NC State gets this weekend off to reset after the kind of Week 0 loss that leaves a mark, but the Wolfpack won’t have much time to breathe. Friday brings Richmond to Carter-Finley Stadium, and the Spiders are already 2-0 after surviving Howard on the road. With the Pack’s schedule rolling forward, here’s where NC State’s opponents stand after the opening week of the season.
Richmond has looked sharp out of the gate again. The Spiders jumped on Howard early, building a 20-0 cushion by scoring touchdowns on three of their first four drives.
A fumble by quarterback Ashten Snelsire opened the door for the Bison, but Richmond steadied itself. Snelsire finished with two passing touchdowns, and Aziz Foster-Powell added his third rushing score through two games to keep the Spiders unbeaten heading into Friday.
Vanderbilt’s opener was a strange one. Clark Lea’s team actually trailed Austin Peay after the first quarter, 6-5, before settling in and pulling away for a 28-9 win.
The offense never really found a clean rhythm at home, though, and the Commodores scored only two offensive touchdowns. Blaze Berlowitz started at quarterback and ran for a touchdown, but the passing game never clicked.
Jared Curtis, the No. 2 overall player in the 2026 class, took over in the second half and went 7-of-9 for 60 yards. The two quarterbacks combined for 67 of Vanderbilt’s 187 rushing yards, which makes this a position group worth watching as NC State heads toward that road game.
Appalachian State wasted no time making a statement in its opener. The Mountaineers hammered Maine 55-3, piling up 647 total yards and 55 points.
Malachi Singleton, the former Arkansas and Purdue backup quarterback, was efficient and explosive, throwing for 291 yards and three touchdowns in the blowout. That said, next week’s matchup with ECU should tell a lot more about what App State really has.
Wake Forest opened Year 2 under Jake Dickert with a convincing 38-16 win over Akron on Thursday night. Gio Lopez looked every bit like a dual-threat quarterback, producing 389 total yards and three touchdowns.
The Demon Deacons also ran for 203 yards as a team. Wake will get a much clearer test over the next three weeks against Purdue, Miami and Louisville, but Dickert is now 10-4 since taking over, and if Lopez keeps operating in a competent offense, there’s something to work with there.
Stanford’s early season has already gone from encouraging to ugly. After beating Hawai'i in Week 0, the Cardinal got rolled by Miami, 45-6, on Friday night.
Stanford actually won the turnover battle 2-0, but that didn’t matter much because the defense had no answer for Darian Mensah and Malachi Toney. Mensah threw for more than 400 yards and five touchdowns, while Toney caught three of those scores and set Miami’s single-game receiving yards record with 234 yards on 12 catches.
Stanford’s schedule doesn’t get any friendlier, with trips to Duke, Wake Forest and Notre Dame over the next four weeks and Georgia Tech coming to Palo Alto in between. Davis Warren and Micah Ford getting back on track would help a lot.
California had the game right where it wanted it for a while against UCLA. The Bears led early and got it tied at 24-24 entering the fourth quarter, but the final period turned into a mess.
Jaron-Keawe Sagapolutele threw two fourth-quarter interceptions, both of which UCLA turned into touchdowns on the way to a 45-24 win. The loss was compounded by an apparent ankle injury to Sagapolutele, who was hobbled for much of the second half and appeared to aggravate it further on the final drive.
That’s something to monitor before Syracuse next week.
Duke found a way to beat Tulane, and that mattered, especially after failing to do it last season. Nate Sheppard carried the offense with 227 rushing yards and two touchdowns on 35 carries, while the defense controlled the game all afternoon.
The Blue Devils recorded three sacks, seven tackles for loss and gave up only 54 rushing yards. The passing game, though, was rough.
Walker Eget, making his first start, went 13-of-26 for 131 yards, and only two of his completions went for more than 20 yards. Illinois may try to crowd the box next week and force Duke to show more balance in Champaign.
Syracuse put up one of the loudest opening-week scores on the board, blasting New Hampshire 66-3. Steve Angeli threw for 263 yards and three touchdowns, while Shavane Anderson Jr. and Tylik Hill combined for 192 rushing yards and four scores.
Umari Hatcher also made a big impact with nine touches for 158 total yards and two touchdowns. Syracuse will try to keep that offense humming against Cal next week.
Florida State got enough done offensively to open with a win over New Mexico State, but the real test comes Monday night against SMU. The Seminoles’ ACC opener in Tallahassee will tell more, and this article will be updated after that game.
UNC-Chapel Hill started the season by knocking off TCU in Dublin, as the Horned Frogs faded badly in the final three quarters of their first game without Josh Hoover. Bill Belichick guided the Tar Heels to the upset with a strong defensive effort, picking up his fifth win since arriving in Chapel Hill. Even with the on-field result, the off-field noise hasn’t stopped, with general manager Michael Lombardi resigning and the fallout continuing after that move.
In Other News...
Former NC State Forward Lands A First Head Coaching Chance
Levi Watkins is getting his first shot at running a program, and it comes at the high school level after a long climb through college basketball. The former NC State forward, who played for the Wolfpack from 2001 to 2005, has been named the head coach at Green Hope High School, bringing years of experience in assistant coaching and basketball operations to a new kind of challenge.
Watkins takes over for Richard Howell and inherits a Green Hope team that struggled last season, which makes the job as much about rebuilding as it is about game-night decisions. For NC State fans, it is another reminder of how often former players keep moving through the game, and now Watkins gets the chance to put his own stamp on a program that is looking for a reset. [Read more 🡒]