18 B1G Things
- UMass was on a 16-game losing streak, and was three orders of magnitude worse than the second worst team in FBS last season.
- They were three orders of magnitude worse than some mid-tier FCS teams, in fact.
- They were gunning for Northwestern's losing streak coming into the season.
- Things look pretty good when Notre Dame is not on your schedule anymore.
- I guess it's "fly the boat" now, huh?
- This spot is reserved for all the teams who struggled with their buy opponent but pulled it out in the end.
- NOT YOU!
- OR YOU!
- The rest of you get a cookie.
The Rundown
UMass snaps their losing streak!
At no point did Rutgers look like the Big Ten team, or UMass like the MAC team coming off a 16-game losing streak. If Schiano survives the season, I'd be surprised.
Eastern Illinois must be really bad
Minnesota had 35 in the first half, then never looked back. 147 on the ground and 348 through the air will have that effect.
WhiteSpeedReceiver: Meets or exceeds expectations. We beat the sacrifice with a sack of nails, which is what you're supposed to do.
Biff: Minnesota played an FCS team with the results I needed to see from playing an FCS team. It follows that there are associated limitations of drawing conclusions from it, which won't stop me from enjoying myself, because Minnesota might actually have functional Special Teams this year. Javon Tracy returned 2 punts for touchdowns, first time a Gopher has ever done that in the same game; he added 98 yards receiving on 5 catches and looks to be the top WR. The linebackers are good as expected, and there was some interesting experimentation with a 3 man DL that was fun but I hope I don't see against Mississippi State. Darius Taylor led all scorers with 3 touchdowns but was used carefully and subbed out by TJ Thomas as soon as practical.
Eastern Illinois’s only score came on an absolute brain fart of a defensive play that I presume PJ Fleck will have on every monitor in the Gibson-Nagurski Complex all week.
Max Shikenjanski scored a rushing touchdown. Whenever you've got that many consonants scoring for Minnesota, you know things got out of hand.
Nothing here to change my 7-5 prediction; the Fighting Tony Romos went 3-9 last season. CLANGA comes to town next week.
UAB keeps it interesting for a half
Illinois prevails in the end. Probably says more about the Blazers, though.
He was a high school QB: Tackling was a problem, but the new defense was aggressive and players were in position to make plays even if they didn’t quite finish the job. Houser looked like the real deal as the offense generated 7.7 YPP. Explosive plays on offense, better special teams, and more discipline (1 penalty vs 9 for UAB) will win you a lot of football games and it did this week.
Thumpasaurus: Scrappy upstart UAB briefly contended thanks to a heroic performance from rootin tootin cowboy man Ryder Burton YEEEEEE HAWWWWWW! But Illinois converted a hilarious Hail Mary to close out the first half, then executed a 75 yard TD drive to start the second and that was the end of the threat. Some over pursuit on defense but Illinois continues to not be the team that makes the big mistake
Purdue gets its win of the season
Indiana State also made it interesting for a half, but that probably says more about Purdue.
BoilerUp89: Purdue won. Hooray! They looked bad. I think it more likely than not they go 1-11 based off Friday's game. Thats what happens when you being back the worst rated QB in the conference, inexplicably rehire possibly the worst DC at any B1G school in the past decade, and are unable to establish the run against what should be an overmatched Indiana State. We should be celebrating a win here but things look dire.
HoustonBoiler: Purdue won, snapping their 10 game losing streak. Of course, everyone expected Purdue to easily win over a tomato can and they did. Against an overmatched Indiana State team, here was the good: 1) the WRs caught passes as Asaad Waseem and Xavier Townsend looked good, 2) Ryan Browne looked better than he did last season, going 23 of 29 for 317 yards, 3 TDs, and most importantly, 0 INTs, 3) Minnesota transfer RB Fame Ijeboi looked great, showing excellent vision, patience, power, and a nice burst, 4) Utah transfer CB Don Saunders had a pick-6, 5) Purdue didn't turn the ball over, 6) Colombian via Pittsburgh true freshman kicker Jacobo Echeverria Lozano nailed all his FGs and XPs, 7) Purdue came out of halftime and dominated, extending the lead to 44-6, until Odom called off the dogs. However, we're talking about Purdue, so here was the bad: 1) Defense struggled to contain ISU's running QB, 2) OL didn't completely dominate a bad FCS DL, 3) way, WAY too many penalties (9 for 85 yards), one nullified a 63-yard TD run, another nullified a 72-yard kickoff return, and many others showed a lack of discipline - several false starts that killed drives in the redzone, an unsportsmanlike conduct, etc., and 4) even though it was garbage time, the backup DBs gave up two long completions, one for a TD and the other just short (down at the one). Overall, I'm happy with the win, but Purdue has a lot to work on and must play much better if they hope to win any of their remaining 11 games against P4 teams.
glass: This Purdue team wouldn't go 3-0 against even IU's downy soft non-con. 57 days until basketball.
Michigan State gets past Toledo
I got bored and put the USC game on. I guess that's what Pat Fitzgerald teams do though.
USC is 2-0!
Maybe Zuzu just wants to be a permanent USC fan now. It's the right time to join the bandwagon.
Ohio State makes the scoreboard look even
14 in every quarter. So pleasing to the eye!
Transient Buckeye: Ball State is terrible. How terrible? The spread for this game was 50.5, and Ohio State covered. But as performances go, this was just "okay." Julian Sayin and Jeremiah Smith did Sayin and Smith things. The receiver corps looks deep and talented. The defense was fine, though a little more pressure would've been welcome. The running game was pretty bad in the first half, though it looked much better in the second half. Way too many penalties on the offensive line, though most of the flags were thrown on the second unit after the starts got pulled midway through the 3rd quarter. Big Ten fans are going to absolutely hate Legend Bey.
