College football is now fully back in swing with the first full weekend of action in the books. And with the first full slate of games now behind us, it’s time to reflect and discuss what caught my eye over the weekend.

Welcome to McGuire’s Musings, a sampling of assorted thoughts and random observations from the previous weekend of college football. This column has been seen in a couple of forms over the last couple of years, but I am happy to say it will reside here for the time being. Each Monday (or Tuesday in this particular case), I’ll share a few thoughts on some stories that I particularly enjoyed or felt the need to discuss from the weekend. I’ll also share a few fun tweets and offer my latest quick pulse on the College Football Playoff picture. I’ll also throw in a few links you may have missed over the weekend. This post will generally go live Monday mornings. We’re getting started on a Tuesday because of Monday night’s Louisville-Notre Dame game wrapping up the Labor Day weekend.

Is Jalen Hurts going to bring another Heisman Trophy to Oklahoma?

It’s way too early to talk about the Heisman Trophy, but let’s talk about the Heisman Trophy.

Nobody wins the Heisman Trophy in Week 1 of the college football season. But if they did, then Jalen Hurts may have just taken home the Week 1 Heisman Trophy in his first game in an Oklahoma uniform. Hurts thrived in the Oklahoma offense, which didn’t look as though it was about to skip a beat from last season. Hurts completed 20 of 23 passes for 332 yards and three touchdowns with no interceptions and he led Oklahoma with 176 rushing yards and three more touchdowns.

For those keeping score at home, that was the second 300-yard game for Hurts in his career (347 yards vs. Mississippi State in 2016) and a career-high rushing total all in one evening with the Sooners. Yes, that will do. Hurts made it difficult to avoid the inevitable discussion of what this means for the Heisman Trophy race after just one week of play. Hurts was already high on the board behind two favorites (Clemson’s Trevor Lawrence and Alabama’s Tua Tagovailoa), but the odds figure to look a little different after this week’s grand debut in Norman.

As much as I despise instant reactions projecting what the first week of games means in the bigger picture, it is nearly impossible to not think about how unique a situation coudl potentially be on our hands here when it comes to Lincoln Riley and Oklahoma. Riley is the only coach to have two Heisman Trophy winners in his first two seasons as a head coach, and he did so with two guys who transferred to the program (Baker Mayfield was already there after his transfer from Texas Tech, but Riley was the one in charge of the program when Kyler Murray came over from Texas A&M). Now, Riley has plenty of people thinking he cna do it again with Hurts.

And honestly, how cool would that be for Riley and Oklahoma?

I really hate overreacting to the first week of the season but I can’t help but think about how insanely awesome it would be to see a first-time head coach go 3-for-3 with transfer QBs winning the Heisman Trophy to start his career (yes, I know Baker Mayfield was already there). https://t.co/TdkDJBSNQd — Kevin McGuire (@KevinOnCFB) September 2, 2019

I loved the situation for Hurts since he clearly was not going to get a starting job again in Tuscaloosa (and no, Nick Saban isn’t having second thoughts). After all, it’s not like we are talking about an unproven player here. Hurts was the starting quarterback for an Alabama team that played for a national title in 2016 with him as the starting quarterback and he was at the helm for a run back to the national title game the following season in 2017 (where he was replaced by Tagovailoa at halftime). Maybe he wasn’t the best quarterback Alabama has had or had at the time, but he wasn’t exactly holding the Tide back from being national title contenders. He had skill and it showed. I was skeptical the offensive production would be on par as the numbers put up by Mayfield and Murray the last couple of seasons. It was only one game from Hurts, but man, was it a dandy.

It’s still a long season though, and Hurts will see stiffer challenges down the line. But if he plays like this, it’s hard not seeing yet another Oklahoma player being awarded the most iconic individual award in sports at the end of the season.

Vols continue to slide from Rocky Top

The Tennessee Volunteers got their season off on the wrong foot. Year 2 for Jeremy Pruitt opened with a dud in Neyland Stadium as the Vols were topped by Georgia State. The same Georgia State program that won a grand total of two games a season ago and one of them was a come-from-behind victory over an infant FCS program at Kennesaw State. It was also the first victory for Georgia State over a team from a power conference in program history. What a way to knock that milestone off the to-do list.

Here is a complete list of every FBS team Georgia State has ever beaten: Ball State

Coastal Carolina

Charlotte

Georgia Southern

Louisiana-Monroe

New Mexico State

South Alabama

Texas State

Troy

Western Kentucky And Tennessee — Kevin McGuire (@KevinOnCFB) August 31, 2019

And as the Vols went down, the pitchforks went up around Knoxville. There is no sugar coating on this one because that was simply a new low point for a program that has continued to find new depths for low points.

