Miami is real, Oregon sweated, and Michigan got a second it didn't earn.

Let's start with the play, because everyone else is. Western Michigan led Michigan 12-7. Bryce Underwood heaved a Hail Mary that sailed through the end zone into a crowd of bodies drifting out of bounds. The NBC clock hit zero before the ball touched anybody. Western Michigan's sideline poured onto the field. And then the officials huddled, put one second back on the clock, and gave Underwood a do-over. He threw a 47-yarder to JJ Buchanan, Michigan stormed its own field after beating a MAC team, and Lance Taylor's Broncos went home with a loss that will follow them to their graves.

The Big Ten's explanation is that WMU safety Micah Davis touched the ball while he was out of bounds, which makes it an incomplete pass and stops the clock at whatever the league's clock said, which apparently was 0:01. Their clock was not the broadcast clock. NBC's rules analyst Terry McAulay couldn't figure out how they got there. Reporters asked for a pool report and, as of Sunday morning, got nothing. Rodger Sherman slowed the tape down frame by frame and the ball is still a few feet from any human being when the zeros show.

Here's the part Michigan fans won't want to hear: even if you grant the second, the other 3,599 were a mess. Underwood went 12-of-22 for 170. The Wolverines scored on the opening drive and then their next four possessions gained 26 yards combined. Their last first-half drive was a baffling decision to throw from their own 27 with nine seconds left; Dillon Moore intercepted it and WMU kicked a field goal. Western Michigan ran a 20-play drive that chewed 13 minutes and 40 seconds off the third-quarter clock. Michigan fumbled inside its own 35 with three minutes left. This was a 27.5-point favorite that got out-executed for an hour, then got a gift. Oklahoma comes to town next Saturday. They will not be giving gifts.

Who looked good

Miami, and it's not close

Darian Mensah came over from Duke with a lot of hype and a lot of money and threw three incompletions all night. 27-of-30, 401 yards, five touchdowns, and the Hurricanes scored on six of their first seven drives against a Stanford team that already had a game under its belt. Malachi Toney, the 18-year-old sophomore on the cover of the video game, caught 12 balls for 234 yards, which is the most anyone has ever gained in a single game in Miami history, and three of them were touchdowns, two of which came with Toney so open you could have fit a second receiver in the frame. Cooper Barkate, who followed Mensah from Durham, caught one too.

It was Stanford. We know. But it has been a long time since a Miami quarterback and receiver looked like this together, and the tape doesn't care who was on the other sideline. There's an injury worry at corner with OJ Frederique Jr. and the run blocking was ordinary. Nobody cares yet.

LSU, and Lane Kiffin's first night in Death Valley

There was a lightning delay, there was an interception on the second snap of the Kiffin era, and there was no doubt after that. LSU scored 51 unanswered. Sam Leavitt, the Arizona State transfer, ran for 113 yards and two scores on top of 230 through the air. Dilin Jones also ran for 113 and two. Edge rusher Jordan Ross took an interception back for six. The defense held Clemson to 74 yards before garbage time, forced ten punts, and Dabo Swinney's offense went 0-for-12 on third down. Total yardage: 644 to 145. First downs: 38 to 8.

Clemson is not a good football team this year, and that tempers things. But you don't accidentally hang 51 on Dabo. The schedule gives LSU a week off from the spotlight (Louisiana Tech) and then Kiffin walks back into Oxford to face Ole Miss in Week 3, with Texas A&M right behind it. We'll know a lot by the end of September.

Ohio State did Ohio State things

56-3 over Ball State. Julian Sayin went 21-of-25 for 320 and three touchdowns and added his first career rushing score. Jeremiah Smith had 151 yards and two touchdowns by halftime, one of them a 48-yard catch in coverage tight enough to be a penalty on somebody, and then hit the Heisman pose, which is either confidence or foreshadowing. Bo Jackson ripped off a 65-yard run. Fourteen different Buckeyes caught a pass. They fly to Austin next week, and that's the game of September.

Texas, and Arch's one bad throw

Arch Manning finished 20-of-27 for 305 yards and four touchdowns in a 59-7 win over Texas State, two of the scores to Auburn transfer Cam Coleman, who looked like he'd been in the offense for years. The one blemish was an end-zone interception into triple coverage late in the second quarter, which is the kind of throw you can make against Texas State and absolutely cannot make against Ohio State. The Longhorn defense held Brad Jackson, who put up 38 total touchdowns last year, to 177 yards and zero scores. That's the more important stat.

Georgia, briefly

Gunner Stockton threw one incompletion. Georgia scored on each of its first five drives, led 35-0 before some fans found their seats, and Nate Frazier scored three times on four carries. Tennessee State finished with 109 total yards and 10 rushing yards on 32 attempts. Stockton was on the bench by the middle of the game. Fine. Nothing learned, nothing lost.

