Speaker 1: Check it out college football on the West Coast. This
is Get Off My pylone, a look at the PAC
twelve and more, part of the College Gridiron Coast to
Coast podcast network.
Speaker 2: Here's your host, Matt zimon Welcome to the latest position
of the Get Off My Pilon college football podcast, part
of the College Gridiron Coast to Coast podcast network. This
is your host, Matt Zemeck. So week one in the books,
we finally have a full weekend of college football to
review in the new twenty twenty five season. Uh, get
off my pileline reviewing college football in the Western United States.
So Western teams in the various conferences, we're looking at
them as we do every week during the season on
this show. A reminder that College Gridiron Coast to Coast
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terms of listening to College grid Aroon Coast to Coast podcast,
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whether it's the all sports discussion podcast covering the acc
Yards and Stripes covering the Service academies, Florida football Insiders
with Jason Powers covering the Florida schools and of course
Florida schools had a great weekend with South Florida beating
Boise State. More on Boise State, and a bit Miami
beating Notre Dame, Florida State being Alabama. So hey, that
like that Florida Football Insiders podcast is hot. You want
to listen to Jason Powers. He has a lot of
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So we go into our week one review show, and
let's start with Boise State because that was on Thursday,
the first really big game involving a Western school from
week one, and that was shocking. And you know, if
you watch the TCU North Carolina game on Monday, North
Carolina with a brilliant first drive and then did basically
nothing the rest of the game. That was kind of
Boise State, not the first drive, but got up seven
to nothing, and it seemed like Boise State was the
better team in the first quarter and then boom just
completely stifled the rest of the way by South Florida.
And you know, full credit to South Florida thoroughly outplayed
Boise State in every facet over the final three quarters,
entirely deserved to win the game. It was just surprising
to see Boise State have zero answers and zero adjustments
for South Florida. And you know, if you're a Boise
State fan, I think you knew that life after Ashton
genty would have its challenges, But was it going to
be this bad? Was it going to be this severe
right out of the blocks, right because there's still a
lot of good talented players on that team. And you know,
you don't make the College Football Playoff just because you
have a stud at running back, just because you have
a Heisman Trophy runner up on your team. I mean,
that certainly goes a long way. You know, you need
that aircraft carrier, which Astra Gent was. But you have
to have a decent offensive line, you have to have
a solid defense, you have to have a capable quarterback,
you have to have a lot of pieces. I mean,
you know, this is a sport in which there are
twenty two players on the field at the same time,
eleven in a unit. You can't just have one really
good player. You need other good players. You need balance,
you need the units working together, people pulling together. So
it's not as though Boise State was supposed to be
chopped delivered this season. Yeah, not as good as with genty. Sure,
of course most people would have assumed that. But to
get absolutely boat raced, that was certainly a surprise to many.
It was a surprise to me. So we certainly have
to ask questions. We have to ask questions of two
people in particular, one Maddox Madson, and you know, Boise
State figured to have to pass the ball a little
bit more now in twenty twenty five, after losing genty
from last season's team, Madson not up to the task.
But the even bigger concern Spencer Danielson. You know, he
is a young coach. It's not as though he's he's
a seven or ten or twelve year veteran of this thing.
He's still new to this. And you know, having Ashton
Genty really helped him, and to his great credit, like
he knew how to maximize gent, he knew how to
win games with a stud in the backfield, but now
that he doesn't have him, I mean, Spencer Danielson got
caught flat footed. One of the big moments from that
game was South Florida's fake punt touchdown pass the ball
put in their backup quarterback, lining him up as the punter.
That thing has to be noticed on the Boise State sideline.
You can call time out right if you see something
and you don't think you're ready for it, call time out.
That can basically ford the fake punt. And you call
time out, you can just go into a safe prevent
defense to make sure that you're not snookered by that
fake punt. But Spencer Danielson did not do it south forward,
it pass its lead and it was off to the
races after that. So Spencer Danielson not a very good
coaching performance, to say the least. In the opener, he
did not have his team in a position to make adjustments.
You know, Boise State started the game. Well, I'll give
Danielson that, Like at the beginning of the game, they
were ready to play. So it's not as though he
didn't have his team ready to play, but he didn't
have his team ready to adjust That was really the
key that Boise State made no adjustments whatsoever and certain
things didn't work. Boise State didn't really have a plan B.
