Week 3 College Football: The Good, the Bad & the Ugly (Updated all day!)

Week 3 of college football is here, and a 11-game slate of Texas FBS games has us excited. We'll give you our thoughts on the best and the worst (and sometimes, the absolute worst) of the weekend. JUMP TO...Cal 50, Texas 43Texas A&M 29, Auburn 16Texas Tech 59, Lousiana Tech 45Florida 32, North Texas 0Arkansas 42, Texas State 3SMU 29, Liberty 14Army 66, UTEP 14TCU 41, Iowa State 20Arizona State 32, UTSA 28Baylor 38, Rice 10Houston 40, Cincinnati 16Cal 50, Texas 43The Good: Well, the running game sure looks great! The Longhorns’ offensive line had a field day against an undersized and undertalented Cal front seven, and Texas took advantage to the tune of 307 yards and an impressive 6 yards per carry. D’Onta Foreman and Chris Warren were unstoppable, each running for a pair of touchdowns and looking like the kinds of runners we expected from the Texas offense this year. The Bad: Well, the Longhorns lost their first game away from Austin, and it’s time to reconsider the whole “Texas is back!” narrative that’s swept the nation for the past couple of weeks. This game doesn’t end the season by any means — in fact, if they start 3-2, that’d be a pretty sizeable accomplishment — but it’s worth a recalibration of expectations. Texas is decidedly moving in the right direction. The Longhorns are a better team than they have been at any point in the Charlie Strong era, and I don’t think that’s necessarily up for debate. But the Peak Texas teams would’ve run this largely average Cal squad out of the building, so any notion that “Texas is back” should probably wait. The Ugly: Can we finally start talking about the Texas defense — especially the secondary — as a major problem? The Longhorns looked positively clueless against Cal quarterback (and former Texas Tech signal-caller) Davis Webb tonight, and had no answer for something called a Chad Hansen, who went off for 12 catches for 196 yards and two scores. This is two weeks removed from Texas allowing five touchdowns through the air to a Notre Dame team that couldn’t decide on a quarterback. With high-flying attacks like Baylor, Texas Tech, Oklahoma and Oklahoma State still on the conference slate, the secondary is very much in danger of becoming, appropriately, burnt orange. -Greg Tepper, DCTF managing editorTexas A&M 29, Auburn 16The Good: Kevin Sumlin’s program completed its transformation into an SEC contender. Known more for improvising quarterbacks than form tackles since joining the best conference in the country, the Aggies went on the road and won in SEC fashion, relying on a stout defense and a consistent kicking game. Defensive end Myles Garrett led an ever-improving Aggie defense, recording 2.5 tackles for loss and two sacks. Auburn didn’t complete a single pass beyond 20 yards against the Texas A&M secondary. The Tigers weren’t averaging over four yards per carry until late in the fourth quarter. Defensive coordinator John Chavis earns his paycheck. The Bad: There will be a point this season when field goals won’t win football games. Earlier in the day, we watched Alabama and Ole Miss put up big points against strong defenses. It is hard to win without scoring touchdowns in the red zone and tonight the Aggies defense was good enough to overcome five total field goal attempts, four of which came within 35 yards. Trevor Knight only completed 50 percent of his passes. Take away an 89-yard touchdown run late by Trayveon Williams and Texas A&M averaged 3.94 yards per rush. Texas Tech 59, Lousiana Tech 45 [caption id="attachment_18801" align="alignleft" width="350"]Photo by Ashley Wirz Photo by Ashley Wirz[/caption] The Good: We’ll start with the group of Red Raiders I’ll call “The Triplets,” in a sudden fit of originality. We all know Pat Mahomes — aka Patty Ice aka #GOAT aka NAIJFF (New and Improved Johnny, err, you know the rest) — and Mahomes always has great games for the Red Raiders. He did it again on Saturday with 470 yards and five touchdowns on 26-for-36 passing while adding another score on the ground. Now, let’s get to the newbies. Demarcus Felton had 15 carries for 118 hard-fought yards with two scores as the Tech running game resembled that of the past few years with DeAndre Washington leading the deceptively good rushing attack in Lubbock. Then, there’s the biggest positive of the night offensively in wide receiver Jonathan Giles. Tech