The biggest news of Week 9 came off the field. Clemson star quarterback Trevor Lawrence had tested positive for COVID-19, and coach Dabo Swinney said following the Tigers’ 32-28 comeback win over Boston College on Saturday that Lawrence will unfortunately not be back in time for the trip to Notre Dame next weekend.
Freshman quarterback D.J. Uiagalelei passed for 342 yards and played well in filling in for Lawrence, but the Tigers simply aren’t the same team without their Heisman Trophy front runner.
Clemson was expected to knock off Notre Dame but now that Trevor Lawrence is not playing, anything can happen. Clemson will have to step up in other places and in this one, it’s going to come down to defense.
If Georgia loses to Florida and Cincinnati beats Houston, that would put Cincinnati in position to get in the top five. Wouldn’t that be funny.
Week 10 matchups to look for
No. 1 Clemson at No. 4 Notre Dame | 7:30 p.m. | NBC
Rutgers at No. 3 Ohio State | 7:30 p.m. | Big Ten Network
No. 8 Florida vs. No. 5 Georgia (Jacksonville, Florida) | 3:30 p.m. | CBS
Houston at No. 6 Cincinnati | 3:30 p.m. | ESPN
No. 7 Texas A&M at South Carolina | 7 p.m. | ESPN
Stanford at No. 12 Oregon | 7:30 p.m. | ABC
No. 23 Michigan at No. 13 Indiana | Noon | FS1
Here’s a look at the top-five teams in college football with some news and notes.
Alabama: An example of Alabama’s SEC success? Senior DeVonta Smith has more receiving yards (203) than Mississippi State had total yards (200) in the Crimson Tide’s 41-0 shutout.
Clemson: Uiagalelei isn’t the only five-star freshman killing it for the Tigers. Defensive linemen Myles Murphy and Bryan Breese both have combined for 46 tackles, 11 tackles for loss, nearly 7 sacks and 10 quarterback pressures.
Ohio State: Fields has six scores and seven incompletions. Two of those incomplete throws were dropped touchdowns in the end zone by Ohio State receivers.
Notre Dame: With surprisingly little attention, the Fighting Irish own the nation’s longest active winning streak at 12 games.
Georgia: Kirby Smart will again be tasked to answer questions about his choice at quarterback after Stetson Bennett had two interceptions in a sloppy 14-3 win against Kentucky. On the positive side, the Georgia’s defense is playing at a championship level.
As far as around the nation, we have an interesting weekend ahead of us in college football with lots of good games. So good, it could change the entire college football rankings moving forward, and not to mention the other leagues starting back up to create more football for us to watch.
