College Football: Winners and Losers from Week 1 | News, Scores, Highlights, Stats, and Rumors

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M.J. Devonshire Mark Alberti/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images

The first full slate of college football games kicked off this weekend, and it was packed with action.

On Thursday night, No. 17 Pitt defeated West Virginia 38-31 at home in the Backyard Brawl rivalry.

In the Saturday noon slate of games, Iowa survived an upset at home against South Dakota State, narrowly beating the FCS team 7-3. No. 13 NC State also had a close one against East Carolina, beating the Pirates 21-20 in Greenville. Meanwhile, North Carolina narrowly defeated Appalachian State on the road, defeating the Mountaineers 63-61 in a thriller that came down to the wire.

The biggest game of the 3:30 p.m. slate, No. 3 Georgia vs. No. 11 Oregon, was over pretty quickly. The Dawgs rolled to a 49-3 victory over the Ducks in a game that wasn’t really ever close. No. 19 Arkansas defeated No. 23 Cincinnati at home, winning 31-24.

We’ve got you covered on the biggest winners and losers from Week 1 of the college football season.

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Kedon Slovis. Mark Alberti/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images

For the first time in 11 years, the rivalry between West Virginia and Pitt known as the Backyard Brawl was renewed on Thursday night.

While the game had a pretty low-scoring first half, tied at 10, it really opened up in the second half.

CJ Donaldson gave the Mountaineers a 17-10 lead early in the third quarter by blocking a punt and rushing in for a score on consecutive plays, but Pitt’s offense scored two touchdowns near the end of the quarter to take a 24-17 lead heading into the fourth. Pitt’s defense forced a WVU three-and-out between the Panthers’ two scoring possessions.

But this one continued to be back-and-forth through the end of the quarter. West Virginia scored a go-ahead touchdown on JT Daniels’ rushing touchdown to make it 31-24 with 10:37 left in the game. Pitt responded late in the quarter with a Kedon Slovis 24-yard touchdown pass to Israel Abanikanda with 3:41 left to tie things up.

West Virginia had plenty of time to respond, but on first down from their own 39-yard line, Pitt’s M.J. Devonshire picked off Daniels and returned it 56 yards for an unbelievable pick-six to give Pitt a 38-31 victory.

The win for the Panthers snapped a three-game losing streak to the Mountaineers and gave them their first win in the series since 2008.

This game should be played on the first Thursday night of college football every season based on how exciting this one was.

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Mack Brown. Grant Halverson/Getty Images

Saturday’s game between UNC and App State in Boone, North Carolina, was an absolute barnburner. It looked like the Tar Heels would run away with this one after the third quarter, as Noah Burnette’s 44-yard field goal made it 41-21 UNC entering the fourth.

But App State had other plans, making this finish as chaotic as possible. The Mountaineers scored touchdowns on consecutive possessions to open the fourth quarter, capitalizing on a Drake Maye fumble to get the ball back after its first score. UNC kept scoring to try and put the game away, but App State never let the game get out of reach.

The Mountaineers tied the game at 49 with a Camerun Peoples 38-yard touchdown. The last four minutes of the game were when things went off the rails. Maye found his running back D.J. Jones for a 42-yard touchdown pass to make it 56-49 with 2:50 left.

The Mountaineers countered with a 75-yard scoring drive, capped off by a Chase Brice touchdown pass to Dashaun Davis with 31 seconds left. Instead of going for the extra point to tie it up and send it into overtime, App State opted to go for two. Brice overthrew Davis on the two-point conversion attempt, making it 56-55 UNC.

The Mountaineers then attempted an onside kick, but North Carolina’s Bryson Nesbit returned it 43 yards for a touchdown.

There were just 19 seconds left on the clock—surely the Tar Heels had put the game away, right? Nope. App State drove right down the field—helped by a defensive holding penalty— to score a touchdown. App State had to go for two to tie things up, but Brice was tackled short of the goal-line, giving the Tar Heels the 63-61 win.

So in total, App State scored 40 points in the fourth quarter, including 338 yards of offense, and still lost. Tough way to lose for the Mountaineers.

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TStetson Bennett. odd Kirkland/Getty Images

The Georgia Bulldogs didn’t miss a beat in Week 1. Opening in Atlanta, Georgia, against the No. 11 Oregon Ducks, the Bulldogs rolled to a 49-3 victory on Saturday.

This one was pretty much over in the first half. It was already 28-3 heading into intermission, with quarterback Stetson Bennett throwing for 254 yards. He also scored a pair of touchdowns in the second quarter. The quarterback finished with 368 yards in the air on the day.