has been looking for a dominant go-to receiver this year, and Giles showed he might have the makings of one with six grabs for 186 yards and three touchdowns. Now, how ’bout a little love for the Red Raiders’ defense. After the worst showing in recent memory full of a lot of bad defensive showings, there were some positives on Saturday. For one, the Bulldogs, a great third-down offense was just 2-for-8 on third down. Also, if not for a garbage TD in the final seconds, the score wouldn’t have looked quite so close against a team that is no slouch and took Arkansas to the wire. The Bad: Any coach will tell you the last few minutes of the first half and the first few of the second half are some of the most important moments in a game, and the Red Raiders’ defense failed miserably in both. They led 35-10 before letting the Bulldogs score with 1:10 left in the half to go to halftime down 35-17 with the second-half kickoff going to them. And, of course, La. Tech capitalized as they took the second-half kick and scored in just more than two minutes to cut the Red Raiders’ lead to 35-24 in a matter of three minutes and 15 seconds of game time. The Ugly: Those white helmets, man. As a native West Texan, I can tell you with full confidence the Red Raiders should never wear a helmet that isn’t predominantly black. It’s just the way it is. Tommy Tuberville started all this mess, and we all know what a disaster that guy was. Lose ’em, Kliff. - Adam BoedekerFlorida 32, North Texas 0The Bad: North Texas gave up 32 points in a shutout loss to Florida. The defense played well for the most part considering the lack of help from the offense, but the Gators did average six yards per rush. Florida quarterbacks combined for just 216 yards, zero touchdowns and one interception on 29 attempts. It was the Mean Green rushing defense that wore down as the game entered the fourth quarter. It’s nitpicking to put much blame on the defense considering how bad the offense performed. The Ugly: First-year head coach Seth Littrell is a few recruiting classes away on offense. A week after a solid performance, true freshman Mason Fine looked like a young quarterback still adjusting to the system and the speed of the game. Like last week probably shined to bright a light on the improvements on offense, getting shut out against Florida probably looks worse than it is considering no team in Conference USA will field that level of talent. It wasn’t a step forward for this offense and the stats were humbling. North Texas passed for 66 yards and finished with negative 13 yards rushing. - Mike CravenArkansas 42, Texas State 3The Bad: The Bobcats are a plucky, underdog team that uses up tempo offensive attacks to gain an edge where they may be lacking size, strength and skill. Arkansas is a big, nasty SEC team that may not have top flight speed or offensive variance, but against Texas State, just being brutes was enough. The Razorbacks ran for 226 yards and passed for another 241, dominated the time of possession, and generally pushed the Bobcats around. Frankly, it’s about what you’d expect from Texas State’s defense against a team built to steamroll SEC opponents down the field. Sun Belt teams don’t really stand a chance. The Ugly: While Arkansas is a bulldozer on offense, it is absolutely suspect on defense, and Texas State didn’t come close to exploiting that at any point in the game. The Bobcats ran for just 22 yards on 26 attempts. Tyler Jones mustered 105 yards of passing on the back of 11 completions in 26 attempts. Everett Withers’ bunch was overmatched, and if you want to take the disappointment to the level of nitpicking, they didn’t do a great job of attacking the weaker part of the Razorbacks’ game. - Max ThompsonSMU 29, Liberty 14 [caption id="attachment_25486" align="alignleft" width="350"]Photo by Will Leverett Photo by Will Leverett[/caption] The Good: The obvious start here is the Mustangs’ ground game, powered by Braeden West. The SMU tailback finished the night with 220 yards on 24 carries with two touchdowns as he averaged just short of 10 yards per carry. Jordan Wyatt followed up his big week of being the in-studio guest on The Ticket’s Norm & D Invasion by picking up two interceptions, including the game-sealing pick-six with under a minute remaining. Wyatt and his defensive teammates stood tall late when the Flames were trying to take their first lead of the night with less