CFB Storylines, Week 4 2024: Hello, "Mr. Here to Stay?"
Week 4 has everything from Josh Heupel back in Norman to Arch Manning's likely first start and my B1G dreams for perpetually downtrodden Indiana
Week 4 brings a road test for Tennessee in Oklahoma’s SEC debut and a big game at the (presumptive) top of the new-look Big 12. But what I’m dying to know is if we’ll be singing goodbye to Quinn Ewers after seeing a whole game (and possibly more) of Arch Manning. How do you send this back to the bench?
1. This Movie Is Starting to Look Familiar — #6 Tennessee Volunteers (3-0, 0-0)
The Vols are the second team in SEC history to open a season with three straight 50-point outings — the other one, 2018 Alabama, didn’t hit 50 in game four but did win its first 14 before losing the CFP Championship to Clemson. It’s not just the offense that’s scorching hot as Tennessee’s defense hasn’t allowed a touchdown in four straight games dating back to last season — their longest streak since shutting out 15 straight opponents spanning 1938-39.
Tennessee’s beaten its first three opponents (including a once-ranked NC State) by a combined 191-13 margin, the best through three games in SEC history and second-best by any team in the AP Poll era (since 1936).
The Vols are looking to start 4-0 for the second time in three seasons — prior to 2022, they hadn’t won their first four since 2016. Before that it had been since 2003 and they’re looking to do it twice in three seasons for the first time since doing it back-to-back in 1991-92.
Much like 2018 Alabama with first-year starter Tua Tagovailoa under center, these Vols are led by an emergent star in first-year starting QB Nico Iamaleava — though he didn’t have to do a whole lot last week as Tennessee ran all over Kent State en route to its most points (71) since 1929.
Dylan Sampson racked up 101 rushing yards and a school record-tying 4 rush TD on 13 carries while becoming the first Vol with four straight 100-yard rushing games since Arian Foster in 2005. Redshirt freshman DeSean Bishop had his first career 100-yard rushing game with 120 yards and a pair of scores on just 7 carries — he’s averaging 10.1 yards on his first 22 career rushes. Neither of them had a carry after halftime.
Iamaleava threw the ball just 16 times, going 10-16 for 173 yards and a TD. It’s the first time he’s been responsible for fewer than 3 TD in four career starts dating to a Citrus Bowl rout of Iowa.
2. In the Words of a Famous Sooner, “Business is About to Pick Up” - #15 Oklahoma Sooners (3-0, 0-0)
Oklahoma’s been less dominant than Tennessee since throttling Temple 51-3 to start the campaign — the Sooners followed up a lackluster 16-12 win over Houston in Week 2 with a slightly more encouraging 34-19 win over Tulane in Week 3. The long-maligned Sooners defense seems to be coming along in year three under head coach Brent Venables but the offense still has some kinks to work out — particularly the pick-6 which let Tulane get back within a 24-19 margin in the 4th quarter.
The Sooners defense is holding opponents to a Success Rate of just 33.3% through the first 3 games, which would be its best mark for a full season since 2009. But the offense has just a 36.0% Success Rate, which would be its lowest since either 2001 or 2002 (incomplete data from 2002, they had a lower rate in 2001). The OU offense finished each of the last 10 seasons with a Success Rate of at least 45%.
First-year starting QB Jackson Arnold has thrown a pair of INT in 86 attempts this season and five in 155 career pass attempts — his 3.2% interception rate is tied for 3rd-worst among 16 Oklahoma QBs with 100+ pass attempts this century.
Dominant or not, Oklahoma continues to rack up wins in the early portion of the season with the best of them — the Sooners are 3-0 or better for the fourth straight season as well as the seventh time in the last eight seasons. Only Georgia (24-0), Alabama (23-1) and Oklahoma State (23-1) have a better record over their first three games of the season since 2017.
Oklahoma’s 22-2 mark in games 1-3 is tied with Oregon for 4th-best since 2017. Expanding to game 4, OU is 28-3 in the same span — tied with Ohio State for 3rd-most wins (Alabama and Georgia are each 30-1, Ohio State is 28-2 entering its third game).