Bennett’s receivers had a productive day, as well. Sophomore Ladd McConkey opened the scoring with a first-quarter rushing touchdown and totaled five receptions for 73 yards and another score. Adonai Mitchell added 65 yards, including an 18-yard touchdown reception.

Georgia finished with 571 total yards of offense with four rushing touchdowns and averaged 9.2 yards per play on the day.

Oregon’s offense couldn’t get much going at all under new quarterback Bo Nix, who recorded 173 passing yards and two interceptions. The Ducks, who finished with 313 yards of offense, had a chance to score a touchdown during the last two minutes of the fourth quarter. But Georgia’s defense stalled the drive at the 2-yard line as Nix’s fourth-down pass fell incomplete.

Georgia returned just three starters on defense from last season. If the Dawgs’ offense can play like this all season, they should have no problems making it back to the playoff.

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Anthony Grant. Steven Branscombe/Getty Images

This is not the way Scott Frost wanted his team to rebound after losing to Northwestern in Week Zero. The Cornhuskers were playing their home opener against FCS North Dakota. Let’s just say this thing was way closer than it should have been.

The Cornhuskers were 28.5-point favorites at home against the Fighting Hawks, and North Dakota kept this a one-score game throughout most of it. This game was tied at 7 all at halftime, even!

Luckily, Nebraska started pulling away late in the third quarter. The Cornhuskers went up 24-17 off an Anthony Grant 46-yard touchdown run with 2:30 left in the third. The Cornhuskers finally made it a two-score lead with an Ajay Allen touchdown in the fourth quarter. Quarterback Casey Thompson added a five-yard touchdown pass with 2:07 left to give Nebraska a 38-17 win.

Thompson improved a bit from his game last week against Northwestern. He finished with 193 yards, two touchdowns and one interception. If Nebraska wants to have a winning season, his numbers will likely have to improve a bit.

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Jayden de Laura. Chris Williams/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images

The Arizona Wildcats have struggled quite a bit in recent years. Their last winning season was in 2017, and they’ve gone 10-31 over the last four seasons.

But the Wildcats, under second-year head coach Jedd Fisch, got a huge road win on Saturday against San Diego State. Arizona went on the road and defeated the Aztecs 38-20. The win marked the first road win for the Wildcats since October 2019, and the first non-conference road win in five seasons.

The Wildcats took command of this game from the get-go. They had a 10-0 lead after the first quarter and led 24-10 at halftime. In the second half, Arizona’s defense held San Diego State to just 10 points. The Wildcats scored another 31 points in the second half to win it by three scores comfortably.

Arizona quarterback Jayden de Laura had a great day for the Wildcats, throwing for 299 yards and four touchdowns with one interception. Wildcats running back D.J. Williams added a touchdown in the fourth quarter.

San Diego State has been a decent program in recent years, too, so this makes this win even more impressive for Arizona. The Aztecs went 12-2 last season, marking the second double-digit win year for SDSU in three seasons.

Congrats to Wildcat fans on this big win. We’ll see if Arizona can keep the winning trend going this season.

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Bo Nix David J. Griffin/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images

The Pac-12 didn’t have the best day against SEC teams on Saturday. There were two games between the two conferences, in the aforementioned No. 3 Georgia vs. No. 11 Oregon game and No. 7 Utah vs. Florida.

The conference went 0-2 in both games, with Oregon falling flat against the Dawgs, as we mentioned previously. The second loss of the day came down by Utah to the wire. Utah got the ball back with 1:25 left, trailing 29-26 after a Florida touchdown drive. The Utes managed to drive down to Florida’s six-yard line and looked primed to score in the games’ final seconds. But on 2nd and goal, Gator linebacker Amari Burney intercepted Utes quarterback Cameron Rising’s pass in the end zone to seal Florida’s upset victory.

WIth the loss, the Pac-12 is now 1-8 against SEC teams in the last 11 years, according to ESPN’s broadcast.

Oregon losing to Georgia wasn’t all that surprising, but there was certainly hope the Ducks would put up more of a fight. The Utah loss to Florida definitely hurts the Utes’ playoff hopes. Entering the matchup against the Gators, Utah was a legitimate playoff contender. Instead of making a statement to get a big win on the road, the loss makes Utah’s path to the playoff a lot harder.

The Utes still have games remaining against USC and Oregon before the regular season is over. One more loss would knock the Utes out of the playoff entirely, if the loss to Florida didn’t already.