The weekly episodic nature of college football makes the sport ripe for analysis – and of course overanalysis.
Don’t get us wrong. After a long offseason of predictions and projections, it’s nice to actually have a full week of results to chew on. Naturally, amateur fans and professional pundits alike will attempt to draw long-term conclusions from the small sample size of action just witnessed.
Some of these, admittedly, will actually prove to be true. But generally speaking, overarching narratives shouldn’t be created just yet after only 60 minutes of game time.
Here are the top five overreactions from Week 1.
Ohio State isn’t the offensive juggernaut we expected
First and foremost, credit should be given to the Notre Dame defense, a well-coached and disciplined unit that will lead the Fighting Irish to a lot of wins this year. The absence of standout Buckeyes’ receiver Jaxon Smith-Njigba for most of the game also hindered the team’s ability to generate the kind of explosive plays we’ve come to expect from C.J. Stroud’s group.
But the way the Buckeyes took charge late with a pounding ground game should be just as scary for the rest of the Big Ten. When you have multiple options for moving the ball, your offense is even more dangerous.
BUCKEYES RALLY:No. 2 Ohio State uses two scores to topple Notre Dame
The Pac-12 is already out of the playoff race
The league took some hits to be sure, and the fact that they happened in spotlight games didn’t help the…
