College Football Awards, Week 1 (2017) September 11, 2017

(Note:  All rankings are current AP [week 1] unless otherwise noted.)

COACHES
Wish I were him: Nick Saban, Alabama

Glad I’m not him: Matt Rhule, Baylor

Lucky guy: Jim Mora, UCLA

Poor guy: Kevin Sumlin, Texas A&M

Desperately seeking a wake-up call: Bobby Petrino, Louisville

Desperately seeking a P.R. man: D.J. Durkin, Maryland

Desperately seeking sunglasses and a fake beard: Tom Herman, Texas

Desperately seeking … anything:  Lane Kiffin, Florida Atlantic

TEAMS

Thought you’d kick butt, you did: No. 14 Stanford (defeated Rice 62-7)

Thought you’d kick butt, you didn’t: Pitt (defeated Youngstown State 28-21)

Thought you’d get your butt kicked, you did: Akron (lost to No. 6 Penn State 52-0)

Thought you’d get your butt kicked, you didn’t:  Buffalo (lost to Minnesota 17-7)

Thought you wouldn’t kick butt, you did:  Colorado State (defeated Oregon State 58-27)

Dang, they’re good: Ohio State

Dang, they’re bad:  Akron

Can’t Stand Prosperity:  –

Did the season start?  Texas

Can the season end?  Rice

Can the season never end?  Alabama

GAMES
Play this again:  UCLA 45, Texas A&M 44

Play this again, too:  No. 16 Louisville 35, Purdue 28

Never play this again: No. 14 Stanford 62, Rice 7

Close call:  Kentucky 24, Southern Miss 17

What? Tennessee State 17, Georgia State 10

Huh?  James Madison 34, East Carolina 14

Double-Huh? Howard 43, UNLV 40

Are you kidding me??  Maryland 51, No. 23 Texas 41

Oh – my – God:  Liberty 48, Baylor 45

NEXT WEEK

(rankings are current AP (post-week 1, pre-week 2)
Ticket to die for:  No. 7 Oklahoma @ No. 2 Ohio State

Keep an eye on this one:  No. 15 Georgia @ Notre Dame

Best non-Power Five vs. Power Five  matchup: Western Michigan @ Michigan State

Best non-Power Five matchup: Buffalo @ Army

Upset alert: No. 16 Louisville @ North Carolina

Must win: No. 14 Stanford @ No. 4 USC

Offensive explosion: Nebraska @ Oregon

Defensive struggle: Buffalo @ Army

Great game no one is talking about: TCU @ Arkansas

Intriguing coaching matchup:  Gary Patterson of TCU vs. Bret Bielema of Arkansas

Who’s bringing the body bags? Louisiana-Monroe @ Florida State

Why are they playing? San Jose State @ Texas

Plenty of good seats remaining: New Mexico State @ New Mexico

They Shoot Horses, Don’t They?  UAB @ Ball State

Week 1 Take-aways:

What is wrong in Austin?  Tom Herman, supposedly a fine, young offensive mind (and Urban Meyer protégé), has not started off his tenure at Texas well.  The Longhorns lost, at home, to Maryland, 51-41.  The Terps are hardly an offensive juggernaut, either.  The loss frankly stinks.  What accounts for this?  It could be perhaps that Herman has yet to bring in the recruits that he needs to compete at a top-ten level.  But perhaps the most likely reason of all is that the Horns were simply looking past Maryland, devoting all their relatively limited practice and preparation time to USC, a marquee matchup that will take place two weeks from now.  How else to account for such an embarrassing debut?

Let us admit this without hesitation:  notwithstanding their close loss today, Purdue’s turnaround performance is quite impressive.  Jeff Brohm debuted as the Boilermakers’ head coach in a less-than-ideal match for one’s inaugural game.  In this case, it was against a formidable Louisville team, at Lucas Oil Stadium (neutral site) in Indianapolis.  On paper, the Cardinals should have made mincemeat out of a Purdue team that, theoretically, would still be recovering from the Darrell Hazell malaise.  Luckily for Purdue, that was not the case.  The Boilers’ performance has markedly improved on both sides of the ball.  Moreover, they played consistently hard throughout the game, and – with the luck of three turnovers by the Cardinals – kept the game close and interesting throughout regulation.  If this impressive performance is a harbinger of what is to come, then Purdue shall have a comparatively respectable record despite a semi-brutal schedule.

Meanwhile, how rare a treat it is that fans can enjoy a top-five matchup to kick off the season!  That is exactly what we the fans enjoyed when No. 1 Alabama took on No. 3 Florida State in Atlanta (played inside the brand-new Mercedes-Benz Stadium, no less).  Speaking of great games, another fine example was No. 11 Michigan playing No. 17 Florida in AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas.  Once again, we the fans got our money’s worth.  Sure, there were lots of throwaway games today, especially in the Noon Eastern Time slot.  But these two games, along with the Louisville-Purdue game (all three of which were, interestingly, played in NFL stadiums), more than made up for that, and it all adds up to a great start to the 2017-2018 college football season.  Let the games begin, and the good times roll!

Postscript:  Bobby Petrino won an engaging game.  Why is he thus “desperately seeking a wake-up call”?  Simple reason:  his team had three turnovers that game, which were a contributing factor to why the game’s score was so close (seven points difference in the end).  Two of those turnovers are at the goal line.  Mistakes like that will cost the Cardinals dearly as they delve into the conference part of their schedule.  Remember what happened in November of last year?  ‘Tis best to fix and pre-empt those mistakes NOW.

Speaking of wake-up calls, put Texas A&M down for an honorable mention.  There is no excuse to blow a 37-10 lead like that in the second half, with the Aggies allowing the bulk of the scoring in the 4^th quarter.  For shame, Aggies.  Yet, at the same time, good on Bruins’ head coach Jim Mora and QB Josh Rosen for engineering such a comeback.