College Football Believe it or Not: Florida’s playoff chances, Alabama’s toughest test, Red River Showdown

In this week’s College Football Believe it or Not, the guys examine Florida’s playoff chances, Alabama’s toughest test and if Texas can beat Oklahoma in the Red River Showdown.

Things are beginning to get interesting in the 2019 college football season, with a lot of players laying claim to Heisman frontrunner and a lot of teams calling themselves playoff contenders.

It’s time to sort it all out in this week’s “Believe it or Not”, with FanSided college football experts Michael Collins, and Patrick Schmidt.

Believe it or not, Florida is in the playoff conversation

Schmidt says – Believe it: In the second week of October, the Florida Gators are in the College Football Playoff conversation. Florida has been the most disrespected top-10 team all season. The Gators extended their winning streak to 10 games with a win over the previously undefeated Auburn Tigers at the Swamp. The defense was opportunistic, forcing four turnovers, and making Bo Nix look like the freshman quarterback he is.

Florida got big strikes from Freddie Swain and Lamical Perine and Kyle Trask threw a pair of touchdowns. Trask avoided what looked like it would be a serious knee injury when he returned to play with a sprained MCL. Emory Jones looked capable in limited time while Trask was out, but Florida can’t afford any more injuries to the position after already losing Feleipe Franks.

The schedule will get tougher, beginning this Saturday with a trip to No. 5 LSU and the looming Cocktail Party with Georgia. For now, Florida is in the playoff conversation, but ask me this question again in a few weeks and we’ll see if the answer is still the same.

Collins Says – Not: This isn’t really a knock on the Gators, as they’ve made huge strides since firing Jim McElwain in 2017, but this isn’t a playoff team nor should they be in that conversation right now.

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There are six teams – Alabama, Clemson, Georgia, Ohio State, Oklahoma, and LSU – who are all going to be dogfighting for those precious four playoff spots. Florida has to beat two of those teams (LSU and Georgia) over the next few weeks to show they belong in that group. Until then, I’ll just say that Florida is a really good team, and improving, but aren’t at that playoff elite level just yet.

Believe it or not, no one in the Pac-12 is great

Schmidt Says – Believe it: The Pac-12 was already out of the playoff conversation before September ended. Maybe even before September began considering Oregon lost to Auburn in Week 1.

Washington was perceived as a potential playoff-caliber team but they just dropped their second game. Utah lost to USC’s third-string quarterback. Cal has had their moments and Justin Wilcox is a great young coach. Arizona State has looked good, but they’re not great.

Arizona has rediscovered Khalil Tate, but again, not great. USC, let’s not even go there. Stanford, normally good, has been beset by injuries but at least they picked themselves up to beat Washington. So there’s a number of good teams, but none that fall into the great category.

Collins Says – Not: First of all, “great” is a rather ambiguous term, and depending on the context within that conference it could mean different things.

Are any teams in the Pac-12 playoff contenders? No, not even close. But Oregon and Arizona are both one-loss teams who have yet to lose a conference game. Either of them could potentially end up with only one loss at the end of the year, putting themselves in a New Year’s Six bowl.

For any program, a season with a single blemish and a berth in one of the biggest postseason games of the year can be considered a great season and can carry the mark of a great team. Of the two mentioned, I think Oregon has the best shot at that.

Believe it or not, Jonathan Taylor should be the Heisman frontrunner

Schmidt Says – Not:  Jonathan Taylor is off to a great start for undefeated Wisconsin and will go down as one of the most productive running backs in college football history. He’s outpacing recent running backs who won the Heisman Trophy through five games.

Taylor’s 859 total yards and 16 total touchdowns are more than Reggie Bush, Mark Ingram and Derrick Henry had at this point. Taylor is firmly in the Heisman conversation, but he’s not the front-runner.

He is the best running back candidate but it’s tough to top the results from quarterbacks, Tua Tagovailoa, Jalen Hurts, Joe Burrow and Justin Fields. Taylor should be a Heisman finalist but unless Wisconsin goes undefeated and Taylor has 2,500 yards and 30 touchdowns, he’s not going to win.

