Connelly's 25 favorite games: How they went down and what they mean

In Week 12, college football said, “You’re going to miss me when I’m gone.” The results were consequential enough: No. 4 Alabama went down at home in the funkiest fashion imaginable, No. 5 Georgia pulled off a statement win and plenty of aspiring College Football Playoff contenders — No. 3 Texas A&M, No. 16 Georgia Tech, No. 17 USC, No. 18 Michigan — narrowly avoided disaster.

But really, this was one of the best college football weekends of the season because the college football itself was just so damn good. Tuesday night’s MACtion was incredible. We got beautiful ACC nonsense Friday night. The noon and 3:30 p.m. ET shifts gave us a number of heart-stoppers, and while Saturday evening wasn’t particularly dramatic, we still got a rush-off between Missouri’s Ahmad Hardy (300 yards and 3 touchdowns against Mississippi State) and Ole Miss’ Kewan Lacy (224 yards and 3 touchdowns against Florida) and an angry, late statement of intent from BYU. Meanwhile, the smaller-school ranks gave us countless overtimes, comebacks and surprises, plus some last-minute playoff berths.

In this column, we have a longstanding policy: If a week is just so good that you want to relive it game by game, then we relive it game by game! With stops to explore different playoff and conference title odds, here are my 25 favorite games from one of my favorite weekends of the season.

My 25 favorite games of Week 12

1. No. 3 Texas A&M 31, South Carolina 30. We’ll start with the obvious one. At halftime, after probably the worst half of Marcel Reed‘s life, I looked up what the worst-ever home loss was for a top-three team against an unranked opponent. Best I could tell, it was a tie between No. 2 Iowa’s 24-7 loss to Purdue in 2021 and No. 2 Auburn’s 27-10 loss to Arkansas in 2006. Since the score was 30-3 South Carolina at the time, this felt awfully relevant.

Reed had misfired nonstop in the first half, going a shocking 6-for-19 with 2 interceptions and 2 sacks. Almost any time he delivered a semi-accurate ball, his receivers dropped it. A&M was unbeaten and obviously had a mulligan to give in this one, but it was fair to wonder if the Aggies might drop quite a bit in the playoff rankings, enough to make fans nervous heading into their season ender against Texas.

Some relevant second-half stats:

Total yards: A&M 371 (9.8 per play), SC 76 (2.9)

Success rate*: A&M 65.8%, South Carolina 23.1%

Marcel Reed: 16-for-20 for 298 yards and three touchdowns

SC’s LaNorris Sellers: 6-for-11 for 63 yards and four sacks (net yards in 15 pass attempts: 39)

(* Success rate: How frequently an offense is gaining 50% of necessary yardage on first down, 70% on second and 100% on third or fourth.)

A&M won the second half 28-0, and the Aggies only made things interesting after a fumbled, goal-to-go trick play kept them from going up 38-30 late. South Carolina had a chance to drive for a shocking game-winning field goal, but that would have required Sellers to stay upright. He was sacked twice, and the Gamecocks turned the ball over on downs.

I’ve been referencing Playoff Tiers quite a bit lately — it’s my way of separating teams into groups with similar playoff odds (combining the Allstate Playoff Predictor’s odds with odds derived from SP+). Now that A&M has avoided disaster, Tier 1 is pretty much set.

CFP Tier 1 odds: Ohio State 99.9%, Indiana 99.9%, Texas A&M 99.9%.

While we’re at it, the five teams in Tier 2 are also in excellent shape.

CFP Tier 2 odds: Texas Tech 94.9%, Georgia 94.8%, Ole Miss 94.0%, Oregon 88.4%, Notre Dame 78.2%

There’s still some maneuverability here but not much. And honestly, considering Notre Dame is a projected favorite of at least 31 points in each of its final two games (Syracuse and Stanford), I don’t see how the Irish are under about 95%.

2. Kent State 42, Akron 35 (OT). Last Tuesday was my favorite day of MACtion in quite some time. We’ll get to Western Michigan’s win over Ohio below, but Kent State and Akron played an all-timer for the Wagon Wheel.

