College Football 2024 – Week 4 Preview

Where Things Stand After Week 3

• Texas looks like the real deal. They lost Quinn Ewers to an oblique strain early against UTSA and didn’t miss a beat when Arch Manning took over. What a luxury to have someone with Manning bloodlines as your backup quarterback. Arch will get the start this week against UL Monroe, though Ewers’s injury is not expected to keep him out long.
• Meanwhile, the Horns moved up to #1 on just about everyone’s rankings (mine included) thanks to a lackluster offensive showing by Georgia at Kentucky, a 13-12 Bulldogs win. No need to panic, as a game like this has been a feature as much as a bug just about once every season in the Kirby Smart era. In fact all of their trips to Lexington have been tight, defensive struggles, a fact for which Smart was quick to credit Wildcats coach Mark Stoops defensive game plans.
• While I have October 19th circled on my calendar, the day the Horns and Dawgs square off in Austin, we can’t get too far ahead of our skis. Each has a very difficult matchup away from home turf before then; Texas against Oklahoma in the Red River Rivalry on October 12th and Georgia at Alabama September 28th.
• The SEC once again looks like the class of college football. Six of the top seven teams in the AP poll come from the conference of It Just Means More, and nine teams in all sit in the Top 25.
• That is a big reason why Florida coach Billy Napier looks to be a dead man walking. The embattled coach was already the preseason odds-on favorite to be fired. A blowout loss to Miami in Week 1 plus a loss to #25 Texas A&M have the Gators sitting at 1-2 with games against #6 Tennessee, #2 Georgia, #1 Texas, #16 LSU and #5 Ole Miss still remaining. I’d say he’d at least have a chance to finish out on a high note by beating the one Florida school struggling even more than they are, the rival FSU Seminoles, but I seriously doubt Napier makes it that far.
• Right now the Big Ten seems rather open, mainly because we really haven’t learned anything about preseason favorite Ohio State thanks to a weak September schedule. They opened with blowout wins against Akron and Western Michigan in Weeks 1 & 2, then had a bye last week. The Buckeyes host Marshall this week followed by a trip to Michigan State, so we’re still not likely to know just how good they are anytime soon. October will be a different story; they host Iowa, travel to Oregon, return home to play Nebraska, then head to Happy Valley to play Penn State. That’s more like it.
• Speaking of Nebraska, it might be time to take them seriously again. Yeah, we’ve all heard that before, but look at what Matt Rhule did in Year 2 of his tenures at Temple and Baylor (+4 game improvement over Year 1 at each). The improvement from Year 2 to Year 3 at each stop is just as impressive. The guy can coach….well, college. (Though if you look at what’s happening at Carolina it’s safe to say that wasn’t all him). They have a sneaky interesting game Friday Night against #24 Illinois. I know Nebraska-Illinois hasn’t moved the needle in a long, long time, if ever, but I’m not missing this one.
• Oregon seems like they got right against their in-state rival Oregon State (a 49-14 win), particularly offensively, and even more specifically on the offensive line. Not counting kneel-downs at the end of each half, the Ducks scored on every offensive possession against a Beaver defense that pitched a shutout against San Diego State the week prior.
• Speaking as a 17-year Oregonian, the new-look Civil War just wasn’t it. Playing in September, with nothing of major consequence on the line for either team doesn’t sound like a rivalry. The Civil War is meant to be played in the rain and chill, while eating Thanksgiving leftovers, with something on the line for at least one if not both teams (even if it’s just bowl eligibility). Maybe a more competitive game would have made a difference, and OSU students hadn’t returned for fall classes yet, but I can honestly say I’m not the only one who thought the atmosphere in Corvallis was lacking.
• They are contracted to play next year in Eugene, but nothing after that as of now. Could the 2nd most-played rivalry in college football (127 games, less than only Minnesota-Wisconsin) disappear?
• On a related note, by now you likely know the Pac-12 will rise from the ashes in 2026. Oregon State and Washington State will keep it in zombie status this season and next, and then Boise State, Colorado State, Fresno State and San Diego State will join for the 2026 season. That’s still two teams short of what the Pac-12 needs to be a FBS conference, so they still have work to do. Indications are they will not wait long before adding at least two more teams – expect to have an update on that pretty soon.
• It appears the Pac-12 is targeting the top football programs in the AAC for its next move. Memphis is allegedly at the top of the list, with Tulane, South Florida and UTSA also getting interest. Obviously travel and money would be an issue for all of those schools save UTSA (they’re pretty much right in between both footprints and as a new AAC member they are getting only a partial share of revenues). The Pac-12 would have to make a really good case to get Memphis and Co. to join, but as we know by now logic seems to take a backseat in conference realignment.
• If the Pac-12 does successfully raid the best of what’s left in the AAC, along with already plucking the top of the Mountain West, they’d likely be the favorite most years to get the 5th and final CFP bid for conference champions. That might be the tipping point for the AAC schools to bolt. I don’t think adding the top tier of the G5 to Oregon State and Washington State gets the Pac-12 back to “power” conference status, but it would seem to put them solidly above the rest of the G5 class too. Maybe we’ll have to come up with some other category name.
• In more realignment news, there are rumblings coming out of ACC country that settlement talks between the conference and Florida State-Clemson might actually bear fruit. There are apparently proposals for unequal sharing of TV revenue based on the ratings a teams draws. That would skew towards the two rogue schools and perhaps satisfy them enough to drop their lawsuits and stay put (for now). That the two are rumored to be getting the cold-shoulder from the Big Ten and SEC in the back-channels might also have something to do with their willingness to consider the ACC’s olive branch.
• The possibility of the ACC remaining stable might well be why the “Pac-2” made the move they did to poach the four Mountain West schools last week. ACC-triggered realignment chaos was really OSU-WSU’s only chance to get a power conference invitation. Absent that, the next best move is to try and build something that is as close as they can get to their own power conference.
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My Top 12

