Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...

By Chris Amos

Takeaways from the College Football weekend ending November 21, 2021:

1- There is obviously a concerted and well-coordinated initiative every week with the number of ESPN GameDay signs about Jesus. As much as I enjoy seeing the snarky and funny signs in the crowd, I love seeing the standout signs every week that proclaim the One that offers the answer to all of our problems.

2- You expect the unexpected in college football. What makes it so interesting are the upsets and the surprise programs that work their way into the Top 10 for the first time in decades. But these young men will let you down more than you want them to on the big stage and on the road. Case in point: Michigan State and Wake Forest. Both programs had an opportunity to step into the limelight and catapult their programs into the big boy club. But talent always rises to the top and despite our interest in seeing new teams in the CFP, it looks like the powerhouse programs will be there once again – which is OK when you want the best playing the best.

3. Best game uniforms go to Utah and Oregon. Too bad the Ducks didn’t play in theirs. Utah paid homage to the USS Salt Lake City. Goodbye, Oregon – Hello, Cincinnati for the CFP.

4. Raise your hand if you watched more than the first quarter of the OSU-MSU game. Now imagine you were an LSU fan watching this game. Have you ever seen a better example of a team not ready for the moment? That is what you saw with Mel Tucker and the Spartans. The game was over after the second OSU possession and despite having the best RB in the game, MSU was done. OSU looks very strong right now and easily the #2 team when the CFP rankings come out again. You have to like OSU if they were to play Oregon again or any team other than Georgia.

5. The annual coaching carousel of college football coaches getting fired and winning the lottery on the same day hits a couple more houses this week. Troy and Florida become the latest schools to make changes and pay off ridiculous contracts for what amounts to a failure of leadership. Name another profession that does that. At some point, schools have to realize that they are being taken advantage of, but it also points to just how big a business college football is…college sports for that matter. To have the resources to payoff these coaches, it has to come from somewhere.

6. Life is tough in the SEC. I believe that because Nick Saban said it. He is the best coach to ever coach a college football game, but even he knows that the Tide has been on the ropes too many times this year and that can affect young men’s confidence in big games. The offense has a lot of confidence, but the defense continues to do just enough to survive. Despite the obvious weaknesses on Alabama’s young defense and its below Tide standards secondary, Alabama survives a late surge by the Razorbacks. Can you win an SEC game and still drop in the CFP rankings? Alabama might experience that.

7. SEC Championship Game is set. Don’t let anyone tell you that Georgia has been tested the way that Alabama has. UGA is the only ranked team in the SEC East. Five of the eight teams in the SEC West are ranked.

8. The Bryce Young Show was awesome to watch. He took some very healthy step towards some more Heisman Trophy votes as he shattered the Tide’s single game passing record, throwing for 561 yards and 5 touchdowns. He had all day to throw the ball and I think even I could have thrown for 200 yards behind that pass protection. He even had a TD play that he was compared to Dansby Swanson.  I think Brad Nessler is a Braves fan.

9. Auburn fans are not feeling too good right now after the Tigers lose to South Carolina, but it will make them all the more dangerous this coming weekend for the Iron Bowl. All the frustration, all the angst will go away with a win over Alabama. It will be interesting to watch Bryan Harsin handle the hype of the Iron Bowl for the first time, but all he should say is, “Play like you guys always play against Alabama in Jordan-Hare.” That means like a rabid cheetah. Should be a great game. That doesn’t mean that it will be, but it should be. That is because it is the Iron Bowl and more fingernails are chewed off during this game than all others combined.

Chris Amos is a guest contributor to The Messenger and can be reached at chrisjamos42@gmail.com.