Week 6 Overreactions: Shorthanded Georgia still sport's king, Mike Elko bites the hand that feeds him

Georgia is still the apex predator in the SEC, Lane Kiffin still can't beat a first-year head coach on the road and the hierarchy of the Big Ten has changed.

Week 7 was anticipated to be the marquee slate, not Week 6. But for the casual doubters, Saturday delivered a smorgasbord of outstanding football, dramatic upsets and even messy games that still yielded thrilling finishes and unexpected outcomes.

Right when you assume the doubters have it figured out, authentic football wisdom pulls you right back in. 

No. 2 Georgia beat No. 6 Alabama 20-17 in the game of the week, giving Kirby Smart his first win in Tuscaloosa as head coach. It was a close, defensive-minded battle as many expected. Veteran Georgia quarterback Gunner Stockton edged out promising youngster Keelon Russell on a rain-soaked Saban Field at Bryant-Denny Stadium. The game lived up to the hype, but in the end, the Dean of the SEC proved he was still the King after so many were reluctant to crown Nick Saban's heir apparent. Kirby Smart, who has done nothing but win back-to-back SEC titles after Saban tucked tail for a cushy TV gig, continues to win, and win his way. 

"I don't judge my happiness or success on how we play 'Bama. I've got a lot of respect for this place. Nick taught me a lot," Smart told reporters after the game.

Smart, Stockton, and Georgia answered any remaining questions in Tuscaloosa on Saturday, asserting their claim to the top spot in the country.

Georgia doesn't need to chuck the ball all over the field, nor does it require a single tailback to carry the load to win big ball games. Stockton threw only 22 passes, but only four fell incomplete, including an interception, as he finished with 249 passing yards and a touchdown. Dwight Phillips Jr. ran for 120 yards and Bo Walker added 69 -- all without top 'backs Nate Frazier and Chauncey Bowens. Only one receiver caught more than three passes.

Georgia boasts enviable depth, and as the nation's deepest squad, it can attack opponents with virtually every weapon in its Swiss Army knife.

Mike Elko doesn't get it

Texas A&M has lost five of its last seven games against power opponents, and its quarterback, Marcel Reed, is an inconsistent mess.

The fans are mad, but Elko doesn't care about that, umm, "cesspool."

"There's a difference to me between the fan base and social media," Elko said Saturday after a 27-6 loss at Missouri. "So there's one group that I really don't care much about. Billy's cesspool can go be Billy's cesspool. Our fan base, stay with us, be behind us. We're going to build something that we told you we were going to build. So we're in a really bad spot right now, but we'll work our way out of it."

"Billy" is Billy Liucci, the well-known co-owner of the popular TexAgs fan site. Liucci called Elko's comments "ridiculously tone deaf" on social media.

I agree. 

After all, that "cesspool" may have helped Elko get one of the best jobs in the country. An intense fan backlash on TexAgs in November 2023 erupted only after news leaked that Kentucky's Mark Stoops was poised to take the job. That pushback forced A&M administrators to reverse course and hire Elko, who was serving as Duke's head coach after a prior stint as the Aggies' defensive coordinator.

In many ways, Elko owes Liucci and his "cesspool" a thank-you card for his $69 million contract.

It's never smart to go after the fans, especially after a 3-3 start and a CFP appearance last season that ended with a thud at home. It's worse when you do it against a fan base that helped fund one of the sport's richest rosters.

Good luck on the fundraising circuit in the offseason, coach!

Kiffin's Konundrum 

Lane Kiffin is a mediocre road coach against SEC teams. After a 35-34 overtime road loss at Kentucky, his conference record is 14-16 away from home as an SEC head coach.

Apparently, LSU believes two losses before the midpoint of the season are worth $13 million. As they say about NIL, if that's the market, it's the market. Kiffin owns the third-most expensive contract in college football, and he's in it for the long haul in Baton Rouge with the athletics department that is already so dug in. LSU's river gambling may pan out in a few years (hell, Ed Orgeron won a national title), but let's not let a misguided narrative stand in the way of the facts:

• Kiffin has compiled an 0-2 record on the road against first-year head coaches this year, including a loss to Pete Golding at Ole Miss.
• He is the sole coach among the top five highest-paid coaches who has never won a major conference championship.
• In fact, Kiffin has never even appeared in a power conference title game.

LSU is betting on the future. That's fine. At least, I hope it pans out, because Kiffin's past is littered with hopeful beginnings that quickly transformed into disappointing shortcomings at Tennessee, USC and Ole Miss. Kiffin wants you to believe that's no fault of his own, but the result of outside forces. 