So that is what Spencer Danielson needs to worry about,
and he has to get that passing game to a
point where Boise State can throw the ball to move
the ball if it needs to, because it can't rely
on the running game in quite the same way that
it was able to last year with Ashton Genty staying
in the Mountain West. Hawaii goes to Arizona, so we
have two Western teams to talk about. And you know,
Hawaii's quarterback Michael Alahado injured against Stanford. So the conventional
wisdom going into this game against Arizona was that Arizona
should be able to take care of Hawaii pretty easily.
That's exactly what happened. You know, Hawaii making the big
commute to the mainland with a quarterback who is not
physically one hundred percent like that game just set up
well for Arizona. So I don't know if we learned
a whole lot about Arizona, but the Wildcats did at
least take care of business at a level that they
were supposed to, so give the Wildcats credit for that.
But Arizona's schedule obviously going to get a lot tougher
in the near future, and we're going to learn a
lot more about Brent Brennan's team elsewhere moving along Arizona State.
So we talked about Arizona, let's talk about Arizona State.
Pretty scratchy, rough opener. You didn't see the Arizona State
offense explode the way it so often did, so there
was a lot of rust and of course the adjustment
to not having Cam scataboo profound and that should not
rate as a surprise. The idea that Arizona State's going
to have it figured all out right away unlikely. But
you know, in a cupcake game week one, Arizona State
didn't have to figure it all out right away. The
Sun Devils can adjust and evolve as they move along,
and it'll be fascinating to see what head coach Kenny
Dillingham is able to do with that team. Right, So
we stay in the Big Twelve with the other Western
schools in the conference. So Colorado narrowly loses to Georgia Tech.
The Yellowjackets win it on a late tie breaking touchdown
inside the final ninety seconds, Haines King getting free. It's
a game that was close all the way. So it's
gonna be really interesting to see, you know, what national experts,
what national observers make of that performance by Colorado. For me,
you know, I felt Georgia Tech a team that wants
to be seen as a top tier ACC program, a
team that has legitimate aspirations to win nine or ten games.
That was a must win for Georgia Tech. And with
Colorado having lost two elite college football players from last season,
Shader Sanders and the Heisman Trophy winner Travis Hunter, the
adjustment to this year, you know, could have been really bumpy.
It could have been really difficult. And this is not
to say that you know, Colorado was great, but Colorado
was decent against Georgia Tech. Colorado put up more of
a fight than than some people felt it would. I mean,
ty game going into the two minute warning. That is
a very credible performance. It's a very respectable showing for Colorado.
You know, getting getting blown out would have been one thing,
but taking Georgia Tech, a good team at least in
my estimation, down to the wire like that should encourage
people in Boulder. Deon Sanders, I know he's not there
for moral victories. He's not there for coming close. He's
not there for putting up a good fight. He wants
to win, he wants to conquer, he wants to lift
trophies as he should h and that is a winner's mentality. Dion,
you know, succeeded as an athlete because he had the
right mentality. So you know, a part of him is
going to be frustrated and legitimately so. But Colorado acquitted
itself quite well against Georgia Tech. So there is reason
for optimism in Boulder, and it's really important that Colorado,
regardless of what the record is, if Colorado can be
robustly competitive throughout the whole season, you know, if the
way it played against Georgia Tech is the way it
plays throughout the season and Colorado is at least able
to get back to a bowl game. To me, that
rates is a very successful campaign. That you lose two
elite players and you're able to back it up the
next season and still get back to a bowl game.
What does that say? That says that your program is good.
It's not just that you bring in star players. But
your program is good. Your program has achieved a certain
measure of consistency. Your program has a certain measure of
stain power and durability. So you know, if Kloradle plays
eleven more games like that, and you add in just
the natural evolution that occurs over a season, at least
for most teams, Colorad should be okay. And when I
say okay, I mean at least getting to six and six,
making a bowl game. I think that would be a
good year for Colorado. A lot of people might think
the program will fall off a cliff now that it
doesn't have Schrader and Travis Hunter. So six and six
it might not be something that Dion will be thrilled
with if it happens. But to me, that would be
a good twenty twenty five season for Colorado. So we'll
see how the team responds to the performance against Georgia Tech.