3. Heupel’s Homecoming — #6 Tennessee at #15 Oklahoma
This is both Oklahoma’s first conference game as a member of the SEC and just the fifth matchup between two of the sport’s most storied programs — but somehow neither of those things is the juiciest part of the matchup. That’s because this game will also bring Tennessee head coach Josh Heupel back to the school he led to the BCS Championship in 2000 as Heisman runner-up…and the school he hasn’t returned to since being let go as co-Offensive Coordinator 10 seasons ago.
This is Heupel’s first game against Oklahoma at any level of coaching.
Tennessee and Oklahoma will meet for the first time since a 2014-15 home-and-home swept by the Sooners. Before that, they’d only previously met in the Orange Bowl following the 1938 (17-0 Tennessee win) and 1967 (26-24 Oklahoma win) seasons.
It’s been more than a minute since Tennessee knocked off a team ranked as highly as Oklahoma on the road — the Vols haven’t won a road game against a team ranked higher than #17 since October 2006 at #10 Georgia.
#17 is specifically the rank Pittsburgh held when the Vols won there in September 2022. Their highest-ranked SEC road win since 2006 came in November 2021 at #18 Kentucky.
When it comes to the Top 15 Tennessee’s lost 28 straight true road games, all of them against SEC opponents. The last nine losses in the streak all came by at least 14 points, most recently last October at #11 Alabama.
Oklahoma’s hosting a Top 10 opponent for the first time in almost seven years, since beating #8 TCU 38-20 in November 2017. The Sooners had lost their previous two home games against Top 10 visitors and went 2-3 in such games during the 2010’s.
4. Who’s Under Center for Number One? — UL Monroe Warhawks (2-0) at #1 Texas Longhorns (3-0)
Texas has returned to the top of the AP Poll for the first time since getting Crabtree’d on November 1st, 2008 and falling to #5 — but as of Sunday afternoon it looks like they’ll be without starting QB Quinn Ewers for this game after he left the Week 3 rout of UTSA with an abdominal strain. That means this week likely brings the first start in the career of Arch Manning — after last night’s display, it’s hard to imagine Arch makes many starts before he’s QB1.
I mean absolutely no disrespect to Ewers, who entered Saturday as the Heisman favorite but exited it looking like the second-best quarterback on his own team. Peyton and Eli’s nephew simply looked worthy of every bit of the mountains of hype he’s received while going 9-12 for 223 yards (a measly 18.6 yards per attempt) and 4 scores through the air with a dazzling 67-yard rush TD on top. For Ewers sake I hope he heals quickly because people know Wally Pipp’s name for a reason.
Because this game features ULM and a highly-ranked opponent, I am duty-bound to mention that the Warhawks are looking for their second-ever win against an AP Top 25 opponent and their first since stunning John L. Smith and #8 Arkansas a dozen Septembers ago.
ULM has lost 13 straight to ranked opponents since the win at Arkansas. This will be its first-ever encounter with AP #1.
5. Big 12 Debut, Take Two! — #12 Utah Utes (3-0, 0-0) at #14 Oklahoma State Cowboys (3-0, 0-0)
Two weeks after beating Baylor in a non-conference game from a bygone era, Utah plays its first actual Big 12 conference game against another third of the Big 12 pod occupying the #12-14 spots in the AP Top 25. The Utes are hoping to have seventh-year QB Cam Rising back after he missed last week’s win over Utah State with a hand injury suffered against Baylor in what was definitely not a Big 12 game.
College football in 2024 couldn’t be encapsulated better than Utah turning from a 25-year old Cam Rising to true freshman Isaac Wilson, younger brother of one-time BYU star and current Broncos backup Zach Wilson…whose true freshman season in 2018 was also Cam Rising’s. Anyway, the younger Wilson (who is babyfaced like his brother) was solid against Utah State, going 20-33 for 239 yards with 3 TD and an INT in a 38-21 win.
Utah is 3-0 for the second straight season and is looking to start 4-0 for the second straight season as well. Before last season the Utes hadn’t started 4-0 since 2017 when they did it for the third straight season.