Kent State took a 35-17 lead early in the fourth quarter, thanks in part to four Dru DeShields touchdown passes — including a 89-yarder to big-play man Da’Realyst Clark (who also has two kick return scores and a touchdown pass) — but you don’t give up the Wagon Wheel without a fight! Akron scored, recovered a perfect, chip-shot onside kick, kicked a field goal, recovered a fumble and tied the game on a 13-yard Ben Finley-to-Israel Polk touchdown and 2-point conversion.

And then, after all that, DeShields found Ardell Banks for a 25-yard touchdown on the first play of overtime, Akron went four-and-out, and the Golden Flashes won anyway.

The win somehow kept bowl hopes alive for Kent State, which is an incredible thing to say considering the Golden Flashes went 0-12 last season with one of the worst FBS teams of the 21st century, then fired head coach Kenni Burns in mid-April. They have bounced back in a way that should encourage UMass fans, if nothing else — the Minutemen are on pace for an 0-12 record with nearly the same awful SP+ rating that Kent State had last season. At 4-6, the Golden Flashes probably won’t win their final two games to get to six wins (SP+ gives them a 7.8% chance of beating both Central Michigan and Northern Illinois), but SP+ didn’t think they would win four games either! Damn the computers! Go Flashes!

3. FCS: No. 11 Harvard 45, Penn 43. Harvard had to take this one twice. The unbeaten Crimson, darlings of the SP+ ratings, trailed 27-14 late in the first half but used a 21-0 run to take control and led 42-33 with less than four minutes remaining. But Penn charged back, scoring a short touchdown, forcing a three-and-out and taking a shocking lead on a 30-yard field goal with just 22 seconds left. That was just enough time for Jaden Craig (390 yards and 3 TDs on the day) to complete three passes and for Kieran Corr to knock in a 53-yard field goal at the buzzer.

ABSOLUTE CINEMA

KIERAN CORR DRILLS A 52-YARD FIELD GOAL TO WIN IT

📺 https://t.co/8oOFxoFh06
📻https://t.co/hEVv11DZR8
📊https://t.co/OtJ5xL5LM1#GoCrimson pic.twitter.com/J78Rwq7yKL

— Harvard Football (@HarvardFootball) November 15, 2025

Harvard has now clinched a share of the Ivy League title, and while their SP+ rating fell a bit, the Crimson are still as proven as anyone in the non-North Dakota State category.

Current FCS SP+ top 10
1. North Dakota State (11-0): 34.7
2. Tarleton State (10-1): 27.0
3. Harvard (9-0): 25.8
4. Lehigh (11-0): 24.7
5. Montana State (9-2): 24.2
6. Montana (11-0): 22.3
7. North Dakota (7-4): 20.8
8. Tennessee Tech (10-1): 20.1
9. Stephen F. Austin (9-2): 20.0
10. Mercer (9-1): 20.0

There’s a 3.5-point drop-off to No. 11 Rhode Island, but at least nine teams will be able to talk themselves into a potential national title game run, at least if they don’t land on NDSU’s side of the 24-team bracket. And even with its defense struggling Saturday, Harvard is among those contenders.

4. No. 11 Oklahoma 23, No. 4 Alabama 21. South Carolina over A&M would have been a massive upset. This one was still pretty big, though. It was familiar, too.

One of my go-to measures is what I call Postgame Win Expectancy (PGWE). It takes a look at the predictive stats a game produces — the stuff that eventually feeds into SP+ — tosses them into the air and says, “With these stats, Team A could have expected to win this game X% of the time.” By PGWE, Alabama’s loss to Vanderbilt last season was the least likely defeat of the season.

Against the Commodores, Bama had a comfortable success rate advantage (55.6% to 42.7%) with bigger big plays (yards per play: Bama 8.8, Vandy 5.6), fewer negative plays, more goal-to-go situations, you name it. Vandy won with perfectly timed bursts and turnovers that included a perfectly deflected pick-six into the arms of Randon Fontenette. Based on the game’s stats, Bama would have won 98.5% of the time. But with a 1.5% chance, the Commodores won. Combined with a late egg-laying at Oklahoma, it contributed to the Tide falling short of the CFP.

