As the month of September draws to a close, I would like to express my thanks, not just once, but many times over, to multiple recipients.  Yes, Thanksgiving is almost two months away, but it’s always a great time to offer gratitude.

Grateful acknowledgement seems particularly in order this month, though.  Most Septembers of college football in recent memory have frankly been mediocre.  Sure, there has always been the occasionally good conference matchup here and there, but so many recent Septembers have been tainted by too many “body bag games.”  By that, I mean games that are grossly mismatched, where, for example, Alabama plays, say, South Alabama.  The talent and coaching levels of such respective teams are not even close, and a boring blowout ensues.  We the fans suffer as a result.

This month, it was different.  The opening weekend alone was arguably the best in the history of the game (certainly within the past 20 years or so).  The matchups were so good, it felt like a mini-bowl season.  So without further ado, I would like to express a great deal of gratitude for that and related things.

I would like to express my thanks to Kansas State and Stanford; to USC and Alabama; to Clemson and Auburn; to Oklahoma and Houston; to LSU and Wisconsin; to UCLA and Texas A&M; to Texas and Notre Dame; to Georgia and North Carolina; also to Ole Miss and Florida State.  On paper, these games were fantastic, and most of them developed that way.  Had USC’s coaching staff gotten themselves better pulled together, they might not have embarrassed themselves as horribly as they did.  But all the other games turned out to be competitive, highly engaging affairs.  As college football fans, we were experiencing nirvana, if only for a weekend.

Nobody made these teams put their records and rankings on the line by playing these challenging, difficult teams.  All of these games were scheduled because both parties agreed to, without coercion on either side.  All these teams deserve our thanks for agreeing to take a risk and open their seasons with tough games, because we the fans benefitted immensely from it, as did the equity of college football as a whole.  Bravo to all coaches and athletics directors of these aforementioned parties concerned for making this happen.

While the following week was not nearly as engaging as the opening week, I would nevertheless like to thank Virginia Tech and Tennessee agreeing to play each other inside the massive Colosseum that is the Bristol Motor Speedway, and setting a football attendance record of 156,990 in so doing.  Grateful acknowledgement of Arkansas venturing to Fort Worth to play TCU is also in order.  Same goes for Arizona State and Texas Tech, and they engaged each other in a shootout that did not disappoint.

Concerning the third week, more thanks are due.  I would like to thank an underrated Cincinnati team for putting up a valiant fight against a surprisingly lethal Houston team.  I would like to thank Alabama and Ole Miss for not wasting any time in playing each other early in the year.  Same thing goes for Louisville and Florida State (hopefully the then-No. 2 Seminoles did not take their butt-whipping personally).  Same sort of thanks go to USC and Stanford; to Oregon and Nebraska; to BYU and UCLA; to Michigan State and Notre Dame; and to Texas and Cal for the same reason.  Even Pitt and Oklahoma State turned out to be a pleasant surprise of a good game, and thus further contributed to another wonderful week of college football.

But most of all, concerning the third week, my deepest thanks are reserved for Oklahoma and Ohio State agreeing to play in a nice, marquee matchup.  Indeed, special thanks should go to Oklahoma for taking huge risks by playing both highly-ranked Houston and juggernaut Ohio State.  They have two losses to prove this amazing strength of schedule that they have boldly built, and should be judged leniently for those two losses come bowl selection time.

Even the last week of the month was peppered with intriguing matchups across the board, such as Nevada at Purdue; Colorado State at Minnesota; Florida State at South Florida; even Central Michigan at Virginia.  These are not nearly as sexy as, say, Ohio State vs. Oklahoma, but the respective talent levels of these teams suggest close, competitive, cross-conference pairings.  Combine that with some great intra-conference games such as No. 11 Wisconsin vs. No. 8 Michigan State; No. 12 Georgia vs. No. 23 Ole Miss; No. 17 Arkansas vs. No. 10 Texas A&M; also No. 19 Florida at No. 14 Tennessee.  If that’s not enough, BYU ventured to Morgantown to play West Virginia.

All these pairings add up to one fantastic month for college football, and I thank all of these aforementioned teams for agreeing to take some risk to make it happen.  Many thanks to all!