The Pack fall back down to earth
1. SMU (last week: Bye)
Despite not playing, the Mustangs gained full control of first place in the conference with Miami’s loss to Georgia Tech. Games against Boston College, Virginia, and California are all that remains between SMU and an ACC title game appearance. Win those three and the Mustangs are likely in the CFP regardless of the outcome of the ACC title game.
2. Louisville (last week: Bye)
The Cards may have three losses – all in conference – on their resume, but the totality of the work has been great. Right now, there’s no clear #2 in the conference behind SMU, so we’ll put Louisville here until further notice.
3. Georgia Tech (last week: 28-23 W vs Miami)
The Engineers prevail! Haynes King returned from injury to lead the Yellow Jackets in handing Miami their first loss of the season. The field storming afterwards is hilarious, you should look up the one student getting absolutely wrecked by a Miami offensive lineman, as well as the security guards going way beyond their duties to try and keep the goalposts in the stadium (spoiler alert: they were not successful). GT scored first, led at the half, and had a 12-point lead early in the 4th quarter. In other words, this wasn’t a fluke. With King at the helm, this team is good enough to beat anyone on their schedule.
4. Miami (last week: 23-28 L @ Georgia Tech)
It was only a matter of time until the Hurricanes dropped a game. They were bailed out of two losses earlier in the year (Virginia Tech, California) thanks to the ACC, and they’ve played numerous tight games otherwise. It was going to catch up to them. The difference in this one was GT playing clean (0 turnovers, 3 penalties) and getting Miami off the field when the opportunity was there (the Canes were 3-of-10 on 3rd down, 1-of-4 on 4th down). If the Hurricanes defense could have got the Jackets off the field more (9-of-14 on 3rd down, 34:49 time of possession) then the offense could have done more to bail out the team once more, but it wasn’t to be. The CFP is still there for the taking if the Canes can top Wake and Syracuse to reach the ACC title game. Any slip up, and in might slide…
5. Clemson (last week: 24-14 W @ Virginia Tech)
The Tigers offense put together a 15-play drive on their first possession of the game, then a 10-play drive on their next, only to come away with 0 points (interception, turnover on downs). The defense then tried to help the cause by forcing a fumble, but a missed field goal continued the pain and Clemson found themselves down 7-0 at half. Clemson scored TDs on three of their first four drives of the second half to take control of the game and VT never threatened from there. The Tigers defense was the story of this one. This isn’t nearly the best Clemson team we’ve seen under Dabo Swinney, but if they can beat Pitt this weekend, they’ll set themselves up for a potential ACC title game appearance. That might require some help from Miami, though.
6. Duke (last week: 29-19 W @ NC State)
Duke went into Carter-Finley on Saturday afternoon and allowed the Wolfpack offense to self-destruct their way to a Blue Devils win. It was a 5-0 Duke advantage just three Blue Devils drives into the game despite the offense having a total of 26 yards in that span. Offensive woes of their own (Duke was 0-for-9 on 3rd down) almost allowed the Wolfpack to come from behind in this one, but State’s offense simply isn’t good enough to overcome a two-score 4th quarter deficit. The Blue Devils get a week off before hosting Virginia Tech.
7. Virginia (last week: 24-19 W @ Pittsburgh)
I did not see this one coming, but the Wahoos overcame a 6-point halftime deficit to pull out the victory. The third quarter is really what made the difference as Virginia posted a pair of touchdowns while Pittsburgh missed a field goal and threw an interception. The Cavaliers need one win over their last three games, but that may be tough to come by given the schedule (@ Notre Dame, vs SMU, @ VT). It’s gonna be a little wild if that UVA-VT game to end the regular season has bowl eligibility on the line for both squads. If that’s the case, it may have jobs on the line, too.
8. Pittsburgh (last week: 19-24 L vs Virginia)
Call it a hangover from the butt-whipping they took against SMU the week before, but Pitt didn’t really have it together. Like NC State’s performance against Duke, the Panthers settled for too many field goals in this one and that ultimately came back to bite them. Losing QB Eli Holstein in the third quarter with any injury didn’t help either, even if he was playing poor. His replacement went just 4-of-12 passing for 44 yards, one TD, and two INTs. Not letting the two-game slide continue is going to be a tall task with Clemson and Louisville up next.