Welcome to the biggest upset of the season. Rocky Top has officially fallen. #JeremyPruitthttps://t.co/nbz4PU5zwo — Sports by Brooks (@SportsbyBrooks) August 31, 2019

Tennessee has had losing seasons each of the past two years and has been the punching bag in the SEC East because this is not how Tennessee is supposed to be as a program. It has been over a decade since the program’s last 10-win season and they have just one of those since 2005. Just twice in the last decade have the Vols ended a season ranked in the AP Top 25, ending the 2015 and 2016 seasons at No. 22 each time. But after losing a home game against Georgia State, all hope seems to be lost among the Vol faithful. Perhaps they can take some inspiration from a similar power outage at another national power. Take a look at Alabama.

Anytime you feel down about your program, keep your head up. Use this shot as a reminder that bad times can happen to any program and you can come back form it. pic.twitter.com/q8nib8oR96 — Kevin McGuire (@KevinOnCFB) September 3, 2019

Prior to Alabam’s hiring of Nick Saban prior to the 2007 season, Alabama had their own stretch of subpar football, especially for the program. Since their 1992 national championship season (at which point, by the way, Tennessee started to hit their stride as a top SEC threat and eventual BCS national champion), Alabama started to fall off a bit (NCAA sanctions certainly were a reason). Alabama won three games in 2000, four games in 2003, and six wins in 2004 and 2006. Alabama was far from being a national title contender and had finished in the AP Top 25 just three times from 1997 through 2006. And in Saban’s first season, Alabama lost a game to Louisiana-Monroe, and that was a week after losing at Mississippi State (and this wasn’t the Dan Mullen Mississippi State). This Alabama team also lost to a mediocre at best Florida State team on a neutral field in the middle of the year.

For Alabama, the loss to Louisiana-Monroe was the ultimate low point for the program that culminated at the end of a relatively long stretch out of the national championship picture. We almost forget how much Alabama was behind the pack during the bulk of the BCS years and the few seasons leading up to it, but they were. Now, Tennessee is in a similar position. Tennessee has a lot going for it as a program between its history and facilities. All it takes is the right coaching hire. This is not to suggest Pruitt is the right coaching hire, nor am I suggesting he will one day prove to be on the same level as Saban. But if Alabama can go form losing a home game to Louisiana-Monroe to one of the dominant forces in the game, who is to say Tennessee can’t go form losing a home game to Georgia State to at least a top contender in the SEC East?

But while we’re on the subject of Tennessee, here is a pretty cool reunion of sorts from Knoxville from before the meltdown commenced. Ryan Leaf and Vols legend Peyton Manning, two men linked together in NFL Draft history and who took very different paths in the pros, got together for a quick photo as Leaf was in town to provide commentary on the game in the broadcast booth.

Just a couple 43 year old dad’s taking in a ball game on a Saturday afternoon on Rocky Top…yeah right!! #GOAT #25yearsolderandwiser #HOF #Peyton pic.twitter.com/7auZLgi99S — Ryan D Leaf (@RyanDLeaf) September 1, 2019

Meet C.J. Thorpe, college football’s most animated offensive lineman

Penn State dropped 79 points on poor Idaho over the weekend. It was a game I barely watched given the lopsided outcome that I anticipated so I could focus on some other games for my assignments that day. Fortunately, College Football Twitter had me covered in discovering the theatrics and celebrations of offensive lineman C.J. Thorpe.

The moment of the game might have been Brandon Smith busting out the truck stick and C.J. Thorpe reacting like he was moved by the Holy Spirit. pic.twitter.com/xgwMuorWha — Roar Lions Roar (@RLRblog) August 31, 2019

This is the proper celebration after a great block and a touchdown. Watch the RG, number 69. Dude is FIRED UP for this late touchdown. pic.twitter.com/dcVrBDgW5e — Geoff Schwartz (@geoffschwartz) September 1, 2019

Oh yes, this dude seems like a fun character and I hope we see more of his raw emotions this season.

Penn State and Maryland each scored 79 points in their season openers. They’ll play in College Park in a few weeks for a Friday night game. The over/under on that game has been set at infinity 3000.

It’s cool seeing Mack Brown again

I have been critical of a couple of coaching hires this past offseason, largely because I felt it would have served a few programs better to go in a different direction with their coaching hire. Kansas hiring Les Miles was weird to me but certainly has the potential to be a short-term fix to make the job better for whoever comes next for the Jayhawks. And North Carolina hiring Mack Brown felt too comfortable for me, although I really liked the staff he surrounded himself with in Chapel Hill.

Mack Brown made his return to coaching with North Carolina this weekend and he got a victory in his first game against South Carolina. Coaching against Will Muschamp, who was once named Brown’s successor-in-waiting at Texas, Brown’s Tar Heels came from behind to stun the Gamecocks in the Belk College Football Kickoff Game in Charlotte. Afterward, Brwon got emotional as the moment seemed to hit him right in the heart.

Who can blame Brown for getting swept up with the emotions. And considering this was Brown’s return to the UNC program, which has fallen on hard times decades after he took them to storied heights, this was genuinely awesome to see. And although Brown may be much older than his players, Brown still knows it is important to bond with the players any way possible, and showing off some dance moves in the locker room while celebrating after the game is a surefire way to get people on board.

