Hard to believe we're already a third of the way through the regular season. So it's a good time to check out the biggest surprises of the season thus far:
1. The Mountain West: We knew BYU and Utah would be solid teams, although I'm not sure anyone outside of the state of Utah believed both would be looking this strong. Better still, it's been the impressive play of the rest of the league that has gotten everyone's attention, highlighted by that 4-0 sweep of the Pac-10 Sept. 13 when BYU pounded UCLA, New Mexico beat Arizona, UNLV stunned ASU and TCU beat Stanford. The improved play of UNLV, which just beat another BCS conference school (Iowa State) has been particularly surprising. Heck, the worst team in the league, San Diego State, went to Notre Dame and almost knocked off the Irish.
The top of this bunch is very legit. BYU has emerged as a very scary team. We knew the offense would be terrific, but the D has come though big-time, compiling consecutive shutouts, while the Utes' defense also has been quite salty. In fact, one of the best performances of the weekend was Utah bottling up an Air Force ground attack to 53 yards, 303 BELOW the Falcons' average coming into the game. Now if TCU can upset OU, again in Norman, the MWC really makes noise and probably leapfrogs every league outside of the SEC in conference rankings.
2. Javon Ringer: I debated whether he belongs on this list -- same for UConn's Donald Brown since both were terrific in 2007. However the workload Ringer has carried for Michigan State has been amazing. This weekend, he became the first Spartans player to rush for 200 yards or more in consecutive games. He also has had 143 carries, which is more than one-third of the teams in the FBS have had. The guy is on pace for a whopping 429 carries (and 2,097 rushing yards and 33 TDs.) Ringer has 11 TDs already, almost double his total for '07 (six).
3. Vandy: Most people expected this to be a rebuilding year since the Commodores had only nine returning starters and six of the guys they lost off last year's team made NFL rosters. Both lines had to be entirely rebuilt. Yet, here they are, 4-0 for only the fourth time since World War II. It also may anger Tennessee fans to read this, but it's not hard to make the case that Vandy is the best team in the state right now. Whether you want to attribute it to great coaching adjustments or supreme conditioning, Vandy has been terrific in the second half, outscoring its opponents 51-10 this season. Better still, every week it's been a different star stepping up. Against Ole Miss it was FS Ryan Hamilton who had three interceptions, a fumble recovery and a tackle on a fourth-and-1 at the goal line to lead Vanderbilt to a 23-17 win and a 2-0 start in SEC play.
4. Kellen Moore: The Boise State QB plays like a senior even though he's just a redshirt freshman. In one of the country's tougher road environments (Oregon), Moore completed 67 percent of his passes for 386 yards and three touchdowns while also hitting 11 different receivers even though he was faced with arguably the nation's top secondary. His 386 was actually the most yards allowed by the Ducks since Fresno State passed for 418 yards in a loss back in September 2005. On the season, Moore, who was passed over by Pac-10 schools apparently for concerns over his size, is completing 72 percent of his passes with 5 TDs and just 1 INT.
5. Charles Scott: LSU has a great stable of backs, but it's been Scott who has separated himself. The guy has always had a rep as a punishing runner, but word is he's relying more on his vision and picking his spots better and the results have been outstanding. In fact, the guy might be barreling his way into the Heisman race. After Scott banged his way through Auburn for 132 yards, he became the first LSU player since Charles Alexander in 1978 to have three straight 100+ yard rushing performances. Maybe even more impressively, Scott averaged 6.3 yards per carry against an Auburn defense that allowed just 53 rushing yards per game entering the contest. On the year he's averaging nine yards per carry. Keep this up and he's getting invited to the Heisman ceremony.
6. Robert Griffin: I have to admit when I ranked him fourth in last spring's Freaks list, I never expected he'd actually be this good of a QB this fast.
However he's proving to be a big-time talent. I got a chance to see him in person the other night at UConn and Griffin looks like he is going to be the cornerstone of a very nice turnaround at Baylor. He is the fastest QB in the country and it's not close. But the real impressive part has been how smart he has been with the football. His QB rating is over 171 and he ranks ninth in the country in passing while amassing an eye-popping seven TD passes and zero INTs.
7. Bama's Run Defense: The Tide loses its best D-lineman and returned minimal experience at linebacker, but Bama has been awesome against the run this season, holding opponents to 55 yards per game. They completely dominated the vaunted Clemson ground attack in the season-opening Alabama romp. Give a lot of credit to mammoth JC transfer Terrrence Cody, the nose tackle. The 360-pounder is making a case to be the top newcomer in the SEC this season, eating up double-teams, getting penetration and clogging up the middle.
