Real Kato Blog: College Football Recap: Week 3

Michigan and N.C. State both handle their cupcake opponents; Ohio State and Michigan State fall in marquee games.

Michigan 31, Eastern Michigan 3. Well, it's a win. EMU outplayed Michigan early on, marching down the field twice in the first quarter but ending up with a turnover and a field goal. It was a bit troubling that Michigan could not defend sweep plays; the interior run defense was OK but the defensive ends and outside linebackers seem to lose containment a lot.

On offense, Michigan failed to get much production from the power running game; it did, however, get yards in huge chunks with the zone read play out of the spread. Denard Robinson ended up with 198 yards rushing... this looked a lot like games from last year.

Eventually EMU ran out of tricks and Michigan's defense settled in. But this wasn't as impressive a win as I would have liked to see; clearly there's still a lot of work to do. There was one piece of good news, though: we're now 1 for 1 on field goals for the year.

Grades: Offense B, Defense B. It's hard to be unhappy with the result, but the first quarter was a disaster on both sides of the ball.

N.C. State 35, South Alabama 13. This was a similarly unimpressive win; the Wolfpack got the job done but fumbled away the ball three times and only managed 95 yards rushing, at 2.6 YPC. That's inexcusable against an FCS school. Next week's game against Cincinnati might not be pretty.

Other Notable Games

Oklahoma beat Florida State 23-13 in the day's headline game, with a solid defensive effort and just enough plays on offense. Oklahoma should easily remain the consensus #1 team.

Miami (FL) beat Ohio State 24-6. Oh, Luke Fickell... why didn't you use any timeouts near the end of the game? With three minutes left, if you had held Miami to a field goal, you could have gotten the ball back only down by two possessions. Had you already given up? OSU fans are calling for Fickell's head (and praying that Urban Meyer will save them).

Notre Dame righted the ship against Michigan State, winning 31-13. This was despite turning the ball over three times and only gaining 275 yards; they were helped immensely by an 89-yard kick return for a touchdown, and the fact that Michigan State utterly failed to run the ball. MSU has a severe problem on the offensive line; they have just one tune-up game against Central Michigan before meeting Ohio State on October 1st.

Clemson snapped the country's longest winning streak, beating Auburn 38-24. Clemson might be the front-runner in the ACC now.

Illinois held off Arizona State 17-14, thanks mostly to its defense. OK, I will grudgingly admit that Illinois has some potential this year. I still believe that Zook will find a way to screw it up.

Navy hung tough against South Carolina before eventually falling 24-21. Navy is a legitimately good team; they could be 6-1 when they meet Notre Dame on October 29th. Meanwhile South Carolina now has three quality wins under its belt, and they don't play LSU or Alabama in the regular season. It might be a good year for Spurrier.

Nebraska got a solid win against Washington, winning 51-38. It turned into more of a shootout than expected; Nebraska fans may be worried about the defense after surrendering 444 yards last week and 420 yards this week.

Florida beat Tennessee 33-23. Remember when people actually cared about this game? Me neither.

Texas blasted UCLA 49-20. That's probably more an indication of how bad UCLA is, than how good Texas is.

LSU beat Mississippi State 19-6 on Thursday in a key SEC matchup. I was not a believer in LSU before, but after watching their defense against Oregon and Mississippi State, I'm a believer now.

Penn State squeaked by Temple. Just like last year, Temple led for much of the game... Penn State's offense sputtered, but Temple turned the ball over three times and only managed to gain 197 yards. Penn State's next four games seem winnable, but unless something improves on offense, they might go 0-5 to close the season, with games against Northwestern, Illinois, Nebraska, Ohio State, and Wisconsin. Yikes.

Iowa managed to get by Pitt 31-27, rallying from a 17-point deficit. Iowa is not nearly as impressive as some people thought they'd be this year.

Minnesota finally won a game, beating Miami (OH) 29-23.

Northwestern lost to Army 21-14. I think, like Iowa, Northwestern was a bit overrated in early Big Ten predictions.

Duke beat Boston College 20-19. I think it's quite possible BC might go 1-11 this year... and that's if they can knock off UMass next week.

UNC beat Virginia 28-17. UNC improves to 3-0 and gets a win against a legitimate opponent; Georgia Tech next week will be a tougher test.

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