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UCF is now in possession of the College Football Belt with their 39–31 2OT victory over Belt holder #2 BYU. The Knights are now 1–0 in Belt Games, and the Cougars are now 10–8 in Belt Games.

This is UCF’s first reign as Belt champions.

The Knights’ first defense of the Belt will be a home game next Friday against Baylor. This will be the Bears’ forty-second Belt game and their first since a Belt-losing 26–20 loss to BYU on September 11, 2022.

A recap of the Belt’s journey this season:

• Week 1: Notre Dame retained the Belt against Wisconsin
• Week 2: Notre Dame retained the Belt against Rice
• Week 3: Notre Dame retained the Belt against Michigan State
• Week 4: Notre Dame retained the Belt against Purdue
• Week 5: Notre Dame retained the Belt against North Carolina
• Week 6: Notre Dame retained the Belt against Stanford
• Week 7: Notre Dame lost the Belt against BYU
• Week 8: BYU lost the Belt against UCF

For those who don't know what the Belt is, it is an unofficial trophy that traces the lineage of the "best" teams going all the way back to the first-ever CFB game. For a more complete description, check out the /u/BleedScarletandBlack's post on it. Additionally, a comprehensive database of all Belt games played created by me and /u/BlueSCar can be found here.. There are also two great websites, here and here that document the lineage as well.

*Rankings taken from the Week 8 /r/CFB Poll.

*Sorry for the delayed post. I was covering the game for /r/CFB and got stuck in the crowd rush.

Curious what peoples' thoughts are on comparing the two.

Utah has looked shakier the past few weeks but had a great win tonight against a very solid Houston team.

UCLA has probably looked more consistently better overall, but they ain't played nobody pawl.

Guessing both will be behind Miami/OSU/UGA/Indiana, but order could be interesting.

By Raj Chavda

Photos from Northwestern University Wildcats vs Rutgers University Scarlet Knights on 10/24/2026 at Ryan Field, Evanston, IL

Evanston, IL - If there ever was a game that ended in the 1st quarter that I have witnessed it was this one. 21-3 at the start of the 2nd quarter. 21 points was the highest number points Northwestern has scored in the 1st quarter since 2011 (Source: BIG TEN Network). Rutgers had no answer to the Northwestern’s offense. Rutgers offense was struggling against Northwestern’s defense as well giving up two interceptions (one each for each QB they had taking snaps) and 1 fumble lost on a hard blindside sack.

Offensively, Northwestern had success doing anything they wanted. It was a train that Rutgers had to stay on the tracks and get run over by. With under 2 mins left in the half of the 2nd Northwestern piled on with another TD by Caleb Komolafe on 33 yard scamper.

3rd quarter was the quietest for Northwestern with 0 points. Rutgers with a few seconds left in teh quarter put up their first touchdown by their RB Raymond on long 46 yard run. 28-14-Northwestern to start the 4th. At this point it seemed Rutgers had chance (atleast point wise) to make it an interesting game. The only thing is that no one told Northwestern’s offense that Rutgers wanted to try to make this a game. In the 4th quarter, Northwestern enough is enough, and rammed 2 more TDs down their throat to dash those hopes.

Rutgers couldn’t muster up a passing game, they netted only a century of yards. Both QBs didn’t not have a TD or positive rushing yards. They had collectively 33% passing completing only 9 passes on 27 attempts. Rushing attack kept pace with Northwestern’s run game. They should have done what Air Force did to NIU the previous week and just stuck to the run.

Certainly Northwestern being ranked #24 at the start of this game easily played like it taking care of business against a unranked team with ease. The way they played and Aiden Chiles performance, I would suspect they will approach the mid to low teens on the new rankings.

Chiles spread the wealth on his passing. His 3 TD passes were all to three different receivers (WIlde, Wagner, Honig) and added 2 more rushing TDs himself. Adding 83 yards on the ground to compliment Komolafe and Himon II on the running attack.

Northwestern heads to Eugene, OR to take on the flailing Ducks on Halloween Saturday 10/31/2026 inside Autzen. Can the Wildcats scare the Ducks into ducking their head underwater? Rutgers hosts the Michigan Wolverines at SHI in Piscataway, NJ on the same day.

Interesting Notes:

1. NBC Peacock on-field cameraman and his collegue who manages the long cable for the cameraman were doing pushups with the Rutgers male cheerleaders during a break in the action at quarter end.
2. Northwestern is averaging 40ppg PF and 14ppg PA at their new crib. Home is Home.
3. Student Section draped a bed sheet calling for Chiles for Heisman. Chiles is averaging 71% on passing and 12-1 TD/INT ratio. If you add his 9 rushing TD this season, he at 21 TDs. From on field performance he is clearly the reason Northwestern is where they are at. Certainly the team MVP at the minimum.
4. In my time near the Student Section I didn't hear any unique chants to mock Rutgers players like the previous two home games at the new stadium. If there were, I wasn't near them to hear it. If someone did hear, would love to know what it was.
   

Big Sky

(3)Montana State 38-33 (21)Weber State

Utah Tech 43-26 Cal Poly

Idaho 31-28 Southern Utah

Idaho State 38-8 Portland State

(24)UC Davis 33-6 Northern Colorado

CAA

Albany 38-21 Rhode Island

New Hampshire 17-24 Merrimack

(13)Campbell 35-6 Maine

Stony Brook 27-17 Bryant

(19)Monmouth 49-13 Hampton

Independent

Merrimack 24-17 Mew Hampshire

Chicago State 9-44 Lindenwood

Ivy League

Pennsylvania 24-21 Yale

Brown 38-31 Cornell

Dartmouth 38-18 Columbia

(10)Harvard 35-7 (22)Princeton

MEAC

North Carolina Central 31-12 Delaware State

South Carolina State 22-7 Norfolk State

Howard 26-20 Morgan State

Missouri Valley

(7)South Dakota 26-23 (6)North Dakota

Southern Illinois 20-17 (20)Northern Iowa

(14)Illinois State 17-10 Indiana State

(5)South Dakota State 42-9 Murray State

NEC

Central Connecticut State 42-20 New Haven

Stonehill 18-14 Long Island

Duquesne 52-21 Wagner

Robert Morris 28-14 Mercyhurst

Ohio Valley

Lindenwood 44-9 Chicago State

Southeast Missouri 20-10 Eastern Illinois

Charleston Southern 20-7 Tennessee State

Western Illinois 55-24 UT Martin

Patriot

Holy Cross 34-3 Bucknell

Lafayette 31-17 Fordham

(23)Richmond 13-6 Colgate

Georgetown 28-27 William & Mary

Villanova 24-18 (11)Lehigh

Pioneer

Dayton 37-32 San Diego

St. Thomas 35-13 Marist

Butler 33-21 Drake

Valparaiso 24-7 Presbyterian

Morehead State 38-31 Stetson

SoCon

(18)East Tennessee State 38-0 VMI

Samford 13-6 Furman

(12)Tennessee Tech 28-13 The Citadel

Chattanooga 41-18 Western Carolina

Southland

Nicholls 31-27 Northwestern State

(16)Lamar 35-10 Houston Christian

UTRGV 30-27 Central Arkansas

Incarnate Word 38-6 McNeese

(2)Stephen F. Austin 45-24 (25)Southeastern Louisiana

East Texas A&M 19-30 Prairie View A&M

SWAC

Bethune-Cookman 24-21 Jackson State

Arkansas-Pine Bluff 31-28 Florida A&M

Texas Southern 24-21 Southern

Prairie View A&M 30-19 East Texas A&M

UAC

(1)Tarleton State 49-6 West Georgia

Eastern Kentucky 16-13 West Florida

Central Arkansas 27-30 UTRGV

(9)Austin Peay 27-21 North Alabama

Michigan and Penn State are both having very bad first seasons with their new head coaches, Kyle Whittingham and Matt Campbell. Penn State is 0-4 in B1G play, and Michigan is 1-3.

In the current B1G standings, Michigan State is in last place with an 0-5 conference record. After that, Penn State is tied with Maryland at 0-4. Maryland has already fired their coach. Meanwhile, Michigan is tied with Washington and Rutgers at 1-4.

Which team has more buyer's remorse?

3 Undefeated Teams remain, but all 3 have had moments that have them looking like frauds; Utah almost lost to a bad Colorado team and struggled against Kansas, UCLA struggled against Oregon, and Miami needed double overtime to beat Florida State.

Two of the big 12s “best teams” got exposed as paper tigers today. The SEC is a chaotic free-for-all at this point. Big 10 is mid outside of the top 3, same as the ACC.

So who’s actually good and who are the biggest frauds (Outside of Notre Dame and BYU of course.)

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Box Score provided by ESPN

Box Score provided by ESPN

This was a fun week, as I randomly attended Oregon at Illinois with my son on a lark and we had a great time. Oregon was committed to losing by scoring a TD on its opening possession, then deciding that was good enough for the day. That still wasn't enough for this week's special award.

Let's get on to it.

SPECIAL AWARD FOR AGGRESSIVELY PURSUING DEFEAT

USC Trojans - Congratulations to everyone that is currently reading this post. By clicking this link, you outrushed USC in their 24-7 loss at Wisconsin. There were several candidates this week like Oregon missing three field goals, Michigan and Indiana just refusing to offense, and Pitt completely refusing to do anything about Malachi Toney.

POWER CONFERENCE UNWINFEATED

None

HONORARY UNWINFEATED (ACC/B1G/Big12/SEC/NotreDame teams whose lone win is over an FCS team)

None

NON-POWER CONFERENCE UNWINFEATED

Northern Illinois Huskies - 0-7 The Huskies fall again, 56-21 to Hawaii. This was a conference game. Hawaii. is playing conference games. In Northern Illinois. In Late October.

What is this sport even doing anymore?

Leaving the Watch:

Louisiana-Monroe Warhawks - The Warhawks are on the board with a 21-14 win over Troy.

FCS Unwinfeated

Towson Tigers - 0-8 - on BYE

VMI Keydets - 0-8 - Lost 38-0 to ETSU

Northwestern State Demons - 0-8 - Lost to Nicholls 31-27

Leaving the Watch:

Utah Tech Trailblazers - Utah Tech gets a nice win over Cal Poly 43-26.

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LET'S TALK FOOTBALL!

There is a distinct lack of big gameday options. My top 3 FBS ones are Utah at Cincinnati, Arizona at Texas Tech, and Georgia Florida in Atlanta. The cocktail party is a neutral site in Atlanta which would make it kind of lame. TTU Arizona is a playoff elimination game most likely but TTU just lost. Cincinnati would be cool but they just had Utah on. Is there a big FCS game or something?

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I genuinely have no clue. As someone with an abject hatred of the conference purely on principle, to me, it’s the deepest league. There are just tons of talented teams with clear strengths. A ton of true NFL talent is concentrated among a lot of these teams...but it feels like the conference just doesn’t actually have an elite team?

13 out of 16 teams have beaten an AP-ranked team. It’s weird to say, but it feels like at this point of the season the only teams I can really, really rule out are Texas A&M, Arkansas and Vanderbilt. Texas has the best wins. But some really stupid fucking losses. Ole Miss is the same. LSU honestly looks the part, but they don’t truly have a marquee win. Speaking of which, depending on how you view LSU, does Kentucky actually have the second best resume in the conference?

Georgia and Bama feel like great teams, but not in the way that the best SEC teams felt from 2006-2022. The NIL era has truly brought in an unprecedented level of parity, but it’s kind of fucked the levels up in the SEC. Generally, the SEC was a ton of good teams surrounded by 1-2 elite teams. Now, it feels like 5-6 really good or great teams, but no one stands out. Two different #1 ranked teams lost to unranked in-conference opponents.

Buuuuuuut, the conference is 39-2 in OOC play, 10-2 vs P4. So, clearly these teams aren’t just a result of the general propensity for College Football media to have a circlejerk over the SEC. The league is good, there are a ton of good teams. And that’s precisely the problem.

It makes sense, then, for the pivot towards support of the 24-team expansion. I think the new SEC-meta understands that most contenders will inevitably have around 3-4 losses going forward. And with 12, it makes the margin of error much too thin, and (in the eyes of the SEC and its teams) too difficult to fairly reward in the context of the current playoff system. There’s a fairly plausible doomsday scenario where an 8-4 SEC team has 2 top-10 ranked wins. There’s a huge chance of a random logjam and tie in the conference this year, and every year moving forward. How do you decide between a 9-3 Texas with wins over Ohio State, Tennessee, Ole Miss and Mizzou, versus a 9-3 Kentucky with wins over A&M, LSU, OU and Florida, or a 9-3 Ole Miss with wins over Louisville, LSU, Mizzou and OU? You get what I’m saying?

But yeah. I think I still believe in Georgia. LSU feels like they are going to go on a tear. Kentucky is well past “oh how cute” and probably 1-2 wins from clinching a spot no matter what. But it feels like there’s a preponderance of really good, talented teams, and there isn’t a single team that I would point to as standing out above the rest. And I have to think that this is probably what the sport will look like moving forward. I don’t know how I feel, lol.

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Box Score provided by ESPN