College Football Week 3 Early Takeaways: Memphis opens up everyone’s eyes
By Jack Crosby
The early slate of college football games in Week 3 have mostly come to a close, and Memphis may have impressed the most
Week 3 of the college football season, on paper, did not look like the most appealing so far here early in the campaign. However, if there is one thing this beautiful sport has taught us throughout the years it’s that, week in and week out, we can expect some fireworks and storylines developing that everyone will be talking about; it doesn’t matter how appealing the games on the slate may look.
Week 3 of the season, early in the day here on Saturday, certainly gave all of us some talking points for the rest of the week, that’s for sure.
Memphis enters their name as a legitimate G5 contender
Well hello there, Memphis Tigers. Saturday afternoon Memphis welcomed in Josh Rosen and the UCLA Bruins to the Liberty Bowl, and all week some were pointing toward this game as an upset special on the docket. It turned out those folks were on the button, as the Tigers walked away from this one with the dramatic 48-45 win.
Coming out of this, of course, all of the focus and bashing will be directed toward Rosen and UCLA, however, it can’t be overlooked how well this Memphis team played on Saturday at home. Quarterback Riley Ferguson was phenomenal, tossing for 398 yards and six touchdowns against the Bruins defense. Running back Darrell Henderson was a stud on the ground as well to help in the effort, rushing for 105 yards on 14 carries.
We always love to talk about which Group of 5 team out there has the chance to run the table and make it to a New Year’s Six bowl, and heading into the season you didn’t hear Memphis’ name mentioned all that much. Well, after this win on Saturday over a Pac-12 foe, you’ll start hearing more and more about Mike Norvell’s team going ahead — and rightfully so.
Oklahoma State is just downright terrifying
Coming into the season, with the key pieces they had returning, we all knew the Oklahoma State Cowboys — mainly on offense — were going to be a joy to watch each and every week. Through three weeks of the 2017 season, they’re definitely not disappointing, and Saturday was their most dominant effort yet.
Oklahoma State just straight up obliterated the Pitt Panthers on the road in Pittsburgh Saturday, racing out to an ungodly 49-14 lead at halftime. Yes, at halftime.
While it was probably more than possible for the Pokes to hang 100 on Pat Narduzzi and the Panthers, the final in this one ended up 59-21 as the Oklahoma State offense was on full, terrifying display. Mason Rudolph threw for 497 yards and five touchdowns, four different receivers pulled in over 100 yards receiving on the day, and running back Justice Hill showed his effectiveness on the ground again, tallying 91 yards on 11 carries with two scores.
It should also be mentioned, while this offense will get all the love, the defensive side of the ball performed well to boot.
There will be skepticism about this Oklahoma State team, especially given the perception of Big 12 defenses, but sooner or later it looks as if they’ll have everyone buying in to their deadly onslaughts — if they haven’t already.
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How much longer for Mike Riley?
Another upset that took place on Saturday involved the Nebraska Cornhuskers, who are not off to a great start here in 2017. While they put up a valiant effort last week in the loss to Oregon after getting their doors blown off early, things took a turn for the worse on Saturday. At home in Lincoln, no less, the Huskers dropped a 21-17 game to Northern Illinois of the MAC — a team which lost to Boston College the first week of the season.
The hiring of Mike Riley following the Bo Pelini era was met with a lot of confused responses, and it seems as if it’s turning out to not be the ideal fit after all. Riley is indeed one of the nicer guys anyone will talk about in all of college football — basically, as we said when he was hired, the anti- Bo Pelini — but he’s not quite the right piece to the puzzle the Nebraska program is looking for as a head coach.
There’s a chance to right the ship the next two weeks with games against Rutgers and Illinois coming up, but that’s followed by contests against Wisconsin and Ohio State plus the rest of the Big Ten schedule.
The fanbase of a true blue-blood program like the Nebraska Cornhuskers will not be patient for long, and the administration probably won’t be either. Riley needs to start improving on the 16-13 overall record he holds since taking over the program in 2015, or else we’re going to have a high-profile coaching search on our hands in the very near future.