8. Rodney Stewart: It's no surprise that a freshman tailback has given the Colorado offense a major jolt. Of course, it was expected to be uber blue-chipper Darrell Scott, not 5-6, 180-pound Rodney Stewart, the Darren Sproleseque pinball who lit up the West Virginia D the other night for 166 yards. Stewart, a lightly recruited speedster from Columbus, Ohio, has gone from getting four carries in the opener to nine carries the following game to 28 carries against WVU.
9. Minnesota: The young Gophers could go from 1-11 to a bowl game this fall. Granted the early-season schedule hasn't been very tough, but it's the way they've been winning. They avenged last season's loss to FAU by thumping the Owls 37-3. Impressive when you consider the Gophers had the nation's worst D in 2007. Minnesota also blasted a decent Bowling Green team, 42-17 on the road, right after the Falcons had won at Pitt. The team is forcing turnovers with 13, third most in the country. The key has been some impact JC transfers who have really improved the secondary. Also, young QB Adam Weber is quietly putting together a good season and WR Eric Decker is on pace to catch nearly 100 passes for almost 1,400 yards. This is all even more impressive when you consider the Gophers lost their leading rusher, Duane Bennett, in Week 2.
10. Converted receivers: The two guys leading the country in receivers, Kansas' Kerry Meier and Rice's James Casey, both are still getting settled in at their positions. Meier is a former QB while Casey is the play-everything former minor league baseball player. That's actually quite a follow-up to last year's breakout receiving star Michael Crabtree, who had been a high school QB before winning the Biletnikoff Award in his first season at receiver. Casey's versatility makes him one of the better stories in college football this fall:
"Last year we made the move during two-a-days to play him at quarterback," Rice offensive coordinator Tom Herman said of Casey, who was recruited as a strong safety. "We saw some potential with him at quarterback, [but] you try not to overload the kid's plate when he played an entire spring at defensive end. And so you introduce him into the offense slowly. We put him into our Thor package, and he was running people over. And then one day we had a bunch of wideouts that were dinged up and weren't practicing, and we sent him and [backup quarterback] John Thomas [Shepherd] to go run some routes, and he's out there [making] one-handed [catches]. We said, 'Hey, we need to play this guy a little bit.'" Smart move.
RANDOM STUFF
•I had a blast watching games up in Bristol this weekend. I also had a much better week of picking games although I really missed on Boise State-Oregon. (I have to give props to my buddy Chris Spielman for calling that one before the game.) I've talked a lot about Oregon's Chip Kelly, but we have to give it up to Boise OC Bryan Harsin and head coach Chris Peterson, who baffled a very fast and talented Ducks D with a lot of motion, misdirection and window dressing that seemed to have Oregon back on its heels most of the day. The play-action work by Kellen Moore and a still fairly inexperienced O-line was superb.
•Love the move by Jim Tressel getting Terrelle Pryor going. Sure there will be some moments when he tries to do something from nothing because he's so used to being waaay more gifted than everyone else on the field (the long sack right before halftime that forced OSU out of field goal range is my example) but the guy is going to do so much more positive than negative, and he's bringing a spark to a program that desperately needs one. Also, Troy isn't a bad team. Although I was still surprised that the OSU D had given up so many yards in the first half.
•The aforementioned Donald Brown is a terrific back. He is very patient and breaks a lot of tackles. I wonder how much better UVa and Rutgers, the two schools UConn beat for his services, would be if they had him. It's hard to believe that he could've been teammates with Knowshon Moreno on a Pop Warner team and it wasn't very good.
•I'm ready to tout LSU as a serious national title threat, and yes, I know I'm late here, but I wasn't sold until I watched Jarrett Lee shine like that at Auburn against a great defense. Lee threw for 182 yards and two TDs in the second half after going 0-for-5 with a pick six. He has good, fast receivers to work with, a very solid O-line and some dynamite RBs. Look out for LSU.
•I've been a big believer in Robert Marve since I first saw him when I was working on Meat Market. The guy not only has a live arm, really good feet, but also the toughness and grit to be a great college QB. Marve was terrific the other night in a hostile road setting at Texas A&M and Greg Cote also thinks he is poised to restore a proud tradition at Miami that had gathered quite a bit of dust:
"This kid from Tampa, this freshman, raised his right hand and showed enough magic and promise in it -- in only his second college start -- to make you think he has a chance to join champion quarterback Ken Dorsey from early this decade as UM's only truly special quarterback since Gino Torretta walked away with a Heisman Trophy 16 years ago."
•Bad stat dept: FSU committed three turnovers in the first half to make it 11 turnovers in the past 10 quarters against the Demon Deacons.
•Pete Carroll says he is disciplining cornerback Shareece Wright for his role in an incident that led to his being charged with felony resisting a police officer, but the junior will play against Oregon State if cleared medically to do so.
Carroll declined to specify the nature of the disciplinary action, reports Gary Klein.