Against Oklahoma on Saturday, Bama produced a massive success rate advantage (46.7% to 27.5%) with fewer negative plays and, despite a massive field position disadvantage, more goal-to-go situations and the same number of red zone trips. The Tide’s PGWE against the Sooners: 95.2%. OU was going to need defensive heroics (such as an 87-yard Eli Bowen pick-six) and special teams explosions (such as a 42-yard Isaac Sategna III punt return and a tipped field goal before halftime) to win this one. Guess what they got?

Thanks to an earlier run of ranked wins, the two-loss Tide are still comfortable in this year’s playoff hunt — they’ll probably have to suffer an Iron Bowl defeat to an interim-coached Auburn team to fall out of contention (and nothing wild and unexpected has ever happened in the Iron Bowl before). But with the loss, they fall from Tier 2 to Tier 3 in my playoff tiers. In addition to the top two ACC contenders and one-loss BYU, they’re joined in Tier 3 by the team that just beat them.

CFP Tier 3 odds: Alabama 58.6%, BYU 50.2%, Oklahoma 41.7%, Virginia 41.7%, Georgia Tech 36.6%

Combined with Georgia’s comfortable win over Texas, Bama’s SEC title odds took a bit of a hit too.

SEC title odds, per SP+: Georgia 33.0%, Texas A&M 31.5%, Alabama 30.0%, Ole Miss 5.4%

I’m guessing Bama fans have seen their team win enough SEC titles through the years to get a little spoiled — they’re probably more interested in CFP odds. Still, this remains an interesting race.

5. Division II: Lenoir-Rhyne 48, Catawba 46. On a beautiful, 67-degree fall day in Hickory, North Carolina, 4,987 fans saw the home team blow an enormous lead and win anyway. Lenoir-Rhyne went up 42-12 with 4:29 left in the third quarter, then watched Catawba unleash a 34-0 run over the following 18 minutes. Amari McArthur’s 87-yard catch and run (!) made it 46-42 Catawba with 1:14 left, but Khamoni Robinson completed four passes, then charged 13 yards into the end zone with six seconds remaining.

𝙈𝙤𝙣𝙚𝙮 𝙘𝙖𝙡𝙡𝙚𝙙 𝙜𝙖𝙢𝙚💰

🐻🏈#GOBEARS | #BetweenTheBricks | #W1N pic.twitter.com/pyn3nE1dRv

— Lenoir-Rhyne Football (@LRBearsFootball) November 15, 2025

6. No. 16 Georgia Tech 36, Boston College 34. After last week’s chaos, Georgia Tech and Virginia entered Week 12 atop the ACC hierarchy. Virginia played maybe its best game of the year in a surprisingly easy 34-17 win over Duke in Durham, but Tech thought long and hard about going ker-splat in this one.

BC, which played good ball in losses to Louisville and Notre Dame before face-planting last week against SMU, brought its A-game back in this one. Despite yet another ridiculous day from Tech’s Haynes King — 371 passing yards, 61 non-sack rushing yards — the Yellow Jackets found themselves trailing 28-17 heading into the fourth quarter. Jordan Allen‘s 54-yard score gave Tech the lead, but Turbo Richard responded with a 43-yard burst to make it 34-33 Eagles. BC missed the 2-point conversion, however, and that loomed large when King drove the Jackets 68 yards in four minutes and set up Aidan Birr’s chip-shot field goal for the win.

Virginia and Georgia Tech boast the best title odds at the moment, but both still have work to do.