than eight minutes to play. Liberty appeared to have taken that lead on a long touchdown pass by its backup quarterback, apparently known as “Buckshot,” but the play was negated by an illegal man downfield penalty. Still, the Flames drove the ball down inside the SMU 10-yard line before the Mustangs’ defense stuffed a first-down run, forced third-and-long and then got a key sack of Buckshot to bring up fourth-and-20. The Flames missed the field goal and SMU clinged to its 19-14 lead. The Bad: Well, first things first. SMU let Liberty — the Liberty Flames — hang around for entirely too long in a home game against Liberty, of all teams. If not for that aforementioned penalty, Liberty very well could’ve won that game with its backup quarterback. Not that SMU is a juggernaut, but in its second year under Chad Morris, you’d hope the Mustangs could force the issue at home against a team like Liberty. The offense’s ineffectiveness in the red zone was a main culprit for the nail-biter, as the Mustangs stalled three times in the red zone and had to settle for field goals instead of touchdowns — must be something in the water in University Park (ahem, Jerry Jones’ team, anyone?). - Adam BoedekerArmy 66, UTEP 14The Good: Aaron Jones still plays for UTEP. He scored a touchdown. The Bad: To date, we’ve had no reason to believe the Miners’ defense is particularly bad (or particularly good, but especially not particularly bad). That changed when UTEP allowed the most points Army has ever scored against a FBS/Division I team. Army ran at will against the Miners’ defense, plowing along for a staggering 424 yards. When Sean Kugler looked across the field, he certainly saw a team molded in his own vision, and most impressively, built within the confines of a service academy. The Ugly: The defensive gashing was bad, but hey, sometimes it’s not your day. The offensive ineptitude was worse. Just 9 first downs (compared to 33 by Army). Two turnovers (compared to zero). Just 103 rushing yards from a team built to run and featuring one of the best running backs in the state’s FBS ranks. This was as bad as the offense looked without Jones all last year. Army’s got one of its best teams in years, but this was a major step back for UTEP. - Max ThompsonTCU 41, Iowa State 20The Good: Everything involved in this game needs to be viewed through the lens of Playing The Worst Team In The Big XII, so take everything with a grain of salt. That said: TCU took care of business, showing little if any ill effects from last week’s disappointing loss to Arkansas. The defense was exceptional, especially in the secondary, making Iowa State’s passing game a non-starter. Safety Denzel Johnson was everywhere, whether it was crashing down in the box to help the run or dropping into coverage. And on the offensive side, Kyle Hicks clearly staked his claim as the Horned Frogs’ top running back option, showing outstanding burst and exceptional receiving ability out of the backfield. The Bad: So, three games in, what do we think of Kenny Hill? His numbers are fair, but watching the game made it clear of the duality of the Horned Frogs’ signal-caller — he’ll look like an All-American one play, and downright average the next. His accuracy continues to be an issue, and while his running ability is a decided plus, his passing game has to develop to match it. Hill wasn’t bad in this game, but there are reasons to worry under center. The Ugly: The headline for this one is “Horned Frogs start conference play 1-0”, but the sub-headline should be “KaVontae Turpin hurt.” The star wide receiver for the Frogs went down awkwardly in the third quarter and immediately clutched his knee, having to be carried off the field. We’ll obviously know more about the injury in the coming days, but if the sophomore Turpin — the nation’s leader in all-purpose yards entering the day — is out for any significant period of time, it could be a huge blow to the TCU attack. -Greg Tepper, DCTF Managing Editor [caption id="attachment_25460" align="alignright" width="350"]Photo by Mary Scott McNabb UTSA QB Dalton Sturm (Photo by Mary Scott McNabb)[/caption] Arizona State 32, UTSA 28The Bad: Arizona State outscored the Roadrunners 17-0 in the fourth quarter to steal an upset victory from UTSA. It would have been UTSA’s first win over a P5 program. The offense couldn’t maintain drives and the defense couldn’t get one more stop, mostly due to depth. Arizona