Brock Bowers didn’t just become one of the NFL’s top tight ends by accident. At Georgia, he put together a three-year run that looked almost unreal on paper: 2,538 receiving yards, 26 touchdowns, two national championships and a 38-2 record in the games he played.
He also won the Mackey Award in 2022 and 2023, and the part that still jumps out is how fast it all started. As a true freshman, Bowers arrived and immediately looked like a problem for every defense he saw, finishing that season with 56 catches for 882 yards and 13 touchdowns.
That’s the standard now being tossed at USC freshman tight end Mark Bowman.
Bowman, a five-star recruit, opened his season Saturday in USC’s 42-26 win over San Jose State in Year 5 under Lincoln Riley. The stat line was modest - three catches for 15 yards - but the flashes were there, and one first-half play was enough to get college football analyst David Pollack talking.
"(I) had an SEC coach tell me he is the closest thing to Brock Bowers he has seen in recruiting," Pollack posted on X. "Mark Bowman. Get to know that name, America!"
It’s a heavy comparison, but it also says something about what USC thinks it may have on its hands. Bowman doesn’t need to be Bowers on day one.
What matters most right now is how quickly he settles into the college game and how much bigger his role becomes as the season goes on. Still, the upside is obvious.
Bowers came into Georgia with plenty of hype and turned himself into one of the most dangerous players on the roster right away. Bowman now has the chance to carve out a similar kind of path at USC.
Three catches in one game won’t make anybody a star, and they certainly don’t prove the Bowers comparison. But when an SEC coach with a track record for evaluating elite talent says a freshman tight end reminds him of Bowers, that’s not the kind of comment people should shrug off.
For now, Bowman is just getting started. But if Pollack’s source is right, Mark Bowman is a name college football fans may want to keep close.
In Other News...
USC Just Got Another Reminder It No Longer Looks Like An Elite Program
USCs place in the national conversation has become a little easier to measure by who is missing from the preseason spotlight. The Trojans did not place a single player on the USA TODAY Sports preseason All-America college football team, a list that leaned heavily toward the sports familiar heavyweights from Oregon, Ohio State, Indiana, Georgia and Texas. For a program that still carries a blueblood name, it is another sign that the market no longer treats USC like one of the sports defining powers.
The bigger concern is how often this sort of reminder keeps arriving for a team that has not reached the College Football Playoff in 12 seasons and now heads into a pivotal 2026 campaign under Lincoln Riley. USC is still being measured against the standard set by programs such as Ohio State and Oregon, but the preseason rankings suggest it has work to do before it can claim that tier again. For a fan base used to thinking in championships, the gap between reputation and reality is becoming harder to ignore. [Read more 🡒]
USC May Have Found A New Weapon Sooner Than Expected
USCs 42-26 win over San Jos State offered an early glimpse of a player who may have arrived sooner than expected. True freshman Trent Mosley caught seven passes for 118 yards in his college debut, becoming the first USC freshman since 2014 to clear 100 receiving yards in a first game and giving the Trojans another dynamic option to watch as the season unfolds.
The performance came on a day when USC was also sorting out its leadership structure, naming Tobias Raymond, Kilian OConnor, Alex VanSumeren and Jayden Maiava as permanent captains for the season. OConnor is currently sidelined by injury but remains part of that leadership group, while the program also unveiled the Progressive Insurance logo on the field as part of a multiyear sponsorship agreement, another sign of how much is changing around the team even as Mosleys emergence grabs the attention. [Read more 🡒]
Notre Dame Fans Just Got A Reminder Why This Rivalry Matters
The USC-Notre Dame rivalry has always been bigger than a single game, and the absence of it this season made that clear in a hurry. The matchup has been played almost every year since 1926, so when scheduling disagreements pushed it off the calendar, USCs season opener against San Jose State took on extra weight as a replacement game.
It did not take long for the atmosphere to tell its own story, with attendance noticeably lighter than what the Trojans are used to when a true marquee opponent is in the building. Notre Dame and USC have since struck an agreement to bring the series back in future seasons, a reminder that some games are too important to stay sidelined for long. [Read more 🡒]