ACC title odds, per SP+: Virginia 41.3%, Georgia Tech 27.1%, SMU 17.2%, Miami 6.1%, Pitt 5.2%, Duke 3.0%

Virginia, 6-1 in conference play, can clinch a spot in the ACC championship game with a rivalry win over Virginia Tech in two weeks (projected win probability, per SP+: 88%), while 6-1 Tech has a trickier game against Pitt next week (55%). Pitt, 5-1, likely has to beat both Georgia Tech and Miami (15%) to have a shot, and SMU, 5-1 without playing either Virginia or GT, has to beat Louisville and Cal (44%) to remain in the mix. Miami lurks at 4-2 — the Hurricanes don’t have a great shot of sneaking in, but they’ll be the favorites if they get to Charlotte.

7. Division III: Merchant Marine 39, Coast Guard 38. “College GameDay” at Pitt was pretty fun, but if I were in charge of locations — and it’s probably good that I’m not! — I would have sent Rece and the guys to … Fenway Park. That’s where the 8,966 in attendance for the Secretaries’ Cup saw maybe the most back-and-forth game of the weekend. Neither team led by more than five in the second half, and after Harrison Hensley gave Coast Guard the lead with 6:52 remaining, Merchant Marine quarterback Bubba Mustain scored from 7 yards out with just 20 seconds left to give the Mariners the win.

Mustain on the day: 46 carries for 274 yards and 3 touchdowns, plus 6-for-8 passing for 150 yards and another 2 scores. Goodness! Give him an honorary 10 points in my Heisman of the Week section below.

8. No. 18 Michigan 24, Northwestern 22. This one changed in a blink. Jordan Marshall scored with 41 seconds left in the third quarter to give Michigan a 21-9 lead, and Northwestern’s offense, which gained 181 yards in three quarters, didn’t seem capable of a comeback. But Preston Stone capped a 75-yard drive with a short touchdown, and Braden Turner returned an interception to Michigan’s 6. Caleb Komolafe gave the Wildcats a sudden lead, and Michigan turned the ball over on its next two possessions as well. But the Wolverines got one last shot and took advantage. Bryce Underwood completed a third-down pass to Andrew Marsh, then ran for another first down, and Dominic Zvada‘s 31-yard field goal at the buzzer saved the day.

Michigan’s playoff odds aren’t great because the Wolverines will almost certainly need to beat top-ranked Ohio State again to get there — as if that could ever happen — but they’re still alive, and they’re still part of …

CFP Tier 4 odds: Utah 29.9%, USC 17.8%, Miami 15.5%, Vanderbilt 13.8%, SMU 10.0%, Michigan 7.6%. (Technically Pitt still has a chance at 3.9% too.)

At most, only one team will likely get in from this tier, and with only games against Kansas State and Kansas remaining (odds of winning both, per SP+: 68%), Utah is in solid shape even (or especially?) if the Utes miss the Big 12 championship game. But USC, Miami and Michigan all remain in the hunt, and both the Trojans and Wolverines had to pull off comebacks Saturday.

9. Division II: Tiffin 23, No. 8 Findlay 21. It wasn’t the most prolific game of the day, but Tiffin and Findlay managed to pack in eight lead changes, including five in the second half and two in the last minute. Findlay appeared to have kept its unbeaten record intact with a Jayden Farmer touchdown with 53 seconds remaining but despite getting pinned at its 6-yard line after a penalty on the ensuing kickoff, Tiffin drove 94 yards in nine plays, and on the final play of the game Alex Johnson found Jaedyn McKinstry for a 13-yard, game-winning score.

DRAGONS WIN ON THE FINAL PLAY OF THE GAME 😱🐲

📺: https://t.co/ye3taPbWn6#G_MACfb | @GreatMidwestAC | @TUDragonFB pic.twitter.com/Yc4EhiexuE

— FloCollege | Football (@FloCollegeFB) November 15, 2025

10. UNLV 29, Utah State 26 (2OT). Oof. With a chance to secure bowl eligibility, Utah State set up a 44-yard field goal for Tanner Rinker at the buzzer in regulation, but he missed it. And after UNLV missed a field goal itself in overtime, Rinker got a look at a 41-yarder for the win. Missed it too. He finally knocked one in to start the second OT, but UNLV’s Kayden McGee raced 25 yards on the next snap, and UNLV moved to 8-2. The Rebels have an excellent chance of finishing with double-digit wins for the second time in three years (and only the third time in 50).