USC is 2-0 and Jayden Maiava has missed six passes all year

39-0 over Fresno State on Friday night after the Week 0 win over San Jose State. Maiava is 48-of-54 for 635 yards and five touchdowns across the two games. Fresno managed 116 yards. The Trojans have quietly moved to No. 12 in Bleacher Report's staff poll and, with Louisiana up next, will be 3-0 before anyone has to think hard about them.

Indiana, with a side of blood

Josh Hoover's first pass as a Hoosier was a touchdown to fellow transfer Nick Marsh. A few drives later he took a facemask that opened up the top of his nose, kept playing with blood running down his face, and threw a touchdown to Charlie Becker before finally coming out to get stitched. 13-of-16, 231 yards, four touchdowns, no turnovers in a 52-16 win. The defending champs did give up 367 yards to North Texas, which actually outgained them, so Curt Cignetti has something to yell about this week. He'll enjoy that.

Boise State, in a loss

The Broncos went to Eugene, led 17-7, led at halftime, were tied entering the fourth quarter, and lost by a touchdown to the No. 2 team in the country. Their defensive front pushed Oregon's offensive line around most of the afternoon. If the Group of Six playoff spot comes down to résumé, Boise just built half of one in a game it didn't win. With the American wide open, an 11-2 Mountain West champion is getting in.

Army and Navy, together

Army ran for 569 yards on 57 carries against Bryant. That is the most rushing yards by any FBS team in four years. Sixteen different players carried the ball. Zach Mundell went for 105 on four touches. Navy, not to be outdone, ran 73 times for 506 yards against Towson, with Braxton Woodson getting 200 of it and three scores. Neither service academy plays a Power 4 team this year, which makes Army in particular a fun thing to watch in November when people start looking for unbeaten teams.

The surprises

UMass beat Rutgers, and it wasn't close

Say it again, slowly. UMass, 0-12 in 2025, without a win over an FBS team since 2023, went to Piscataway as a 29.5-point underdog on Thursday night and beat a Big Ten team 37-21. Rutgers scored on its first drive and then gave up 30 straight points. Virginia Tech transfer Pop Watson went 19-of-22 for 197 and three touchdowns. UMass outrushed Rutgers 200 to 30 and took the ball away from Dylan Lonergan four times. It's the biggest win in the program's history and the Minutemen's first ever over a power-conference opponent.

Greg Schiano is in year seven of his second stint. He has not won more than seven games in any of them. The schedule ahead includes USC, Indiana, Michigan and Penn State. If Rutgers loses at Boston College next week, the conversation in New Jersey changes from "when" to "who."

Oklahoma State lost to Tulsa. Again.

A year after losing to Tulsa in the game that ended Mike Gundy's tenure, the Cowboys, now coached by Eric Morris with a roster full of the North Texas players who won 12 games last season, lost to Tulsa 24-10. Drew Mestemaker threw two interceptions, Oklahoma State turned it over four times, and it lost a game it outgained while committing fewer penalty yards. Tulsa won one conference game in 2025. Oklahoma State hosts Oregon next week. Good luck.

Oregon needed everything against Boise

Dante Moore was terrific: 28-of-37, 378 yards, three touchdowns, no turnovers, and the 62-yard strike to Dakorien Moore with 7:51 left that finally won it. The rest was not. Ten penalties. A defensive line that got moved. New coordinators on both sides of the ball trying to call a game in real time. Dan Lanning said afterward there's "a lot to fix," and Bleacher Report dropped the Ducks from No. 1 to No. 7 in a single week. That's an overreaction, but it tells you how the game looked.

Auburn 17, Baylor 16, and nobody deserved it

Two coaches who badly needed a clean win instead produced three Byrum Brown interceptions, a DJ Lagway pick and fumble, a turnover on downs each, a missed field goal, and no running game on either side. Auburn won because safety Eric Winters blew up a two-point conversion. Alex Golesh gets the W in his Auburn debut. Dave Aranda gets another week on a very warm seat.

Colorado, saved by a block

Julian Lewis went 14-of-27 for 124 yards. Georgia Tech returned a kickoff for a touchdown. The Buffs missed a field goal. And they won 14-13 because Boo Carter blocked a 45-yarder as time expired, after Georgia Tech burned twelve plays and most of the fourth quarter driving to the Colorado 11 and then kicked with 1:40 left rather than running the clock down. Deion Sanders was 3-9 last year. An ugly 1-0 beats a pretty 0-1.

