Darian Mensah still sits atop the ACC quarterback board, even after Miami came up short against Notre Dame in a game that turned into a grind down the stretch. Mensah’s Hurricanes fell 31-24, but he did enough to stay in the conversation at No. 1 as Week 11 arrives.
The Notre Dame-Miami matchup had the kind of back-and-forth tension that makes quarterback play matter on every snap. CJ Carr and the Fighting Irish built a 21-point lead early in the third quarter, only for Mensah and Miami to claw all the way back to within a touchdown. The Hurricanes even had a potential game-tying touchdown pass ruled incomplete late in the fourth quarter.
Mensah’s numbers were still strong despite the loss. He threw for 269 yards and three touchdowns, hit Elija Lofton and Cooper Barkate, and helped give Miami life late even while throwing a season-high 19 incompletions. The first weekend without Malachi Toney ended in defeat, but Mensah’s performance kept him in the top spot.
The other big quarterback performance from Week 10 came in SMU’s 51-28 win over Virginia Tech, where Kevin Jennings took over after halftime. The Mustangs led 23-14 at the break, then scored touchdowns on each of their first three second-half possessions to blow the game open.
Jennings finished 24 of 32 for 350 yards and four touchdowns, with Yamir Knight catching six passes for 103 yards and three of those scores. His lone blemish was an interception on a tipped pass at the line of scrimmage.
Virginia Tech needed Ethan Grunkemeyer to keep pace, and he did plenty in the first half. He threw for 291 yards and a touchdown and added a rushing score before halftime, but the Hokies couldn’t sustain it. A late fumble and a forced throw into a tight window that turned into an interception helped swing things fully toward SMU.
That result sets up one of the best quarterback matchups of Week 11, with Wake Forest heading to SMU in the early window. Gio Lopez and Jennings are both running offenses that have scored at least 20 points in every game this season, and the stakes are real for both teams’ ACC Championship hopes.
Lopez sat out Wake Forest’s 77-0 win over Merrimack for precautionary reasons, but his season has been excellent. In eight games, he has thrown for 2,176 yards, 18 touchdowns and only one interception, while also rushing for 317 yards and six scores. The Demon Deacons’ defense has also tightened up, not allowing more than 14 points in a game since the end of September.
Another ranked quarterback gets a week off in Stanford’s Davis Warren, whose Cardinal were idle because of their Week 0 game against Hawaii. Through nine games, Warren has thrown for 2,203 yards, 14 touchdowns and three interceptions. Stanford now heads to Virginia Tech, where the Hokies are coming off a game in which SMU piled up 569 yards and 51 points.
Grunkemeyer’s own spot in the rankings is tied to that same shootout. Against SMU, he was productive but not quite enough, and Virginia Tech’s defense has now been exposed in back-to-back ways by a high-powered offense. Stanford’s defense offers a different kind of challenge, but not one that inspires much confidence after allowing 545 total yards in a 52-24 loss at Louisville two weeks ago.
Speaking of Louisville, Teddy Kienholz also earned his place in the Week 11 rankings after the Cardinals’ 44-17 win over Georgia Tech. Louisville leaned on the run game, but Kienholz still went 17 of 25 for 182 yards and two touchdowns. He also led the team on the ground with 81 of its 251 rushing yards, including a second touchdown pass threaded into a tight window to TreyShun Hurry.
North Carolina’s Gio Edwards Jr. joins the list after a sharp showing in the Tar Heels’ 38-21 win at Connecticut. He finished with 255 yards and three touchdowns, bounced back from an early interception, and managed the game cleanly. One of his best throws was a 23-yard screen completion to Demon June.
Duke’s Darian Eget also cracks the rankings for the first time this season after guiding the Blue Devils to a 41-3 win at NC State. Duke leaned on Nate Sheppard and the ground game, but Eget still provided steady help through the air, finishing with 208 yards and repeatedly finding receivers near the sideline when the offense needed a spark.
The Blue Devils now travel to Miami, where the Hurricanes’ defense has NFL talent but has looked weaker than expected over the last month.
North Carolina’s next test comes at home against Louisville, with the Tar Heels returning to Kenan Stadium for their penultimate home game. Louisville’s defense has been inconsistent through ACC play, though it did come off one of its better outings in the rout of Georgia Tech.
SMU’s home finale against Wake Forest looms as one of the week’s biggest games, and Miami gets Duke at Hard Rock Stadium in another matchup that could shape the rankings again before long.
In Other News...
Wake Forest Has A Chance To Prove Its ACC Standing This Weekend
Wake Forest kept rolling with a lopsided win over Merrimack, a 77-0 result that did little to change the bigger picture around the program but did reinforce how comfortably the Demon Deacons have handled the stretch they are in. The latest ACC Football Power Rankings still place the Deacs at No. 2, where they have sat for seven straight weeks as Miami continues to hold the top spot.
The real test is still ahead, and it comes with far more weight than anything Wake Forest has faced recently. A trip to Dallas to meet No. 4 SMU now looms as the kind of game that can sharpen the league race and clarify where the Deacons truly stand in the ACC pecking order, with the rankings and the upcoming schedule both pointing toward a matchup that should say plenty about their championship path. [Read more 🡒]
Former Notre Dame QB Sam Hartman Is Headed For A Very Different Spotlight
Sam Hartmans football path has already taken a few unexpected turns, from five seasons at Wake Forest to a stop at Notre Dame and then on to the Washington Commanders practice squad. Now the quarterback is stepping into a completely different kind of spotlight, one that has little to do with playbooks or pocket presence.
ABC has tapped Hartman to lead the next season of The Bachelor, with the 30th edition set to premiere in March. For a player still attached to an NFL roster, it is a notable detour and one that shifts the attention from training camp fields to prime-time television, with plenty of curiosity still hanging over how this latest chapter will play out. [Read more 🡒]
Wake Forest Faces A Season-Shaping Test Against SMUs Dangerous Offense
Wake Forest heads into a pivotal regular-season matchup with SMU knowing the stakes reach well beyond one Saturday afternoon. With ACC Championship hopes still in play, this is the kind of game that can tilt a season one way or the other, and the Demon Deacons are staring at a Mustangs offense that has earned its reputation by making opponents defend every inch of the field.
The challenge starts with quarterback Kevin Jennings and running back Kendrick Raphael, but SMU also brings defensive pieces such as Marques White and Kilgore who can make life difficult in their own right. For Wake Forest, the margin for error is thin, and the result could end up shaping not just the conference race but the programs postseason outlook as well. [Read more 🡒]