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Welcome to the 300th edition of Until Saturday. Pop quiz: Which two quarterbacks share the record for the most 300-yard passing games in a season? Answer below. (Hint: One holds a million additional records, and they once played in the same conference at the same time.)
Takedowns: How unusual is this kind of parity?
It was an especially dangerous weekend to be an undefeated college football team. Let’s get immediately to the damage. Of the 11 remaining FBS unbeatens, five fell, starting before Saturday even began:
Louisville 24 (5-1), No. 2 Miami 21: Friday night, Carson Beck’s four INTs muddied what’d once looked like the smoothest Playoff path in the country. I still believe in this defensive line, but … same ol’ Canes?
No. 9 Georgia 43, No. 5 Ole Miss 35: Again feels weird to wonder whether Georgia — Georgia! — can keep scoring enough to make up for its flawed defense.
Arizona State 26 (5-2), No. 7 Texas Tech 22: Just when it looked like the Red Raiders might’ve bankrolled their way to immunity from the notorious Big 12 Final Scores Randomizer, ASU came back to negate a TTU comeback in a wild one.
UAB 31 (3-4), No. 22 Memphis 24: Firing Trent Dilfer works wonders.
Boise State 56 (5-2), unranked UNLV 31: The Broncos now look much likelier to win their seventh Mountain West title while on their way to the new Pac-12. Their 294 rushing yards were more than they had in either of Ashton Jeanty’s games against the Rebels last year.
All of that means we’re down to just these six unbeaten teams:
No. 1 Ohio State 34, Wisconsin 0 (2-5): Huge yikes involved. More below.
No. 3 Indiana 38, Michigan State 13 (3-4): Normal blowout-victory stuff for the newly enriched Curt Cignetti. The Hoosiers’ first time winning the Spittoon in consecutive years since the 1960s.
No. 4 Texas A&M 45, Arkansas 42 (2-5): For the second week in a row, I don’t particularly wish to praise interim coach Bobby Petrino, but the underdog Hogs fought all the way.
No. 12 Georgia Tech 27, Duke 18 (4-3): The Jackets are 7-0 for the first time since 1966. (Hey, in Austin Mock’s Playoff projections, they’re in the bracket, as of this writing … and lined up against archrival UGA.)
No. 15 BYU 24, No. 23 Utah 21: Good thing realignment repented for some of its transgressions by bringing these two back together. Cougars at Texas Tech on Nov. 8 is now even bigger.
Also, unranked Navy deserves a Top 25 spot for being wise enough to avoid playing football during this perilous weekend.
Sure, that’s the exact list we all would’ve predicted as the final six undefeated teams! As for the big question:
Just six left standing! Is this a whole new level of mayhem? Is this happening because of NIL And The Transfer Portal And All That Other Newfangled 2020s Stuff?
This level of parity is unusual, but far from unprecedented. So I’d rather wait to see whether we have at least another couple more seasons like this before declaring 2025’s distinct flavor of chaos is certainly all attributable to Newfangled 2020s Stuff.
After all, if this were college football’s new normal, wouldn’t it have happened last year too? Three of the last four seasons, which occurred amid all the same newfangled-ness, had eight or nine undefeated teams after Week 8, a number fairly in line with seasons from before the portal. (On the flip side, at this point in pre-portal years like 2003, 2007, 2014 and 2018, we had even fewer than the current six.)
So for now, I’d just say: College football gets especially wacky every few years, and that has been the case since long before NIL. As the book of Ecclesiastes notes, nothing is ever really new, mainly because everything has always been new.
One side effect of this lovely mess, via Ralph Russo: Get used to the idea of three-loss Playoff teams.
On to the quick-hitters:
Superlatives
Longest-shot Heisman Contender: A former two-star JUCO by the name of Diego Pavia hit ‘em with the pose after scoring one of his three total touchdowns against No. 10 LSU, and it was merited. No. 17 Vanderbilt won 31-24, and the question of “who is 2025’s Indiana?” has nearly been answered by the 6-1 Dores. (The Hoosiers themselves cannot be 2025’s Indiana because they had already established themselves as the kind of football school that makes the Playoff, you see.)
Busiest Time Slot of the Year: Last night’s evening slate was overwhelmingly involved, with more than enough going on to fill your TV’s quad box and then some. In just the two biggest rivalry games going on at the same time (along with BYU’s win over Utah and so many other things):
Hot-seat Coach of the Week: Luke Fickell. Last week, 37-0 against Iowa was Wisconsin’s first home shutout loss since 1980. Yesterday’s similar eradication by Ohio State was Wisconsin’s first home shutout loss since, well, seven days prior. Sure, it’s hard to score on the Buckeyes, but even the Ohio Bobcats did it. (And sure, it’s hard to score on Iowa, but even Albany and UMass have done it.)
Last time Wisconsin was blanked in consecutive games: 1977. Last time the Badgers lost consecutive shutouts by a worse margin than these past two: 1968.
“It took 90 seconds for Wisconsin fans to start the ‘Fire Fickell’ chants,” and then things got even worse for Fickell, 15-18 and on the verge of being the first Wisconsin coach with consecutive losing seasons since Barry Alvarez first began unearthing the program in the early ‘90s. Oh, and the Badgers’ final five opponents include Oregon, Indiana and the top-40 defenses of Minnesota and Washington. Despite all this, Fickell might not be the next one fired, partly for buyout reasons.