Yet, facts rarely interfere with his carefully constructed narrative. The record shows it. Ole Miss explicitly cautioned him a year earlier as he weighed offers from Florida and LSU, making it clear he wouldn't lead the team in postseason play if he accepted either role. Nevertheless, he tried to frame his decision as a crusade to stand by his players, demanding to coach Ole Miss in the playoffs after accepting the LSU job, despite management having already ruled that out.

Recall his abrupt departure from Tennessee for his "dream job" at USC, capped off by a bizarre press conference where he attempted to dictate terms to the local media on his way out. Or remember his Ole Miss team suffering a decisive loss to Arkansas right as he was actively entertaining interest from Auburn.

And that's just his life on the field.

Eventually, Kiffin may prove his skeptics wrong. With LSU's immense talent and deep financial resources, the foundation is there for him to win a championship during his tenure in Baton Rouge.

Eventually. 

Saturday, however, reflected the past. He fell to Will Stein, Kentucky's rookie head coach, who even borrowed a tactic from Golding's playbook, running two goal-line formations to coax Kiffin into calling a timeout in a masterclass of gamesmanship.

Meanwhile, supporters will keep elevating him and excusing his shortcomings. Yet Week 6 was a sharp reminder of his recurring inability to meet his own ambitious goals, no matter how many social media stars tag along to whichever stadium he's coaching in. 

As it turns out, reality looks different outside your bubble.

Texas is (sliding) back 

Texas' season isn't over, but its reign atop the polls is.

Pin the rise and the fall on Arch Manning.

Texas' favorite Manning led the Horns to a 17-7 lead, then gave Oklahoma 10 points in the fourth quarter on a pick-six and another interception that set up the walk-off field goal. The Longhorns' 27-24 loss was long overdue. They nearly lost to Ohio State in Week 2 but rallied back in a legendary fourth-quarter comeback, and two weeks ago they flirted with disaster at Tennessee. 

Saturday was the Longhorns' first loss, but it won't be the last. Florida, Ole Miss, Mississippi State, Missouri and LSU remain on the schedule. All five were ranked in the Top 25 entering Sunday.

Manning is as hot and cold as they come in the pocket, and at this point in his career, he is what he is: a good college quarterback surrounded by elite talent. He was 19 of 31 for 260 yards and three touchdowns against two interceptions. His Heisman odds doubled from +3000 to +6500 at FanDuel during the game. They oughta just remove him from the board.

Has Oklahoma (3-2) regained some much-needed offensive confidence? I'm not so sure. The Sooners put up 238 yards, averaged just 2.7 yards per rush, and were 2-of-13 on third downs.

"We ain't that bad," Oklahoma coach Brent Venables told ABC after the game. "When we put it all together, get out of our own way, take care of the football, good things happen. We've got a really good football team. There's a lot of yeah-buts going into the game. Yeah-but, yeah-but, yeah-but. And these guys continue to believe. It doesn't matter what everybody else says, what everybody thinks; it only matters what we believe and what we do. Our guys have refused to break."

The Sooners' schedule the rest of the way is more favorable, with Mississippi State, Florida, Ole Miss and Missouri the only remaining ranked teams.

Something's Bruin in the Big Ten

In college football's multi-million-dollar search for the next Curt Cignetti, the ideal candidate might have been right where Cignetti surfaced.

No. 21 UCLA moved to 5-0 under Bob Chesney with a gritty 17-15 road win over No. 13 Oregon. While much of the narrative will center on Oregon's meltdown -- marked by seven turnovers and a benching of Dylan Raiola in favor of a third-string quarterback after a dismal opening half -- the spotlight belongs on the Bruins' performance.

Whether UCLA is the new Indiana is complicated. Star quarterback Nico Iamaleava was held out for the second half after throwing two interceptions and suffering a leg injury, and the Bruins left a lot of points on the board because of mistakes. Still, the similarities are hard to deny. Both programs flipped overnight with a slew of JMU transfers, led by coaches who won championships there and elsewhere, as they climbed the ladder from Division II and III to the FBS.

That takes great coaching and, more importantly, a great eye for identifying talent. Remarkably, Chesney and Curt Cignetti are 10-0 combined this season: one rallied from a 17-6 fourth-quarter deficit Saturday, and the other held on to win after building a 17-6 fourth-quarter lead. Like Cignetti, Chesney is already breaking records in his first season leading a big program. He's the first UCLA coach to start his career 5-0, and he's won 15 straight regular season games, the second-longest active streak in the country.

UCLA's path to the CFP suddenly doesn't seem impossible. Heck, it seems probable. The Bruins should be favored in their next five games before traveling to Michigan and ending the regular season against USC. Does 11-1 get UCLA into the CFP with two ranked wins? Does 10-2 work?