11 and 12. East Carolina 31, Memphis 27; Navy 41, No. 24 South Florida 38.

Make it three one-score losses for Memphis in 2025. On Senior Day in Greenville, the Tigers led at halftime thanks in part to an 84-yard Sutton Smith touchdown run, but Katin Houser and Payton Mangrum connected for a 31-yard score with 1:08 left, and Mike Wright Jr. picked off Brendon Lewis‘ last-second heave to secure the win and move ECU to 5-1 in American Conference play and keep its slight conference title hopes alive.

Earlier Saturday, Navy took an early lead on USF and somehow made it hold up. The Midshipmen rushed for 338 yards and led 14-3 after one quarter, and while USF cut the deficit to one score on five occasions, the Midshipmen responded with a score of their own four times and recovered a late onside kick to finish off the upset.

USF’s loss was an eliminator in the race for the Group of 5’s playoff race, which, according to the combined playoff odds used above, basically give the Sun Belt’s James Madison the best shot of reaching the CFP.

CFP Tier (Group of) 5 odds: James Madison 40.3%, North Texas 30.4%, Tulane 10.8%

The American Conference still has the best chance of producing the CFP’s representative, be it North Texas, Tulane or a longer shot, but JMU is the single most likely team.

13. Clemson 20, No. 20 Louisville 19. Clemson fumbled the ball on third-and-goal from the 1, recovered it, then fumbled again on fourth down. Louisville committed three fourth-quarter personal fouls (it felt like about 12) and missed a potential go-ahead field goal. Clemson muffed a punt snap. Louisville missed another field goal.

I guess games don’t always have to be good to be good. This one was tense, gripping and all sorts of sloppy — as sloppy as the win probability chart, in fact.

With the loss, Louisville no longer has a role to play in the ACC race.

14. Arizona State 25, West Virginia 23. Still hoping to snag bowl eligibility at 4-6, West Virginia did so many things right in this one. The Mountaineers limited ASU quarterback Jeff Sims to 81 rushing yards — he had 228 his last time out — and scored on second-half touchdown passes of 75 yards (from Scotty Fox Jr. to Jeff Weimer) and 90 yards (Fox to Cyncir Bowers) to take a 23-22 lead into the final minutes. But Jesus Gomez‘s 49-yard field goal gave ASU a 2-point advantage, and Fox was out of magic. He was picked off by Keith Abney II near midfield. Ballgame.

15. FCS: Valparaiso 32, Stetson 31 (OT). You know how coaches will sometimes talk about having one 2-point play they’re particularly confident in? Valpo came up with a pretty good solution for that: Make every 2-point play your best! Down 24-0 late in the third quarter, the Beacons surged back with three touchdowns and three 2-pointers — the last of which came with just one second left in regulation — and when they got the ball second in OT and scored to get within a point, what did they do? Go for two and make it, of course!

A look at how the comeback W finished. @valpoufootball x #GoValpo pic.twitter.com/oB1xaW3ncD

— Valpo Athletics (@valpoathletics) November 16, 2025

16. Division III: No. 25 Franklin & Marshall 29, No. 3 Johns Hopkins 28. What’s better than beating a mighty rival to secure your first-ever Division III playoff berth? Doing it in overtime after coming back from 21 points down!

FB | CHAMPIONS @FandMFootball are your 2025 Centennial Conference Football Champions‼️

The Diplomats outlast Johns Hopkins 29-28 in an OT thriller to claim their first #CCfb title since 2017. #CentConf #d3fb pic.twitter.com/rc23uDK22v

— CentennialConference (@CentennialConf) November 15, 2025

November is peak “players storm the end zone in celebration after an historic touchdown” month. Love it.

