College Football

For Michigan and other top contenders, toughness has become the calling card

Updated Oct. 9, 2023 5:02 p.m. ET

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Bryan Fischer

College Football Writer

There are still three weeks to go until our Tuesday night discourse is dominated by College Football Playoff rankings.

However, if this past weekend was any indication, the talking point that will be harped on by everybody from the selection committee chair to the random fan in Section 303 is going to be centered upon one trait this year: toughness.

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It's been a regular crutch of coach-speak to discuss just how tough (or not) their team might be. Just ask Ohio State's Ryan Day, who landed a full two weeks' worth of coverage about his team's resilience after making a postgame sound bite for the ages while defending the Buckeyes' toughness after a gritty victory at Notre Dame. He alluded to it again on Big Noon Saturday, as a tight game against Maryland turned into a 37-17 runaway.

"The way we played in the second half, that's the way Buckeye football is supposed to be played," Day told FOX's Jenny Taft. "The guys played tough, I thought they played physical."

Just how tough and physical this OSU side is will be determined down the road, but it's apt that Day is using that as a measuring stick considering so many of his playoff hopeful peers are doing the exact same — especially during this 2023 campaign.

A few miles to the north, bitter rival Jim Harbaugh certainly underscores that characteristic while leading his program. Michigan has grown into the Big Ten team to beat not by virtue of its skill-position players or a swarming secondary, but because of how its players have embraced hitting opponents in the mouth and running them over for a full 60 minutes.

RJ Young breaks down Kyle McCord, Ohio State's win

The Wolverines looked the part of a bully in crushing Minnesota on Saturday night, and they aim to do the same to Indiana in even more lopsided fashion during their "Big Noon Kickoff" matchup Saturday at the Big House. You can be sure that Harbaugh noticed how Ohio State held the Hoosiers to just 153 total yards and three points and is using that as a benchmark for their upcoming game.

Fellow Big Ten East rival James Franklin is leaning into the toughness theme, too. Entering the year, there were plenty of questions about Penn State centered on quarterback Drew Allar. Yet the hot start has mostly been centered on the way the Nittany Lions are taking everybody's lunch money (an FBS-leading +11 turnover margin) and then running the ball right over them to rub it in (their 46 rushing attempts per game rank sixth nationally). The offensive line, led by a future top-10 pick in Olu Fashanu, is bruising, and their opposite numbers on defense are as difficult to play against in the trenches as any in the country.

What's emanating from Happy Valley, as a result, isn't just a healthy dose of confidence but an attitude of toughness that was not present even dating back to the last time the program won the Big Ten.

Then there are the likes of Oklahoma, and even Texas, who the Sooners beat Saturday at the Cotton Bowl.

Take the latter, which will watch the tape from the Red River Rivalry and kick itself for all those little mistakes that cost it everything from field position to points. For years, the Longhorns were known for folding when things started to matter — despite the stockpile of blue-chippers on the roster. 

That has now changed in Austin under Steve Sarkisian, and it was on full display during a win over Alabama and at times against the Sooners. It's not quite a fully-formed persona embracing such toughness, but it is there in burnt orange in a way it hasn't been since the days of Vince Young galloping through the 40 Acres.

Breaking down Oklahoma's upset of Texas

More impressive is how toughness has become part of the ethos in this Year 2 turnaround for Brent Venables.

Not only has Oklahoma gone from a poor tackling team to one of the best in the Big 12, but it is a group that likes to get after you defensively so that the offense can rip your heart out with a perfectly timed touchdown. Sooners fans had already enjoyed watching this group more than many of their predecessors for a variety of reasons well beyond beating Texas on Saturday, but it's their toughness that has been so attractive more than anything else.

"I think the parallels are that we didn't know how good we could be," Venables said, comparing his squad to the vintage 2000-era Oklahoma teams for which he was the defensive coordinator. 

It's still a bit too early to talk about a title in Year 2 for Venables, but thoughts of at least making the playoff have surfaced after a 6-0 start. 

Why? 

Toughness. And for many of this year's playoff contenders, it's increasingly the one attribute that's easy to identify. 

Michigan is proving to be the best team in the country

First and 10

1. College football is as much about playing to win as it is managing to avoid a loss, all of which makes what happened in Coral Gables on Saturday night all the more inexplicable.

To wit, Miami only had to kneel to run out the clock on Georgia Tech late in the fourth quarter. Instead, they opted to run a play, and running back Donald Chaney Jr. — whom coaches were evidently trying to get to 100 yards on the night — ended up fumbling. 

"That is one of the biggest coaching mistakes at this level that I have ever seen in my lifetime," ACC Network color analyst Tim Hasselbeck said at the moment.

