
College football week 1 is in the books. After every week fans can take away things from what happened on the field. Here are five things learned from college football week 1.
Maybe it should have been expected, but with everything going on in the world right now, some teams were ready for week 1 and others just simply weren’t. BYU blew out Navy, while Middle Tennessee was no match for Army. Marshall had no issues with FCS-level Eastern Kentucky. SMU also played down to their competition.
With teams having messed up practice schedules and lives due to COVID, it is something college football fans might see more of in the coming weeks. It was noted that Navy didn’t have any practice tackling leading up to their home opener. Some teams had to scramble to put together their schedules. The year of 2020 is crazy enough, so there will be upsets, close games that shouldn’t be and some overall crazy results.
BYU was one of the teams that had to scramble to put a schedule together because they are an independent team. They did a great job of getting a schedule together and were ready for their season opener against Navy. The Cougars won 55-3 and had the game under wraps in the second quarter.
Last season, BYU went 7-6, but also had to deal with injury issues, specifically at the quarterback position. Zach Wilson is now healthy and was sharp against Navy, throwing for 232 yards and two touchdowns. This was without star tight end Matt Bushman, who was lost for the season with an injury. The Cougars have seven more games on the schedule and will likely be favored in most games.
Over the last few seasons, Memphis has lost Anthony Miller, Tony Pollard, Darrell Henderson, Antonio Gibson and Kenneth Gainwell (who opted out of the season). They showed in their game against Arkansas State that they will be able to find good players to fill in.
Damonte Coxie was expected to be a key contributor and produced with eight catches for 90 yards and a touchdown. Sean Dykes also had a big day at receiver with 10 catches for 137 yards and two touchdowns. Rodrigues Clark, filling in for Gainwell, had 20 carries for 105 yards and one touchdown. The Tigers beat the Red Wolves 37-24 and look like they are headed for another solid season.
The triple-option is usually a hard defense to defend, although don’t tell Navy that after they couldn’t move the ball against BYU. Army, on the other hand, was ready to play. They rushed for 340 yards and could not be stopped.
The Black Knights had a great performance from Tyrell Robinson, who carried the ball nine times for 94 yards. Because they blew out Middle Tennessee, 10 players were able to get carries to contribute to 340 yards. Army will look to continue to run the triple option well against Louisiana-Monroe next week and then BYU, who shut down Navy this week.
Texas State battled SMU tough all game, but were unable to upset SMU. It was a good showing, but the most impressive thing was a touchdown catch by Jeremiah Haydel. He only had four catches for 37 yards with one of them being an acrobatic touchdown catch.
https://twitter.com/TxStateBobcats/status/1302368998567211008
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