What to watch: Week 11 college football viewer's guide

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The push for the College Football Playoff is upon us.

We now have an idea of how the committee is evaluating the season after the inaugural rankings release on Tuesday night. The top of the rankings looked a lot like the AP Top 25, but there were some significant differences once you got outside the top five.

Like Week 10, Week 11 doesn't look incredibly thrilling. But we warned you what Week 10 could have in store and, sure enough, the Nos. 8, 9 and 10 teams in the AP Top 25 all lost on the road.

Will we see some big upsets this week? Here are our games to watch.

Things are about to get wild in the American Conference.

Tulane and Memphis are two of six teams with just one conference loss heading into the final four weeks of the regular season. The Green Wave are 6-2 overall and 3-1 in conference play while Memphis is 8-1 overall and 4-1 in the conference. After Friday night, Memphis still has a game against Navy. Tulane visits Temple. Those other two schools are also in the one-loss group along with North Texas and South Florida, who Memphis beat in Week 9.

The Green Wave enters this game off a loss at UTSA. QB Jake Retzlaff was replaced by Brendan Sullivan during the second half after he was 14-of-28 passing for 194 yards with a touchdown and two interceptions. Sullivan was 6-of-7 passing for 63 yards and a TD, but his incompletion was also an interception.

A day later, Memphis easily beat Rice, 38-14. QB Brendon Lewis had just four incompletions as he threw for 225 yards and also rushed 12 times for 87 yards and a TD.

Tulane ranks just 81st in college football with 25.9 points per game while Memphis is 12th at 37.7. Can the Green Wave keep up with the Tigers on the road?

The Cougars are one of just four undefeated teams remaining in college football and haven’t played a team as good as Texas Tech yet this season. Conversely, BYU is by far the Red Raiders’ best opponent of the season.

Both teams have played just one ranked opponent so far — Utah. Tech beat Utah 34-10 on the road in September, while BYU took down the Utes 24-21 at home in their rivalry game. With ESPN’s “College GameDay” in Lubbock, it should be the most raucous atmosphere that BYU freshman QB Bear Bachmeier has ever dealt with.

Bachmeier ran for a TD and threw for another in the second half of BYU’s 41-27 win over Iowa State on Oct. 25. That game was the first time he had thrown more than 30 passes in a game in his college career as he was 22-of-35 for 307 yards and two touchdowns. Bachmeier is completing just 63% of his passes for the season, but he’s thrown just three interceptions on 201 attempts.

Tech QB Behren Morton returned against Kansas State in Week 10 and threw for 249 yards and two TDs with an interception. As Tech has needed to play three quarterbacks this season because of injuries, RB Cameron Dickey has rushed for 746 yards and 10 TDs. Both he and J’Koby Williams are averaging over 5.5 yards a carry.

BYU RB LJ Martin should be healthy enough to play after leaving the Iowa State game after just five carries for 15 yards. Martin has rushed for 789 yards so far this season as BYU runs the ball over 40 times a game. Can they do it successfully against the Red Raider defense? Tech allows just 2.4 yards a carry.

Both the Aggies and Tigers were off in Week 10. The Aggies are tied with Alabama atop the SEC at 5-0 and could still make the SEC title game by going 2-1 in their final three conference games, though that would likely involve some tiebreakers. The easiest way to get to Atlanta is to simply win out.

The task could be easier than it looked against Missouri with true freshman QB Matt Zollers making his first career start for the Tigers. Zollers replaced Beau Pribula against Vanderbilt in Week 9 after Pribula suffered an ankle injury on a fourth-down run. Zollers started the season as Missouri’s No. 3 QB and became the backup in Week 1 after No. 2 QB Sam Horn suffered a season-ending leg injury on his first play of the season.

Zollers was 14-of-23 passing for 138 yards and a TD against the Commodores and has had two weeks of preparation as the starter. Mizzou will likely try to lean on a run game that’s been bottled up in recent weeks as opponents have wanted the Tigers to throw the ball down the field. RB Ahmad Hardy has rushed for 937 yards and 11 TDs this season but hasn’t broken 100 yards in any of the Tigers’ last three games.

A&M RB Rueben Owens has emerged as the team’s top back in Le’Veon Moss’ absence and QB Marcel Reed had his first 100-yard rushing game of the season against LSU with 13 carries for 108 yards and two touchdowns in the Aggies’ win that sent LSU spiraling.

