Oklahoma stuns Texas, Georgia downs Alabama, Indiana keeps streak alive, UCLA’s CFP push + Top 10

The passion on Saturday is just different. It's just different. This is true right now. They were better on offense with Quinn Ewers. Can you make a strong case? The two teams we saw play in Tuscaloosa on Saturday night are the two best teams that we've seen in college football. I think you can make a strong case for that. Hey, what's going on? Welcome to the Joel Klatt Show. I'm Joel Klatt. This show is sponsored by Hilton. Hilton for the stay, and we thank them for their support as always. What an incredible day of college football that we get to talk about here on this show. My gosh, Saturday was awesome, and it was every single television window. The game that we had on big noon Saturday was, I thought it was fantastic. Indiana at Nebraska, the environment was terrific. We'll talk about that one. Then in the next window, the 3.30 Eastern, Red River was a classic. Oregon-UCLA came down to the wire. And then at night, we had basically a trio of great football games. Bama-Georgia, the whiteout over there in State College, Kentucky's upset of LSU on the two-point conversion. This is what the sport is all about. And I was texting with some friends. I'm sure you guys have all your text chains going on at all times. And so I've got text chains with a bunch of different guys. And I was texting with them on Sunday, and I was just like, you know, as good as some of those finishes were in the NFL, and listen, like the San Francisco game, the San Francisco-Seattle game was awesome. And that environment is awesome as well. But man, you get some duds, man, in the NFL. And I know you can get that in college football as well. But the passion on Saturday is just different. It's just different. And all of those great games, I cannot wait to talk about them. I'll reveal my new top 10. I've got a team that lost and moved up for me in my top 10. So I'll reveal that in just a little bit. Let's start with Red River. Red River. I thought it was kind of the best game of the day. I thought Red River was amazing. Oklahoma stuns Texas in Red River. And that game never disappoints. I've had the absolute honor and fortune of calling that game a few different times. And I can tell you, it's one of my favorite games to call. I think it's the most unique college football game that we have. Because of the nature of the neutral site and the 50-50 fans, it's a fever pitch the entire game because of the 50-50 fan base, how they split them up. The colors, the old school Cotton Bowl, that rivalry. And man, it is a phenomenal game. And it never, ever disappoints. It doesn't matter the records. And this year, more than any other possibly, you have Texas coming in with the number one ranking in the country. And you have Oklahoma fledgling coming into this game. They're 2-2. They can't move the ball. And yet, and yet, what did I tell you guys last week in our picks and previews? I said, I think this game could be a little bit closer. Than we anticipate. Because the margin between these two teams wasn't as significant as the unranked versus number one team in the nation would suggest. And I also told you, and I got some heat for this, by the way, about Texas and specifically their offense, that they were better on paper than they were on film. And that's exactly what played out on Saturday. I want to give a ton of credit to Oklahoma, Brent Venables, John Mateer, that entire program. Because they came in there and they had a very specific blueprint that they had to follow. Had to follow. Listen, Oklahoma was never going to get in an offensive shootout and win. They had to create a short field or score on special teams. They had to create a short field or score on defense. And that's exactly what they did. And then the offense had to show up in moments and create some explosive plays with the guys that you know that you can rely on, like Isaiah Satania. That's the exact blueprint. That's the exact blueprint that they had to follow and they were able to follow it. So a gutty, gritty performance from Mateer, from Oklahoma. Their defense from Brent Venables. And they just found a way to win that game. So, you know, kudos to them. I thought that that was an incredible performance from them. And I will say, just from a Mateer perspective, he's gotten a lot of heat this year. And listen, some of it is appropriate because of the turnover, specifically in that Georgia game. The throws he made. He made after Archer's second interception in the fourth quarter to get them in field goal range so that they can go out there and Tate Sandell, who I think is one of, if not the best kicker in college football, so that he has a chance to put the left foot on it and win the game. The two throws to Satania at the end were phenomenal throws. So, like, all the hand-wringing about John Mateer, like he showed up in those moments. And, you know, I'll give him the slow clap right there because that was clutch. And in particular, I don't think you guys really understand. And I don't want to say, like, well, you know, you've never been in those shoes. But I've been in those shoes where your fan base is on you. You're struggling at the quarterback position. Maybe they want to change. You know, everyone's thinking, like, oh, this can't happen. It is incredibly lonely to be in that spot. Incredibly lonely. At times, you can wonder, are my coaches behind me? Are my teammates behind me? And sometimes, it takes an incredible amount of fortitude, confidence, belief, and trust to go out there and play really well in big moments when that's going on. Because I can just tell you, a lack of confidence can seep into your psyche as a quarterback in particular because it is a lonely position. As much as this is the most beautiful team game that we have in all of sports, that position, man, there are times when it feels like you're on an island. And John Mateer, over the last couple of weeks, has been on an island. And he came out there and showed up. Was it great all day? No. But when they needed him to play his best, he played his best. Those two throws were incredible to Cetania. And then, of course, Cetania, who shows up, he's really their only threat. I know Avant ran the ball well, and they were able to do some things on the offensive line that were better than what they have been over the last year and a half, let's call it. But Cetania is really their threat on the offensive side, and he shows up and makes great plays. In the most clutch moment of the game. And I've just got a question. If you're on the Texas side, how is Will Muschamp single-covering Isaiah Cetania