The small-school chaos file

• Charlotte lost 43-41 in triple overtime to The Citadel at home despite 538 yards of offense. Tim Albin is 1-12 there.
• Bowling Green lost to FCS Tarleton State. Buffalo needed the final minutes to shake Albany.
• Houston, a 20.5-point favorite, led Oregon State 26-20 with nine minutes left before Conner Weigman put it away, 33-20.
• James Madison beat Liberty 20-13 in Billy Napier's return to the Sun Belt, which is about the last thing Conference USA's playoff hopes needed.
• Virginia Tech's running backs scored three rushing touchdowns all of last season. Under James Franklin they scored four in the first half against VMI.

Coaching debuts, graded

A big class of new Power 4 head coaches opened this weekend. Rough report card:

Players to watch

Malachi Toney, WR, Miami. Twelve catches, 234 yards, three scores, a school record, and he cannot legally buy a beer. He's the most electric player in the country at his position and his quarterback throws 90 percent completions. If a receiver is going to break the quarterback stranglehold on the Heisman, it's him or Jeremiah Smith, and Toney's schedule is softer.

Mason Heintschel, QB, Pitt. 31-of-41 for 453 yards and seven touchdowns against Miami (Ohio), and every touchdown went to a different receiver. Last year he threw 16 touchdowns and eight picks as a freshman and looked like a project. This looked like an offense. The ACC schedule sets up for real numbers.

Faizon Brandon, QB, Tennessee. True freshman, 18 years old, first career start: 13-of-17 for 226 and three touchdowns, plus 68 yards and two more scores on the ground. Yahoo's Nick Bromberg dug it up: the last SEC quarterback to throw three and run for two in his first start was Cam Newton in 2010. It was Furman. It was still absurd. He goes to Georgia Tech next.

Keelon Russell, QB, Alabama. Won the camp battle, then went for roughly 250 through the air and 86 on the ground with a rushing score in a 48-10 win over East Carolina. He took too many hits running and forced a couple of throws. He also connected with Ryan Coleman-Williams for 130 yards and looked, for stretches, like the five-star he was recruited as. Alabama's rushing edge was 227 to 2. Kentucky on the road next.

Sam Leavitt, QB, LSU. 113 rushing yards from a quarterback in a Kiffin offense is going to be a weekly thing. The interception on play two is the kind of mistake that Ole Miss and Texas A&M will punish. Both games are inside a month.

Dakorien Moore, WR, Oregon. The 62-yard touchdown that saved the Ducks' season was a catch-and-run where he made three defenders miss. When Dante Moore needed one play, he went to him. That's the whole scouting report.

Austin Simmons, QB, Missouri. Lost the Ole Miss job to Trinidad Chambliss, transferred, and went 17-of-19 for 252 and four touchdowns in the first half of his Mizzou debut. Missouri also ran for 357. They're at Kansas next week in a game that suddenly looks interesting.

Ta'Shawn James, DB, UCLA. Two fourth-quarter interceptions in Berkeley, both of which turned into Wayne Knight touchdowns within a play or two. That's how you win a road game by 21 after being tied in the third.

Kamari Moulton, RB, Iowa. 183 yards and two touchdowns on 11 carries in a 40-0 win over Northern Illinois. Iowa outrushed NIU 289 to 7. Iowa State comes to Kinnick under the lights on Saturday.

The Heisman board after one Saturday

FanDuel's numbers, pulled after the 3:30 window on Saturday. Miami's quarterback is the favorite before the sport has played a real conference game, which tells you how much Friday night in Palo Alto moved people.

Player	Team	Odds
Darian Mensah, QB	Miami	+550
CJ Carr, QB	Notre Dame	+850
Jeremiah Smith, WR	Ohio State	+1100
Arch Manning, QB	Texas	+1100
Julian Sayin, QB	Ohio State	+1400
Malachi Toney, WR	Miami	+1400
Dante Moore, QB	Oregon	+1400
Jayden Maiava, QB	USC	+1900
Josh Hoover, QB	Indiana	+2200
Trinidad Chambliss, QB	Ole Miss	+2200

Two notes. Carr hadn't played yet when these were posted; Notre Dame and Wisconsin meet at Lambeau Field on Sunday, and his number will move either way by Monday. And Manning versus Sayin on Saturday in Austin is the first true head-to-head Heisman game of the year. Whoever wins that one is going to be the favorite for a month.

Playoff dark horses, one week in

We're not touching Ohio State, Georgia, Texas, Miami or Notre Dame here. These are the teams sitting somewhere between "nice story" and "they could actually do this," in the order we'd bet on them.

LSU. Yes, they were No. 11 in the preseason, so calling them a dark horse is a stretch. But the market had them as a Kiffin experiment, and a defense that held Clemson to 145 yards changes the math. Win in Oxford in Week 3 and they're a contender, not a curiosity.