Now we go to Utah, the final of the four
corners schools in the Big Twelve, and this is another
game with two Western teams, Utah Ucla. This was the
late game on Saturday. Wow, Utah looked like a Kyle
Winningham team. And when Kyle Winningham coached Utah teams r
at their best. What do they have not just the
fierce pass rush, not just the dominant line play, you know,
owning the trenches, which Utah certainly did, But they also
have the quarterback that makes it all happen. You know,
cam Rising finally unlocked the code. He finally lifted Utah
to the mountaintop. After the Youths had been a good program,
but an almost program, not quite winning Pac twelve championships,
not quite reaching the biggest bowl games. You know, in
twenty eighteen, in twenty nineteen, lost to Washington in the
PAC twelve title game, lost to Oregon in the PAC
twelve Tile Game. So when cam Rising turned things around
in twenty twenty one, twenty twenty two, you know, the quarterback,
the guy at the controls, was able to make it
all happen. He was the final piece of the puzzle. So,
after a couple of years of Cam Rising being hurt
and u taught, not having answers at quarterback, the Youths
get Devin Dampier, the transfer from New Mexico, and he
was awesome against UCLA. The agility, the improvisational playmaking ability,
being able to make plays with his legs, being able
to make plays with his arm. Devin Dampier was a
well rounded package and UCLA had absolutely no answer for him.
So Devin Dampier looked the part. He looked like the
real deal, and so Utah has to be very encouraged
by what it saw in Game one. But here's the
flip side. Utah looked great, Ucla looked abysmal, and so
if you're a Utah fan, you're you're you're very happy
with the way the team performed, no question. But is
UCLA going to crater this season? It's a possibility. So
Utah might not derive too much value from beating UCLA
in terms of strength of schedule or just in terms
of the caliber of owning it defeated. It's just something
to watch for, right because in week one we're always
trying to see, you know, did did did teammate get
a good win against Team B? Or was Team B
just so horrible that of course teammate was gonna win.
And so we get to October, we get to November
and we say, you know, that win that might have
looked really good in week one, well, of course that
the other team was horrible. You know, a lot of
people felt UCLA was going to have a decent team
this season. I know that some riders with the Los
Angeles Times felt UCLA was going to be an eight
win team this season. So like Utah beating an eight
win team by thirty three, that looks pretty good. But
after seeing Saturday night, Ucla might be a three win team.
Ucla could be in for a really rough year based
on what we saw in Week one. The Bruins have
to make dramatic adjustments across the board in Week two
and beyond if they are going to save their season.
Bottom line, Ucla got ragdalled in this game. Ucla got bullied,
Ucla got shoved around, couldn't tackle, you know, both mistackles
and also Utah ball carriers balancing three or four yards
off UCLA defenders after the first point of contact, dragging
bodies up the field. So Ucile's defense looked weak and
the UCLA's offensive line was just Swiss cheese. Nico Iamaliava,
you know, you can't really judge his performance because he
was running for his life the whole game. And this
was the big concern for Nico, and this was something
that Tennessee fans talked about all off season. You know, Nico,
you're leaving Tennessee. You're leaving this support system. You're leaving
Josh Hipel's offense. You're leaving a roster which has depth
and quality and physicality across the board on the line,
at receiver, at running back. You know, you're not going
to be surrounded by ten really good teammates anymore. You're
going to be by yourself. That thesis for one game,
at least held up. That line of thought was strongly
affirmed in this first game. Nico did what he could.
He made some great improv scrambles and made some plays
by himself. But he was running for his life, and
so he's gonna need some help if this UCLA season
is going to amount to anything. He didn't get any
of that help against Utah. On the defensive side of
the ball, let's hit on this particular point. Let's let's
remind everyone UCLA sent four defensive players to the twenty
twenty five NFL Draft. Carson Schwessinger, the linebacker who went
to the Browns at pick number thirty three. You know
he's and he's been crushing it in preseason camp with
the Browns Oluwaemi. Oladejo went at also in the second
round at pick number fifty two to the Tennessee Titans,
so two picks in the in the top fifty five,
two second round picks, and then UCLA also had Kine
Madrono who went in the back end of the draft
to the Washington Commanders, and Jay Toya, interior defensive lineman
also at the back end of the draft. All four
of those guys were not only NFL draft picks, they
all made their rosters. They all made the fifty three
man Week one NFL rosters. So that's four opening day
not necessarily starters, though Schwsinger in Cleveland and Oladejo in
Tennessee they're starters, but four players that made NFL rosters.