in that moment? I don't understand that whatsoever. Again, this is an offense that struggles mightily. He's the one threat down the field. He's the one threat in a one-on-one situation that can actually make plays. And he's single-covered twice? Come on, man. Like, what are we doing there? That is a giant coaching mistake from the Texas Longhorns. Now, from Oklahoma, from Oklahoma's standpoint, do I see this turning their season around? Well, possibly. Although, you can't have that blueprint every day. You're not going to get the special team score with the block punt every single week. You're not going to get the defensive touchdown every single week. Now, you're not going to see Texas' defense every single week. So, what you have to do is you've got to take the positives from this game, from an offensive perspective, and you've got to build on those. How can we take the run game that we had success with in periods and build on that? How do we take the passing game and the confidence that Mateer has now, throw in the football outside of the numbers to Cetania, so on and so forth, and build on that? Do I see them all of a sudden turning into a playoff team? Not really. They still struggle for too long of stretches on the offensive side for a team, you know, to all of a sudden become a top-ten team. But, man, that defense is going to keep them into it. Definitely going to keep them into it. From the Texas perspective, this Texas team, and, again, I took a lot of heat last week. And, listen, anything you say about Arch is always going to get picked up. And now for a couple of weeks, I've been saying, like, hey, Arch is just playing okay. And, actually, there's some things that are worrisome. He doesn't process information all that quickly. His eyes tend to be in the wrong spot at times. You saw that on the last interception. There are some brilliant throws. So you see the ceiling of Arch, but then the floor is really low. It's really low. And because of that, the entire offense, their floor becomes very, very low. Texas made the mistakes necessary for OU to go and win that football game. If you're Texas, and you're Steve Sarkeesian, and you're building a game plan, the only thing that you cannot allow is a special teams touchdown and a defensive touchdown. If you just play clean, you win the game. All you've got to do is play clean. You don't have to be spectacular. You don't even have to be explosive. You're going to play and win the game if you're just clean. And they were unable to do that. Again. Again, they have been sloppy and ineffective on the offensive side, and that continues to hamper them. Over the last two games, with as much talent on the offensive side as they have, this has got to be maddening for Texas fans. Last two games, Tennessee and Oklahoma. Over half of Texas' drives have either been a three and out or a turnover. Come on. What are we doing? Six three and outs and two turnovers in each football game. Only reason Tennessee has a chance late. Only reason Oklahoma has a chance late. This is better than both of those teams. They just are. Roster-wise, talent-wise, they are better. The defense is doing their part. This is still a top-ten defense in the country as far as yards per play go. They are doing their part. Will they make a silly mistake here or there? They get the roughing the passer. When OU is trying a silly double pass in plus territory, Cetania is going to throw an interception. That kind of puts the game away. You can start to salt them away. If you don't make mistakes, they get a roughing the passer because they jump up and bang, they hit him on the head. They get a roughing the passer. you can't make those mistakes. So again, the mistakes, the sloppiness, it's got to be maddening from the Texas perspective. Take a look at some of these offensive ranks. I don't want to harp on this, but again, this is one of the more talented offenses in college football, just from a roster perspective. And yet, they're sitting here. Yards per play in the country right now, 104th. Yards per carry, 117th. QB pressure rate, 100th. Three and out rate, 122nd. What are we doing? At this point, you've got to start to evaluate, what's the issue here? We did this last week with Michigan. What is not connecting so far between these talented players and the offense that they're trying to run? And I come back to Arch in this. Is this just an Arch problem? Not necessarily. Now, was that last interception egregious? 100%. It was an egregious interception with 19 seconds left. It's the only way that you're going to lose the game, and they ended up doing it. But Arch right now, again, and I touched on this a bit earlier, you see the brilliance from him. So when he throws the football fourth quarter, he throws that deep ball. I believe it was Cam Coleman, right kind of down the middle of the post route. And you're like, whoa, there's not many quarterbacks in the country that can make that throw. Maybe a handful, maybe five guys can make that throw. So Arch's ceiling is really high. And yet the floor, he pulls out right and just wings the ball for a pick six. Like, you can't make that decision as a quarterback. They bring pressure on the last interception, and the pressure is from the right side, and his eyes go left. And then he's got to come back right. And because it's in his lap, he gets nothing on the ball. He throws it off his back foot. It's inside on an outbreaking route, and it's picked off. You can't make that mistake. And so right now, high ceiling, low floor. He's like a boxer who's like, goes in there, and he's just like ready to knock people out. And the power punch is incredible. It's elite. The power punch is elite. The problem is he's not a technical boxer for the rest of the 12 rounds, right? So they get beat up at times. They're three and out. There's turnovers here and there. And then all of a sudden, they can hit the post. They can hit that. I think back to the last couple of years of Quinn Ewers. At quarterback. And listen, the data is going to bear this out. And I know this is going to generate all the headlines, but this is true right now. They were better on offense with Quinn Ewers because Quinn was a fast processor. He had very quick feet. He had a very quick release. And so what they could utilize more was the RPO. It helped them in the run game, and it helped them in the pass game. Now, what Quinn didn't have is the ability to have the knockout punch. He could not throw the football down the field as well. As Arch does. That's why I always felt like we were going to get a more 2020 Alabama offense out of Arch Manning and Texas than what we've gotten so far. That 