17. Western Michigan 17, Ohio 13. This game was a little more controlled than Kent State-Akron, but this Tuesday nighter was just as tense and more important in the MAC standings. Every score gave a team the lead, and Ohio finished a 17-play, 10-minute drive with a short Sieh Bangura touchdown to build a 13-10 advantage early in the fourth quarter. Just three plays later, following a 71-yard catch and run by Tailique Williams, Jalen Buckley scored to make it 17-13. Three stops later, WMU was in sole possession of first place in the MAC. The Broncos are 5-1 with five teams tied at 4-2.

18. Sam Houston 26, Delaware 23. Sam Houston went on a 26-0 run to seize control, but Delaware scored two touchdowns and recovered an onside kick. But Nate Reed‘s late 36-yard field goal attempt failed. SHSU has won two in a row after an 0-8 start.

19. No. 17 USC 26, No. 21 Iowa 21. First half: Iowa averages 6.8 yards per play while building a 21-10 halftime lead. Second half: The Hawkeyes go scoreless with a turnover and turnover on downs, and Jayden Maiava leads the Trojans to a comeback win that saves their CFP hopes (and sends “College GameDay” back to Eugene for this week’s USC-Oregon game).

20. Division II: No. 6 Central Washington 19, No. 24 Western Oregon 17. Down 17-3 heading into the fourth quarter, CWU scored twice to get within four points, and with the Lone Star Conference title on the line, Kennedy McGill found Logan Brady for a 13-yard score as time expired.

21. Division II: West Liberty 68, Wheeling 67. The most ridiculous track meet of the day was in West Liberty, West Virginia. The game began with a 100-yard kick return score and never calmed down for a second. WLU’s Hunter Patterson had a 62-yard TD catch and a 68-yard TD run in the third quarter alone, and after Wheeling erased a 10-point, fourth-quarter deficit to take the lead, Osama Hurst caught a short touchdown with eight seconds left for the win.

22. Division II: West Texas A&M 45, Angelo State 44. West Texas A&M told WLU, “Game-winning score with eight seconds left? We can cut two seconds off of that!” Angelo State led 37-17 in the third quarter, but the Rams scored 28 points in the final 20 minutes, and Zach Phipps caught the game winner with six seconds remaining. Division II has been ridiculously fun the last couple of weeks. Can’t wait for the playoffs.

23. FCS: No. 22 South Dakota 53, No. 23 Southern Illinois 51 (5OT). Can I interest you in a five-overtime marathon with playoff stakes? South Dakota moved to 8-4, but it took forever. The Yotes had to erase a 31-14 third-quarter deficit, then watch SIU send the game to OT with a late field goal. But Larenzo Fenner‘s 2-point catch in the fifth OT made the difference.

24. NAIA: No. 20 Georgetown College 34, No. 10 Campbellsville 32. Trailing 34-13 with nine minutes remaining, Campbellsville scored three times, but Jett Engle’s 2-point conversion pass with 26 seconds remaining failed. Georgetown needed this one to keep NAIA playoff hopes alive and juuuuuust barely got it.

25. FCS: Elon 31, Campbell 24. We end with one more smaller-school finish. Elon watched a 17-3 halftime lead turn into a 24-17 fourth-quarter deficit, but Landen Clark‘s 19-yard scramble on fourth-and-8 tied the game with 2:50 left. The Phoenix got the ball back at their 5 with about a minute left — play for overtime, right? Nope! Go deep to Isaiah Fuhrmann instead!

*96 Yards. #PhoenixRising | #AED pic.twitter.com/6b3TwwcSZZ

— Elon Football (@ElonFootball) November 16, 2025

I would say that silenced the home crowd.

---

This week in SP+

The SP+ rankings have been updated for the week. Let’s take a look at the teams that saw the biggest change in their overall ratings. (Note: We’re looking at ratings, not rankings.)

Moving up

Here are the five teams that saw their ratings rise the most this week:

Nevada: up 4.6 adjusted points per game (ranking rose from 128th to 121st)

Texas Tech: up 3.6 points (from fourth to third)

UConn: up 3.2 points (from 58th to 47th)

Texas State: up 3.0 points (from 98th to 80th)

Virginia: up 3.0 points (from 43rd to 34th)

It’s hard for a team near the top of the ratings to gain a ton of points this late in the year, but Texas Tech’s performance against UCF was so resounding that the Red Raiders nearly rose more than anyone else this week.