Ucie A lost four guys of that caliber from twenty
twenty four. Did Deshaun Foster have replacements for each of
those four guys, whether in the portal or in terms
of his own program and developing players. Very clearly not, like,
at least going by game one, like there was no
star or standout player who carried the load for the
UCLA defense. The whole unit was bad. It was bad
at all three levels. Defensive line, linebackers secondary. So you know,
Deshaun Foster inherited those four players. And it's worth noting
that former UCLA defensive coordinator Danton Lynn, who is now
USC's defensive coordinator, he coached all four of those guys Sweessinger, Oladejo, Madrono,
and Toya in twenty twenty three under Tip Kelly, and
so Deshaun Foster inherited good players who had been coached
up and developed by Danton Lynn when he stepped in
twenty twenty four. So you know, UCLA overachieved last season,
and I thought UCLA would be like a two to
ten team last year, but the Bruins went five and seven,
and I thought, oh, Deshaun Foster did an amazing job.
This game against Utah kind of shifts the ground a
little bit in the sense that, oh, it was more
about Danton Lynn giving Deshaun Foster some well developed, well
rounded players last season. Now, Lynn was of course on
USC staff last year, not UCLA's, but what Danton Lynn
did with those guys in twenty twenty three it set
the table beautifully for DeShawn Foster now that he doesn't
have any of those guys on his team in twenty
twenty five, he looks lost and just as a PostScript here,
Deshaun Foster told local media in Los Angeles after the
Utah game and more specifically, after watching film, he said,
and this is a direct quote quote, we were close unquote.
Deshaan Foster said, quote, we were close unquote after losing
forty three to ten, after losing by thirty three points,
we were close. That folks as a coach who's in
over his head. Now, maybe Deshaun Foster is not in
over his head, but he sure sounded like it after
this game, and without the defensive depth and quality that
he had one year ago, you know, this guy could
be lost at sea, He could be a drift and
he might not ever get to save harbor at UCLA,
Bruin fans have to be very concerned. And so just
briefly looking ahead, I know we have other teams to
get to in our week one review, but just to
briefly look ahead to Week two, UCLA at UNLV. If
Deshaun Foster and UCLA cannot win that game in Vegas,
they'll be zero to two and on their Big ten
schedule they have to play Penn State. They have to
play Ohio State, Like, where are the win's gonna come from?
So if UCLA loses to Vegas in Week two, very
likely that UCLA is going to miss a bowl game
this season. And we said last week on our preview
show before week one, before the season began, UCLA needs
to make a bowl game this year period. That's the goal.
Make a bowl game, improve on your five and seven
record from twenty twenty four. If UTLA is not making
a bowl game, no one's gonna think correctly that the
program is heading in the right direction, that there's no improvement,
there's no real growth, that Deshaun Foster really isn't moving
this thing forward. And there were only thirty five thousand
and change at the Rose Bowl for that UCLA Utah game,
and Utah had at least ten thousand, maybe even fifteen,
so nearly half the stadium was Utah fans. So the
apathy surrounding UCLA football is very real. It remains intact.
If UCLA is not making a bowl game, They're just
not going to sell many tickets for home games. The program,
which sorely needs revenue, is not going to get that revenue,
not going to get those extra dollars. How is UCLA
going to compete for lead talent? And UCLA was able
to put together an NIL package good enough to lure
Nico Imliava to Westwood. If UCLA misses a bowl game
this year, like what's gonna lure future stars, you know,
future notable names to UCLA football. Failing this year with Nico,
if it happens, would just be a disaster for UCLA
and it would be a disaster as well for Deshaun Foster.
So tons of pressure, tons of pressure on Deshaun Foster
to beat UNLV in Week two to get this season
back on track. If it doesn't happen, UCLA is looking
at a very very very long year, all right, continuing
on with our western schools and get off my pilon.
So we've looked at UCLA from the Big ten. USC
in contrast to UCLA, you know, look look good on offense,
scoring seventy three points. The defense was kind of spotty,
but USC had a lot of prime players out on defense,
featuring Jackem Stewart, the Big five star freshman. He did
not play a freshman named Alex Graham did not play.
Other players on this defense at multiple levels of the
defense did not play. They were all hurt, and of
course us he wants to exercise some caution, rightly, so
because you know, playing Missouri State, you don't need guys.
You don't need your frontline players to win that kind
of a game. In USC plays Georgia Southern and Clay Helton, hello,
former USC coach, in week two. USC will not need
those frontline players against Georgia Southern either. Now, it would
be good to get them some work heading into Purdue
in week three on September thirteenth. But you know, if
they're not fully healthy and us he is not sure,
it's whether it makes sense to play them. You know,
you hold them out another week. You save them for
the Big ten schedule, which is just around the corner.
