Alabama Football: Week One College Football Power Rankings

Again, not much I can say that differentiates this team from USC or Arizona State. They face both of those teams in back-to-back weeks in October so, we will see what they are made of then. They also get UCLA in the back half of the schedule which may determine the PAC-12 champion.

As much as I hate to admit it, Auburn looked very good in Coach Harsin’s debut. Yes it was against Akron, but any time a team puts up over 600 yards and 60 points you had a good day regardless of the opponent. The defense also held Akron under 200 offensive yards, which is also a nice day regardless of opponent. Nix looked sharp in the new offense and Tank Bigsby proved why he should be getting 30+ touches a game. They have an opportunity to vault themselves into national contention in 2 weeks against Penn State.

If you want my pick for best game this past weekend it was Penn State vs. Wisconsin. I love hard-nosed gritty defensive slugfests and this was a good one. Scoreless at halftime and it took two red zone INTs in the final 2 minutes to finally cement a win for Penn State. Wisconsin has a legit defense again and they will still make some noise in the BIG10.

I don’t know if the Sooners were just that overrated or if simply training in Tuscaloosa has some kind of magic effect on teams. Alabama football opened its doors to Tulane to allow them to practice due to the effects of Hurricane Ida. While there, Tulane must have found the magic potion Nick keeps in the training center, because the Green Wave gave Oklahoma every last bit it could handle and then some. As for the Sooners, you can’t let a Group of 5 team walk into your stadium and come one yard short of having a chance to take the lead in the fourth quarter. The talent is there and that is why they get some benefit of the doubt but they certainly didn’t look like the second best team in the nation out there.

The biggest surprise for most people to start 2021 is the UCLA Bruins. I however, was not surprised. I knew this was just a matter of time. LSU was overrated and the Bruins were underrated. They were the better team start to finish. The Bruins are in a good position to win the PAC-12 this year and perhaps have an outside shot at a playoff bid. Watch out for UCLA.