing for 61 yards and no touchdowns. His longest completion of the night was 12 yards. The Gators had one first down in the entire first half and were 0-7 on third down conversions.

And Napier’s seat is clearly very toasty again, even with the $19 million buyout.

Make Room on that Seat

Whatever hot seat Napier finds himself on, he needs to scoot over a little to make room for Wisconsin’s Luke Fickell. The hiring of Fickell seemed like a good match. He was one of the hot-name young coaches on the list that we create every year.

But Fickell is 15-15 in his two-plus years as the full-time head coach. And one of those wins was a bowl win as the newly named head coach at the end of the 2022 season, in which Jim Leonhard really was doing the work. Fickell is also 8-11 in Big 10 play. After last season, he fired offensive coordinator and longtime friend Phil Longo as the scapegoat for a bad offense.

But on Saturday, the Badgers dropped their conference opener, at home, to Maryland, 27-10. Wisconsin is now 2-2 on the season, with games against Oregon, Michigan, Ohio State, Indiana, and Illinois still to come. And that poor offense that was supposedly the fault of Longo? It ranks 103^rd in the nation out of 134 teams.

The hot seat melted Virginia Tech’s Brent Pry and UCLA’s Deshaun Foster last weekend. It likely is not done this season. Mirages never last very long.

The Look

We apparently have created a weekly tradition for ourselves in judging the team uniforms. We find ourselves favoring the helmets worn by the Oregon Ducks this week.