We'll take that week by week. For now, I bet Chesney and his father, "Coach Senior," are celebrating with a bag of Skittles and a few Mentos.

Nebrask-ugh

Losing does funny things to a man. At Nebraska, losing just isn't funny anymore.

That's the only way to explain Matt Rhule's decision to keep the offense on the field for fourth-and-9 at its own 44-yard line with 4:47 remaining. In typical Nebraska fashion, Anthony Colandrea overthrew a receiver, turning the ball over on downs. 

If it worked, Rhule is a genius. But it didn't, not against the defending national champion, who suddenly found momentum. Indiana scored 14 unanswered points before Rhule's decision, taking a 20-17 lead it never relinquished. The Huskers lost their 31st straight game against a ranked opponent and their eighth straight home game decided by three points or less.

Yup, another close call on the big stage. Some call it the Cornhusker Curse. It seems the ghost of Nebraska's past is actively clouding its head coach's decision-making. Nebraska's defense got the ball back on a punt, but instead of playing field position and setting up a slow-rolling offense for a go-ahead score, Rhule single-handedly flipped the field on his own squad and made a potential comeback all the harder.

Predictably, Nebraska couldn't get far enough down the field after starting at its 5.

Everyone outside of Indiana feels terrible for the Huskers, but as much as Rhule was responsible for grabbing the 17-6 lead with a ball-control offense (Indiana had the ball for less than 8 minutes in the first half), he is just as responsible for how it fell apart.

The Cornhuskers' defense suffocated Indiana and smothered running back Turbo Richards most of the afternoon. When Colandrea sprinted and hopped into the end zone on a 39-yard touchdown run to extend the lead to 17-6 in the defensive slugfest, Memorial Stadium came unhinged, cautiously celebrating what appeared to be a coronation of Rhule's rebuild of the program. Then the most Nebrask-ugh thing that could happen did: On Indiana's next play, Josh Hoover fired a bullet, Nick Marsh split the Huskers' coverage, broke an arm tackle, and sprinted untouched for a 75-yard touchdown.

Nebraska had allowed 15 combined points in the fourth quarter of its first five games. On Saturday, Indiana flipped the script and scored two touchdowns in under 5 minutes in the fourth.

Worry not, Huskers. You get another chance to revisit the past again next week against Oregon, when Dylan Raiola returns to Nebraska with a bullseye on his chest. Just don't let the past affect your future as much as it has over the last 15 years.

Give Shane Beamer a break

Florida was my favorite team in the country two weeks ago. The Gators played smashmouth football and had adopted the unmistakable swagger of their head coach, Jon Sumrall. Now they look lost in The Swamp, their secondary bumbling through mistake after mistake.

I'm unsure whether this marks the start of another familiar Florida collapse, but South Carolina appears to have regained its footing under Shane Beamer. Though the embattled head coach remains on the hot seat, he and his team answered the bell under intense pressure Saturday, winning 38-19 in Gainesville. Frankly, the rebound is remarkable in an era dominated by NIL and money-over-team attitudes when seasons go South. Look no further than the two South Carolina superstars. Dylan Stewart forced two fumbles fresh off suspension. LaNorris Sellers scored five times for the second time in his career. 

I joked afterward that South Carolina must have had a hell of a practice week. It's one of Beamer's favorite post-practice comments, even when the team looks anything but great.  

But, truly, that was a hell of a game plan and response by Beamer, who has several realistic opportunities to get South Carolina back on track with winnable games against Tennessee, Oklahoma, Texas A&M, Arkansas and Clemson remaining on the schedule. The Vols come to Columbia in two weeks. Williams-Brice Stadium will be rocking.

Beamer just needs to stay off social media, stop reacting to the fans with pitchforks and keep coaching his team. Otherwise, that seat will warm back up, and the boosters will wire that $24 million to get him out of the Palmetto State.

North Carolina, raise up

Pat Narduzzi called out AP voters a week ago for not ranking his Panthers before a thrilling win at Virginia Tech. Does that mean he'll rank North Carolina this week?

Bill Belichick's Tar Heels defeated No. 25 Pitt 21-17, delivering the program's first ranked win in three years. In the preseason, the CBS Sports staff picked North Carolina as the ACC's most underrated team. They've proven it, moving to 3-2 as the season approaches its midpoint.

Kudos to Belichick for steering this squad forward despite nonstop off-field distractions. The same certainly can't be said for Deion Sanders and the situation unfolding at Colorado, though he's safe because the former administration gave him a massive contract with a $25.5 million buyout.