Here are some of the key stats if we filter out garbage time:

Yards per play: Tech 8.6 (41 snaps), UCF 2.1 (34 snaps)

Success rate: Tech 68.3%, UCF 23.5%

Yards per successful play: Tech 12.0, UCF 6.8

Pct. of plays gaining 20+ yards: Tech 12.2%, UCF 0.0%

Pct. of plays gaining zero or fewer: Tech 19.5%, UCF 38.2%

Red zone trips: Tech 7, UCF 1

Red zone TD rate: Tech 57.1%, UCF 0.0%

UCF’s one decent non-garbage time drive ended in a David Bailey sack of Tayven Jackson on fourth down. The Red Raiders did whatever they wanted. They probably aren’t as good as Ohio State — I’m resigning myself to the Buckeyes being a hefty title favorite at this point — but I would put them on even ground, at worst, against anyone else in the country.

Moving down

Here are the five teams whose ratings fell the most:

Louisiana Tech: down 3.4 adjusted points per game (ranking fell from 69th to 76th)

Southern Miss: down 3.3 points (from 73rd to 86th)

NC State: down 3.0 (from 57th to 68th)

UCF: down 2.9 points (from 55th to 67th)

Purdue: down 2.9 points (from 84th to 96th)

It’s my own fault, I realize, but with the way quarterback CJ Bailey had been playing, I thought NC State might be able to make Miami sweat a little bit Saturday. I knew the Wolfpack defense would probably get hit pretty hard, but I thought it was fair to assume Bailey would manage to throw for more than 120 yards (with two picks) or Hollywood Smothers would manage more than minus-2 yards in seven carries in a 41-7 loss. Complete domination by Miami, complete implosion by the Pack.

---

Who won the Heisman this week?

I am once again awarding the Heisman every single week of the season and doling out weekly points, F1-style (in this case, 10 points for first place, nine for second and so on). How will this Heisman race play out, and how different will the result be from the actual Heisman voting?

Here is this week’s Heisman top 10:

1. Ahmad Hardy, Missouri (25 carries for 300 yards and 3 touchdowns against Mississippi State).

2. Kewan Lacy, Ole Miss (28 carries for 224 yards and 3 touchdowns against Florida).

3. Dante Moore, Oregon (27-for-30 passing for 306 yards and 2 touchdowns, plus 16 non-sack rushing yards against Minnesota).

4. Fernando Mendoza, Indiana (22-for-24 passing for 299 yards and 4 touchdowns against Wisconsin).

5. Gunner Stockton, Georgia (24-for-29 passing for 229 yards, 4 TDs and 1 INT, plus 33 non-sack rushing yards and a touchdown against Texas).

6. Haynes King, Georgia Tech (26-for-34 passing for 371 yards and a touchdown, plus 61 non-sack rushing yards against Boston College).

7. OJ Arnold, Georgia Southern (21 carries for 267 yards and 2 touchdowns, plus 53 receiving yards and a touchdown against Coastal Carolina).

8. Marcel Reed, Texas A&M (22-for-39 passing for 439 yards, 3 TDs and 2 INTs, plus 31 non-sack rushing yards against South Carolina).

9. Caleb Hawkins, North Texas (27 carries for 189 yards and 5 touchdowns, plus 21 receiving yards against UAB).

10. Carlos Del Rio-Wilson, Marshall (22-for-27 passing for 321 yards and 3 touchdowns, plus 102 non-sack rushing yards against Georgia State).

One of my favorite things early in the season was the prominence of YAC, yards after contact, and the way it was driving some early-season success. Mizzou’s Ahmad Hardy was at the center of that and generated some momentary Heisman buzz before an October funk — three games, 207 total rushing yards, 3.7 per carry — put an end to that. But after a 109-yard performance in a loss against Texas A&M last week, Hardy put together his hardest-running performance of the season Saturday night.