Collins Says – Believe It: Hey, will a running back win the Heisman Trophy this year? Probably not (Patrick and I have covered this before), but right now as things stand, Jonathan Taylor should absolutely be considered the frontrunner.

Trevor Lawrence is having a completely meh first half of the season, and of all the other quarterbacks who were looked at as Heisman possibilities this year, only Joe Burrow and Justin Fields have faced anything other than token resistance.

What Taylor has done in outpacing former Heisman winners is much more impressive than Joe Burrow setting LSU quarterback records (I mean, not the highest bar to reach) or Justin Fields looking incredibly average against the only decent defense he’s faced this season – Michigan State.

I stand by my prediction that Taylor, like most running backs, will be gassed by the time November is here and will fade back in the Heisman pack, but right now he’s got my vote as the frontrunner.

Believe it or not, Ohio State is the biggest threat to Alabama for the national title

Schmidt Says – Believe it: Clemson hasn’t looked like themselves all season.

Oklahoma has Jalen Hurts and the offense remains outstanding, but there are still lingering questions about the defense and how much they can be trusted in a playoff setting.

LSU and Georgia are certainly threats within the SEC but they haven’t shown they can beat Alabama.

That leaves Ohio State who has looked fast and dangerous on offense with Justin Fields under center and J.K. Dobbins returning to the form he showed two years ago. Coupled with the defense making significant strides from last year and Chase Young dominating like he’s a Bosa brother, it’s easy to see why Ohio State is rising up the AP Poll.

Alabama is the standard but they have questions on defense where a number of young players have been thrust into big roles. Alabama’s kicking game is always suspect. Alabama can score on anyone but after six weeks, the team they’d least like to face is Ryan Day’s Buckeyes.

Collins Says – Not: The biggest threat to Alabama is, and most likely always will be, navigating their way through the SEC.

The Crimson Tide will have to play (and beat) LSU, Auburn and either Georgia or possibly Florida before they even think about teams like Ohio State and Oklahoma. Any of the aforementioned SEC teams have the firepower and the ability to beat Alabama, and they are absolutely the most imminent and greatest threat to the Tide’s national title hopes.

If Bama survives all those difficult SEC games, they’ll be even more battle-tested for a potential matchup with Ohio State, and will most likely handily beat them should that happen.

Believe it or not, Texas will beat Oklahoma for the second year in a row

Schmidt Says – Not:  Texas won the Golden Hat last year and will look to win the Red River Showdown in consecutive years for the first time since 2008-2009. That’s when Texas was ranked No. 5 and beat No. 1 Oklahoma in 2008 and No. 3 when they beat No. 20 Oklahoma in 2009. Both games were instant classics.

I’m expecting another instant classic from the Cotton Bowl on Sunday afternoon. Texas won 48-45 last year when Sam Ehlinger and Texas made one more play than Kyler Murray and Oklahoma.

Could we see something similar on Saturday?

I don’t think so.

Oklahoma opened as 9.5-point favorites which shows you how much faith Vegas has in the Sooners to avoid dropping the Red River Showdown for the second year in a row.

It’s not like we didn’t see Riley and Oklahoma get a dose of revenge last year vs. Texas in the Big 12 Championship Game so it’s not like they’ll have that hangover effect weighing over them.

Both are good, but Oklahoma is great and I expect Jalen Hurts to be the difference in a 10-point win for the Sooners.

Collins Says – Not: It’s a rivalry game, so anything is possible. Texas is a good team this year, but they’re also a known commodity. Oklahoma isn’t going into this year’s game thinking they’re still light years ahead of the Longhorns as they may have done in recent seasons.

However, the simple fact is that this year, Oklahoma truly is light years ahead of Texas. Ehlinger makes Texas dangerous, but he’s not going to be able to keep up with the number of points that Texas defense will give up to one of the most explosive offenses in the nation right now.

Texas may be back, but Oklahoma is front in the Big 12. No back-to-back Showdown wins for the Horns. Jalen Hurts will be MVP of the game and probably set one or two Red River Showdown records in the process.

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