The most enticing menu of college football games this season lived up to its billing in Week 7, and the biggest takeaway of all is that LSU’s offense is for real.
The Tigers had been dynamic all year long, but it was hard to know whether their success was sustainable against an elite defense. The verdict? Watch out, Alabama.
LSU was just sensational at home in a 42-28 win over Florida in which it piled up 509 yards of offense and committed no turnovers. And the Tigers needed to keep scoring, as the Gators proved to be feisty with 457 yards of their own, 27 first downs and a 38:19-21:41 edge in time of possession.
Coming off the emotional home win over Auburn last weekend, this was a tough spot for Florida to come back and play its best. But this was a 28-28 game midway through the third, and Florida was driving for another score midway through the fourth trailing just 35-28. At that point, the door was open for the Gators to win, but quarterback Kyle Trask made a poor throw into the end zone on third-and-1 from LSU’s 16-yard line that Derek Stingley Jr. picked off. LSU quarterback Joe Burrow then connected with Ja’Marr Chase for a 54-yard touchdown four plays later to basically salt away the game with 5:43 left.
Another big game, another big throw from @Joe_Burrow10 😤🎯 pic.twitter.com/dpyKLMOW2S
— SEC Network (@SECNetwork) October 13, 2019
The Tigers have scored at least 40 points every game this season. It’s one thing to do it against Vanderbilt and Utah State. It’s another to do it against Florida, which came into the game ranked 11th nationally in total defense. That suggests it’s going to be tough for anyone — including Auburn and Alabama — to slow this train down.
At 6-0, LSU should feel terrific about where it sits in the College Football Playoff landscape, but more importantly, the Tigers are playing well and continuing to grow offensively. After seeing them continue to put up big numbers against a quality defense, this certainly feels real.
Winners and losers: Week 7 led by Georgia and Oklahoma
Red River: Oklahoma might be complete package after strong defensive showing against Texas
Here are more takeaways from Week 7 of the college football season:
Alex Grinch’s stock got a big boost
Though the final score of 34-27 didn’t necessarily reflect it, Oklahoma pretty much dominated Texas in the Red River Showdown. And the reason is because the Sooners’ defense under first-year coordinator Alex Grinch controlled a significant portion of the game and allowed Oklahoma to maintain the lead despite some miscues on offense.
The first half, in which Texas had just three points and seven first downs on five possessions, was the best Oklahoma’s defense has played in years. Ultimately, the Sooners held Texas to 310 yards of offense and successfully shut down quarterback Sam Ehlinger’s big-play ability, limiting him to 210 yards on 25-of-37 completions. Though Oklahoma may not be a truly elite defense at this point, the improvement in tackling and ability to generate pressure is evident under Grinch, who started to generate national buzz in 2017 when he led a Washington State defense that finished 16th nationally in yards allowed per game.
The Sooners’ offense uncharacteristically left a bunch of points on the board Saturday as quarterback Jalen Hurts committed a pair of turnovers to kill potential scoring drives, had a couple drives stall in the red zone and failed to convert a fourth-and-1. Still, Oklahoma was able to maintain a comfortable lead for most of the game and scored 34, which bodes well for the Sooners as a national title contender.
Kirby Smart will feel heat for the first time
During his 3½ seasons as head coach, fans have coalesced around the belief that Smart is the guy to deliver Georgia’s first national championship since 1980. And given the way Smart has recruited, Georgia’s fan base has had plenty of reason to believe that he’ll climb the mountain sooner or later. But mark Saturday’s 20-17 double overtime loss to South Carolina as the moment where doubt may start creeping in. Beyond the questions about whether Smart is good at coaching situational football — and the body of work to this point suggests that he isn’t — Georgia has coughed up at least one hairball a year on his watch. It’s one thing when you don’t show up for Auburn or LSU on the road. It’s something else entirely when you’re playing a South Carolina team you should beat anyway who was down to its third-string quarterback after an injury to Ryan Hilinski. Georgia held South Carolina to 155 yards passing but was minus-4 in the turnover department and missed a couple of field goals, including a 42-yarder that would have extended the game. But Georgia’s lack of explosiveness on offense is now a glaring weakness, not just for this year but for the entire program under Smart. And given the level of talent he’s recruited, he’s going to feel some blowback if Georgia doesn’t play for an SEC title this year.
Playtime is over for Clemson
All the hand-wringing over how pedestrian Clemson’s offense looked the first part of the season will probably be made to look silly by the end of the year if Saturday’s 45-14 win over Florida State is any indication.
During this championship-level run over the last five years, Clemson has often started slowly on offense and cranked it up toward the latter part of October. It seems history is poised to repeat itself, as the Tigers basically did whatever they wanted in the running game with 320 yards on 53 carries. Though some critics may continue to nitpick quarterback Trevor Lawrence, who threw for just 170 yards on 17-of-25 passing with three touchdowns and an interception, Clemson scored touchdowns on four of its first five possessions in the competitively relevant portion of the game.