2020 Alabama team, they could throw haymakers. They could run the football. They could throw underneath. They could do all of it with Mack Jones at quarterback and all those great players, including Devontae Smith. It's never materialized for Arch. So you get the home run balls, and then everything else is just late, inconsistent, slower in processing, slower feet, slower release. And that's what I see right now. The variance is kind of killing them. Sloppy for the second straight week. They've got to fix some things. So where does Texas go in the top 10? I'm going to reveal these kind of as we go. Where does Texas go in the top 10? Here's the thing. Because they still have such a high ceiling, they are still a top 10 team. Now, have they played like that for even a full half? I don't think that they have. But I can't put them lower than seven. So Texas is going to have to do something. I don't think they're going to have to do anything. Texas is going to be seventh right now. And I'll get into more of that a little bit later. I think that there are seven teams still with insanely high ceilings that have an ability to go. And if everything is right, then they can potentially go and win the national championship. I would still say that about Texas, but they're not close to that right now. Not even close. So they're going to be at number seven right there. Let's move on. Let's go. Georgia beats Alabama in T-Town. How do you think they're going to play? I think they're going to play. I'm optimistic about Alabama. I love Keelan Russell. Love Keelan Russell. He made a couple of plays. And again, I'm on the group chat with like all the guys, including Mark Ingram. And we're all like, wow. Remember, he's like eludes a rush. He gets over the right side, makes a throw. And you're just like, holy cow. Like he's, he's, he's going to be great. Keelan Russell is going to be great. However, however, Georgia is still Georgia. Okay. They still can get you and they can get you up and they can say, you are going to feel our power. And that's exactly what Kirby smart was talking about after the game and his post game interview with Laura Rutledge. He said something. I was like, oh man, that is so good. I want to play for a guy like that. Now, since we've seen or heard through social media, some of the leaked pregame speech that he gave to his team, obviously we can't play it. It's basically just an entire bleep for the entire, I mean, Kirby, uses colorful language. All right. Like I don't love that aspect of, of Kirby, but what I do love is the message that he was giving his team. And it's centered around this, the, the, the pared down version that he even gave to Laura after the game was, listen, I told my guys, one, I love them too. I I've got their back. I think they're great players. So he's instilling confidence in these guys. And then he says, and I told him, I didn't care what the scoreboard said. I didn't even care if we won. I just wanted them to feel us. And I was like, yeah, oh, that's yes. I'm in man. I'm in. And that's what played out. Now, again, it wasn't to the extent that we saw Georgia beat up Alabama at the line of scrimmage a year ago. And so there are positives for Bama. There's no doubt your quarterback is elite. The line of scrimmage was different than a year ago and you are gaining, but you are not there. You're not there. You're not bulldog there. You're not go dogs there. Those guys, can still get after it at the line of scrimmage. Gunner Stockton still makes plays when he needs to make plays the third down late in the game, making plays. I think the frustrating part for Bama is, is that, and I'll get to the, the blown non-call at the end of the game. And in a moment, the frustrating part for Alabama is that you were better on the offensive line, not better than Georgia, but better than you have been in this matchup. And you got the short field on a Gunner Stockton interception in this game. And you had the two best backs that Georgia have that are not playing and you still couldn't beat them. So that's the frustrating part. Is there some level of optimism the way that the game played out? Yes, of course, even though Caitlin was losing his mind at the end. And I think a lot of that was, was the horrendous non-call in the corner of the end zone. Let me get to that because yes, Georgia beats Alabama 20 to 17. Can you make a strong argument that, that the officials cost Alabama the game? Absolutely. At a minimum, they're going to have a great chance to tie the game with a field goal. A great chance. About three and a half minutes left. George is on the 34-yard line. It is as clear a pass interference as I can remember seeing. This is going back to what was the NFC Championship. You remember the Saints-Eagles, was it? Was it Saints-Eagles? Gosh, who was it? Anyways, the horrendous non-call that we got in the NFL playoffs, it was tantamount to that. How is that not called? And Georgia fans are going to be irate at this next comment, but all of us who are not dyed-in-the-wool dog fans, Georgia gets an incredible whistle. It's just true. In some of the biggest moments and most crucial moments of tight ballgames, man, Georgia gets an incredible whistle. An incredible whistle. The second interception, even the booth, they were talking about like, hey, did that bounce off the wrist? And it's just quick review, incomplete, no interception. You can go all the way back to the Ohio State-Marvin Harrison semifinal game where it's, like, hold on a second, that's not targeting. You can go to the Auburn sneak, and then all of a sudden it's a fumble, and they're running down, and they take a huge review. Where does it go? It goes Georgia's way. They come back and win that game. Georgia gets a good whistle. They do. They just do. And again, dog fans, you're going to be upset, even though, even though I really love Georgia. I've told you now for a couple of weeks, I said, what was it, three weeks ago, that I have a sneaky suspicion that Georgia's actually the best team in the country. I put them up at number one in my top 10. Why do I feel that way? Because of all the things that we saw on Saturday night. When they need a play, Gunnar Stockton makes it. When they have to gain some yards, they do it. They just don't beat themselves, and for that, they're the number one team in the country, and we all know it. We all know it after this weekend. They are, they are the number one team in the country. country. They have proven that. And here's the other sentiment that I will just kind of throw out there. And this is why I don't think it's all doom and gloom with Alabama. Sure, there's some frustrating things