So USC Jade and Mayava at quarterback looked the part.
He looked fairly comfortable, like he looked a lot better
than he did last season. But it's Missouri State, Missouri
State making its FBS debut as a member of Conference USA.
Last season, Missouri State was an FCS program. So USC
beat a Tomato camp. Let's just be honest about that.
The Trojans will need to beat a much better team.
Authoritatively before they really begin to deserve and earn major
national buzz as a Big Ten and College Football Playoff contender.
So the performance was decent enough, but USC obviously needs
to make a climb in terms of strength of schedule,
caliber of competition before we really begin to say USC
is back. We're not there yet. Beating Missouri State does
not get you there. USC is gonna need to get
a lot more work done, But as far as it goes,
Week one was a good one for Lincoln Riley and company.
Similar story with Oregon. Obviously, Oregon has established itself as
an elite program more than USC has in recent years. Oregon,
you know, had the unbeaten regular season last year before
losing to Ohio State in the playoff quarterfinals at the
Rose Bowl. So Oregon's done more than USC has in
the past few years. But similar dynamic. Oregon crushes Montana State.
Dante Moore, the new quarterback, looked pretty good, but it
was Montana State. It was an FCS team. Now Montana
State is not a bad FCS team, but still that's
an FCS team. It's a cupcake game, It's a paycheck game.
Let's see Oregon and Dante Moore do this against better opposition.
So they play Oklahoma State this week. Let's see how
good Oklahoma State is. That would be interesting to look at.
And finally, among our West Coast Big Ten teams, Washington.
Washington did not dominate Colorado State, but it was not
a squeaker either. It did not go right down to
the wire. Husky's offense was solid, if not spectacular. So
the Huskies did pretty much what people expected, no more,
no less's let's now see what we get in week two.
I think there's a lot to improve on for Washington
because this was not a max out performance, but it
was not a horrible performance either. It was okay. It
was an okay performance from Jedfish's group. Like the they
basically met expectations on the dot. They didn't exceed them,
they didn't undershoot them. So let's see now what Washington
can do as it moves along with its schedule. So,
in terms of the over of western college football in
the United States after Week one, so Boise State and
UNLV have both looked sluggish, and that basically means that
the Mountain West is in real trouble in terms of
being able to win the group of Five championship, which
it did last year with Boise State. Right now, Tulane
number one and Navy number two from the American well
probably the two best most likely choices to win the
Group of five championship. Obviously it's early, but you know,
Tulane allowed just three points to Northwestern, a Big ten team,
and Northwestern is not a good team, but it's still
a Big ten team. That's not a cupcake game for Tulane.
And Tulane's defense looked really, really good. So Boise State
getting clobbered by South Florida, UNLV barely injury passed Idaho State,
and then you know, UNLV beat Sam Houston somewhat comfortably,
but it was not a forty to fifty to sixty
point win, so the Rebels, you know, have left a
lot to be desired. And now, of course UNLV plays UCLA,
a game that we've talked about earlier. This is a
proven moment for UNLV just as much as it is
for UCLA. Both teams really need that game. Ucla needs
it more, but UNLV really needs a strong performance and
the Mountain West needs a strong performance from UNLV to
kind of reset the dial and perhaps create new hope,
fresh hope that the Mountain West can still be a
factor in the Group of five championship race. But right
now the Mountain West is definitely behind the American in
terms of the strength and quality of the Group of
five conferences. So it was not a good Week one.
It was not a good August for the Mountain West.
This league definitely needs a bounce back. So plenty to
talk about in Week one of the college football season
across the West, whether it's the Big Ten, whether it's
the Big twelve, the Mountain West. Plenty to think about
in the world of Western college football. And so after
Week one, you know, the Week one overreaction, the week
one hot take, the week one verdict. You know, this
is always a part of every college football season. You
know what was real, what kind of fell a little
bit hollow that it might not hold up over the
course of the season. How good are the opponents, how
good will the opponents be? All these things are always
part of a week one evaluation. So week two we
began to find out if Week one was a true
indicator or if Week one was an aberration. Always a
central and challenging part of college football analysis from we
one sticks and what from week one fades away. We
always have the challenge of trying to make that kind
of determination, so week two will give us a lot
more information as we continue on the road to the
twenty twenty five college football playoffs. All right, folks, so
once again this podcast Get Up My Pipeline is part
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my Pilot College Football podcast, this is your host, Matt Zemeck.
We'll see you next week. Thanks for listening.