Mike Gundy is even older than Cam Rising, impossible as such a thing seems — Gundy’s FIFTY-SEVEN years old now, and is perhaps the most reliable constant in the sport with Nick Saban off the sidelines.
Gundy’s Cowboys are 3-0 for the seventh time in eight seasons and the 14th time in his 20 seasons as head coach at his alma mater. They’ll look to improve to 4-0 for the fourth time in five seasons and the eighth time in Gundy’s tenure (also 2008, 2010, 2011, 2015, 2020, 2021 and 2022) — they went on to win 10+ games following five of Gundy’s previous seven 4-0 starts and 9+ games after six of the seven.
Oklahoma State’s quarterback was also a true freshman in 2018 along with Cam Rising and Zach Wilson — Alan Bowman started seven games for Texas Tech six years ago and is 12-4 as Oklahoma State starter over the last two seasons. He matched his career-high with 5 pass TD last week at Tulsa, a mark he originally set in 2018 (and matched in 2020, also for Texas Tech).
6. A Big Ten Debut To Take In, Too! — #11 USC Trojans (2-0, 0-0) at #18 Michigan Wolverines (2-1, 0-0)
USC, like its former Pac-12 brethren Utah, most recently beat Utah State — but had a week off since thrashing the Aggies 48-0. That blanking marked USC’s first shutout since 2011 and the first one against an FBS opponent in Lincoln Riley’s career as a head coach — his Oklahoma teams shut out FCS foes Missouri State in 2020 and Western Carolina in 2021.
New starting QB Miller Moss has completed 75.0% and 70.0% of his passes in his two games this season after coming just a hair shy of 70% (23-33, 69.7%) in his Holiday Bowl starting debut against Louisville last season. He and USC are 3-0 in the post-Caleb Williams era while he’s thrown for 979 yards and eight touchdowns with just one pick, though six of those eight scores came in the Bowl game compared with one in each game this season.
This is USC’s first conference game ever in a league other than the Pac-12 (which USC belonged to from 1959-2023) or its predecessor the PCC (which USC called home from 1922-58), whose history the Pac-12 claims as its own.
Michigan got back in the win column in Week 3 against Arkansas State, rolling up 301 yards and three touchdowns on the ground in the 28-18 triumph after having just 228 rushing yards in the first two games of the season combined while failing to score a rushing touchdown in either of them.
Michigan’s playing its fourth straight home game to open the season, looking for a 25th win in its last 26 games in Ann Arbor after having a 23-game home win streak snapped in Week 2 against Texas.
This will be the 11th meeting all-time between USC and Michigan and the first one that isn’t a Rose Bowl game since September 1958.
USC’s won six of the previous 10 meetings including the last three. The teams have met twice this century, both on New Year’s Day following the 2003 and 2006 seasons. The most recent meeting featured Chad Henne at QB for Michigan against John David Booty who threw four scores for USC including a pair to Dwayne Jarrett as part of his 205-yard game.
7. Kinda Wish No One Had to Lose — #24 Illinois Fighting Illini (3-0, 0-0) at #22 Nebraska Cornhuskers (3-0, 0-0) (Friday)
It’s hard not to root for both of these programs and both of their head coaches, Illinois’ Bret Bielema and Nebraska’s Matt Rhule, after watching them all endure some pretty miserable times to find themselves here, with an unbeaten Top 25 showdown on broadcast TV on a Friday night.
Illinois is looking for its first 4-0 start in 13 years, since reaching that mark in 2011 en route to a 7-6 finish in Ron Zook’s final season as head coach. This is the second season of Bret Bielema’s tenure to see the Fighting Illini crack the Top 25 after they peaked at #14 two years ago — they didn’t appear in the Top 25 once during the tenures of Tim Beckman (2012-14), Bill Cubit (2015) or Lovie Smith (2016-20).
Nebraska is looking for its first 4-0 start since 2016, enjoying its first stint in the Top 25 since 2019 when it was ranked #24 in the preseason and fell out quickly following a 1-1 start. The Cornhuskers have held their first three opponents to 20 total points and 10 or fewer each — their first time doing so in three straight games at any point in a season since October/November 2009.