and the penalty was frustrating. There's no doubt. And I know Kalen was losing his mind on his players there with the personal foul at the end. But I think he's losing his mind on his players partly because of the non-call in the corner of the end zone. But here's the thing about Alabama. For a large section of that game, and again, I'm going through the big noon chat. We're sitting there and were we watching the two best teams in the country there? Of all the games that we've seen in college football, can you make a strong case that the two teams we saw play in Tuscaloosa on Saturday night are the two best teams that we've seen in college football? I really, really do. I didn't put them at number two. I thought that that was a bridge too far. But Alabama is going to move up for me. They proved a lot. Keelan Russell will improve. Bama goes to four. Keelan Russell is going to see that for the first time. He's seeing this Georgia defense for the first time, the speed of that Georgia defense for the first time, the disguise of their secondary looks for the first time. He is going to grow from this game more than any other game that he's played. Everyone say it's, oh, your first, your most growth from your first game to your second game. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Your first real game to your second game. That's when the growth starts. The growth shows up and Russell is going to grow from this. So Bama is going to go to five. They were at, or excuse me, four. They were at five last week. Texas dropped out of there. Obviously they can move up again. Bama can absolutely win the national championship. That team could win a national championship. I firmly believe that in particular, if Russell continues to improve and he becomes a little bit more efficient, if the offensive line continues to develop under Adrian Clem, their offensive line coach, like then they've got something. They totally rebuilt their offensive line. And it shows in a positive way. So Bama, again, Bama fans, they're the last fans in the world that are going to want a moral victory, but there was a small moral victory in that game on Saturday night because it didn't look like the bloodbath that was the SEC championship a year ago. It just didn't. Now was Georgia still more physical? Yes. Georgia is still the number one team in the country right now, but man, that Bama team, they showed me quite a lot. How about our game? Big noon kickoff was in Lincoln. Can I just first start with this? And I'm not supposed to say this because I played at Colorado and Nebraska is our rival. The Husker fan base is awesome. You guys are amazing. You know, for the better part, we're almost going on 30 years of just desert for Nebraska. There've been a small pockets of some success. Bo Pelini had some success. I think that you probably would take the Bo Pelini era now, if you're a Nebraska fan and you're being honest with yourself. Mike Riley had one year that kind of popped, but guys, you are phenomenal fans. Big noon kickoff was packed. It was one of the best environments that we've had on big noon kickoff since we started big noon kickoff. And that was all the way back in 2019. Okay. So that was before the game, the stadium, and I've played there like that is a difficult place to play. And I played against some better Nebraska teams than maybe, you know, of recent vintage. But man, like the fans are so intelligent. I said it during the broadcast. It's, I think it's at least as in, in, in environments that I've either called the game. I haven't done every single environment. I've never called a game in some of those sec venues. So I don't want to just blanket this by saying there's not one that's smarter than Nebraska. As far as the venues that I either played in or have covered football in, it is the most intelligent fan base, football, intelligent fan base that, that I've ever seen. And here's why. They understand when to be loud and when not to be allowed. Cause here's the thing when you're at home and, and you're like, man, I would like, can our crowd just calm down for a second? We need to communicate on offense. Nebraska's fans allow their offense to communicate. Okay. So they kind of softly like a golf. They're like a golf crowd until a score happens. Right. And they quiet down quickly. A big play happens. A first down, you know, it's huge. And then they quiet down quickly and they allow their offense to communicate. Defense comes out there and man, they're playing the music and here it comes in. Boom. It's the noise. And so like, that's just the atmosphere. I think Lincoln is amazing. I think college football will be better. It's better with, with Miami and Notre Dame back in the top 10. Don't we all agree with that? I would agree with that. If we could get Nebraska going, Oh man. Oh, and this is coming from a Colorado guy, guys, like, come on, come on. It'd be great to get them back. Now, as far as the game goes, I credited Georgia. With the idea that it's just hard to beat them because they won't beat themselves. So guess what? You've got to say the same thing about Indiana. Same thing about Indiana. It is tough to beat Indiana. Now they've won 22 straight football games, which is so insanely difficult to do 22 straight football games, including an undefeated national championship. Why? Because they don't beat themselves. There are other pieces of that and I'll get to it, but paramount to all of that is that they don't beat themselves. All right. This is a team that doesn't beat themselves. All right. This is the turnover margin, almost every game, which is absurd, absurd. The amount that they've got the longest streak straight right now of winning the turnover margin or being even in the turnover margin that, that we can even record since statistics go back like that. That's how well they play. Um, was it brilliant? Was it dominant? Was it like super impressive? No, but the element of, Indiana finds a way is impressive in and of itself. You don't win 22 straight football games without it. A couple of things from the Indiana perspective. I think that they, you could argue that they're a little too reliant on splash plays. They've played two games that have been tight football games, Northwestern at home, this one against Nebraska on the road. And in both of those games, they get into a tight game late in the game and in the second half and in the fourth quarter, and they broke the game open. They won the game. They created the space in the game via the splash play, the explosive play on offense. And so if you were playing devil's advocate for Indiana right now, you would say like, well, you can't rely on that all