With the September portion of the college football season now officially in the books, we can draw a few conclusions about a few teams that had playoff aspirations entering the campaign. Texas A&M? Oklahoma? Not happening. Southern California? Michigan? Penn State? On life support. We feel fairly safe asserting that none of those statements are overreactions.
But that’s not what we do here, is it, friends? This is the space in which we discuss events from the just-completed weekend that spark leaps to conclusions that might be a tad over the top.
Here are our top five overreactions from Week 4.
Indiana won’t repeat as national champion
Fans accustomed to seeing their Hoosiers dominate lesser opponents since Curt Cignetti’s arrival were a wee bit nervous Friday night when the Big Ten opener
against Northwestern wasn’t secured until the final possession. But should they really be worried?
Several things can be true at once. Northwestern has undoubtedly improved, and Indiana might not be quite as good. The latter half of that sentence is assuredly not an indictment of the current Hoosiers. When your most recent season was an all-timer with a national championship and a Heisman Trophy winner, it’s natural to expect a tiny step back early as replacement pieces come together. Don’t forget also that even the 2025 squad that went undefeated had a squeaker or two – Penn State, anyone?
So while it might not be realistic to expect Indiana to run the table again, it’s also way too early to say the Hoosiers are incapable of winning enough games to make a third consecutive playoff appearance. Cig’s teams also tend to get better as the season progresses. In short, nobody in Bloomington should be panicking.
Florida is back as SEC championship contender
It seems like every week, a team from the conference of high meaningfulness gets a big poll boost from a notable win. This week it was Florida getting the SEC bump after taking down last week’s beneficiary Ole Miss.
We’ll say this much for the Gators – they’re putting up points in bunches. They exit September with the nation’s No. 2 scoring offense at 53.5 points a game. For skeptics, those numbers aren’t just due to feasting on cupcakes. They’ve put up scores of 44 and 52 against their first two SEC opponents.
Can they keep it up? Probably not quite at this pace given that there are a few more accomplished defenses on their dance card. October will find Florida facing the two teams currently heading the polls away from home. Fortunately for the Gators there’s a week in between the trip to Texas and the annual Cocktail Party encounter with Georgia, which will take place in Atlanta this year. It is fair to say the program has regained its competitive edge. So while we can’t start measuring the Gators for championship rings at this early juncture, we can’t discount it completely.
Notre Dame needs Wisconsin to keep winning
Not much was made of the 41-13 victory by the Fighting Irish against Wisconsin in Week 1. Notre Dame, after all, was thought by most poll voters to be a top-five team, and the Badgers were coming off a subpar campaign. That result might carry more weight than we knew at the time, thanks to Wisconsin’s win at Penn State.
Notre Dame will have a couple opportunities against top-10 opponents in the coming weeks, but the rest of their schedule doesn’t look as though it will improve their metrics appreciably. Any more quality wins the Badgers can snag will also help out the Irish with some additional margin for error when the College Football Playoff field is announced in December.
Cincinnati should be getting more attention from poll voters
There are three ranked Big 12 teams that got through September unscathed and a fourth one, Houston, that just rejoined that group in the Top 25. But there’s another unbeaten squad in the conference that isn’t especially close to cracking the top 25 in the US LBM Coaches Poll. Cincinnati just got to 4-0 by handing another league member, Kansas State, its first loss. Should the Bearcats be getting more respect? The short answer is, we’ll find out.
The Bearcats do have a non-conference win against another Power Four league member, though that opening victory against Boston College wasn’t likely to move the needle. The Bearcats also had a narrow escape against long-time regional foe Miami (Ohio) in Week 3 before this week’s successful Big 12 debut.
So, remember those four ranked Big 12 teams we mentioned above? Well, UC’s schedule includes all four of them. The Bearcats will close out October hosting Texas Tech and Utah back-to-back, followed immediately by a trip to Houston. The regular season will conclude with a date at Brigham Young. If the Bearcats are indeed worthy of a spot in the poll, they’ll have ample chances to prove it.
The best Group of Six team is – Massachusetts?
Only three FBS teams from outside the power leagues made it through September undefeated. That UMass is one of them is nothing short of remarkable, considering the Minutemen were winless in 2025.
UMass raised a few eyebrows right out of the gate in 2026 by soundly thumping Rutgers on the Scarlet Knights’ home field. The Minutemen, back in the MAC this season, improved to 4-0 in the late hours Saturday with a decisive 35-6 triumph at new league member and FBS newcomer Sacramento State, very much the sort of game the team probably would not have won a year ago.
By no means should we pencil the Minutemen into the College Football Playoff. But a bowl game is very much within reach, a huge step forward for the program under second-year coach Joe Harasymiak.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Indiana won't repeat, Florida is back headline college football Week 4 overreactions