Worst Cross-country Trip: Surprising zero Until Saturday readers, it’s a tie between losses by Mike Norvell’s 3-4 Florida State (20-13 at 3-4 Stanford as a 17.5-point favorite, per BetMGM) and Bill Belichick’s 2-4 North Carolina (21-18 at 5-2 Cal on Friday). Actually, Norvell’s was way worse. Excluding 2023’s 13-1 run, he’s 23-30 at FSU. 👀
Hot Seat That Most Makes Me Wonder Whether Nuance Even Matters: Hugh Freeze has lost four in a row … yet each was by 10 points or fewer against a team that will rank in today’s top 15, the latest L being 23-17 in overtime to No. 16 Missouri. Auburn is 3-4, but more like a 5-2 team in quality … yet with a 14-18 overall record, does Freeze get any benefit of the doubt?
Billy “Rasputin” Napier of the Week: Theoretically, that might yet again be Billy Napier. (Maybe. Still can’t rule out the 3-4 Gators canning him any minute now during this bye week, since squeaking past 4-3 Mississippi State by a 23-21 score in Gainesville fell short once more of the Florida ideal.)
Funniest Scenario That Has Become Quite Plausible: No. 18 Virginia lost to NC State in Week 2, but remains 5-0 in ACC play — because that game had been scheduled outside of the actual conference schedule. Well, because Miami does not play either UVA or Georgia Tech, that scenario in which the Cavaliers block Miami from the conference title game because their loss to a conference opponent simply did not matter? Realistic, now that the Canes have lost.
Most Brutal Loss, Second Week in a Row: One week after nearly beating Ole Miss in Oxford, 3-4 Washington State lost 22-20 at Virginia … via a game-deciding safety. Change a couple plays from the past two weeks, and the realignment outcast might’ve been the season’s greatest underdog story.
Worst Job Interview: No. 25 Nebraska’s Matt Rhule — the widely presumed front-runner for the head coaching job at his alma mater, Penn State — lost 24-6 at 5-2 Minnesota on Friday. Still not ready for prime time.
Most Chaotic Rivalry, Postscript Edition: Last week, Oklahoma lost badly to Texas despite having been the better team all season. Yesterday, everything reverted to exactly what it’d been before Red River, a rivalry annually full of nothing but deep-fried lies. The No. 14 Sooners trampled South Carolina 26-7, while No. 21 Texas escaped 2-4 Kentucky 16-13 in OT.
Second-most Disappointing South Carolinians: The preseason No. 13 Gamecocks are now 3-4 … with Bama, Ole Miss and A&M next, the latter two on the road. (Preseason No. 4 Clemson also fell to 3-4, losing 35-24 at home to 5-2 SMU while lacking QB Cade Klubnik.)
Box Score Double Take of the Week: Sun Belt contenders Old Dominion and James Madison were trading blows evenly, but the next thing I knew, 6-1 JMU had won 63-27. Settle down, Dukes! Only loss was at Louisville, the team that just beat Miami.
Most Delightful Things to Notice While Scanning the Standings: Newly bowl-eligible teams include Cincinnati (first time since 2022), Hawaii (2020), Houston (2022) and Virginia (2019), and Oregon State finally grabbed a win (over FCS Lafayette). Elsewhere, all hail 5-2 UConn, 5-2 Northwestern and UCLA interim coach Tim Skipper’s three-game winning streak (though it unfortunately meant further trading places with the previously 4-0 Maryland). Also, every FBS conference is down to just two or three teams yet to lose any league games.
Manning of the Week: Missouri WR Joshua was the Tigers’ second-leading receiver, with five catches for 63 yards in the win over Auburn. The Manning of the Year race is truly a dead heat between Joshua, Texas QB Arch and Mississippi State DB Jahron.
Quick Snaps
🔎 “‘Any success James had was seen as a slight to the Paterno legacy,’ a former Penn State administrator said of a portion of Franklin’s detractors.” One of the many overlapping threads in this insider debrief by Bruce Feldman and Ralph Russo.
🙄 “UNC football GM Michael Lombardi took ‘exploratory fundraising trip’ to Saudi Arabia.” Just win an ACC game, man.
🙄 “Big Ten’s consideration of private capital plan ‘ongoing’ despite vocal Michigan opposition.” You have more than enough money, man.
Mementos
Yesterday’s wonderful visuals included “B1G TURD Peacock,” Tulane’s bobbling game-winner over Army and Utah’s 5-11, 320-pound Semi Taulanga on the loose.
My favorite, though, was late in Georgia Tech-Duke, when Jackets QB Haynes King looked back at his coaches, asking in real time whether he should score or just down the ball to kill clock. After the game, he said he’d wanted “a second opinion.”
Haynes King looked toward the sidelines to see if he should go down before scoring the last Georgia Tech TD
His answer at the end: “get a second opinion on if I needed to go down or to score”
— CJ Fogler (@cjzero.bsky.social) October 18, 2025 at 3:47 PM
Pop quiz answer: Conference USA legends Case Keenum (2011 Houston, 13-1) and Paul Smith (2007 Tulsa, 10-4) threw for 300-plus yards in all 14 of their games in those years, splitting the single-season record. Chicago Bears backup Keenum’s college career game log remains an overwhelming deluge of digits, starting with the 2007 game in which Oregon’s mascot attacked Houston’s before ending with the 2011 season’s Ticket City Bowl torching of interim Tom Bradley’s Penn State.
I hope you go undefeated today. Say hey at untilsaturday@theathletic.com if you want. 🫡
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