True freshman QB Dylan Raiola has completed at least 70% of his passes in each of his first three games — according to Nebraska he’s the first Cornhuskers QB to complete 70% in three straight since Jeff Quinn in 1980.
8. Woke Campbell Stadium Cometh? — California Golden Bears (3-0, 0-0) at Florida State Seminoles (0-3, 0-2)
Like everyone else, I circled this game on my calendar months ago as a matchup of an unbeaten team and the last Power conference team without a win…we just all had it backwards, obviously. Also like everyone else, I had no idea how good Cal’s meme game could be.
I swear it’s true what I said about Florida State — thanks to Houston’s rout of Rice, the Seminoles are the last Power conference team left without a win. They’re one of just 10 winless across the entire FBS, a very dubious list that also includes Kent State, Miami (OH), New Mexico, Old Dominion, Temple, UMass, UTEP, Troy and Wyoming.
Cal is looking for its first 4-0 start since its last winning season in 2019, and its second 4-0 start under eighth-year head coach Justin Wilcox. Wilcox, forever on the hot seat, had one of the more memorable moments of Week 3 when he commandeered the referee’s mic to ask his own fans to stop getting his team penalized for the things they’d thrown on the field.
9. The Avery Johnson Show Hits Provo — #13 Kansas State Wildcats (3-0, 0-0) at BYU Cougars (3-0, 0-0)
Kansas State QB Avery Johnson is one of the most exciting players to watch in the sport despite not having thrown for more than 181 yards in any of K-State’s three wins to open the season. The true sophomore’s thrown exactly two scores in each game so far this season and last week had the first 100-yard rushing game of his career as K-State routed Arizona 31-7.
K-State’s looking for its first 4-0 start since 2012, when the ‘Cats matched their program-record with 11 wins behind third place Heisman finisher Collin Klein (now the OC at Texas A&M after serving in that role at K-State for the last two seasons). This is their fourth attempt at a 4-0 start since then.
BYU’s also 3-0 after throttling winless Wyoming 34-14 last week in Laradise. The Cougars are 3-0 for the second straight season and the fourth time in the last five, looking for their first 4-0 start since 2021 after losing at this stage last year and starting 2-1 in 2022.
The Cougs wins so far have come against a winless FBS team, by three points at SMU (which has beaten Nevada and Houston Christian) and against FCS Southern Illinois. I will pay actual attention to them if they win this game.
10. This is Why Vandy Can’t Have Nice Things — Vanderbilt Commodores (2-1, 0-0) at #7 Missouri Tigers (3-0, 0-0)
This was very nearly an unbeaten SEC showdown between a team from Tennessee and a former Big 12 team to perfectly mirror the one between Tennessee and Oklahoma, but Vandy had to go and allow a TD with 15 seconds left in a 36-32 loss at Georgia State last week.
Vandy was that close to starting 3-0 for the first time since 2017. This week they’ll look to avoid a 10th straight SEC loss dating to a win over Florida in November 2022.
Missouri is 3-0 for the second straight season and will look to say the same thing about 4-0 — a mark it reached for the first time in a decade last season. The Tigers have reached the AP Top 10 in consecutive seasons for the first time since 2007-08 and just the second time in the last 40 years (since a three-year streak from 1979-71).
Last week Tigers receiver Luther Burden III had his third game with at least 100 receiving yards and a touchdown since the start of last season. That’s more than the rest of the program has had since the start of the 2019 season combined.
11. It’s Hard to Stay At the Top — #8 Miami Hurricanes (3-0) at South Florida Bulls (2-1)
Saturday night’s Heisman race shifts had me wondering just how lucky the early Cam Ward backers are to have gotten the current 5-1 favorite at odds of 40-1 and up over the summer. With deepest apologies to the Hurricane in my life, the last decade indicates they’re probably not so lucky. This is just the result of some googling as past Heisman odds aren’t kept in a handy database, but as far as I can tell the September favorite hasn’t won the Heisman since at least 2014 (excluding deeply weird 2020 which I didn’t even bother checking).
Last September, Caleb Williams was favored to repeat. He didn’t.
