A slate of college football games that appeared rather bland on paper turned out to be anything but as Week 4 unfolded. Here are 13 observations from Saturday:

What the heck, Virginia Tech? You’d have to think really hard to come up with a result in recent memory as unexpected as Old Dominion 49, Virginia Tech 35. Sure, the game was in Norfolk, which begs the question why the Hokies scheduled a game there in the first place. And certainly the 28-point line in Las Vegas wasn’t the biggest upset we’ve ever seen. But all that aside, Old Dominion had been so bad through the first three weeks it would have been hard to come up with any scenario for the Monarchs to win this game. Here’s what they had done prior to Saturday: opened the season losing 52-10 to Liberty, lost 28-20 at home to Florida International, and lost 28-25 to Charlotte in Week 3. It wouldn’t be unfair to say coming into the game that Old Dominion was the worst team in the Football Bowl Subdivision.

Even though Virginia Tech was never as good as its No. 10 ranking (the Hokies’ reputation was largely built on beating Florida State, which has not turned out to be a very good team at all), this is still a game you expect them to win 100 times out of 100. How Bud Foster’s defense gave up 632 yards to this team is hard to explain. No way around it: This is just a bad, bad loss for Justin Fuente and crew. But congratulations to Bobby Wilder, one of the truly nice guys in college coaching, who has built the Old Dominion program literally from the ground up.

More:Old Dominion stuns No. 10 Virginia Tech for first win of season

So what now, ACC? The Hokies’ loss certainly furthers the narrative that Clemson has a cakewalk to the ACC title and a playoff berth. Then again, the Hokies weren’t equipped to play with Clemson anyway. The Tigers may experience a letdown somewhere unexpected in the schedule (a la Pitt in 2016 when they won the national championship), but there’s no doubt the ACC looks quite average aside from the Tigers. Who’s the second best team in the league? It’s probably still Miami, but it also doesn’t really matter. A couple years ago, it looked as if the ACC was getting closer to the SEC. Now the gap seems pretty wide.

More:Winners and losers from college football's Week 4 headlined by Alabama's dominance

How did Stanford do that? You may not see a wilder game this season than Stanford 38, Oregon 31. First of all, the game should never have gotten into overtime. When Justin Herbert scrambled for a first down with 2:17 left, Stanford had just one timeout left. So even if you take a knee three times, the worst-case scenario is that you have to run out the clock by punting with a handful of seconds left. Your odds of losing that way are almost zero (though Jim Harbaugh would argue otherwise after the 2015 Michigan-Michigan State game). Instead, Oregon coach Mario Cristobal wanted the first down that would have negated such a scenario. He got burned when C.J. Verdell fumbled it back to Stanford with 51 seconds left. The Cardinal sent it to overtime with a field goal and won it in overtime, putting this game in the same category of catastrophe as that Michigan blocked punt and the fumble by Arkansas quarterback Clint Stoerner against Tennessee in 1998 when the Razorbacks were trying to run out the clock on a win. Cristobal will get roasted — and deservedly so — for not taking a knee. It was the obvious, low-risk strategy in that spot. And it robbed quarterback Justin Herbert from getting proper credit for his brilliant, 26-of-33 passing performance. As great a win as it was for Stanford, which trailed 24-7 (and nearly 31-7 until instant replay overturned a touchdown) it will be remembered more as a game Oregon gave away.

Texas is back-ish: We need to forgive the Longhorns for that odd and poorly played game against Maryland in the opener and recognize that they’ve improved greatly since then. Beating TCU 31-16 is serious evidence of that improvement, as the Longhorns now look as if they’ll factor in the Big 12 race. If you want to nitpick this effort, you can. Texas missed plenty of opportunities throughout the game and was plus-4 in the turnover margin, which you can’t count on every week against quality opponents. They also caught TCU at a good time, as the Horned Frogs spent a lot of physical and emotional energy the previous week trying to beat Ohio State. Still, if Sam Ehlinger can play like this against good teams — he finished 22-of-32 for 255 yards and two touchdowns — the Longhorns have a chance of actually being “back.”

More:Texas is back (on track, anyway) after beating TCU for third consecutive win

Kentucky is legit: Totally didn’t see this coming, but Kentucky’s 28-7 victory over Mississippi State was very real and spectacular. Though the competition hadn’t been great, the Bulldogs looked awesome the first three weeks, so it didn’t seem like going to Lexington would pose a huge threat to their chances of contending in the SEC West. Instead, Mississippi State’s offensive line absolutely got destroyed and Kentucky all-SEC linebacker Josh Allen did most of the destroying. It seemed as if he were in Nick Fitzgerald’s grill all night, and Mississippi State couldn’t do anything to block him. Though it was a disappointing and perplexing effort by the Bulldogs, particularly rushing for just 56 yards, we may need to consider the possibility that 4-0 Kentucky is borderline elite defensively. In the SEC East, they may be the only potential challenger to Georgia.

So much for the Oklahoma State hype: Another huge day for Texas Tech coach Kliff Kingsbury — maybe the biggest of his career — to go into Stillwater and come away with a 41-17 victory. It seems as if there’s a lot of parity in the Big 12 right now. Last week, we were crowning Oklahoma State as a real contender after it destroyed Boise State. This week, the Cowboys got out-gained 621-386 by Texas Tech. It will be exciting to watch the career of Red Raiders freshman quarterback Alan Bowman, who threw for 397 yards (35-of-46) and has really been terrific right out of the gate.

