Good morning, and welcome back to CFB Roundup from CFB Home – the first daily newsletter that’s all college football, all the time with no bias, no slant, and no fluff.

AP Top 25

The AP dropped its new Top 25 yesterday (or this week, Top 26 as both UNLV and Texas A&M are tied for 25th), with UNLV making its first Top 25 EVER.

1. Alabama (+3)

2. Texas (-1)

3. Ohio State

4. Tennessee (+1)

5. Georgia (-3)

6. Oregon (+2)

7. Penn State (+2)

8. Miami (-1)

9. Missouri (+2)

10. Michigan (+2)

11. USC (+2)

12. Ole Miss (-6)

13. LSU (+1)

14. Notre Dame (+2)

15. Clemson (+2)

16. Iowa State (+2)

17. BYU (+5)

18. Utah (-8)

19. Oklahoma (+2)

20. Kansas State (+3)

21. Boise State (+4)

22. Louisville (-7)

23. Indiana (NEW)

24. Illinois (-5)

25. UNLV (NEW) / Texas A&M (-1)

RV: ARI (106), PITT (42), NEB (30), BC (18), IOWA (17), JMU (13), SCAR (8), OKST (8), RUTG (7), NAVY (6), UK (6), SMU (4), ARMY (2), COL (1)

Dropped: Oklahoma State (20)

Purdue Parting Ways with OC Graham Harrell

It’s not quite October, but Purdue has already announced a change at Offensive Coordinator, as the Boilermakers have officially parted ways with former OC Graham Harrell.

Harrell was in his second season with the program where he was the highest paid assistant on a three-year deal. His replacement has not been announced yet, but the move makes sense considering that the offense is 108th in the country in points per game, which is fairly inflated by 49 points in the opener against FCS Indiana State. Since then, Purdue has score 7 against Notre Dame, 21 against Oregon State, and 10 against Nebraska, less than 13 points in those three games on average.

This is after Purdue finished 87th in the country at 23.9 points per game in 2023 with just 380 yards per game. Through 4 games, Purdue is averaging just 322 yards per game.

Coach Ryan Walters said in a statement, “decisions like these are never easy. After evaluating our start to the season, I felt that it was best for our team to make a change now. We are appreciative of Graham’s contributions to our program and wish him the best going forward.

Mack Brown On Questions About His Future

North Carolina’s Mack Brown has had a fairly noteworthy season, and not noteworthy in a good way.

Though it’s still only September, North Carolina already gave up 70 points at home to a Group of 5 program rebuilding under a first-year coach who had never coached at the FBS level before this season. And this past weekend, North Carolina gave up a 20-point lead in the second half to bitter rival Duke.

Coach Brown also gave a quote following the James Madison game, which he has since clarified was interpreted improperly, that gave some the impression he was ready to retire for good.

Upon receiving some questions about his future with North Carolina (and with coaching, generally, to be frank), Coach Brown did not want to really focus on any of the noise: “I say go to the Pittsburgh game next week and really support these kids. They’re great kids that work their rear ends off to do the best they can do. Everybody in the country that loses a football game has noise. So I don’t worry about the noise.”

4-Star S Demetres Samuel Flips Back to Syracuse from Florida

Consensus 4-star Demetres Samuel has flipped his commitment back to Syracuse after originally flipping from there to commit to Florida.

Samuel originally committed to Syracuse back on March 30th before flipping to Florida on July 31st. Now, he flips back once again to Syracuse. When Samuel originally committed to Syracuse, it was because of the type of program Coach Fran Brown is building and how he’s evolving the Syracuse program.

Samuel ranks as high as 123rd nationally and 11th for his position, according to On3. According to On3’s industry composite rankings, Samuel ranks 207th nationally and 18th for his position.

He is Syracuse’s only Blue Chip commitment in a class that has 28 other 3-star commitments, making up a massive class of 29 which currently ranks 47th nationally and 11th of 17 in the ACC.

Mike Norvell on Putting In Brock Glenn for DJ Uiagalelei After Late Pick-Six

Florida State QB DJ Uiagalelei came out firing against SMU, completing 5 of his first 6 passes and throwing for a touchdown.

DJU then did not lead a touchdown drive for almost 2 full quarters. He then threw a pick-six early in the 4th quarter, and was replaced by backup Brock Glenn after that.

