Ten Fourteen Eighteen B1G Things
- Old Dominion embarrassed Cignetti to start the season, and he’s been on a mission since.
- What an emotional time, having to admit you cheated!
- Two more weeks of September left. Use them wisely.
- You know, we don’t know what happens if Rhule doesn’t fulfill his contractual obligations in year 3.
- How bad is Oklahoma State?!
- Are they “get blown out by New Mexico at home” bad?
- Here’s a good use for AI: Listing the game results in chronological order.
- Because apparently the websites dedicated to this very thing don’t seem to know how.
- It was all Al Golden.
- Petty James: DENIED!
- Someone’s going to get harbored this year.
- See? Even death stars struggle with inferior opponents.
- Genuine question: How is Cal even fielding a team? Everyone transferred like two days ago.
The Rundown
Cignetti Special: Indiana 73, Indiana State 0
And they would have scored again if it weren’t for those pesky refs.
BuffKomodo: Well it’s always nice to kick someone’s ass. It’s why buy games exist. Now that the preseason is over, time to turn all attention to the Top 25 matchup coming to town. Indiana vs Illinois to determine…well…who wins I guess.
Thumpasaurus: It’s okay dude it’s just me, nobody else is watching, you don’t have to pretend you don’t care about beating Illinois. What’s on the line is that the winning team has the inside track
to a playoff spot, while the loser will need to win out and get some help.
Jesus Christ UCLA: New Mexico 35, Bruins 10
It’s so bad the rest of the staff had to chime in.
BoilerUp89: Chiming in for UCLA: UCLA fans, its important to know that this is not your fault. I know. My team only beat an awful Indiana State last year. The football team sucking is not a reflection on you or your choices. Its the fault of Ohio State. For taking your head coach in the middle of the offseason for a coordinator position. Ohio State is the root of all your suffering. Welcome to the B1G. You are one of us now.
Thumpasaurus: Chiming in on UCLA’s behalf: Jesus fucking Christ how are you so bad with so much talent? Get the fuck outta my conference.
Suck it down, Ruben Unije. Somehow playing for UCLA after looking like a diamond in the rough for lovie smith’s 2018 recruiting class. Luke Butkus recruited this dude!
Narrator: You’re supposed to show empathy!
BuffKomodo: Chiming in for UCLA fan: Uhhh…whoof ya’ll stink.
September Continues: Maryland 44, Towson 17
Hey ChatGPT, does Maryland have a bye in September?
ChatGPT: Yes — Maryland has two bye weeks in the 2025 season. Testudo Times+2UM Terps+2
Here are when they occur:
- Bye Week #1: Week 5 (following their September 20 game at Wisconsin) FBSchedules.com+3UM Terps+3247Sports+3
- Bye Week #2: Week 8 (after their October 18 game at UCLA) FBSchedules.com+3UM Terps+3247Sports+3
If you want, I can tell you how many weeks until their next bye.
No ChatGPT, I don’t need you to keep me hooked into your feedback loop thanks.
ChatGPT: You’re welcome, do you want me to—
No, good bye.
Larry31: Maryland rolled their FCS competition. The 2’s and 3’s played a great deal in the second half, making for what I’m sure was ugly football had I watched. The fact that the 2’s and 3’s didn’t do shit in the 2nd half tells me Maryland has no depth behind their starters. At Wisconsin next week, at which point we’ll know if Maryland has a legitimate shot at 6 wins.
It was all worth it: Michigan 63, Central Michigan 3
Click the link.
Rockymtnblue: Central Michigan is not good at football. I mean really not good. But still, there were some developments.
To the good: Inline TE Marlin Klein returned after missing most of last week. Flex TE Hogan Hanson played for the first time this year. Michigan with TEs >>> Michigan without TEs. Much more than that, though, was the coaches taking the handcuffs off of Underwood. They called downfield passes and let him run. Underwood responded with 235yds passing (9.4/pass) and 114yds rushing on 9 carries. Michigan had 35 first downs and was 8/11 on third down.
