College Football’s Biggest Disappointments So Far This Season

For these teams, there were some great expectations.

Forty names, games, teams and minutiae making news in college football, where Arizona should have gone for two:

First Quarter: Close-game blunders | Second Quarter: Playoff chaos scenarios

Third Quarter: More was expected

We’re all flying blind into a season, guessing at what will happen, but usually those guesses are educated. They’re based on returning players, incoming players, new coaches, coach rhetoric—sometimes even first-hand observations from practice. (Those are much more rare now.)

As always, there are pleasant surprises. And, as always, there are disappointments. The Dash is here to chronicle the latter group, units that have not performed to either a historic standard or specific 2023 expectations.

The Irish's O-line allowed five sacks and eight tackles for loss in their loss against Louisville on Saturday.  :: Timothy D. Easley/AP

Notre Dame’s offensive line (21). One of the historic strengths of the Fighting Irish has been a powerful offensive line. It’s put plenty of linemen in the NFL in recent years and recruited around Marcus Freeman proclaiming Notre Dame an “offensive-line-driven program.” That line was driven backward all night Saturday by Louisville, resulting in five sacks of Sam Hartman, eight tackles for loss, multiple short-yardage stonewallings and a measly 44 net rushing yards. Notre Dame hasn’t yet rushed for 200 yards against a power-conference opponent, something it did five times last year.

With three returning starters on the line, including potential first-round offensive tackle Joe Alt, a sporadic running game wasn’t one of the presumed areas of concern. Perhaps more attention should have been paid to the offseason retirement of legendary line coach Harry Hiestand. He was replaced by Joe Rudolph, who had a long stint at Wisconsin before going to Virginia Tech for the 2022 season.

LSU’s secondary (22). This was a place that once laid claim to the “DBU” title. It certainly doesn’t apply in 2023, with the Tigers ranking 121st in passing yards allowed and 111th in pass-efficiency defense. This was a shaky area coming into the season, with LSU bringing in several transfers—including a couple with FCS-level experience in the Southland Conference. Overshadowing the shortcomings on the field, safety Greg Brooks was recently diagnosed with a rare brain cancer.

Clemson’s offense (23). The hoped-for energy infusion hasn’t happened. Coordinator Garrett Riley didn’t bring a magic wand with him from TCU. Quarterback Cade Klubnik has not outperformed the departed D.J. Uiagalelei. Running back Will Shipley is slightly less productive this season than he was the previous two. Clemson is tied for 12th in the 14-team ACC in scrimmage plays of 20 yards or longer and tied for 11th in plays of 30 yards or longer. Clemson is averaging a Cro-Magnon 19.8 points per game against ACC opponents.

Alabama’s offensive line (24). The Crimson Tide, who have signed an armada of four- and five-star linemen in the last five years, have allowed 26 sacks, most in the Southeastern Conference and a highly irregular occurrence. (It certainly hasn’t happened since sometime before 2009.) Part of that is on first-year starting quarterback Jalen Milroe, who has a tendency to hold the ball for a while in the pocket, but it’s also symptomatic of the rare Bama line that doesn’t dominate. The Tide are only 11th in the SEC in both rushing yards per game and per play. Tellingly or not, the Alabama coaching staff’s eight Players of the Week following their slog past Texas A&M included no offensive linemen.

Baylor’s defense (25). While going 12–2 in 2021, the Bears had a national top-10 scoring defense. Last year, while slipping to 6–7, the Bears were 67th in points allowed. This year, off to a 2–4 start, they’re 101st at 30.2 points per game. They’ve given up 35 or more to four of their five power-conference opponents, including 39 to Texas Tech on Saturday. Baylor can put this week’s open date to work by fixing a few things before starting a second half of the season that could offer some chances to push toward bowl eligibility—if the Bears can get a few stops.

Arkansas’s running game (26). The Razorbacks remain among the most avid running teams in the SEC. Unfortunately for them, they’re not very good at it. Their 225 attempts are third-most in the league, but their 669 yards are 12th and their 2.97 yards per carry are 13th. In the past two games, losses to Texas A&M and Mississippi, the Hogs ran it 68 times for 78 yards. Of course, that includes sacks, and Arkansas allowed 12 of them in those two games for a minus-74 yards. But Raheim “Rocket” Sanders has yet to get going this season, as does anyone else in the Hogs’ backfield. That has to hurt the soul of Sam Pittman, an O-line coach at heart.

TCU’s clutch gene (27). So many of the things the Horned Frogs did right to go 12–0 last year are missing this year—none more so than the knack for making the big play at the big time. That was a huge part of winning seven straight games by 10 points or fewer during last season. This time around—with an admittedly much different cast of key players—TCU is a minus-three turnover margin after being plus-10 in the 2022 regular season. The Frogs have had three kicks blocked in the past two games. They threw four interceptions against Iowa State. They’re 13th out of 14 in the Big 12 in penalty yardage and last in red zone scoring percentage. The little things are adding up wrong in a 3–3 start.

Kansas State’s road edge (28). One of the reasons a lot of people liked the Wildcats to win the Big 12 before the season was the fact that they’d won six of their last eight conference road games. That included a thumping of Oklahoma and wins in Ames, Waco, Morgantown, Lawrence and Lubbock. But K-State is a wobbly 0–2 on the road so far this year, being upset at Missouri last month and at Oklahoma State last week. The loss to the Cowboys was particularly dismal, with K-State falling behind quickly, trailing by as many as 19 points late in the third quarter and not doing much to slow down the last-place offense in the Big 12 in yards per play. The Wildcats go back on the road Saturday to play Texas Tech in Lubbock.

Minnesota’s passing game (29). O.K., expectations weren’t really that high for the Gophers throwing the ball this season—but it’s still fairly stunning how bad they are in that area. The only Big Ten team that’s worse: Iowa, the default answer. With star freshman running back Darius Taylor missing the last two games due to injury, Minnesota’s deficiencies in throwing have been even more pronounced. The Gophers looked like a high school team trying to pass against Michigan on Saturday. P.J. Fleck has doggedly stuck with Athan Kaliakmanis at quarterback, but a bye week might offer him the chance to experiment with a Plan B.

Pittsburgh (30). All of it. There is nothing to love about the 1–4 Panthers at this point, after establishing themselves as a pretty consistent winner in recent years. Their only victory is over an FCS opponent, they’ve lost four straight and four ranked teams lie ahead on the schedule. On Monday, coach Pat Narduzzi announced that he’s benching starting quarterback Phil Jurkovec for the game against Louisville on Saturday in favor of Penn State transfer Christian Veilleux, a product of Ottawa, Canada.