•Matt Grothe's brash style and his cocksure attitude remind me a little of Jim McMahon.
•The appeal to get freshman wide receiver Josh Jarboe eligible to play this year was denied by the NCAA, Troy head coach Larry Blakeney said Sunday.
•SEC Speed? Think those rules changes have made a difference? The national average for length of games this season is 3:08, down some 12 minutes from last season. SEC games this season are averaging 3:11, although that is still 12 minutes shorter than last year's average of 3:23 and four minutes more than the 2006 average of 3:07.
•Being No. 1 in red zone offense can be very misleading sometimes. Just look at ASU, which tops the Pac-10 in that stat. The Sun Devils are 14-for-15 (.933) in the red zone this season, however they have just seven TDs on those trips.
"When you have a long drive and have to settle for a field goal, even that can be deflating," quarterback Rudy Carpenter told the East Valley Trib. "It takes away your momentum, even if you get a field goal. That's been our story all season. The coaches can only call the plays; we have to do it. It's that simple."
My three cents: Even though it's true it can be very deflating emotionally to come up completely empty for teams, I still think a more telling stat would be percentage of points generated in the red zone. In the case of the Pac-10, Arizona, which is second, has scored on 20 of 22 trips with 18 of those being TDs. For perspective's sake, USC, ranks ninth in the league (8-11), however the Trojans have scored seven TDs.
•Is Steve Spurrier ready to flip the keys to his offense to Stephen Garcia? Maybe. Against Wofford, Chris Smelley, a redshirt sophomore who is 5-4 as a starter, completed 23 of 33 passes for 204 yards and a touchdown in the 23-13 victory against Wofford. Smelley was intercepted on his first pass and had three turnovers in the first half. After Spurrier reviewed game tape he said Smelley actually played a little better than he thought, Joseph Person reports.
But ...
"If Stephen Garcia can show us something in practice this week, that's he's capable, that he can manage the game and take care of the ball, then, yeah, let's put him out there," Spurrier said. "But if he appears lost, if it appears he doesn't quite know what he's doing out there, then we should not put him out there."
•Impressive showing by Georgia and especially freshman WR A.J. Green, who has more than lived up to his lofty hype. Against ASU, Green became the first Bulldog to have more than 100 yards receiving in a game since 2006 after he snared eight passes for 159 yards. His performance was the best at UGA since Fred Gibson had 169 yards against Arkansas in 2004.
How good is Green? Longtime Southern sportswriter Tony Barnhart makes a big statement: "I've seen a lot of really good receivers at Georgia from Lindsay Scott, to Andre Hastings, Brice Hunter, Reggie Brown, and Gibson. It is a long list of All-SEC players. But consider this: Georgia has never had a consensus All-America player at the wide receiver position. Green has a chance to become the first before he leaves Georgia if he stays healthy and listens to OC Mike Bobo and Mark Richt."
•Marshall may have turned the corner under Mark Snyder with its win at Southern Miss in a very tough environment. "In my whole career, this is not the toughest, but it's up in the top 10 hardest places to play in my 20 years of coaching and I have been in some pretty good venues," said Snyder, a longtime former Big Ten assistant.
The win snapped the Thundering Herd's nine-game road losing streak. Now if the Herd can upset WVU, installed as more than a two-TD favorite, then the Marshall fan base will really have reason to pump its fists.
•I was tempted to put Penn State's offense in this week's top-10 list but bumped it for the receiving leaders. Still, let's give PSU some praise: Sure the Nittany Lions' schedule has been softer than a bowl of last week's popcorn, but putting up the numbers PSU has been racking up would be impressive even if they're doing it against air. The Nittany Lions have outscored their opponents 211-40 and are in the top 10 nationally in most of the meaningful offensive stats. Not bad for a school that many thought would have a hard time tuning out a lot of off-field distractions.
•Let's give a nod to Northwestern's D. The Wildcats are 4-0 and making a lot of big plays on defense and special teams.
•Tennessee was awful. I can't believe that after the way UF's players called the Vols out for quitting in last year's game and that was how they responded. I've never seen Phil Fulmer look so frazzled.
•Failure sells sometimes. According to the Daily Orange, three Syracuse students have found a way to wear their disappointment in football head coach Greg Robinson. Seniors Josh Shaw, Shawn O'Donoghue and Mike Zahler started making T-shirts this year that read "Greg Robinson Farewell Tour." The shirts have a list of this season's game dates and locations on the back.
The three have sold nearly 200 shirts -- printed by Holy Shirt company -- to students and tailgaters. Publicity has stemmed from their Facebook group of 73 members and word of mouth.
Not sure if the folks behind the GetGrossOut Web site to rally a move that would oust Daryl Gross, the Cuse AD, are also considering a line of apparel.
Bruce Feldman
