Week 1 didn’t produce any AP Top 25 losses to unranked teams, but that doesn’t mean every ranked team looked the part. A handful of poll members survived, yet left behind enough questions to make the first rankings update of September feel a little shaky.
Michigan’s controversial win over Western Michigan was enough to trigger a historic drop out of the polls, while Oregon, SMU, Washington and Houston all had to sweat through close calls against unranked opponents. By the time the new AP Top 25 came out, the theme was clear: some teams escaped, but not all of them impressed.
Oregon entered its home opener against Boise State as a 24.5-point favorite, but the Broncos looked like the sharper team early and carried a halftime lead. The Ducks finally settled in after the break and pulled out a 20-10 finish over the final two quarters.
Dante Moore helped turn the game around with a 62-yard touchdown shortly after Boise State tied it on a field goal. Moore finished 28 of 37 for 378 yards and three touchdowns.
Even with the win, Oregon slid four spots in the rankings. The Ducks can start answering some of the questions around them when they head to Oklahoma State.
Texas Tech didn’t have the same level of drama in its 33-10 win over Abilene Christian, but the Red Raiders also didn’t exactly make a statement after an offseason full of noise. Favored by more than six touchdowns, they managed only three touchdowns and settled for four field goals.
The defense did its job, limiting the Wildcats to 194 yards, including 75 on the ground at 2.6 yards per carry. Will Hammond threw for 298 yards and a touchdown, but he was intercepted in the second quarter.
Texas Tech left three red zone chances as field goals, and it’ll need to be sharper when it goes to Oregon State this weekend. The Beavers nearly pulled off an upset against another team on this list.
SMU opened with a 27-24 road win at Florida State, but it was anything but smooth. The Mustangs piled up more than 200 yards than the Seminoles and controlled key third-down situations on both sides of the ball, yet they also coughed it up four times.
Three of those turnovers came in Florida State territory, and SMU was flagged six times. Rhett Lashlee’s team looked like a group playing its first game together, which is why the next stretch matters.
The Mustangs should be better if they clean up the ball security, but they’ll have to show it fast with Louisville coming up in two weeks. SMU still moved up in the poll despite the tight finish.
Washington’s 2026 opener was a 24-10 win over rival Washington State, though the Huskies never fully put the game away. The Cougars were scoreless in the fourth quarter, but they made things uncomfortable by cutting the margin to 10-7 and then 17-10.
Washington managed points on only two of its first nine drives, including one trip that started at the Washington State 13, only to unravel into fourth-and-33 before a field goal salvaged it. That stood in sharp contrast to last year’s 59-24 road win in the matchup.
Washington was favored by more than three touchdowns this time around, and the offense - with quarterback Demond Williams Jr. among the returning starters - now gets a chance to settle in against Utah State. The Huskies dropped two spots and face a relatively light September before going to USC on October 3.
Houston got the win it needed, but not the clean one it wanted in a 33-20 home opener against Oregon State. The Cougars, who came in with 12 combined starters back and plenty of experience, built a 26-7 lead in the third quarter before the Beavers answered with back-to-back touchdowns and made it a one-score game.
Houston responded with a 9-play, 75-yard scoring drive and then stopped Oregon State on fourth down to shut the door. Even as a 21-point favorite, the Cougars were slowed by two turnovers and 10 penalties.
Still, they put up 533 total yards and held Oregon State to 25 rushing yards on 1.04 yards per attempt. Houston can work on its passing defense against Southern on Saturday night, and then it faces a quick turnaround before a trip to Texas Tech on Friday, September 18.
The Cougars moved up a spot, but they’ll need to tighten things up fast.
In Other News...
Washington Freshman May Have Already Changed This Defensive Rotation
The snap counts in Washingtons 24-10 win over Washington State said plenty about how the staff views its defensive rotation, and Derek Colman-Brusa was one of the clearest examples. In his first college game, the freshman defensive tackle was on the field often enough to matter, and he made that time count with disruptive moments that showed why the Huskies were willing to trust a newcomer in a meaningful spot.
Colman-Brusa arrived as a consensus four-star recruit and was originally projected as an edge rusher before the Huskies shifted him inside after an offseason of added size. The result was a debut that fit the programs broader approach under a staff intent on playing the best players regardless of age, and it left open a bigger question for the weeks ahead: how much more of the interior rotation he can carve out once the games keep getting bigger. [Read more 🡒]
Washington Gets An Early Warning About Bronco Mendenhalls Aggies
Bronco Mendenhalls first Utah State team has already given Washington a little early-season film to study, and the first impression is not especially tidy. Dan Allisons breakdown of the Aggies paints a picture of a program still trying to settle in under a new coach, with both sides of the ball carrying a mix of familiar Mendenhall traits and the kind of growing pains that can show up fast when a staff is asking players to learn on the fly.
For the Huskies, the bigger takeaway is not just who Utah State is right now, but how much room there still is for the Aggies to improve before the matchup comes into view. The reformed Pac-12 adds more urgency to every nonconference test, and if Utah State begins to clean up its operation the way Mendenhalls track record suggests it can, this is the sort of opponent Washington will want to have fully charted before it shows up on the schedule. [Read more 🡒]
Washington May Have Found A Missing Piece In Its Roster Reset
Washingtons roster reset under Danny Sprinkle has needed more than just time. After two seasons marked by major turnover and the usual headaches that come with rebuilding in the transfer-portal era, the Huskies have added another layer to the staff, bringing in Alex Kline to assist with roster building. It is the kind of move that reflects where the program is right now, with personnel work just as important as what happens on the floor.
Kline arrives after previously being on the Syracuse coaching staff, giving Washington another voice with experience in the behind-the-scenes grind of assembling a team. For a program trying to stabilize its foundation and find the right fit around Sprinkle, the addition points to how seriously the Huskies are treating this next phase. The bigger question is how quickly that extra help translates into a roster that looks more settled and more built for the long haul. [Read more 🡒]