Sep 19, 20236 min read

New Era

Week three of the FBS saw a thunderstorm strike bolts across the college football world that raised the bar; struck an upset; and elevated the landscape across the nation. The noise was LOUD and a certain PRIMEtime game gave the NCAA unprecedented attention.

No rest for the wicked in this post, let's dive right into some quick huddle:

Alabama's QB room continues to struggle. Tide survive unranked South Florida.

Gators upset (11) Tennessee in the Swamp

Colorado WR/CB Travis Hunter to miss 3 weeks after dirty hit

Michael Penix Jr. shines in road blowout of Michigan State

South Alabama goes on the road & blows out OK State in their backyard

Week three struck down the season's first stunner with Missouri knocking off #15 Kansas State with a game winning 61-yard field goal. Mizzou kicker, Harrison Mevis showed his stones walkin' off the Tigers, settin' up the first realistic storm the field of the season.

I love kickers takin' the moment, man. Harrison became a star on campus with just one boot of the leg- a 61 yarder at that. He cleared the thing too, easily had enough leg for a 64-66 yard attempt. The confidence in Mevis was shown by coach Drinkwitz to allow him to attempt the kick with the statistical knowledge that it's easier to block a kick at the college ranks. Go ahead and bask in your glory.

I used the word "realistic" for a reason regarding the storm field in Mizzou. You storm the field on an upset, and that's it (cough Colorado cough). Storming the field is a special occurrence- something that should NOT be over done or done for a reason beyond an upset. The scenes in Mizzou define why that should be:

Through three weeks of action, we continue to see stellar quarterback play across the FBS. Now that we have all those silly lackluster early season matchups out of the way, it's time for the comp bar to be raised as we go into conference play and the meat of the season.

All my current Heisman candidates are QBs... go figure, right? The current four:

Michael Penix Jr. sure looked good in week 3 against Michigan State as he threw for 473 yards and tossed 4 toudys to route the Spartans in East Lansing. Penix now has the best QBR in the nation, on top of leadin' in passing yards. Washington has a televised (ESPN) game against Cal and the week after they play at Arizona before starting their test. Look for Penix to continue to shred the air and stat sheets.

Along with Penix, we have another super senior joinin' the Heisman ranks early on with Notre Dame QB, Sam Hartman, straight slingin' the laces for the Irish. Hartman leads the FBS in passing touchdowns, going a perfect 13/0 through four games. Now, those four games do happen to be against low quality teams- Hartman gets his test this week when he takes on 6th ranked Ohio State. Will he still be in that graphic? We will see.

Caleb Williams continues to be efficient as ever for the Trojans. His case will have more weight once USC welcomes legit comp, which will be next week against Colorado. Williams' rating and completion percentage has been very impressive, puttin' his name in the hat.

Having a Heisman favorite in Week-4 is a bit vague, but if I was asked- it's Shedeur Sanders out of Colorado. Sanders is playing unreal ball and doing so against high level comp right off the bat. Not just high level comp, but teams eager to be the ones to halt the Buffs' and their heatwave of confidence since the arrival of Coach Prime in the FBS. Sanders' game against Colorado State was unreal when you consider the Rams' play; losing Travis Hunter; and the pressure. Big time performance. Now Sanders faces Oregon and USC in back to back weeks, creating a GOLDEN opportunity to create Heisman moments.

The Deion effect is in full gear. The NCAA football world has been taken over by the arrival of Coach Prime in the FBS. We are experiencing a new era filtered around swag; culture; arrogance (in a good way); and purely good vibes. Last time NCAAF saw this kind of hype was when Reggie Bush took over Southern Cal. Even that era doesn't pull the swing the way we are seeing with Deion.

I have never seen anything like what we saw late-night this past Saturday. It was a SPECTACLE. Colorado vs Colorado State was a spectacle... an all-time event. Who in the blue hell would have ever believed that to be true!? The Sanders effect had Boulder feelin' like a world class event from the afternoon all the way to the break of dawn on Saturday.

College Gameday saw the very start of the madness, and was a showing tale of how the night would go as Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson took over the Gameday set with Coach Prime and Pat McAfee:

Pat wasn't kidding when he said everyone was in Colorado. It was unprecedented. I am willing to bet that Boulder had never seen that many stars; media attention; and personality before. First Take; College Gameday; FOX; 60 Minutes; you name it, and the media coverage was there in Boulder. All the people and hype you see in the above video, that was like 10 hours before the actual game. The locals were unhappy, I'm sure. An entire day of festivities just to see Deion Sanders and his Buffalos play their state rival. Two teams that won just a combined 4 games last season just had one of the most watched games of all-time. Everyone wanted to watch after this:

The game brought it to anther level. The house was packed full of celebs; pro athletes; and rappers. I'm talkin Offset; Wu-Tang Clan; Master P; The Rock; Key Glock; Chauncey Billups; Cordae; and many others. Could you imagine graduating or leaving CU last season? Ouch. This game wasn't in New York; LA; or Miami. These cats flew PJs just to watch a 10 o'clock (ET) college football game in week 3 of the season. They got Kawhi Leonard out the house. Kawhi!

You think that's crazy enough? Deion had Lil Wayne perform the team out to the field:

Shedeur was caught pregamin' with Key Glock spreadin' a dap and adoring ice on the wrist. The noise on the field matched the hype in the stands with one of the hardest hitting games seen in some time. After Shilo Sanders started the scoring with an electric 80-yard pick six, the Rams answered back and then controlled the lead for most of the game in part to their aggression and physicality. As much as I loved their demeanor, it became too much quick, with zero accountability from CSU head coach Jay Norvell. That cat gave me baby Bud Kilmer vibes.

No way do you apologize for the physicality and making things "personal". This is football and in my opinion, in physical sports the mental warfare is one of the best cards to play. The fact he didn't show accountability to Blackburn for his hit on Hunter was one thing, but allowing it all game with the penalties, proves he didn't care about his team winning the game. That's when we get to my line in the sand. This isn't Texas high school football. Show a better example, especially with 9M watching. His sideline interview was garbage. Here was the hit from DB Henry Blackburn that sent Travis Hunter to the hospital to be examined:

Cut the death threat bulls*** out towards Blackburn. It's a game for pete sake. I want the coach on him because he wears a captain patch. Captains can't take those stupid decisions to cost the team yards and get ejected for targeting (can't believe he didn't). Stop being goofy by over-reacting to a FOOTBALL play.

The hard-nosed action from CSU ended up being their demise as they couldn't reel it in. Penalties cost them their lead in regulation and the game in general. Shedeur Sanders was flawless orchestrating the comeback win. He has a chance to build himself into a superstar, I really see it. The 98-yard drive to send the game to OT was special. One of the better moments I have seen from a college QB in awhile. The poise was high level. Sanders then followed suit with an overtime (2) not soon forgotten to lift the Buff's to their biggest fourth quarter comeback since 2005. How do they celebrate? To a live locker-room concert by Key Glock, of course!

Coach Prime; Shedeur Sanders; and the Buffaloes are the talk of the college football world week in and week out. The CSU game ended at 2AM for those on the east coast, forcin' many to stay up. The game drew 9.3 million viewers to make it the most-watched late night college football game ever on ESPN and the fifth-most-watched regular season game ever on the network. Colorado plays (10) Oregon and then (5) USC after. What's next!? Deion had the stars out, and the people tuned in. It's a new era, baby.

New Era

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