A quarter of the college football season has already come and gone, as teams wind down through non-conference games and prepare for the official start of league play. A few things have gone as planned: Alabama and Clemson are still very good, Texas-El Paso is still very bad and the Southeastern Conference is still untouchable.

Then there are the unexpected. Take Kansas, which won two games in a row against Football Bowl Subdivision foes for the first time this decade. Or take the tough starts from nearly every first-year head coach, such as Florida State’s Willie Taggart or Nebraska’s Scott Frost.

The quarter point of the regular season is a good time to take our first stock of where things stand across the FBS. Who is the best team, best quarterback? What is the best conference? And let’s hand out some early report cards – there’s still time for teams to get those grades up, but be warned: Those slipping below a 3.0 GPA need to hit the books before things get out of hand.

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Best team: Alabama

The score at halftime through Alabama’s first three games: 28-7 vs. Louisville, 40-0 vs. Arkansas State and 49-7 vs. Mississippi. The Tide have been ridiculously good. What’s been most impressive of all is the play of sophomore quarterback Tua Tagovailoa, who has performed as well as any player in the country and keyed one of the most prolific three-game scoring streaks in program history.

Best conference: The SEC

The idea that the Big Ten rivaled the SEC was erased during a rough Week 3 highlighted by Wisconsin’s loss at home to Brigham Young. Meanwhile, the SEC has been as strong as predicted at the top but better than expected along its second tier, where teams such as Missouri, Kentucky and Texas A&M have impressed. Alabama, Georgia and LSU are in the top six of this week’s Amway Coaches Poll.

Best quarterback: Tua Tagovailoa, Alabama

Not that Tagovailoa has been the only impressive quarterback in the FBS – there’s Penn State’s Trace McSorley, Ohio State’s Dwayne Haskins, West Virginia’s Will Grier and Oklahoma’s Kyler Murray, to name a few. But check out what he’s done on third down: Tagovailoa is a perfect 13 of 13 for 298 yards and six touchdowns through three games. That’s crazy.

Best head coach: Ryan Day, Ohio State

Maybe this comes with an asterisk, since Day was technically the Buckeyes’ interim coach while Urban Meyer served his three-game suspension. But Day successfully piloted OSU through a tough August and three consecutive wins against Power Five competition, the last on Saturday night against TCU, to vault himself into the top tier of assistant coaches heading into the upcoming coaching cycle this December.

Biggest surprise: LSU

All-knowing preseason prognosticators pegged LSU as the SEC team most likely to disappoint, especially in a top-heavy West Division headlined by Alabama, Auburn and Mississippi State. Yet the Tigers have already beaten Miami (Fla.) and Auburn through three games to rewrite the team’s narrative. We’ll see if it’s sustainable, but LSU has played its way into the early title conversation.

Biggest disappointment: Southern California

USC has already lost to Stanford and Texas, the latter in pretty ugly fashion, and seems very unlikely to make any noise through the rest of the regular season. Why do the Trojans seem to always falter under Clay Helton when facing off against a favored opponent? Also receiving votes in this category: Arizona, UCLA, Florida State and Purdue.

Now, quarter-of-the-way grades for every team in the Bowl Subdivision: