Looking for someone to trust after 2 weeks?
— -- What have you seen that you trust after two weeks? Here's a few of mine: The Alabama defense, the right arm of Texas Tech quarterback Pat Mahomes and the jukes of Louisville quarterback Lamar Jackson. I trust that San Diego State senior running back? Donnel Pumphrey?and Florida State senior defensive end DeMarcus Walker, two of the season's early stars, won't convince the underclassmen behind them to stay for their senior years. I trust that the state of Louisiana belongs to quarterback Danny Etling, at least until Mississippi State comes to Tiger Stadium on Saturday. And those Buckeyes look pretty salty, too.
1. As good as No. 10 Louisville looked at Syracuse on Friday night, and that's 845 yards and 62 points good, the Cardinals have until noon Saturday to figure how to keep two teams from beating them: No. 2 Florida State and, yes, Louisville. As hot as the Cardinals appear to be in their first two games, they committed three turnovers and dropped 11 passes in the element-free conditions of the Carrier Dome. They can't get away with that against the Seminoles.
2. TCU redshirt sophomore Kenny Hill is playing beyond his years, and I'm not ready to trust him. At Texas A&M two years ago, Hill threw for 511 yards in his first college game. By November he had lost his starting job and served a two-game suspension; by May he had announced a transfer to TCU. Flash forward to Saturday when Hill threw for 377 yards and one touchdown and ran for 93 yards and two more scores against Arkansas. But he also drew an unsportsmanlike penalty with a throat-slash gesture that provided the Hogs with enough field position to score late and send the game into overtime, where Arkansas won 41-38. How good will Hill be when he grows up?
3. Speaking of the Razorbacks, you may have seen the note from Stats & Info that Arkansas now has beaten five ranked opponents since the beginning of the 2014 season, the most by any unranked FBS team. That sounds like an impressive number, and surely it's better than beating none. But the full story is that (A) Arkansas has been unranked for a reason; (B) that reason being Arkansas also has lost eight games to ranked opponents in that time; when (C) the Hogs have been ranked in only two games, a win over UTEP and a loss to Toledo in 2015. They get another chance this week: No. 24 Arkansas plays Texas State.
4. Oklahoma State head coach Mike Gundy struck the right tone of disappointment and responsibility in the statement he released Sunday about the misapplied rule that allowed Central Michigan to beat the Cowboys 30-27. I was more intrigued by the statement of Oklahoma State athletic director Mike Holder. "In my mind, it is incomprehensible that a mistake made after time had expired cannot be corrected," said Holder, the former men's golf coach who led the Cowboys to eight NCAA titles. In golf, the rulebook may be checked after play and the score adjusted to ensure that it's correct. Instead, Oklahoma State is left to take solace in the two-game suspensions of the MAC crew and the Big 12 replay officials who worked the game.
5. The good news is that Arizona State back Kalen Ballage scored eight touchdowns in the Sun Devils' 68-55 pointathon. The slightly better news is that in Todd Graham's five seasons in Tempe, the Sun Devils have won 10 games in which they have allowed 30 points. The much worse news is that Arizona State has allowed at least 30 points 28 times in Graham's 55 games, and nine times since the beginning of the 2015 season. Let's compare apples to apples. In that same time frame, Oregon, which also runs an uptempo offense, has allowed 30 points in 17 games (the Ducks won 11 of them). The Sun Devils are exciting. But when will Graham figure out that they can't outscore everyone?
6. So Army and Wake Forest are 2-0 (against FBS competition, mind you) and LSU and Oklahoma State are not. The Black Knights haven't started out 2-0 since 1996, when they began 9-0 and finished 10-2 and No. 25 in the AP poll. Army has had only one winning season since. The Demon Deacons haven't started 2-0 against FBS opponents since 2008, when they beat Baylor and Ole Miss. That was so long ago that Wake finished 8-5 and Baylor finished 4-8.
7. And a quick Following the Coaching Legend update: Virginia Tech has lost nine fumbles in its first two games under Justin Fuente. That's two more than it lost all of last season. In fact, in five of the last 10 seasons under Frank Beamer, the Hokies lost fewer than nine fumbles. It probably doesn't make Fuente feel good to remember that his Memphis team last year also lost nine fumbles over the entire season, the same amount as his Hokies have lost in two games.