the time. I think that's a fair argument. Okay. You look at this, um, in that, uh, Northwestern game, they had the long runs from Lee BB in this game. You had a couple of long touchdowns from Nick Marsh, right in the game Saturday, they had 199 yards and two touchdowns on four. I think we've gotten Nebraska fatigue over the last few years. Cause everyone, including myself, I'll raise my hand on this have been like, Hey, watch out for Nebraska. This could be the year that they bounce. And then they don't, and they fall off the map in the second half of the year. And so there's a ton of Nebraska fatigue and it's kind of like, we're not going to talk about them until it's real. I'm here to tell you like that team that I saw on Saturday, they had a lot of good football team. It should have been a ranked team going into this matchup. I thought they should have bumped up into the top 25 because of what they did on Saturday. That's a good football team. That's a gritty quarterback and Anthony Calandria. They had a good plan under Dana Holgerson. Matt rules doing a nice job. Remember every single regular season that Matt has been there, they've increased their wind total. You could say like, well, you know, seven to five is no good. Okay. That, you know what? That's fine. This is still a team that I think has a path to more than that. I think it's a good team. I think that they can win eight games in the regular season. And you know what? In the playoff era, everyone can say, Hey, that stinks. And that's average. I'm just here to tell you like that's growth from Nebraska. This is an offensive line that I thought held up really well against an outstanding defensive line in Indiana. Calandria made plays on the edge. I think Jamal rule their freshmen running back is a really, really good player. Excellent player. One of the better young players that we have in college football. And they got beat by a team that just knows how to win. That just has a little bit more Nebraska controlled the ball nearly 40 minutes time of possession. They ran 83 plays. Indiana ran 44, 44 plays. But what did Indiana do? Well, here's, here's the secret sauce is that Indiana makes great adjustments. Why is it tough to beat them? Well, they don't make mistakes and they won't sit in something that they realize is, is not going to work. Let me explain both sides of the ball here. On the defensive side, the original game plan, the original structure was not working because of the variance that they were getting from the Nebraska offense in particular on the edge and more specifically out of the quarterback, Anthony Calandria, he was killing them with his legs. And it wasn't always design runs, even though that touchdown was a design run. It was mostly out of the scramble, his ability to extend plays, you know, scramble for first downs, extend drives, keep the defense on the field. And so when you get into, the second half, you started to see Indiana adjust one personnel adjustment, as well as you saw a little bit of a front structure adjustment. Now the personnel adjustment is that they moved AJ Harris who transferred from Penn state and they put him on the field. He was back finally since, uh, what was it? Injured week one. And he's been out ever since. And then he's finally healthy. They put him on the field and they try to get more out of their corner position because that's something that they've struggled with more than that in a second. And then also Brian Haynes changed the way that they, rushed the quarterback and rather than coming after the quarterback in Calandria and creating lanes for him to run, What they did is they either dropped eight into coverage and rushed three in a muddle sense, or when they were rushing four, the ends rushed very wide and weren't actually trying to get to the quarterback, but trying to hem him in so that they had eyes on him. So when he did try or decide to run, they could get to him. And then all of a sudden you look up at the end of the day and they have multiple sacks and you're like, oh, they got after the quarterback. No, no, no. It was an adjustment because getting after the quarterback was actually hurting them. And what they did is they started to build just a little bit of a fence, a muddled rush. You started to see them, you know, pressure to the wide side of the field to try to get him to escape to the short side of the field where they had a spy set up already. So rather than a spy having to cover 53 and a half yards across and just say like, I'm going to have to run after number 10 everywhere, they were basically flushing the quarterback out to a set spy where he now has limited space where he can make the play. All of those adjustments worked and helped on defense. And then on the side, here's the thing that Nebraska was doing heavy downhill safeties. So the secret sauce to the Indiana run game is that they block support better than anybody else. If you don't know what defensive structure is all about, here's basically what it is. You have a run structure up front and you have gap fits. So all of the players in the run, uh, or in the front seven on defense have a specific gap, generally speaking that they're responsible for, but then support comes out of the second and third level, depending on coverage structure. What Indiana does so well is that their wide receivers read those coverage structures, and then they'd go and block the support players. And they forced the corners to be making tackles, the free safeties in the corners to be making tackles. So basically your weakest tacklers are constantly having to make open field tackles on turbo Richard and Lee Beeble, Lee BB, excuse me. So what did Nebraska do? Well, they just said, you know what? Screw it. We're going to send our support and we're going to send them heavy so that the wide receivers can't even get there. They can't have tight enough splits in order to get there. So they were sending heavy downhill safety support action and they completely decimated the run game for Indiana. But here's the thing about Indiana. Indiana has answers. So what do they do? They come out and they immediately go RPO after the Calandria touchdown and they hit Nick Marsh for a touchdown going the other direction, just like they did to Iowa a year ago, because I was trying to do this exact same thing to their run game that Nebraska was trying to do. Fernando Mendoza hit Elijah Surratt for a big touchdown late in the Iowa game. Why? Because Iowa's safeties were flying up to the line of scrimmage. You see, if you don't have an answer, then what do you do? Nothing. You sit there and try to drop back against all that pressure, but not