C.J. Stroud was the favorite throughout September 2022. Caleb Williams won.
A rogues gallery including Spencer Rattler, D.J. Uiagalelei and others were favored at times early in 2021, which is very funny in hindsight. Bryce Young emerged from that pack, which is funny now for different reasons.
Tua Tagovailoa was favored early in both 2018 and 2019. He gave way to Kyler Murray the first time and Joe Burrow the second.
Saquon Barkley, Sam Darnold and Lamar Jackson were all favorites at times early in 2017. Baker Mayfield took it home.
Christian McCaffrey was just ahead of Deshaun Watson throughout September 2016. Eventual winner Lamar Jackson started flying up the board right around this point in the season.
Go marvel at the names on this 2015 preseason list yourself, they’re too good to spoil. Derrick Henry, who isn’t there, won it.
I stopped looking there because I just need to let myself believe 2014 belonged to Marcus Mariota wire to wire. And to be clear, I don’t share any of this to disparage new favorite Cam Ward, who I love. It’s just very hard to hold onto favored status for as long as he’s going to have to. Given a soft schedule, he likely won’t be forgiven many (if any) stumbles along the way.
So far, no stumbles in Incarnate Ward’s brief Miami career — he and Pitt’s Eli Holstein have simultaneously become the first two ACC quarterbacks since Philip Rivers in 2004 to have at least 300 passing yards and 3 passing touchdowns in each of the first three games of a season.
12. Shouts to Ole Miss and Ohio State — #3 Ohio State Buckeyes (2-0) and #6 Ole Miss Rebels (3-0)
Neither team has a compelling matchup this week with Marshall and Georgia Southern on tap, but they’ve been impressive and earned some brief recognition.
Ohio State’s coming off a bye following a 56-0 rout of Western Michigan, but the Buckeyes look like a buzzsaw with a defense just as stingy as last year’s (six points allowed in two games) and a dynamic new quarterback (Kansas State transfer Will Howard has 5 total TD in two games without a turnover) to go with an inexhaustible supply of skill position stars. The newest, top overall recruit Jeremiah Smith, has 11 catches for 211 yards and 3 TD in his first two college games with at least five catches, 90 yards and a score in both.
Ole Miss passed its first Power conference and road test last week by dismissing Wake Forest just as easily as it had Furman and Middle Tennessee. The Rebels have yet to allow a touchdown this season, the first time they’ve done that in their first three games since 1961 (nine points allowed are also their fewest through three games in the same span).
13. Hear Me Out!!! — Indiana Hoosiers (3-0)
Last up for this week…what if I told you Indiana is starting 6-0 and perhaps even 9-0? It feels insane to dream this big about a team that has only won seven games once in 17 seasons and hasn’t done it in the first eight games since 1993. But dream big I shall, for these Hoosiers look impressive, Curt Cignetti and Kurtis Rourke might be the best coach and quarterback that get no love and most importantly…their upcoming schedule is softer than the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man.
Cignetti joined Indiana this season after a hugely successful five-year run at James Madison where he took the Dukes to an FCS runner-up finish in 2019 and Semifinal appearances in both the Spring 2021 and Fall 2021 FCS playoffs. He spent the last two years guiding JMU’s transition to FBS with a 19-4 record over those two seasons before taking on the perpetual Indiana rebuild.
Rourke, the 2022 MAC MVP and Offensive Player of the Year at Ohio who earned 2nd Team All-MAC honors last year, also came to Bloomington in the offseason. He’s thrown 57 touchdowns against just 16 interceptions in his career (seven scores without a pick season), and has a 24-13 record in his career as starting QB including 19-6 since 2022.
And then we get to Indiana’s next six games: vs Charlotte, vs Maryland, at Northwestern, vs #22 Nebraska, vs Washington and at Michigan State. ESPN FPI currently has IU as better than a 60% favorite to win each game, which would get the Hoosiers to 9-0 heading into November matchups with Michigan and Ohio State. The way they’ve played so far it would be a surprise if they don’t at least get to 5-0 and until they lose I’m gonna keep dreaming B1G. It’s what Taylor would want.