Boise State. The most obvious Group of Six team, and Saturday only helped. The loss at Oregon is a loss the committee will forgive if the Broncos run the Mountain West table.

USC. A 2-0 team with a quarterback completing 89 percent of his throws and a defense that just held Fresno State to 116 yards and no points. The Big Ten schedule is the obstacle, but this looks like the most complete Trojan team of the Lincoln Riley era, which is a sentence that sounds like a hot seat and isn't.

Texas A&M. Held Missouri State to 67 yards and four first downs. Owned the ball for 43 of 60 minutes. Marcel Reed didn't need to do much. Arizona State in Week 2 is a real test, and LSU in Week 4 is the whole season.

Utah and BYU. Both won by 50-plus, both ran for 300-plus, both have quarterbacks (Devon Dampier, Bear Bachmeier) who are better than the national conversation admits. The Big 12 is going to send someone, and with Texas Tech looking merely fine against Abilene Christian and Oklahoma State losing to Tulsa, the state of Utah is where we'd look first.

Missouri. Simmons was the best quarterback transfer nobody talked about. If the running game keeps producing 350-yard days, the Tigers are a nine-win team with upside.

Army. Not a playoff team by résumé. But 569 rushing yards, no Power 4 opponents, and a schedule that could produce a zero in the loss column in late November. If that happens, it becomes a national argument, and we're here for it.

Hot seats, updated

Greg Schiano, Rutgers. The angriest fan base in the Big Ten right now, with cause. Rutgers fans were calling WFAN before the game ended. Boston College next week is a must-win in the actual sense of the phrase.

Dave Aranda, Baylor. A one-point loss to a five-straight-seven-loss Auburn team, with DJ Lagway turning it over twice. Aranda started the year hot; he's now warmer.

Deion Sanders, Colorado. Won. The win was ugly and the offense was worse. Nobody's firing Coach Prime after one game, but 3-9 last year means the margin is thin and the Big 12 schedule is not.

Eric Morris, Oklahoma State. One game in and it's not fair to put him here. He's here because he lost to Tulsa in Stillwater, which is exactly how his predecessor got fired.

The heat was a real story, not a footnote

Athens was described as "extremely hot" by every broadcaster who touched the Georgia game. Nebraska's opener was billed locally as "scorching." And in Topeka, Kansas, a Division II game between Colorado School of Mines and Washburn was moved to a 9 a.m. kickoff to dodge the worst of a record heat wave, then still got suspended before overtime with the heat index at 107 degrees. Under the conference's extreme-heat rules the game was declared final at 16-16. A tie. In 2026.

We build a fitness app, so we'll say the thing: heat isn't a toughness test, it's a physiology problem. At a 107 heat index your body can't dump heat fast enough to keep core temperature stable during hard work, and the failure mode is heat stroke, not cramps. Early September in the South and Plains is going to keep producing 9 a.m. kickoffs and shortened practices, and the programs treating that as weakness are the ones that end up in the news for the wrong reasons.

What to watch

Sunday and Monday, still to come

• Notre Dame vs. Wisconsin at Lambeau Field. CJ Carr's first real Heisman audition, in the most photogenic setting the sport has this year.
• Ole Miss vs. Louisville in Nashville. Trinidad Chambliss versus a No. 21 Louisville team. Ole Miss is No. 9 and hasn't had to prove it yet.
• Washington vs. Washington State. The Apple Cup, moved to Sunday. Washington is a top-20 team that hasn't taken a snap.
• Florida State at SMU, Monday night. SMU is No. 16 in the Bleacher Report poll and gets a Labor Day spotlight to justify it.

Week 2: the games that matter

Ohio State at Texas. No. 1 at No. 5. The rematch of last year's 14-7 Buckeye win in the same stadium, except Manning is a year older and Texas has Cam Coleman now. Sayin versus Manning for the early Heisman lead. This is the game of the month and possibly the regular season.

Oklahoma at Michigan. The Sooners shut out UTEP 51-0 and got an 88-yard punt return touchdown from Isaiah Sategna. Michigan needed a phantom second to beat Western Michigan. Whittingham's honeymoon is exactly one week long.

Iowa State at Iowa. Prime time, Cy-Hawk, and the first real read on both Jimmy Rogers and Kamari Moulton.

Oregon at Oklahoma State. Two teams with something to prove for opposite reasons. If the Ducks' offensive line struggles again, the No. 2 ranking is gone.

Tennessee at Georgia Tech. Faizon Brandon's first road start against a defense that nearly beat Colorado.

Also: Arizona State at Texas A&M, Alabama at Kentucky, Arkansas at Utah, Missouri at Kansas, and Rutgers at Boston College, which is the most important game on this list to exactly one athletic director.