It’s time for Clemson to pass the torch: The narrative around the Tigers for the first month of the season has been all about the non-controversial quarterback controversy. And while it’s true that the battle between Kelly Bryant and Trevor Lawrence didn’t have as much inherent tension surrounding it as the Alabama situation with Jalen Hurts and Tua Tagovailoa, it seems like the obvious thing everyone intuitively knows is starting to manifest itself on the field. Lawrence is just the better player, and while Bryant is a solid quarterback and can perhaps contribute in some way going forward, the ceiling for Clemson is considerably lower if he’s the starter.

While the Tigers’ defense had full control of the Georgia Tech offense Saturday in a 49-21 win, it felt like Clemson was just wasting time in the first quarter as Bryant led the first two drives that resulted in just 13 yards over eight plays. When Lawrence came for the third series, things changed immediately. The threat of Lawrence making plays vertically opened up the running game, and then he finished off his first series by threading a 17-yard touchdown pass to Hunter Renfrow.

Whether it’s the 53-yard touchdown he threw in stride to Justyn Ross after that or the 12-play, 64 yard drive he engineered at the end of the half to open up a 28-7 lead, you come away from watching Clemson with the distinct impression that it’s only a matter of time before Dabo Swinney makes the change official. While perhaps Lawrence wasn’t as ready in Week 2 when Bryant was the guy who handled the clutch moments at Texas A&M, the highly-touted youngster is getting better every day and will be the key to whether this team can compete with Alabama in a potential playoff game.

Ignoring Oklahoma’s issues … for now: The Sooners had no business going to overtime with Army, but the Knights are a funky team to play. It only takes a couple long, clock-milking drives to totally change the complexion of the game and frustrate a team like Oklahoma, which wants as many possessions and snaps as possible. Despite Army possessing the ball for nearly 45 minutes, Oklahoma got it done in overtime, 28-21. Don’t read too much into this one.

More:No. 5 Oklahoma survives upset bid from Army in overtime

Kirby Smart has a problem to correct: The first time a Georgia player got away with prematurely dropping the football before crossing the goal line this season, that should have been the end of it. Not only is it one of football’s mortal sins because it can cost you six points, it can turn the offending player into a social media sensation. You just don’t want to go there. But rather than learn from what cornerback Deandre Baker did on an interception return at South Carolina (the ball was smartly recovered in the end zone by teammate Juwan Taylor), receiver Jeremiah Holloman almost did it again in a 43-29 win over Missouri. At the end of his 61-yard touchdown in the third quarter, Holloman clearly let the ball go as he was crossing the plane. But even on instant replay, where different angles showed different things, it was unclear whether he dropped it just short of the end zone or after he was already in. It was close and inconclusive — Missouri didn’t have a goal-line camera that might have solved the mystery — so the touchdown stood and Holloman was absolved of a major mistake. But you can bet Smart is going to emphasize the point even further in practice this week in a variety of ways: Just hold onto the ball no matter what.

We have to back off Jim Harbaugh for now: The pile-on after Week 1 was always ridiculous because as disappointing as it was for Michigan to lose at Notre Dame, it was still just a seven-point Week 1 road loss against another very good team. Since then, Michigan has out-scored Western Michigan, SMU and Nebraska by a combined 150-33, which is exactly what the Wolverines should be doing against those kinds of teams. Obviously, the real test for Michigan will start Oct. 20 with a trip to Michigan State, followed by a Nov. 3 home game with Penn State. And it’s worth noting that quarterback Shea Patterson, when he was at Ole Miss, had a penchant for putting up huge numbers against bad teams and then struggling against the better defenses. But he’s also an older, more mature player now and he’s running the Michigan offense pretty cleanly. Michigan seems to be getting into a groove, and while Harbaugh will always have critics ready to fire after every loss, it was premature to do it after the Notre Dame game.

Notre Dame’s QB change paid off: Not everyone would change quarterbacks with a 3-0 team, but Brian Kelly obviously made the right call by benching Brandon Wimbush in favor of Ian Book. No matter what happened, the decision to make a change was justified after watching how stagnant the Irish’s offense had been in their first three weeks. So rather than stick with a quarterback who didn’t appear to be improving, give Kelly credit for going with Book, who provided the necessary spark in a 56-27 win over Wake Forest. Book did everything he was asked to do, going 25-of-34 for 325 passing yards and two touchdowns, and he clearly gives Notre Dame its best chance of putting up points going forward.

More:Brian Kelly makes the smart move in Notre Dame's quarterback switch to Ian Book

Bobby Petrino could be in some trouble: The Louisville offense, in its first year of the post-Lamar Jackson era, has been hard to watch all season. But the Cardinals hit a new low in a 27-3 loss at Virginia, managing just 214 yards of offense and an anemic 2.3 yards per rush on 29 attempts. Coming on the heels of last weekend, when the Cardinals had to rally to beat Western Kentucky 20-17 (they had just 292 yards of offense that day), it’s pretty clear this isn’t a fluke. It’s almost inconceivable that a team coached by Petrino, one of the finest offensive minds of his generation, is this challenged offensively. But the Louisville program clearly wasn’t well-positioned to replace Jackson, and if this thing bottoms out quickly, it’s worth at least keeping an eye on whether Petrino and Louisville could be headed for a divorce.

Things can change really fast: Boston College was the flavor of the month last week after a nice win at Wake Forest that featured its explosive, up-tempo power offense. Now the Eagles are just the team that lost to previously 0-3 Purdue.