To the bad: The penalties were less egregious, but Michigan still had 4 of them and 3 were important. One set up CMU’s only score. Two others negated long TD runs. The mental discipline was better, but not good enough for this league. The defense had decent counting stats, but Central’s offense is legendarily bad and they held the ball for 27 minutes. Michigan cannot get pressure without bringing an extra man. The defensive backfield is a walking MASH unit, so making them play a man down is a good way to get got.
Game management was better. It’s a tomato can and the game wasn’t stressful, but this was a nice sign. Of course, Sherrone Moore wasn’t on the sideline so that might explain it.
Brian Gillis: A week after showing virtually nothing offensively against Nebraska, Michigan opened up the playbook and threw everything but the kitchen sink at CMU en route to more than 600 yards of total offense. What does it mean? We’ll find out next week when the Wolverines travel to Lincoln to take on the high-flying Huskers.
BuffKomodo: Oklahoma
Ducks take time to fly: Oregon 34, Northwestern 14
This might be my bias showing, but if I were a Northwestern fan, I’d be livid. With how they moved the ball, they shouldn’t have been three touchdown game. And if you’re an Oregon fan, you should be concerned. Better teams are going to keep running the ball and finish those drives. Forget about my own team. What do you think Iowa, Indiana, Minnesota, and even Wisconsin, will do if they run for 178 yards?
LincolnParkWildcat: part of the first quarter was fun! we were running on Oregon and things looked good. then the interception started and oregon woke up. wheeee. we’re getting our ass kicked by the #4 team in the country. I’m not even watching the game anymore as I’m typing this, i’m at a McDonalds while my kid is playing on an indoor playground. Preston Stone needs to be benched. And next week is the toilet bowl against UCLA. yayyy.
MinnesotaWildcat: Fire Zach Lujan and bench Preston Stone.
That’s about all there is to it at this point.
Whether it’s because the game is moving too quickly for Stone or whether he just was never that good, it’s not working. Mike Wright’s career line at Northwestern was 38/66 for 354, 0 TDs to 1 INT with 2 lost fumbles against Miami-Ohio and Duke. At this point–and I’ll let you figure out at what point in the game I gave up–Stone is 40/65 for 406, 3 TDs against 4 INTs, and has lost 1 of 3 fumbles.
If only we could suss out what the difference is between the two. Alas. We may never know.
The really stunning sequence, though, game in the third quarter. Northwestern was down 24-0, of course, but the first teamers were all in and the ‘Cats were finally driving again. It was 3rd and 1 in Oregon territory. But it’s OK: Caleb Komolafe had been chewing up yards well enough on the ground. Easy peasy.
NOPE! Lujan, in his infinite fucking wisdom, called a slow-developing play-action pass. Stone saw the rush coming and still didn’t avoid it or throw the ball away to keep it 4th and 1. An 8-yard sack made it 4th and 9, ‘Cats out of field goal range.
NO MATTER! With another pass play dialed up, Stone actually got the ball out quickly enough, right to a Northwestern receiver 15 yards downfield! He was uncovered! This was the moment!
Hit him in the hands. Incomplete. Oregon scored a couple plays later.
This team lacks the players to make plays, lacks the play-callers to set up those mediocre players, lacks the defense to do the heroic task of “stopping the opponent on literally every drive.”
Northwestern’s continued participation in Big Ten conference play is basically like the ‘Cats playing a buy game almost every week. In fact, I think I’ll treat it that way. It’ll be funnier every time we DO manage to win.
—
Ok at least one of you is livid.
Nebraska rolls again: Huskers 59, Houston Christian 7
Matt Rhule continues to fulfill his contract obligations. Year 3 requires a minimum of 10 wins, and he’s 30 percent of the way there.
BigRedTwice: Nothing meaningful can be deduced from playing Houston Christian, and it was a waste of time for everyone involved. However, play they did, and so I will make what meaning of it I can. First, the Huskers wore all-red ensembles, and it was extremely hideous. Fortunately, since no one besides Husker fans were watching this, few people saw this. Second, though the Huskers didn’t quite manage a shutout this week, they have outscored opponents 127-7 in the past two weeks combined. These were very unequal match ups, but it has also been the case in the not-too-recent past that Nebraska couldn’t have counted on this type of dominance, even against these teams. So that’s nice. Third, the Huskers have not punted since Week 1. This is not very B1G of us, and it’s a bummer for our Aussie punter, whose parents have been hanging out in the US hoping to see their kid play, and hit the wrong part of the schedule for that. Fourth, it was nice to see lots of backups – I believe even QB4 made an appearance today. The Huskers in recent years never had a chance to play that deep.