Even more remarkable is that this was the second such scenario that head coach Mario Cristobal had managed to blow in specular fashion, snatching defeat from the jaws of victory back in 2018 when his Oregon team blew a game to Stanford. The Ducks had a three-point lead with 51 seconds in that game, but the Cardinal wound up winning by a touchdown as they beat a future top-five pick in Justin Herbert. 

But back to Coral Gables, where the ‘Canes still had a chance to walk away with a win, but played such soft coverage that Texas A&M castoff Haynes King made like Tom Brady, marching his team 74 yards in 26 seconds without a timeout. Never mind that a defensive back went for an interception instead of making a game-sealing tackle, or that nobody was hustling at 110% after wideout Christian Leary as he made his way to the end zone. 

Also, don't look at that box score, which said Miami out-gained Georgia Tech by nearly two bills, had allowed just 176 total yards before the final drive (and threw multiple interceptions while driving toward the end zone). Even those win probability charts had to be saying, come on guys — not unlike some Miami players did on the benches after the clock hit all zeros. 

To add to the misery in South Florida after all that: Cristobal has just one win over a Power 5 team at home in two seasons, and the last time Miami won an ACC game at Hard Rock, Manny Diaz beat interim VT coach J.C. Price in November 2021.

Saying "oof" just doesn't do that entire sequence justice, as somebody finally managed to knock off Coach Prime as the story in college football this week — for all the wrong reasons.

Will Mario Cristobal recover from Miami’s loss?

2. There were a lot of happy fan bases on Saturday, but it might be hard to top the feelings being shared by those at Oregon and Louisville.

The Ducks, who had a blissful weekend off ahead of their showdown at Washington, have to be thanking their lucky stars that another program actually paid them to take Cristobal off their hands. While there still might be a little skepticism over replacement Dan Lanning, the latter has a top-10 offense and defense, is recruiting even better, and is far more likable than any in the big chair since perhaps Rich Brooks.

The same sentiment is true down in Louisville. Not only did they see Cincinnati pay them this offseason to take the somewhat out-of-touch Scott Satterfield away, but the timing was finally right to bring home native son Jeff Brohm. The schedule was favorable enough that a good start was likely, but Saturday's triumph at home over Notre Dame, which set off a raucous field-storming, was about as good as it gets for the Cardinals — perhaps their best moment since joining the ACC aside from Lamar Jackson winning the Heisman. 

Oklahoma's fans may not be far behind in relishing that a former coach is elsewhere at the moment following a cathartic Red River win, but it's hard to top having your cake and getting paid on top of it, too.

3. What does Texas A&M really want to be? That is the question to ask in the wake of yet another missed opportunity for national relevance after falling 26-20 to a decidedly sloppy Alabama side.

Instead, it was more of the same: another year of looking ahead to another year. At some point in the future, the Aggies will be defined by something other than their head coach's albatross of a contract, but that's not the case in 2023. Win or lose, Jimbo Fisher and the word "millions" are the first line out of any commentator's mouth when it comes to discussing the Aggies, and that is just a miserable state of purgatory to be in for any fan base, much less one as passionate as the one that files into Kyle Field. 

Texas A&M has rarely been discussed for on-field exploits — beyond a singular win over the Tide a few seasons ago, and the brief intoxication with fame that was the Johnny Football era. Both before and after joining the SEC, A&M has been touted for its obvious potential to win games, but never the actual winning itself. There were expectations that Fisher, a large national title ring in tow, would be able to change that. What's transpired has not come anywhere close, having beaten more than six Power 5 teams in a season only once in the past decade.

So, what do these Aggies ultimately want to be? Because when you do things like punt on fourth-and-short in your opponent's territory or kick field goals in the shadow of the goal line, being known for spending a bunch in order to remain mediocre is going to become a stereotype the fighting farmers can't shake no matter how much they try.

4. Does a 12-team playoff, which should have been in place this season, change a weekend like this? On what was the first of three or four "Separation Saturdays," it kind of felt like the eventual outcome would have been pretty close to the same. 

It still hurts to lose Red River if you're a Texas fan, and the Longhorns can still earn the title of being "back" even in a four-team playoff. Miami will have the same cause for concern after that boneheaded ending and still have a shot at winning the ACC. LSU is probably more encouraged by its up-and-down campaign, just like Alabama looks ahead toward further improvement and peaking at the right time of year. It's not over for Fresno State nor Wyoming in their quest for a Group of 5 bid, and Washington State is still sitting pretty despite a missed opportunity at the Rose Bowl.

5. You could just see it coming, couldn't you? An SEC heavyweight who had some early season jitters playing against a ranked opponent that matched up well in terms of strengths … all for the game to become an almost preordained romp. Such was the case between the hedges, where Georgia finally looked like, well, Georgia in stomping all over former No. 20 Kentucky. 

