Brian’s College Football Top 5: Week 3
Photo by Hannah Levine from Pitt News
Week 3 was actually very difficult to find a top 5.
Not because of a lack of options, but because of far too many.
So I want to start with some honorable mentions, like Bowling Green beating up on Liberty, and FIU winning their battle against FAU.
They didn’t make the cut for the top 5, but they were noticed.
And now, the main course.
5. Stanford Cardinal
I, and I think many others, expected this to be a really rough year for Stanford, considering a not so talented roster and a late change at head coach after firing Troy Taylor.
And while Boston College is far from the top tier of college football, this still should have been an easy win for the Eagles.
But Stanford had other ideas, winning the game 30-20 thanks to almost 10 yards per carry from running back Micah Ford.
Is it a signature win? No.
But it shows things aren’t horribly dire in Palo Alto.
4. New Mexico Lobos
This should honestly be higher, but UCLA is really, really bad.
With all that being said, they should still be better than the Lobos, but Jason Eck has already shown against Michigan that his New Mexico teams won’t be the pushovers of years past, and he showed that in a big way Friday night as New Mexico destroyed UCLA 35-10.
Again, I don’t think it can be overstated how bad things are at UCLA right now, but even still, this is a huge win for the Lobos.
3. Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets
Georgia Tech is mean. They’re physical. They’re going to make your life a living hell.
That’s what they did against Clemson, and that’s how they got a 24-21 win over the Tigers to break a 9 game losing streak against Clemson.
Even though Clemson might not be what I thought they’d be, this is a good win heading into the heart of ACC play for the Yellow Jackets.
2. Old Dominion Monarchs
About a month ago or so, Virginia Tech and Old Dominion announced that they are changing their original agreement and would no longer be playing games in Norfolk at ODU’s home stadium.
Personally, I think that’s lame, and that Power 5 teams should play road games against G5 opponents, but that’s neither here nor there.
As it turns out, I guess it doesn’t really matter where they play, because on Saturday Night in Blacksburg, Old Dominion absolutely torched the Hokies.
ODU won 45-26, without their best defensive player Jason Henderson, and the game was not as close as the score indicates.
This was a grade A certified ass whooping.
So much so that it led to Virginia Tech biting the bullet on Brent Pry’s 6 million dollar buyout and firing him on Sunday.
A good win, and maybe a nice little bit of revenge for ODU for Virginia Tech refusing to come to Norfolk.
1. West Virginia Mountaineers
In 2007, West Virginia was one win away from playing for a national championship.
What resulted was a devastating 13-9 loss to Pitt thanks to some odd coaching decisions, head coach Rich Rodriguez left for Michigan and burnt tons of bridges on his way out, and the program never was the same.
Now, 18 years later, Rich Rod returned to WVU, and their first game against Pitt was, go figure, 9/13/2025.
And on Saturday night, WVU lost the lead thanks to some odd coaching decisions from Rich Rod, and it looked like they were headed towards another tough loss against their arch rival.
But despite being down 10 with 5 minutes left in the game, WVU stormed back to force overtime, where they eventually got the win.
It doesn’t make up for what happened in 2007. It doesn’t necessarily mean WVU is back on the right track.
But take the time to watch Rich Rod in the post game celebrations.
It sure as hell had to feel good.