THE CUT BACK & HE CAN’T BEAT. ‼️

AHMAD HARDY 72-YD TD@MizzouFootball x 📺 @SECNetwork pic.twitter.com/lGaKVc2dCr

— Southeastern Conference (@SEC) November 16, 2025

Meanwhile, the guy he more or less replaced in the Mizzou lineup — sophomore Kewan Lacy, who transferred to Ole Miss last winter — had himself quite the evening as well, allowing the Rebels to control the ball and avoid an upset in a funky game against Florida.

Hardy and Lacy managed to overshadow some pretty awesome passing performances from Big Ten QBs Mendoza and Moore (who went a combined 49-for-54) and a pair of Georgia-based QBs (Stockton and King) who should put on a heck of a show against each other in a couple of weeks. And I even had to squeeze Marcel Reed onto the list despite his playing the worst first half of his life against South Carolina. Throwing for 298 yards in the second half can cure a lot of ailments; more guys should try that.

Honorable mention:

• Kaytron Allen, Penn State (25 carries for 181 yards and 2 touchdowns, plus 10 receiving yards against Michigan State).

• Bear Bachmeier, BYU (23-for-33 passing for 296 yards and a touchdown, plus 59 non-sack rushing yards and a touchdown against TCU).

• Jeremiyah Love, Notre Dame (23 carries for 147 yards and a touchdown, plus 20 receiving yards against Pitt).

• Jordan Kwiatkowski, Central Michigan (9 tackles, 1 TFL, 1 forced fumble, 1 pass breakup and a pick-six against Buffalo).

• Andrew Marsh, Michigan (12 catches for 189 yards against Northwestern).

• Toriano Pride Jr., Missouri (3 tackles, 1.5 TFLs, a pick-six, a 62-yard fumble return and a pass breakup against Mississippi State)

• Jordon Simmons, Georgia State (19 carries for 164 yards and a touchdown, plus 64 receiving yards against Marshall).

• Marcel Williams, Akron (14 catches for 206 yards and 2 touchdowns against Kent State).

Through 12 weeks, here are your points leaders, once again with ties broken by total points from the last four weeks:

1. Julian Sayin, Ohio State: 29 points (13 in the last four weeks)
2. Ty Simpson, Alabama: 29 points (zero)
3. Taylen Green, Arkansas: 27 points
4. Fernando Mendoza, Indiana: 26 points
5. Trinidad Chambliss, Ole Miss: 25 points (10 in the last four weeks)
6. Gunner Stockton, Georgia: 25 points (six)
7. Diego Pavia, Vanderbilt: 24 points
8. Demond Williams Jr., Washington: 21 points
9. Haynes King, Georgia Tech: 18 points
10. Luke Altmyer, Illinois: 16 points

Sayin took the lead in the points race last week but had a pretty forgettable evening against UCLA, allowing for Mendoza and Stockton to make up ground.

Of course, this race isn’t in charge of who gets the Heisman, and if conventional wisdom is any indication, it’s Sayin (+225 Heisman odds, per ESPN BET) who must make up ground on Mendoza (-125). I wrote last week that I’m not really a fan of that — Mendoza charged ahead after barely beating a Penn State team Sayin had just torched the week before — but barring some last-minute chaos (something the Big Ten doesn’t seem interested in producing), we’ll get a Sayin-Mendoza showdown in Indianapolis for the Big Ten championship game, and potentially the Heisman, in three more weeks. That could make the choice pretty easy, one way or the other.

---

The midweek playlist

Miami (Ohio) at Buffalo (Wednesday, 7 p.m., ESPN2). You should always watch MACtion just in case; lord knows I wasn’t telling you to watch Kent State-Akron last week, but you missed out if you didn’t. But the most important game of this week’s batch is in Buffalo, where two of five teams with two conference losses face off. (You should definitely dual-screen that one with Central Michigan-Kent State — the Golden Flashes still have a slight chance of reaching bowl eligibility, though CMU is hot.)