Canzano: Week Zero looks different... a day later

Thoughts, opinions, facts... and peek ahead at Week 1.

Oregon opens at home in Week 1 against Idaho. (Photo: Serena Morones)

• College football is back. All is well. I don’t know about you, but I didn’t mind a 9 a.m. PT kickoff on Saturday featuring Georgia Tech’s upset of Florida State.

• I was especially curious to see how DJ Uiagalelei, the Clemson-to-Oregon State-to-Tallahassee transfer, would look at Florida State.

• New head coach. New play caller. New uniform. Same old problems throwing the ball downfield. Mike Norvell, his new coach said after the FSU loss: “We have to be more explosive.” Duh.

• The first-half game plan featured screen passes, dump-offs, and checkdowns. Uiagalelei was 7 of 8 passing for 62 yards in the first quarter and finished 12 of 14 for 96 yards in the first half.

• Norvell was trying to get his new QB some early completions and build some confidence. Not a terrible idea. But DJ struggled in the intermediate and deep passing game in the second half. He finished 19 of 27 for 193 yards with no TDs and no interceptions. It looked suspiciously like some of his Oregon State games.

• A die-hard OSU fan messaged me after the game and said: “DJ is so deceiving to watch for ‘basic’ football fans. He doesn’t throw picks, but can’t throw anyone open.” I’m more troubled by his inability to consistently hit the soft spots in a zone defense from 12-20 yards away. That must improve.

• The bigger thing to me, though, is that Florida State doesn’t have a lethal run game. Aside from one chunk play in the first half, I don’t see the kind of production that DJ had around him last year at Oregon State. That puts pressure on the QB to do much more.

• Guinness served in the ESPN broadcast booth in Ireland? It was supposed to be fun. I’m OK with it. But I had some questions. Will alcohol in the booth be a thing at all college football games? If so, could make for some interesting overtime calls from broadcasters.

• Since we’re leaning into regional stereotypes, will broadcasters smoke weed on camera during games in places such as Boulder, Berkeley, Ann Arbor, and Eugene?

• Yeah, I included a city in Michigan. The Detroit Free Press reported last spring that Michigan overtook California as the top cannabis state in the US by sales volume. In May, for example, dispensaries in Michigan sold 24.2 million “units” while California sold ‘only’ 17.3 million.

• California is still considered the country’s most lucrative marijuana state overall, but only because the product sells at higher prices.

• How about the place kickers on Saturday? Florida State’s Ryan Fitzgerald boomed a 59-yarder just before halftime to tie the game. The kick would have been good from 61 at least. Then, Georgia Tech’s Aidan Birr nailed the walk-off game-winner from 44 yards.

• Last week, Miami (Ohio) coach Chuck Martin accused Alabama of “illegally” recruiting his All-American place-kicker Graham Nicholson. Crimson Tide coach Kalen DeBoer denied the accusation. Nicholson is the reigning Lou Groza Award winner. That whole soap opera crossed my mind as I saw the kicking theatrics on Saturday.

• Dennis Miller, the president of The CW, told me that he’d love to find some Sunday programming for his network. It’s Sunday as I write this paragraph. I don’t know about you, but I could watch a college football game. Does anyone else suspect we’ll see Oregon State and Washington State playing an occasional Sunday game on The CW in 2025?

• Can’t wait for the Week 1 games… you? My five most interesting games this week:

1. Georgia-Clemson

2. LSU-USC

3. Miami-Florida

4. Notre Dame-Texas A&M

5. Penn State-West Virginia

• Don’t sleep on the North Dakota State-Colorado game in Week 1, either. Upset alert in Boulder? Or no? There’s been a steady… drip… drip… drip… of negativity, controversy, and distraction at Colorado. The Buffs have also lost eight of their last nine football games. The offseason has been a circus.

• Will Colorado ban me from asking questions at news conferences for saying so?

• I’ll post my college football predictions against the spread on Thursdays in this space. Two years ago I went 54-40 against the spread (.574). Last season, I finished 48-42-1 (.533). If I hit a 60-percent win percentage this season, should I move headquarters to Las Vegas? Discuss.

• I have four photographers working games next Saturday. The photo galleries and my coverage will be robust. The photo galleries from last season are a fun look.

• How about the remarkable home record of Utah’s Kyle Whittingham? The Utes have won 31 of their last 33 home games. Rice-Eccles Stadium turns into a giant red blender on football game days. I’ve been there in person to see programs such as No. 3 Oregon (2021), No. 7 USC (2022), and Florida (2023) all lose games at Utah in the last three seasons. The numbers are particularly impressive when you consider that the Utes entered the Pac-12 in 2011 with some disadvantages and still ended up dominant.

• In 2018, I did a study on college football attendance. The Pac-12 had suffered the biggest attendance decline in the upper echelon of major college football, drawing nearly 250,000 fewer fans to its stadiums than it did a year earlier. The Big Ten posted its lowest average attendance in 25 years (65,376) that same season. And the football-crazed SEC was down more than 100,000 in total attendance in 2018. Amid that, Utah had a season-ticket waitlist and was adding seats to the home stadium.