1. Texas
2. Georgia
3. Ohio State
4. Alabama
5. Ole Miss
6. Tennessee
7. Missouri
8. Miami
9. Oregon
10. Penn State
11. Utah
12. Kansas State

Week 4 Picks

NC State at Clemson, Noon ET, ABC (NC State +19.5) – So it turns out NC State is not who we thought they were preseason….a sleeper pick to play for the ACC title. The beatdown against Tennessee may not seem so bad in retrospect (more on that later), but uninspiring wins against Western Carolina and LA Tech have left them at #76 in ESPN’s FPI. Clemson is coming off a bye, and flushed that Week 1 debacle against Georgia with a 66-20 win against Appalachian State in Week 2. Still, I’m not sold those 66 points weren’t mirage for the Tigers, so 19.5 points feels a bit too wide. They’ll win, but I’ll take the Wolfpack cover.

USC at Michigan, 3:30pm ET, CBS (USC -4.5) – This will be just the third regular season matchup between these teams, and the first since 1958 (they have met in the Rose Bowl 8 times, most recently after the 2006 season). It feels like these programs are headed in different directions right now. The line opened at USC -6.5, and I was a bit hesitant, but at 4.5 I’ll take the Trojans. While their defense had nowhere to go but up after last season, the improvement so far looks legit, and the Wolverines offense is a mess.

Utah at Oklahoma State, 4pm ET, FOX (Oklahoma State +1) – The state of Oklahoma is the center of the college football universe this week. Utah gets its first taste of Big 12 life (the Week 2 game against Baylor was technically a non-conference game), and the matchup couldn’t be better. It may only be September, but the winner of this should establish itself as the Big 12 favorite (and a Top 4 CFP seed that goes with it). I love betting on Kyle Whittingham and Co. in these types of games, as their physical style of play travels well. But I’m concerned about the health of QB Cam Rising, who injured his throwing hand in Week 2 and sat out last week. He’s expected to play, but we’ve heard that with him before. I don’t think they can knock off the Cowboys on the road without him. It’s a tossup. I’ll lean towards the home team with fewer question marks.

Tennessee at Oklahoma, 7:30pm ET, ABC (Tennessee -6.5) – No lack of compelling storylines in this one. The Sooners open their SEC era by hosting the last QB to lead them to a national title. Memorial Stadium is gonna feel like an asylum, assuming the Sooners can keep this one close. I’m not sure they can. Their defense looks good but their offense bears no resemblance to what we saw in the Bob Stoops/Lincoln Riley era. I think the Vols are just too good, and a team can only feed off emotion and crowd noise for so long.

Bonus Picks:

Illinois at Nebraska, Friday 8pm ET, FOX (Nebraska -9) – Illinois feels like a pretty decent team this year, but I think the Huskers are legit.

Kansas State at BYU, 10:30pm ET, ESPN (BYU +7) – For you night owls, here’s an upset special. I go back and forth on whether the Cougars pull the shocker and win outright, but this will be close enough they cover.

Mike Lowe

College Football Analyst

Mike is a Baltimore native living in Portland, OR since 2007. He currently runs his own business specializing in video production and online marketing. Prior to that he was a legal technology consultant, worked for 9 years at Johns Hopkins University and served 6 years in the Air Force. He also enjoys travel, food, beer, and is a volunteer at the Oregon Humane Society.

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