Indiana. They've got an answer. They've got an answer for everything you want to do. If you want to give them the run like Northwestern did, they'll hit you with the run play. If you want to send your safeties to stop the run, they'll hit you with the pass play. So you could make an argument that it's just splash plays and they can't rely on explosives forever, but in some cases, that's just their answer. And the splash plays are because you have to manipulate your structure to a point where they can get those splash plays. You've got to do something so egregious to your structure of defense that something is available to them, and then they can go out there and they can take advantage of that. Some X's and O's there. And in fact, what I'll do on Wednesday, we've been incorporating X's and O's in some film film session. So since it was our game, we've got the all 22 copy. I'm going to give you some film of that Indiana in particular on offense and maybe some adjustments on defense that's coming up on Wednesday. So where did Indiana fall in my top 10? Indiana is going to be at number six. I think that there's some things there that they need to work on. Their secondary still needs some help. They're trying to figure out where they need to be from a secondary standpoint, but Indiana is going to be my sixth ranked team in the country. And I'm just going to say this. I think Nebraska should be ranked. I think if you actually watch Nebraska and you're not just some silly AP voter who looks at box scores and then does your podcast, if you actually watch the games and you see this team play and you actually look at the metrics of what they've been doing to their competition, even though it has not been great competition, this is a good football team and Nebraska absolutely should be ranked. The AP has them at 29. As we know, the AP is kind of garbage, not even kind of garbage, fully garbage. They were up two spots. This should be a ranked team. They're not right now. And the question becomes like, will they get over the hump? I think this team has a chance. They're five and one. Nebraska is at Oregon in their next ball game. Oregon looks to be reeling. Washington comes to Nebraska. They go to Illinois. They go to Rutgers. Ohio State comes to town. That's going to be tough. And then Iowa at the end. Those next four ball games, Oregon, Nebraska, Illinois, and Rutgers, or excuse me, Oregon, Washington, Illinois, and Rutgers, I could see them win those games. They're five and one right now. Like I said, I think this is going to be eight and four, nine and three football team, which in a lot of people's eyes would be a huge improvement. So that's that game. And then how about the game up in Eugene? UCLA and Oregon was phenomenal. UCLA, 17-15 over Oregon in what was kind of an ugly, sloppy game. But man, it was interesting. It was interesting. In Autzen, it's not easy to win in Autzen. Ask anybody that tries to go in there. It is not easy to do. Bob Chesney is flat doing it, folks. This sounds so, you know, it's, listen, I hate to say we told you, but like we told you. I've been saying this since the off season that who's the team, who's the coach that is like, well, you know, like watch out. The watch out team is UCLA. There's no doubt. Now I know Nico Iomaliava got banged up and they had to finish that game with their backup. They're playing the backup for Oregon and Dylan Rayola, who's totally ineffective. And they had to, uh, uh, fall off of that and go to their third string, uh, quarterback. But UCLA is real. They run the football. You know, do they make mistakes? Yes. Do I think UCLA is going to win the national championship? No. Okay. So like, let's, let's, let's try to have some nuance when we start like talking a team up. UCLA is doing a remarkable job. It wasn't the prettiest win. They had three turnovers. Oregon had seven. Now two of the seven Oregon turnovers, one was on a fourth down where they fumble a quarterback sneak. That's not a good thing. That's not a good turnover. It's a fourth down stop. And then the other was the late pitchy woo woo. And that's technically a turnover. So five turnovers, which is too many, obviously, um, both teams finished with backup quarterbacks. One team's finished with their third string quarterback, but what did UCLA do? They were able to win the game. They were able to establish the run game, Wayne Knight, another hundred yard game. And now UCLA is set up. You've got Wayne Knight and, and I hope Iomali Ava can come back. But even what I saw from them, you know, from the quarterback position on Saturday, like that was good enough because listen, their schedule is not that difficult. Look at what they've got coming up so far on their schedule. They've got three straight home games in America stadium. This is why I wore the Rose bowl hat tonight in America stadium, three straight home games against Wisconsin, Michigan state and Nevada. Then they go to play Minnesota. Then they welcome Illinois into the Rose bowl. Then they're at Michigan and then they're home to USC. I'm just going to throw this out there, depending on what happens with USC against Wisconsin. And then Ohio state and some of those games, there is a world. And I don't think that this is very far-fetched. There is a world where UCLA and USC are playing on the last weekend of college football, regular season for a spot in the post season for, for a spot in the CFP. I think it's that real they're undefeated right now. And I always said during the course of the season, I'm going to throw this out there. I'm going to throw this out there. I'm going to the off season. I said, Hey, like, watch out. If they get a couple of wins early, even if they lost to Oregon, they could be nine and one going to Ann Arbor to face Michigan. Now they get through the Oregon game with a win. Not only do I think there'll be like nine and one, they might be 10 and Oh, going to play Michigan late in November, second to last game of the year. They get Michigan and then USC after that. So like UCLA is real. Where are they at in my top 10? They've cracked it, man. I've got to put them in there. I part of this is their upcoming schedule. Yes. But UCLA is going to be number 10 for me. So I'm going to throw this out there. Well, kudos to Bob Chesney, a little eight clap right there for all you Bruins out there. And I live around a lot of them. Uh, but this, this UCLA team, there's some juice there. I can't wait to see, is it always going to be full in the Rose bowl? No, you know, it's like that home home field environment is not like the, the greatest home field environment, but if it's good, it's good. If it's good, it's good. Um, on