Clemson is a program that tends to build throughout the season, and the easy ACC schedule affords the Tigers an opportunity to do that without putting themselves in too many dangerous positions. Beating the Seminoles so easily suggests that some of the offensive underachievement we’ve seen so far is going to be long forgotten by December.
Wisconsin is scary good
If Alabama-LSU is the game of the year in college football, Ohio State-Wisconsin on Oct. 26 is looking like a strong contender to be right behind it for cachet and impact on the College Football Playoff race. Every week that goes by, the Badgers look more and more like the genuine article, adding to that case by demolishing Michigan State 38-0.
It’s one thing to win a bunch of games against bad teams, which is something Wisconsin has done before only to get exposed a bit against the best of the best. It’s another thing to completely dominate the way this Badgers team has done so far, pitching shutouts in four of its six games and showing the ability to bury teams early when they have the chance.
In its three Big Ten games so far, Wisconsin has held held Michigan State to 149 yards of offense, Northwestern to 255 and Michigan to 299. That doesn’t mean they’ll have the same success against Ohio State, but Wisconsin passes the eye test right now as the best defense in college football and has looked more than capable enough on offense to be in anyone’s playoff mock bracket as of today.
Vanderbilt needs a change
There have been plenty of embarrassing losses for Power Five programs this season, but none was as revealing as Vanderbilt getting destroyed at home by UNLV, 34-10. The Runnin’ Rebels came into Nashville 1-4 with their only win against Southern Utah and subsequent losses by 26, 16, 36 and 25 points to a variety of opponents. So there was little on paper to suggest UNLV would be capable of beating an SEC team on the road, even one struggling as badly as the Commodores. And yet UNLV was able to get the early lead and methodically put away the game in the second half, intercepting Vanderbilt quarterback Riley Neal and getting a strip-sack turnover on the next possession to end any hope of a comeback.
Though Derek Mason hasn’t worked miracles during his six seasons, he’s largely prevented Vanderbilt from regular humiliation. But this year the Commodores are 1-5 and have been blown out in every one of their losses. New athletics director Malcolm Turner made his first big move in the spring when he fired basketball coach Bryce Drew and hired Jerry Stackhouse. He will likely be forced to make another significant change in football unless the Commodores show signs of competence down the stretch.
Louisville is fun again
Coming into the season, many pundits would have pegged the Cardinals as a three- or four-win team after the program imploded under Bobby Petrino last year. But the impact of hiring Scott Satterfield is being felt as Louisville upended previously unbeaten Wake Forest 62-59 and registered its most impressive win of the year following last week’s 41-39 win over Boston College. At 4-2, the Cardinals now have a legitimate chance to make a bowl game and are playing at a high level offensively while rotating freshman Evan Conley and sophomore Micale Cunningham at quarterback.
Smart college football observers knew Louisville made a good hire in Satterfield, whose playcalling acumen was evident as he went 51-24 at Appalachian State over the previous six seasons. Now he’s getting a chance to do it on the big stage, and he’s not missing a beat – even though Louisville’s talent level isn’t nearly as good as it should be.
Minnesota is worth a second look
We kind of dismissed the Golden Gophers after they got a little bit lucky to beat South Dakota State, Fresno State and Georgia Southern by a combined 13 points the first three weeks of the season. But P.J. Fleck’s team put a complete game together in a 34-7 win over Nebraska to move to 6-0 this season. That’s significant because it makes Minnesota bowl eligible for a second straight year, and at 3-0 in the Big Ten, matches last season’s conference win total.
But with Rutgers, Maryland and Northwestern still on the schedule, Minnesota has a very manageable path to nine wins and perhaps more if it can pull an upset over Penn State, Iowa or Wisconsin.
Fleck isn't everyone’s cup of tea. One reason he ended up at Minnesota rather than a higher-profile program is that some administrators thought his “Row the Boat” shtick at Western Michigan smelled a bit inauthentic despite the undeniable success he had in the Mid-American Conference. But it will be interesting to see if Fleck generates some interest again on the coaching carousel if Minnesota puts together a breakthrough season.
The Pirate’s ship is sinking
Washington State coach Mike Leach, who spends an inordinate amount of time engaging with reporters when the topic is himself and using Twitter to advance personal grudges, decided to ban his players from social media for the rest of this year after losing to Utah a couple weeks ago. Leach apparently bought into the ban as well, having posted no Tweets since Oct. 3.
But Leach might have misdiagnosed the problem. Coming off an open date, Twitter-free Washington State lost to Arizona State 38-34 to fall to 0-3 in the Pac-12 for the first time since Leach’s first season there in 2012.
“I think we entertain too many distractions, and if I had to do it over again, I would have done it when we started camp,” Leach told reporters after the game. “I think we’re a little too distracted right now, but I think there is a team-wide determination to be less distracted.”
Of course, when you’re not a very good team, it’s always easier to blame something like social media rather than the root of the issue.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: College football Week 7 takeaways: LSU offense shows it's for real
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