I don’t know how often we’ll see this kind of celebration from Brown this season, but I’m all for more of it.

As for Les Miles? Kansas picked up a win in his first game as head coach too.

Quick Hits

I dropped my first Group of 5 power ranking of the season on my Patreon page. I’m giving a ton of credit to Boise State. I didn’t give enough to Wyoming. And I’m not giving UCF any credit for smacking around Florida A&M, but the Knights will get their chance to move up.

I also had five quick overreactions to what went down in Week 1, which was written on Saturday night before Sunday’s Oklahoma-Houston game and Monday night’s Louisville-Notre Dame game.

As a reminder, my Patreon written content is free for all to read until I manage to hit 100 Patreon supporters (I’m only at 6 now, so we should have plenty of time before any paywall for written content comes into the picture. If you choose to support my content here or anywhere else, please consider supporting the Patreon page for as little as a dollar a month. While all written content is free for all, supporters will begin getting some exclusive video content beginning this week.

If you missed it on the site, I reacted to the news of USC quarterback J.T. Daniels going down with a torn ACL for the year. I don’t anticipate this to dramatically alter USC’s path this season. And I have a few video clips of how Justin Fields got started at Ohio State on Saturday. I had a few more thoughts about Fields’s debut for the Buckeyes over on The Comeback.

Also on The Comeback, a quick reaction to Auburn’s thriller over Oregon, the absurdity of Hugh Freeze coaching form a hospital bed in the press box at Liberty, and a look at our first textbook #Pac12AfterDark moment of the season.

They did it! NAIA's Cincinnati Christian has finally won their first game after starting 0-33 across their first three seasons! https://t.co/2ylrRRr0kP pic.twitter.com/EziUeKOUlz — RedditCFB (@RedditCFB) August 31, 2019

Geoff Collins stood at the opening of Georgia Tech’s tunnel and shook hands and hugged every single player after GT’s loss to Clemson. pic.twitter.com/0JFR5siGkX — Tori McElhaney (@tori_mcelhaney) August 30, 2019

Not that long ago actually… In 2016, the SEC was 6-6 in OOC Week 1 games

Kentucky lost to So Miss

LSU lost to Wisconsin

Auburn lost to Clemson

Miss St lost to So Ala

Mizz lost to WVU

Ole Miss lost to FSU https://t.co/iWp6daGc1F — David! (@ADavidHaleJoint) September 1, 2019

"Unsportsmanlike conduct, Jackson State mascot for coming onto the field." This actually happened 😅 pic.twitter.com/jjBL12XCg3 — ESPN (@espn) September 1, 2019

If the College Football Playoff started today…

Because college football is back, that means I will regularly be asked who my four playoff teams are at any given moment. It’s part of the game when you do radio interviews. Not every station or host will ask me (usually the ones I regularly appear on), but the question will come up on a regular basis. As a general rule of thumb, I hate doing this, but I understand it’s what many enjoy doing so I’ll keep the masses as happy as I can.

I should also make a clarification before I dig into this. You’ll see playoff projections on my page each week, which will take into account everything that has happened to that point in the season and where I see things playing out the rest of the way. That will be my official College Football Playoff Projection. But to keep things simple, I’ll simply keep this section here to my “Who would be in if the playoff started today,” which will assess only what has transpired on the field of play up to this point and nothing else. That means all I care about right now is how does your playoff application look? Who have you played? Who have you beaten? Who did you lose to, and why?

Our goal here is to find a perfect balance between the four best teams and the four teams that have earned a spot in the College Football Playoff, which is essentially what the selection committee is tasked with doing.

With all of that in mind, here is how I would rank the top four teams after one week of games has been etched into the books.

Auburn – Best win on the board sends the Tigers to the top for now Clemson – Opened with a statement and Trevor Lawrence is great Alabama – A little sluggish at first, but got rolling after halftime against Duke in Atlanta Oklahoma – Yeah, the Sooners are going to be fun to watch again

First Glance at Week 2

Overall, aside from some notable individual performances, there weren’t a ton of great games to look forward to in Week 1. Week 2 should be a bit more enticing. Here’s a quick look at some games that will be on the radar:

Clemson vs. Texas A&M: Game of the weekend right here? Tigers escaped College Station with the win last season.

Texas vs. LSU: Nah. This is probably the game of the week. Should be plenty of smack talking here.

Ohio State vs. Cincinnati: Luke Fickell leads the AAC contenders into Ohio Stadium looking to score a massive upset of his former employer

Michigan vs. Army: Army took Oklahoma to overtime last year in Norman. Can they do something similar in The Big House?

Maryland vs. Syracuse: Terps put up 79 last week. Statement game opportunity for Maryland?

Colorado vs. Nebraska: Buffs stunned the Huskers last year in Lincoln. Can they do the same in Boulder?

USC vs Stanford: Trojans have a stiff test in the Pac-12 opener.