the Oregon side, man, Rayola was way too sloppy with his mechanics. You can't go out there and have the weekend prep. He played far too. I thought a against USC to, to roll out there and do what he did. I mean, like all the silly mistakes that we saw against Nebraska when he played for Nebraska showed up in this one, forcing it into tight windows, throwing off of his back foot, the fade away into double coverage is quite a choice. I mean, he under throws that ball by five yards and he's on his own goal line and he doesn't even have anybody in his face. So Dylan Rayola is sloppiness was egregious. And that's one of the reasons why they were, they had to move off of him. And, and they did. If more comes back, I still think that they're good enough to beat anybody, maybe anybody, but Ohio state on their schedule. Are they done? Ah, it doesn't look like this group is going to make a run. And I'm just going to say this, like sometimes you lose an offensive coordinator and you're like, Oh, that, that was, that was the key. And as, as much as I love Dan landing and I do, I think he's an excellent coach. He's a defensive guy. So he's always relied on his coordinators the energy on the offense. He had Kenny Dillingham who was outstanding. And then he had Will Stein who was outstanding. And then he had Will Stein outstanding and both of those guys have succeeded as head coaches i know stein is just doing that now but like they have succeeded so he hires from within drew merringer and it's like it's not working and he even acknowledged that after the game and he said that they're gonna you know evaluate things so read that what you may but they're struggling on the offensive side something fierce they've got nebraska coming in that's not going to be easy they got to go to illinois northwestern who's not bad at ohio state that's a monster michigan at home at michigan state and washington so not an easy schedule for them is it out of the question that they could win every single game i guess not but nothing so far in this season has suggested as such i tried to stay on the train for as long as i possibly could with oregon but at this point it's it's it's time to get off because you know fool me once shame on you whatever the thing is but fool me five times now it's like now it's my problem now it's my problem raise my hand i'll i'll fully accept that they have to prove that they can play better than what they have played in any game in order for me to get back on board and see and and give any suggestion that they could possibly run the table and put themselves in a position to go to the college football playoff uh and that leads me to their former coordinator will stein and kentucky how about will stein and kentucky back-to-back weeks that they win a game 35 34 because he goes for it he goes for a two-point conversion in the first overtime with the second possession of the first overtime and i love it will's is a terrific coach just so you know i do have like a small history with with will we never played together we never coached obviously together i've never coached but will cut his teeth as a backup quarterback at louisville when teddy bridgewater was there and his offensive coordinator was a guy named sean watson sean watson was my offensive coordinator at colorado so will and i have always kind of spoken the same language when it comes to football um and because of that i've all i've always thought highly of will all the way you know he called plays at the high school level gets a chance at utsa he was kind of a quality control and cut his teeth on on some of those staffs at texas and then he got a big break and he got hired to go up there to to oregon and did an incredible job and now he gets a chance to go to kentucky and be a head coach and here we go kentucky does it again they knock off number 10 lsu and as a collective in college football we're all kind of sitting there like yeah you know we kind of love to see it right i mean lane kiffin loses his second game of the year they they can't win on the road now all of a sudden but how about the stones from will stein to go for two two weeks in a row gosh and we all knew it too lane gets the ball to start overtime they go in and they score and they kick kick the extra point and all of us are sitting there i fly home with a lot of money and i'm like oh my god i'm going to go to kentucky people that are also coming back this way fox is located in southern california so i'm on the plane with a bunch of people and we're watching the game and we're all saying to ourselves oh he's going for two oh he's going for two my text chains are blown up he's going for two we know it's going to happen we know it's going to happen and sure enough bang they're able to do it the question now is should we consider kentucky for the playoff kenny minchi is playing really well okay now an overtime win over south carolina and an overtime win over lsu does that put you in the like should we consider you for the playoff well here's the thing if you look at their schedule and if we're going to do that with a team like ucla then we have to do that with a team like kentucky you look at their schedule and it's like well maybe maybe at oklahoma not going to be easy because of that defense vandy i don't think vandy is very very good this year at tennessee they're in some turmoil obviously trying to figure it out at the quarterback position florida they've gotten their doors blown off in two straight weeks at missouri might be very difficult because missouri we saw them lose to mississippi state they have showed up two weeks in a row and then louisville to end they don't have georgia on there they don't have texas on there they don't have old miss on there they already played alabama that's their only loss of the year it's not out of the question guys it's not out of the question for kentucky to be considered um i did consider them actually in my top 10 i i really did they were kind of in my almost category so they were not quite in there and then the last game that i wanted to talk about is usc going out east and playing in the white out at state college that's a great environment obviously and i think that the question for all of us about usc because we talk about them quite often obviously i think that they garner a lot of attention um some of you might feel like they garner too much attention but that's that's that's fine the question for usc was would they be able to go out and travel east and actually play well and they did they did jay maiava is a heck of a football player he's been one of the better quarterbacks in the country and he's been one of the better quarterbacks