9. Boston College (last week: 37-31 W vs Syracuse)
Huge effort by BC to break their three-game losing streak and put themselves just a win away from bowl eligibility. Granted, two of their three games remaining are against ranked teams, but one of those is Pitt (playing pretty bad right now) and the non-ranked opponent is UNC, which has displayed all sorts of issues at times this year. QB Thomas Castellanos played pretty poor in this one before exiting early in the third quarter with an injury. The Eagles didn’t lean too heavily on his replacement, Grayson James, but James came through when asked (5-of-6, 51 yards, 1 TD, 0 INT), including leading a late TD drives to put BC up two scores. The Eagles head to SMU this weekend.
10. Syracuse (last week: 31-37 L @ Boston College)
Kyle McCord had more yards passing (392) than BC’s offense had as a whole (378), but that didn’t really matter much as the Orange defense couldn’t keep the Eagles out of the end zone. It was the first time since September 7th that the Eagles crossed the 30-point threshold in a game. Not a great look for Cuse. The Orange head to Cal this weekend before hosting UConn and Miami over the last two weeks of the regular season, then they’ll prep for their bowl game.
11. Virginia Tech (last week: 14-24 L vs Clemson)
The Hokies offense was completely smothered by the Tigers, gaining just 228 yards and turning the ball over 3 times. It’s hard to win when that’s the case. VT gets this week off before looking to secure bowl eligibility with a win in their last two, at Duke and vs Virginia.
12. California (last week: 46-36 W @ Wake Forest)
That four game losing streak earlier (with the four losses coming by a combined nine points) seems a little in the past now… although maybe I’m giving the Bears too much credit for close losses considering two of those were to not-good to bad teams. Cal went full air-it-out mode in this one with Fernando Mendoza slinging it around 56 times, going for 385 yards and a pair of TDs. He did throw a pick, but also rushed for 51 yards and another TD on 10 carries. The Bears defense picked up 7 sacks on the day and broke up 6 passes. With Syracuse and Stanford up next, Cal should find one win in those two to reach a bowl game.
13. North Carolina (last week: Bye)
The Tar Heels took some serious momentum into their bye week, winning their previous two games by a total of 76-25. A home tilt against Wake Forest awaits them this weekend.
14. NC State (last week: 19-29 L vs Duke)
All the good vibes – every single one of them – that State had built up across wins over California and Stanford exited Raleigh in expedient fashion on Saturday afternoon. C.J. Bailey played his worst game of the season, the offensive play calling was atrocious, and the offensive execution even worse. It wasted a great outing from the NC State defense (held Duke to 276 yards and 0-for-9 on 3rd down, and only gave up three scoring drives of longer than 20 yards). The truth is this is just not a good football team. Heading to Atlanta to take on a GT squad that just took down Miami on the same turf isn’t the greatest timing. Maybe with expectations low, the team will exceed them. Guess you gotta hold onto the hope life raft at this point.
15. Wake Forest (last week: 36-46 L vs California)
Miami and Duke are still to go on the schedule for Wake, so it feels like the loss to Cal was a back-breaker in terms of chances for a bowl game. Can’t give up 500 yards to an opponent and expect to win, though. The Deacs did tally 386 yards of their own – with Demond Claiborne accounting for 164 of those, as well as a pair of TDs. Wake heads to Chapel Hill this weekend to take on UNC.
16. Stanford (last week: Bye)
If not for the complete a total cluster that is the team ranked last on this list, Stanford would be there. The Cardinal will look to snap their six-game losing streak against Louisville this Saturday. They also have games remaining against California and San Jose State.
17. Florida State (last week: 3-52 L @ Notre Dame)
Following the embarrassing loss in South Bend, Mike Norvell fired three coaches (OC/OL, DC, WR coach). Those three coaches will be due over $8.5M in buyouts. It’s not shocking that changes were made my Norvell to buy himself another year in Tallahassee, but the buyouts are a tough pill to swallow on top of that. The Noles are on a bye this week before hosting Charleston Southern and Florida to end their season.