If you simply perused the box score, you'd open one eye just a little bit wider upon seeing Carson Beck throwing for 389 yards and four scores, or Brock Bowers looking like a generational tight end again. The more interesting thing to note: 42 pass attempts to just 31 rushes. That's not the ratio that Kirby Smart will relish, but it was reflective of a team that has struggled to run the ball as well as it should and probably should start putting more and more on its starting quarterback.

Proper judgment of the Bulldogs' three-peat chances won't happen until a November stretch run against Missouri, Ole Miss and at Tennessee, but it was an encouraging effort by the red and black after a fairly pedestrian start to their title defense in 2023. 

This was the Georgia we came to know

6. How dominant was Michigan's win over Minnesota? Sure the 52-10 final score was a good indication, but a better one was the fact that they traveled 74 players and all but one wound up playing (the backup long snapper) as the Little Brown Jug remained safely in Big Blue's hands. 

Though the margin of victory keeps growing, the scary thing is the trajectory that the Wolverines have been on — particularly since Jim Harbaugh's return to the sidelines. J.J. McCarthy is the fourth-most efficient quarterback in the country despite taking a few more chances than he normally would (hence three interceptions) and the defense has allowed just four touchdowns all year and 6.7 points per game.

The schedule, it should be acknowledged, is light on heft, but there's something to be said for taking care of business and leaving no doubt. That kind of focus can be difficult in today's environment, but the approach Michigan takes is almost like a boa constrictor against hapless opponents. We'll see if they continue to squeeze the life out of Big Ten opponents as things ramp up, but they're off to an impressive start in league play.

7. It speaks to the standard that Ohio State has set during the College Football Playoff era that being undefeated and ranked in the top three is cause for concern around Columbus, but such is the case despite a 37-17 win over a Maryland team having its best season since 2001. The final margin — and Marvin Harrison Jr., as Michael Cohen wrote from Big Noon Saturday — covered up plenty of the obvious flaws in this Buckeyes squad, which were compounded by mistakes by the Terps in the hostile environment of The Horseshoe.

Start with the chief area of concern for Ryan Day: the offensive line. Quarterback Kyle McCord receives an oversized amount of attention, but he is not the underlying issue with a team that is 20th in yards per play and 29th in scoring. It starts up front, where the host of four- and five-stars for line coach Justin Frye is not getting enough push and often seems almost unsure of what to do. You have to go back to 2011 to find a game where OSU finished with less than the 1.9 yards per carry it did on Saturday, and the three first-half sacks allowed didn't help matters either.

It's not just the OSU fan base that should be sounding alarm bells ahead of much tougher opposition ahead — particularly those defensive lines for Penn State and Michigan. If things don't improve in the trenches for the Buckeyes, the offensive malaise is going to be accentuated in the games that really matter this fall.

Should Ohio State be concerned?

8. USC is undefeated, ranked in the top 10, and has a clear path to the College Football Playoff. Yet, the Trojans just might have the most frustrated fan base in the country after Saturday night's escape against Arizona 43-41 in triple overtime.

In a game in which the team's normally prolific offense was anything but, the lack of defense on a Lincoln Riley/Alex Grinch-coached team was elevated to unhealthy levels and on full display for a national audience. USC trailed by 17 points in the first quarter (its first deficit of the year) and seemed to allow the Wildcats to march down the field with little resistance on nearly every drive before halftime. In the rare case where a defender wearing cardinal and gold was in the correct position to make a play, more often than not that would result in a missed tackle and the chains moving — a common theme for the team the past three games. 

While QB Caleb Williams once again had to go superhuman (four total scores, plus a meandering 41 yards rushing) in order to rescue his team from the jaws of defeat, it won't be long before SC gets burnt after playing with so much fire — and with so little regard for defense.

USC narrowly escapes Arizona in triple-OT thriller

9. We're approaching the midway mark of the season, and it's never too late to start focusing on several of the award races. While everybody's attention is typically zeroed in on the Heisman pecking order, the Broyles Award for the nation's top assistant might be as competitive as any — and potentially a Pac-12 affair among the top options.

Offensively, Colorado's Sean Lewis has received much well-deserved praise for his work turning things around in Boulder. The Buffs have more than doubled their scoring output compared to 2022, and QB Shedeur Sanders leads the country in passing yards, is third in touchdowns, and has remarkably continued to put up tons of numbers despite playing behind the second-worst offensive line in FBS. Sanders and Javon Antonio's big 43-yard connection in the waning moments against Arizona State helped set up a game-winning field goal in the desert on Saturday for a second clutch drive among the team's four wins, too.

Washington OC Ryan Grubb is another strong contender as he's kept the Huskies attack humming, while upcoming opposite number Will Stein at Oregon is not far behind given how he's elevated what the Ducks are doing with additional creativity that plays into Bo Nix's strengths. 