MaximumSam: A workmanlike effort from the Buckeyes. Devin McCuin looks like a real guy to replace Carnell Tate. I think the most impressive thing was that the Buckeyes did not have to pay off the clock operator.
Death Star looked mortal for a second
North Texas was supposed to be a moribund team, yet Indiana wouldn't truly pull away until the fourth quarter. No wonder they're canceling any power program in the non-con.
BuffKomodo: Sloppy by any standard, the defending National Champions start the year off with a win. A large win actually, beating North Texas 52-16.
First the good. Josh Hoover and the offense looked genuinely great for game 1. The run game worked. Hoover didn’t turn the ball over. It was just a masterpiece of efficiency. The Marsh/Becker combo looks like it’ll be lethal and as advertised.
Now the bad. The defense did not look good. No turnovers forced. 16 points allowed (not the end of the world). More importantly, Indiana looked like it got bodied by North Texas on defense. The defense looked like it was week 1. It allowed close to 400 yards of offense. That’s not where you’d like to be. Of course if you can score 52 points a game, the defense can have issues and you might be able to win still.
Overall, a lot of good. Fixable bad. Indiana looks like they’re back in the hunt for a CFP again at this moment.
IUinVA: The offense already looks more explosive than last season. 52 points on 49 plays. Bloody Hoover was lethal with an absurd 14.4 yards/attempt and more TD passes (4) than incompletions (3). The back-up RB, Beebe Jr, rushed for only 2.4 yards/carry, which is moderately concerning.
Tayven Jackson was NOT stuffed in a locker, and had great command of the Mean Green offense as they had a 15 minute edge in TOP. IU lost both starting corners early to injuries (shouldn't be long-term), and really struggled to get off the field. I'm not too concerned. I wouldn't be surprised to see North Texas in some shootouts this season. All in all, some stuff to work on but still a comfortable 52-16 victory.
Oregon and struggling with Idaho teams. Name a more iconic duo
And when you stack your team with as much talent as Oregon does, it allows you to outlast their best shot! Maybe one day, though, it'll finally bite them.
Iowa State East handles business
Good bye "drive to 325" we'll miss you!
Also looks like the quarterback competition is settled.
Another MAC team gave a Big Ten team trouble!
The oopsie daisy king, though, got going eventually and Nebraska pulled away late.
BigRedTwice: I didn't actually watch the Nebraska game. I'm on vacation in northern Minnesota and we went on an Art Crawl. We monitored the score, and after Ohio scored like three plays in, we decided to keep shopping. The Huskers seem to have rebounded nicely in the second half though, and overall, nothing to rue in a first game. A bit of adversity before ultimately rolling - and didn't need to have outright officiating corruption to get the win. I'll take it.
It's September
Call me back in October, things may get interesting then.
Struggled early, pulled away late, take 12
What is up with all y'all? Why can't you score a bunch then shut out your opponent?
LincolnParkWildcat: Northwestern wins a rock fight against one of the top rated FCS schools. It reminded me of an old school big ten west game. Thank god we won this game, and won it cleanly (looking at the stench in Ann Arbor)
MNWildcat: 52 points and 900 yards of offense. Whatever I thought was gonna happen, that wasn't it.
Anyway, great teams cover and I will not be taking questions at this time. Northwestern won and everything is fine and lalalalalalalala nothing to see here.
Only Northwestern could recruit the #1 punter in the country and have him appear to be a complete lemon in Game #1, by the way. My word, Niki Dugandzic, get it together.
Plenty to fix. The opener is a W and Chip Kelly seems to be OK at getting the ball to the backfield trio and also there are possibly downfield receiving threats? Let's just not pay attention to the 9 penalties or the struggles to get to Chase Mason. That's easiest, right? We can just pretend it's all fine?
A bye, then Colorado. Cool cool cool. Let's get gross.
Western Michigan takes down Michigan in the Big House!
Narrator: Check the clock.
...Michigan Survives Western Michigan at the buzzer!
Rockymtnblue: Soooo
That happened. For approximately 53 consecutive minutes, Michigan was pushed around by a MAC team. At home. The Big10 has released footage from the replay center showing why there was a second put back on the clock, but that doesn't matter for Michigan going forward. We learned this is REALLY not a good football team, and in particular it does not have a good quarterback. I predicted 7-5 before the season. I'm now predicting 4-8. 2-10 is not off the table (I like our chances against UTEP and Rutgers). As I said in the gamethread, apparently Utah knew what they were doing.
Brian Gillis: I'm not sure what was worse: Michigan’s all-maize uniforms or its play on the field. In one of the more uninspiring performances in recent (or not-so-recent) memory, Michigan needed a controversial last second Hail Mary touchdown to avoid being upset by Western Michigan.
Michigan might have escaped with the win, but Western was the better team Saturday night.
Opening game jitters or a sign that it's going to be a long season in Ann Arbor? With Oklahoma coming to town next weekend … we’ll find out soon.
UCLA pours it on late
A hobbled JKS obviously played a part, but hey, good on the Bruins!
Washington plays with its food
Or Washington State may be good this year. Only time will tell. Or maybe Washington won't be as good as all the offseason smoke everyone blew up their ass.
The other W, however, may not be all that bad
Pick-six aside, which seemed to be when everything turned around, Wisconsin went blow for blow with Notre Dame. Maybe not as bad a team as they've been the past three seasons.