State has depth in the trenches and UTSA is still building that under head coach Frank Wilson. Fifteen minutes separated the new regime from its first signature win. The Good: Moral victories don’t soften hardships, but the Roadrunners can gain a lot from this game. It was the program’s best performance since beating Houston to start 2014 and it was on ESPN2 with few other television options. The publicity alone was a victory. The UTSA defense allowed 12 points in the first half to a team that lit up Texas Tech a week ago. Arizona State made two 54-yard field goals and only won by four points as a heavy favorite. UTSA seemingly settled on a quarterback and the offensive playcalling was aggressive. These are all positive signs for Wilson and his program heading into conference play. - Mike Craven, DCTF Senior WriterBaylor 38, Rice 10The Good: The Bears offense didn't quite get off to a red hot start, with both teams fighting to a 0-0 stalemate in the first quarter. But a 21-10 second quarter got things going for Baylor, and by the end of the game, the usual offensive numbers could be found in the box score. Seth Russell looked sharper earlier in this game than he did against SMU, and the offensive line seemed to be working together a bit better. Another nice spark for Baylor was the emergence of RB JaMycal Hasty, who ran for 105 yards and a score. Anywhere the Bears can get depth this season, they'll take it. It was also good to see KD Cannon have a top receiver kind of game with 9 catches for 213 yards and two scores. For Rice, Darik Dillard had his kind of game, rushing for 124 yards. He may end up being the lone bright spot on this campaign if it stays on its current trajectory. The Bad: Rice's defense, already reeling, was never going to look better against this Baylor offense. Owls QB Tyler Stehling had his worst game of the season, completing just 8 passes on 25 attempts. If anything, this is just another morale hit for the Owls in what is turning into an ugly stretch. The Ugly: The Rice band's halftime performance mocked Baylor for its recent scandal, which may have gotten more attention than the actual game. The scandal at Baylor was and still is ugly. Mocking the scandal is also ugly. It's all ugly. Nobody wins. - Max Thompson, DCTF Digital DirectorHouston 40, Cincinnati 16 [caption id="attachment_25462" align="alignleft" width="350"]Photo by Diana Porter Houston WR Chance Allen (Photo by Diana Porter)[/caption] The Good: The Cougars finished. It may get lost because they got the win, but Houston trailed in the fourth quarter of this one. But QB Greg Ward Jr. settled down and took off for two touchdown runs that gave the Coogs the lead and a cushion. And from there, Todd Orlando’s defense pinned its ears back against a hampered Cincinnati attack and made this game a non-issue, getting back-to-back interception returns for touchdowns from Steven Taylor and Howard Wilson. The first three quarters weren’t great (though the defense was great all game, especially against the run), but the fourth sure was, and that’s why Houston is 3-0. The Bad: How serious is Greg Ward Jr.’s injury? He did not look like himself for long stretches of this one, including some miserable play in the red zone. It’s pretty clear that Ward’s shoulder injury that kept him out of last week’s game with Lamar is still an issue, and one that needs to heal in a hurry before the Coogs hit the teeth of conference play. The Ugly: For all the winning that Tom Herman has done at Houston, his teams tend to play with their food. Remember: the Coogs beat Louisville, Cincinnati and Memphis last season by a combined 7 points. They did it again tonight, letting Cincinnati — a good team, but one that Houston is pretty clearly better than — hang around and even lead into the final frame. Perhaps you’re saying, “Yeah, but they got the win.” That’s true! But the Cougars are now in the business of style points, likely needing to run the table and look convincing doing it to crack the College Football Playoff; and in a national spotlight, the Coogs did not look like one of the four best teams in the country for the first three quarters. And even if the more lopsided final score fools some voters who didn’t watch the game, Houston’s tendency to let opponents linger is a troublesome one. Because if you do it enough times, things like Connecticut 20, Houston 17 happen. -Greg Tepper, DCTF Managing Editor