Coach Mike Norvell went on to share that DJU suffered some sort of injury to his hand in the last hit that he took. Coach Norvell went on to say, “in all reality, I was going to make a change anyway to give Brock an opportunity.”

DJU finished 12-of-30 for 222 yards, 2 touchdowns, and 3 interceptions.

Glenn came in and finished 0-for-4.

Carson Beck: Proud of Fight Georgia Showed, But Not Big on Moral Victories

Alabama jumped out to a 28-0 lead over Georgia, but Georgia was able to claw its way back to having the lead 34-33 with only a few minutes to go. Ultimately, the Crimson Tide got past Georgia by a final score of 41-34 in what will likely be one of the best games of the season.

And despite it being a loss for the 2024 record, QB Carson Beck did acknowledge that he was proud of the fight shown even if he himself is not big on moral victories:

“I’m really proud of our guys and how we fought. Obviously I’m upset. I’m not big on moral victories. I believe in winning and losing, and we lost. But we fought hard and I mean that’s something to be proud of. … We brought it all the way back and took a lead, we just weren’t able to close it up.”

CMU QB Coach Jake Kostner Resigned Just Before Season Began, Questions About Timing & Investigation into Conor Stallions

Former Central Michigan coach Jake Kostner apparently submitted his letter of resignation back on August 31st and was gone from the team by September 15th.

The Athletic’s Chris Vannini recently wrote a piece detailing that the letter of resignation former QBs coach Jake Kostner stated he was looking to “pursue other opportunities.”

It’s not so much the opportunities that are of note to college football fans, but the timing of the resignation, which came less than one week after Michigan received a notice of allegations and only four days after Netflix released its documentary on Conor Stallions and his sign-stealing scheme.

It’s unclear right now if Kostner’s resignation is connected. Athletic Director Amy Folan has already stated that Central Michigan does not comment on ongoing personnel matters and Head Coach Jim McElwain already stated that “we were totally unaware of [the images potentially of Stalions on the sideline]. I certainly don’t condone it in any way, shape, or form.”

Ryan Day on Injury Updates for QB Will Howard & DT Tyleik Williams

Ohio State coach Ryan Day opened up about a pair of injuries to star Ohio State players, QB Will Howard and DT Tyleik Williams.

Howard took a big hit and had to come out, which prompted backup QB Devin Brown to come in and throw for a touchdown. Howard came back in for the second half and showed no signs of injury. He’s good to go, according to both Coach Day and Howard.

Williams was listed as available but never saw the field. Coach Day explained that he was available in an emergency role – if the game were ever in doubt, Williams would have played: “He was cleared, but we felt like one more week … of rest, you know, would get him to 100%, which we felt like was the right thing to do. If we needed to, we could have put him in the game. We decided we didn’t need him.”

Clemson’s Dabo Swinney: Ton of Tampering in Postgame Scrums

Clemson’s Dabo Swinney recently shared that following games, there is a ton of tampering going on once all of the players, staffs, and coaches are intermingling on the field.

Coach Swinney stated that Clemson players have been “subtly recruited on the field postgame by opponents.” Coach Swinney did not provide a specific example of this happening, but that it is an issue which has happened at least once this season.

He also said that he’ll mingle with players postgame, but never says something to the extent of “if you hate it there, come play here.”

New ESPN FPI Top 25

ESPN’s computer-generated football power index (“FPI”) has also been updated after Week 5 to give a computer-based power ranking for the season:

1. Texas (27.9)

2. Alabama (27.9)

3. Ohio State (26.9)

4. Georgia (25.2)

5. Tennessee (23.6)

6. Ole Miss (21.8)

7. Notre Dame (19.3, +2)

8. Penn State (18.8)

9. Oregon (18.4, +1)

10. Miami (17.9, -3)

11. USC (15.7, +1)

12. Louisville (15.3, -1)

13. Clemson (15.1, +1)

14. Missouri (14.1, -1)

15. LSU (13.9, +4)

16. Indiana (13.4, -1)

17. Oklahoma (12.2)

18. Texas A&M (11.9)

19. SMU (11.3, +7)

20. Kansas State (11.2, +12)

21. Boise State (10.9, +6)

22. Iowa State (10.6, +3)

23. Kentucky (9.5, +15)

24. Iowa (9.3)

25. South Carolina (9.1, +4)

Other Commitments/Decommitments

3-Star (85) CB Landon Hammond commits to Tulane