College Football Week 12 - Fitz’s Top Takeaways

Jason Fitz offers up his top takeaways from Week 12 of the 2023 College Football season, including Georgia taking care of Tennessee, Bo Nix continuing his hot streak, Michigan squeaking by Maryland, Caleb Williams' likely last game for USC, FSU QB Jordan Travis' leg injury, and more.

Video Transcript

[CROWD CHEERING]

JASON FITZ: Rivalry Week is one of the best weekends in all of sports. Unfortunately, that's next weekend, but there were still some important games on Saturday. Georgia went out and absolutely showed the world why they were the number one team in the country against Tennessee. Now some people thought this might actually be a game. It was not. Tennessee scored on the first play of the game and the last play of the first half and nowhere else. In the meantime, Georgia just absolutely ran away with this thing and showed everybody they like being number one and they'd like to stay there.

Now one of the teams trying to catch Georgia in the rankings-- Michigan. And we all know Michigan-Ohio State's right around the corner, but before we get there, Michigan had to take care of Maryland and that was no easy task. In fact, Michigan goes up 16-3, it looks like it's going to be a blowout. Instead, it turns into a close football game. More concerning than anything, yet again, offense seems to be hard to generate for Michigan without Coach Harbaugh on the sidelines, even if he's working all week. And let's be real, JJ McCarthy for the second straight week wasn't really a part of the game plan for why Michigan was going to win.

Got to be better if they really want to be the best. Speaking of top 10 teams, Louisville is going to remain on that list after they sneak by Miami, a win that puts them in the ACC Championship Game and a game that will have huge ramifications for both teams in the College Football Playoff. In the meantime, remember when Miami football was good? Apparently nobody does if you look at that stadium and how empty it was. App State continued their long tradition of massive upsets taking down undefeated James Madison?

It's almost as big as Michigan? Breaking news, Arizona State's not good. Oregon is. OK, maybe that's not shocking, but Bo Nix put up six touchdowns in this game. Calling him Boogie Woogie Bo. Why? Because he's electric. Look, my guy might be 3,022 years old and have played 20,000 college football games. I don't care. He's having a Heisman candidate-type season. Let's give him some love. And, of course, we got to talk about a West Coast team doing unprecedented things we haven't seen in years, having a wild season that will lead them to a possible conference championship opportunity at Allegiant Stadium.

No, I'm not talking about the Pac-12. I'm talking about UNLV. Come on, let me have this moment. UNLV beats Air Force and they are now the front runners for the top seed in the Mountain West. Washington-Oregon State lived up to the hype and Washington should now be the number four team in the country. Hear me out. The first half was ugly. Weather was ugly, had a safety, had turnovers, had a missed kick. The second half was about survival, but if the argument is they aren't balanced, they were in this one. Their defense came up big, showed up big in this match-up. Washington gets the huge win.

Remember when Caleb Williams was supposed to get a second straight Heisman and USC was supposed to be a National Championship contender? Yeah, none of that happened. It was likely Caleb's last time as USC's quarterback. And by the way, the game was as forgettable as the season for everybody involved. USC takes another loss. And as much as I love to joke around, we end on a serious note. Florida State quarterback Jordan Travis was carted off the field in the first quarter of their win over North Alabama with a gruesome-looking ankle injury.

Now, there's a place and time to talk about what that means for Florida State, what it means for the College Football Playoff, and what it means for the playoff committee and what they need to consider. That time is not right now. The only thing right now we should be focused on our thoughts and prayers for Jordan and his family for quick healing.