Next week is Michigan, which will be several orders of magnitude different than what the Huskers have seen of late. It should be an interesting game, and will reveal a lot about what the ceiling for this year’s Huskers might realistically be.
Michigan State 41, Youngstown State 24
I did not watch this.
Denied: Penn State 52, Villanova 6
Petty James Franklin tried his best to preserve the shutout, but it was not meant to be. Sorry to those who took Penn State -48.5.
The Harboring is coming: USC 33, Purdue 17
This game was 100% closer than the score indicates. Everyone talks about the transfer portal in the context of the heavy hitters, but this is what the transfer portal also does to the teams at the bottom. Purdue went 1-11 last season, and an infusion after talent has them looking like a middle-of-the pack team in the Big Ten, at worst.
BoilerUp89: nobody should have left the Purdue/USC game thinking USC wasn’t the better team. The Trojans were. But Purdue lost by just 16 in a game where they threw three redzone INTs including one pick six. Considering the talent chasm, Purdue wasn’t that far away from being in this game. Despite that the Boilermakers can’t lose the turnover battle by 3 and win games against quality competition this season. They don’t have the talent to overcome that.
Rutgers beats Norfolk State 60-10
I did not watch this.
Illinois continues its mission: Illini 38, Western Michigan 0
Top 10 team did what top 10 teams do.
HWAHSQB: Illinois is good. Western Michigan is not. For the second week in a row, Illinois came out of halftime with better adjustments combined with physical play and quality depth to blow open a game that was close going into halftime.
BuffKomodo: Indiana hasn’t beaten a top 10 team at home in front of fans since the 60’s. But putting stakes on it from a Hoosier fan perspective feels lofty, especially when you have to go to Kinnick, Happy Valley, and Eugene after.
Would I enjoy an Indiana win and will it make me confident they can win at Iowa? Yes. Will losing crush me and make the season just a blob of nothing? No. No it will not.
Death Star struggled: Ohio State 37, Ohio 9
It was 16-9 with about 3 minutes left in the third quarter. They poured it on late, but the Buckeyes were sweating this one out throughout.
MaximumSam: Bo Jackson has returned
Iowa 47, Mass 7
Not even Iowa’s offense could screw this one up.
West Coast Bias: Cal 27, Minnesota 14
WhiteSpeedReceiver: Man, that was stupid. Good for Cal for finding yet another great QB out of thin air, but it’s 2025 and he’s probably going to be at an SEC school or something dumb.
Alabama 38, Wisconsin 14
The other thing AI is good for is getting things totally wrong, when it’s not outright making them up. For example, forgetting Wisconsin is a Big Ten team.
MC ClapYoHandz: Wisconsin continued its strong 2025 campaign with a convincing performance at Alabama, gaining dozens upon dozens of yards on the day en route to a historic 2nd-ever regulation game appearance for a B1G program in Tuscaloosa. The numbers speak for themselves. Wisconsin was able to score more points in this game than Alabama could in the 1st and 4th quarter combined. A show of strength, Wisconsin felt comfortable enough to stick to the ground game on 2/3rds of their plays, while Alabama opted to risk disaster through the air over half of the time to improve their outlook. Vinny Anthony’s kick return TD was by far the longest of the day for either team. Alabama even ended up benching their QB by the end of this one, but the backup fared no better, failing to complete a single pass on the day. Yes, Wisconsin seems to truly be on the up-and-up, and the proof is in the pudding: compared to this time a year ago, Wisconsin’s scoring output against Alabama is up a whopping 40%, while Alabama’s production against Wisconsin over the same timeframe has seen a disappointing 9.5% slide. If this doesn’t convince you of the bright future ahead for these upstart Badgers I don’t know what will.
Anyone else feeling dizzy all of a sudden?