Utah fans at the 2022 Pac-12 title game channeled their inner Cam Rising. (Photo: Serena Morones)

• Anyone else wondering if Oregon is going to expand Autzen Stadium? The Ducks have sold more than 11,000 new season tickets and are currently peddling standing-room-only tickets for the season opener vs. Idaho.

• UO President John Karl Scholz told me in the spring: “We have to look carefully at that. Is that going to be a permanent phenomenon? In which case, we would have to think about expanding Autzen. Or is this, you know, the novelty of joining the Big Ten? Having Ohio State come in? And it falls off? But these are sort of the season ticket sales numbers that we saw in the heyday of coach (Chip) Kelly’s time. It’s something we’ll keep a close eye on.”

• Oregon Athletic Director Rob Mullens will be on the radio show this week. We’re due to catch up on several topics, but potential stadium expansion is on the list.

• Oregon State is 16-2 in its last 18 games at Reser Stadium. The losses? A two-point loss vs. Washington last season and a three-point loss to USC in 2022. Will first-year coach Trent Bray’s program continue to be a tough out at home?

• The OSU team captains are quarterback Ben Gulbranson, defensive lineman Semisi Saluni, defensive backs Jaden Robinson and Skyler Thomas, linebacker Melvin Jordan IV, and offensive lineman Joshua Gray.

• Gulbranson as a team captain is a no-brainer. The guy is 7-1 as a starter and has seen it all. I’m intrigued to see him team up with new offensive coordinator Ryan Gunderson.

• Portland State will play at Washington State on Saturday. The Vikings are being paid $563,000 to make the trip. The Cougars opened as a 31.5-point favorite in Week 1, but in the few places that number is posted, it has been bet down to 28.5 points.

• Washington State AD Anne McCoy spent five years in athletics administration at Portland State (1996-2001). Also, WSU middle linebacker Parker McKenna transferred to WSU after a productive season at PSU in 2023. McKenna led the Vikings with 75 tackles and nine tackles for loss.

• Dante Chachere returns as PSU’s starting quarterback. He’s got 22 consecutive starts and is arguably the best dual-threat QB in the FCS division. I’d like to see him run more — but maybe not in the season opener at Washington State. The Vikings will need Chachere for the long haul.

Dante Chachere will start for Portland State vs. WSU. (Photo: Tim Healy)

• Montana State beat New Mexico, 35-31 on Saturday. The Big Sky is walking tall after the FCS over FBS victory. The biggest chance for a follow-up Week 1 upset? I’ll go with Sacramento State at San Jose State.

• Boise State opens the season at Georgia Southern in Week 1. I’ll pay some attention to this one. The Broncos play at Oregon in Week 2. The talking heads have Boise State as one of the top candidates to earn the G5 berth in the College Football Playoff.

• Keep an eye on Colorado State, Fresno State, UNLV, and Memphis as other G5 playoff candidates. Maybe Air Force, too?

• Oregon State and Washington State are NOT eligible to earn the G5 berth this season. There has been some confusion about this. The Pac-12 is not a P4 conference, but also not currently part of the G5. It is in limbo. If the Beavers and Cougars are going to make the expanded 12-team playoff, they’ll have to win football games, be ranked high, and qualify for an at-large berth.

• The five highest-ranked conference champions (including the G5 champ) receive automatic bids to the College Football Playoff. The seven highest-ranked teams remaining receive at-large bids. The four highest-ranked conference champions are seeded 1-4 and receive a first-round bye. Teams 5-12 will play in the first round with the higher seed getting the home field.

• I had NBC’s Nicole Auerbach on Friday’s radio show. Auerbach wondered if there would be some envy from the top-four seeds when they tune in from home during their week off and see the electricity on the respective campuses for those first-round games.

• Liberty faced Oregon last season in a Fiesta Bowl that ended with a 45-6 blowout. Tulane, however, beat USC after the 2022 regular season in a 46-45 thriller in the Cotton Bowl. It will be important that the G5 champion proves it belongs in the playoffs in the next two seasons. 2024-2025 is essentially a beta test for the playoff. In 2027, there will be an expansion to either 14 or 16 teams and some tweaks to the format. If the G5 programs don’t demonstrate they can hang, I expect bellyaching from the SEC and Big Ten about the G5 participant needing to also be ranked highly.

• WSU coach Jake Dickert has named John Mateer his starting quarterback. But Dickert told me a couple of weeks ago that he thought the running game could be his team’s biggest area of improvement this season. Said Dickert: “We have to be able to run the football.”

• Anyone else into seeing what happens with new ACC members Stanford and Cal in Week 1? I am. The Cardinal host TCU. The Bears face UC Davis at home.

• One of my Stanford sources who is around the program daily reports that the roster has more depth. The source said: “The offensive line is WAY better.” That’s not saying much after what we saw last season, but still. If Stanford is going to win four games this season — and I think they’ll be 4-8 — it will need the starting quarterback and receivers to lead the way.

• Cal’s over/under win total for the season is 6.5. I originally picked 6-6, but after watching Georgia Tech vs. Florida State I found myself wondering if the Bears might get to 7-5.

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