in the country this year and this team when they have trent mosley the true freshman on the field they are different trent mosley is outstanding outstanding and they've got enough around mosley that he doesn't have to be a one-man band they're able to run a little bit i thought that they would be able to run it a lot better than they did against penn state because of what northwestern was able to do to to penn state but they ran it enough okay they didn't make the big mistakes they won on the really well and listen if if you were if i was talking to you as a usc fan before the season and i told you you were going to lose a close game to oregon at home and then you were going to go win the whiteout now obviously those two teams we think of them a lot differently now penn state and oregon than what we would have in the preseason but i'm just gonna throw that out you have taken this five and one five and one they get a bye week an open week and then they go to wisconsin before they welcome ohio state in we all know that's the real test now you've got to go prove that you can do it twice in a row off of an off week you went out and went on the road you did the things necessary to win the defense played well enough again not dominant but well enough at times to get the stops necessary force the field goals necessary to go in there and win the football game and you did it you did it they played a lot better than they did against ruckers i think they even played better than they did against washington in particular from a mistake standpoint so you see some growth from this team i'm just saying like let's just pump the brakes a little bit can everyone settle down on usc they're in a great position right now you've got some of these guys healthy healthy out there and that's a team that can still go and beat wisconsin if they're able to beat wisconsin they would be playing ohio state as a six and one team and i think everyone would take that at that point uh they are not in my top 10 by the way hey just before i get to my top 10 the rest of it i just wanted to quickly throw out there on wednesday along with the film session that i'll do i'm going to hit on a couple more things but i also wanted to just do a mailbag so what do you want to hear about so you can email us the joel class show mailbag at gmail.com or you can hit a hit us up with a question in the comments here on youtube you can hit us with a comment on any of our social platforms and we're going to try to get to that and we're going to try to get to some of these questions that you have so fire away and we'll get a little bit of a mailbag episode by the way when you're there and any one of those platforms rate review us subscribe follow do all of those things that would really help the show out i would appreciate it and when you're there you can also forward some of the content to your friends so you can get a conversation going amongst your friends because college football is always better with a friend here is the rest of my top 10 um i already revealed ucla in there at number 10 at 9 i've got byu uh byu is still in there they beat iowa state 24 10 um but they've got some injuries i don't love the next couple of weeks for byu i certainly don't love their matchup against notre dame without lj martin they're running back without isaiah glasker their linebacker both of those guys look to be out uh moving forward here for the next couple of weeks and so facing notre dame might be quite a tall task and then they've got the huge game in conference on the road in salt lake just up the road i should say against utah and speaking of utah utah is going to be my number eight team in my top 10 another week another comfortable win for the youths although they were messing around a little bit with kansas kansas had a fourth down inside of the five to make it basically like a i think a three-point game at one point in the fourth quarter and then all of a sudden they stop them they get a big run going the other direction and they end up beating kansas 41 24 every win this year has been by at least two touchdowns so they are dominating some folks they had over 500 yards of offense nearly 300 on the first Kansas you saw the rest of the top uh six there texas was seven indiana was six so now we move into the top five notre dame is going to be five they beat stanford 58 to 7 handled them got the ground game going by the way 361 on the ground we're going to finally see what what notre dame is all about when they face byu and maybe we're going to learn that like byu is not very good or maybe we're going to learn that notre dame is not very good maybe we're going to learn that both of them are very good i'm not sure because again we're going to learn that both of them are very good again notre dame's level of competition just hasn't been great again stanford is not going to give you any sort of barometer about what your team is you see bama there i moved them up to number four from five a week ago uh three is going to be miami uh miami was off this week they're the number one scoring team in the country they're the number one point differential team in the country they've got florida state at home this week i think they should beat florida state although florida state is improving a little bit uh but all eyes are pointing towards that that they took care of maryland 45 16 basically they've been one of the most dominant teams and best teams in college football outside of three possessions those three possessions are keeping them out of that number one spot. If they would have beaten Texas that night, obviously they would be number one right there with Georgia. But Georgia's one, Ohio State's two. They've been very consistent after that game against Texas. And how about the best player in the sport? Just kind of your weekly checkup on how Jeremiah Smith is doing. Well, two ridiculous touchdown catches, almost 100 yards, a one-hander over the middle, best player in the sport. There he is, Jeremiah Smith. Every week we could be talking about Jeremiah. By the way, my almost category, I thought about Iowa. Iowa beat up on Washington Friday night. I thought about Ole Miss. I thought about Oklahoma State. That's a team like, careful, careful with Oklahoma State. I thought about USC and I thought about Kentucky. So those were kind of my almost category teams. College football is the best. Again, throw us your questions. We'll do a mailbag on Wednesday. That'll be awesome. Again, you can email us, thejoelclasshowmailbag at gmail.com or just throw a comment question down in the YouTube comments and we will get to those. Until then, enjoy your week and please tweet.