Yet the best assistant in the Pac-12 might be the least recognizable — UCLA defensive coordinator D'Anton Lynn. The Bruins put on a masterclass against a very good Washington State offense in the Rose Bowl last Saturday and have been one of the biggest turnaround stories in the country this year, ranking No. 8 in scoring defense and leading FBS in yards per play allowed (3.74). This side of the ball was previously problematic for head coach Chip Kelly, but it's a unit that is carrying the team, as new QB Dante Moore continues to settle into the job. If things keep going on this trajectory, however, that powder blue defense might just be what keeps UCLA in the running for a Pac-12 title game berth and their young coordinator in the mix for the Broyles.

Breaking down Colorado's victory

10. We've reached the point in the season where there are starting to be some clearly defined tiers in each conference. In the Big 12, there's a pretty clearly established top two of Oklahoma and Texas (much to Commissioner Brett Yormark's chagrin).

After that? Well, that's where things are wide open.

By record, West Virginia would qualify as the Big 12's third-best team. The Mountaineers are 4-1 coming out of their off week and remain one of the two undefeated sides left in league play. Yet few are going to actually group them into that kind of tier considering they have the fourth-worst offense in the conference and are dead last in terms of big plays. 

After Saturday's 51-22 victory over UCF however, it might be Kansas who is playing the best out of any of the other options. Without QB Jalon Daniels for a second straight week, the Jayhawks barely needed to rely on their passing game given how effective Devin Neal (154 yards on 12 carries) and Daniel Hishaw (two touchdowns, 134 yards) were running the ball.

Texas Tech trounced Baylor to climb back to .500 while reigning champ Kansas State looked all out of sorts in losing at Oklahoma State. BYU's lone loss was a blowout in Lawrence to KU, and otherwise might be the only other program capable of nuzzling up to the Longhorns and Sooners in terms of the Big 12 pecking order.

As unpredictable as things have been this season in college football, the middle seven (or so) teams in the Big 12 being so jumbled might just be the most erratic to sort out of any league. 

Play of the Weekend

Double-Take from Week 6

Saturday Superlatives

Best Player: Kimani Vidal, Troy

Team of the Week: Oklahoma

Coach of the Week: Brent Venables

Hot Seat of the Week: Mario Cristobal

Heisman Five: 1. Michael Penix Jr. (Washington), 2. Bo Nix (Oregon), 3. Caleb Williams (USC), 4. Brock Bowers (Georgia), 5. Marvin Harrison Jr. (Ohio State)

Tweet of the Week

Super 16

My ballot going into Week 7 in the FWAA/NFF Super 16 Poll:

1. Florida State
2. Penn State
3. Oklahoma
4. Michigan
5. Oregon
6. Washington
7. Georgia
8. Texas
9. Alabama
10. North Carolina
11. Ohio State
12. USC
13. Louisville
14. Ole Miss
15. UCLA
16. Air Force

Just missed the cut: Washington State

Best of the rest: Oregon State, Tennessee, Kansas, Utah, Wyoming, Wisconsin, Tulane, Iowa

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Pre-Snap Reads

Indiana at Michigan (Saturday, Noon ET on FOX)

This is going to be a familiar script for many of the Wolverines games this season against an inferior Big Ten opponent: play a tight first quarter, create some breathing room in the second (possibly with some turnover help), and then blow the opposition away in the second half. Michigan -35

Iowa at Wisconsin (4 p.m. ET on FOX)

Will the Big Ten West be won in this one? It's increasingly looking like it, as two offenses you can't trust face off against two defenses known to make a play or two. Turnovers will prove critical in what should be a train wreck that you won't be able to turn away from. Iowa +9.5

Oregon at Washington (3:30 p.m. ET)

This Pacific Northwest battle pits the No. 1 and No. 2 offenses in the country, each with Heisman Trophy caliber quarterbacks, solid offensive lines and a host of skill position talents who can take it all the way to the house in the blink of an eye. Naturally, the defense will be what determines the outcome and the Ducks have the edge in that department. Oregon +3

USC at Notre Dame (7:30 p.m. ET)

This matchup essentially begins the season for the Trojans, who have gotten progressively less impressive as the year has worn on. The Irish, meanwhile, look worn out after three straight emotional games that have gone deep into the second half and are starting to show signs of regression on offense as well. It's a rivalry game at night, and it has the feel of the last one with the ball taking home the Jeweled Shillelagh. USC +2.5

Bryan Fischer is a college football writer for FOX Sports. He has been covering college athletics for nearly two decades at outlets such as NBC Sports, CBS Sports, Yahoo! Sports and NFL.com among others. Follow him on Twitter at @BryanDFischer.

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