Another 200-yard passing performance with 100 yards rushing against a ranked opponent will put Reed even further into a Heisman conversation that currently has him just on the periphery.

The Hawkeyes were a relatively surprising inclusion in the first set of College Football Playoff rankings on Tuesday night. Iowa’s best win is 41-3 over Minnesota, though the Hawkeyes have played Indiana the closest of anyone so far in a 20-15 loss on Sept. 27.

Oregon, meanwhile, was three spots lower in the CFP rankings than it is in the AP poll, likely due to a lack of quality wins so far. The Ducks lost by 10 at home to Indiana and haven’t beaten a ranked team thanks to Penn State’s demise this season. But the Ducks can change the committee’s perception on Saturday with a win over Iowa and remaining games against No. 19 USC and No. 23 Washington.

Iowa overwhelmed Minnesota early in that Week 9 win thanks to special teams and defensive scores. Those contributions will probably be necessary again on Saturday for Iowa to keep up with Oregon.

Opponents haven’t thrown for more than 109 yards in any of the last three games against Iowa. The Hawkeyes haven’t given up a TD pass since Indiana’s Fernando Mendoza threw for 233 yards and two scores over a month ago. However, despite adding QB Mark Gronowski from South Dakota State in the offseason, it’s been much of the same for Iowa’s passing offense. Iowa has thrown for more than 200 yards just once all season. That came in Week 3 against a UMass team that is now 0-9.

Oregon’s Dante Moore has thrown for 1,772 yards across eight games and is completing 71% of his passes. Three different backs have rushed for over 300 yards as Noah Whittington leads the team with 433 yards and 8.5 yards a carry.

It’s the Tigers’ first game under interim coach Frank Wilson after the firing of Brian Kelly. A loss to Alabama will drop LSU to 2-4 in conference play and leave the Tigers needing wins over Arkansas and No. 12 Oklahoma just to go .500 in the SEC.

Can an LSU offense that has failed to live up to expectations so far in 2025 keep up with Alabama’s and not turn the ball over? After three turnovers in a 20-10 win against South Carolina, LSU hasn’t turned the ball over in each of its last two games. Alabama’s defense is a turnover machine. Tide opponents have committed 14 turnovers this season and have two or more turnovers in five of Alabama’s seven wins this season.

That includes Alabama’s Week 9 win over South Carolina. The Gamecocks fumbled late in the fourth quarter as Alabama scored twice inside the last three minutes to flip a 22-14 South Carolina lead into a 29-22 win.

The road win was the first time since Week 1 that QB Ty Simpson had failed to complete more than 64% of his passes in a single game. Simpson, currently the No. 3 Heisman favorite, was 24-of-43 passing for 253 yards and also fumbled.

Saturday night may also be a good opportunity for Alabama to get its run game going. Alabama is averaging just 3.6 yards per carry as a team and opponents have rushed for at least 166 yards in each of LSU’s last four games as the Tigers have allowed 10 rushing TDs in that stretch.

No. 2 Indiana (-14.5) at Penn State, Noon ET, Fox: Penn State was competitive for a half against Ohio State. Can they hang around longer against Indiana? Fernando Mendoza may need a strong game to keep up with Ohio State’s Julian Sayin in the Heisman race after the way Sayin picked apart the Penn State defense a week ago.

No. 5 Georgia (-8.5) at Mississippi State, Noon ET, ESPN: Yes, the Bulldogs from Athens are favored by fewer than 10 points as they play MSU after beating Florida and before facing Texas. Mississippi State broke a 16-game SEC losing streak that dated back to 2023 in Week 10 with a victory over Arkansas.

Florida State at Clemson (-2.5), 7 p.m. ET, ACC Network: Can we take a moment to comprehend how the ACC’s preseason game of the year features two unranked teams and is being played on the ACC Network? It sums up the year perfectly for both teams, especially as Clemson has to go undefeated to ensure a winning season.

Navy at No. 10 Notre Dame (-26.5), 7:30 p.m. ET, NBC: The line in this game is massive. But it’s an especially important game for Navy after the Midshipmen were blown out by Notre Dame a season ago. It’s important for the Irish too, of course. If Notre Dame wins out, it’s in the playoff. But the committee could have a close eye on Navy as the Midshipmen are in the thick of the American Conference title race and the chase for the Group of Five playoff spot.

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