I doubt we put up anywhere near those numbers. FAU didn't just fire Saban's brother.
There's always plenty of improvement from Week 1 to Week 2 so FAU should be a better team this weekend. I don't really expect Bama to beat them by 40+ but at least by 28.
If they're a 7-5 team it's because of a combination of having a super young defense and a ridiculous schedule. If you saw Golson play rather than just looking at his stat line, you'd understand where the hype comes from. He's a really accurate passer with a cannon. Two of his incompletions were touchdowns that were dropped by receivers.
It was Rice.
Rice. All that matters at the end of the day is the W but it's early to be speculating about the Heisman going to anyone especially with only a single performance against a very overmatched opponent.
Also teams that have had consistent top 10 recruiting years are pretty hard to call pretenders unless you have an axe to grind.
Plenty of teams underperform when you compare the on the field product and recruiting rankings. See: Notre Dame, Michigan, Miami, Texas, Clemson, Florida, and more in recent seasons. Recruiting doesn't mean shit if you can't develop it, beat opponents you're supposed to beat convincingly, and beat the best teams on your schedule. Notre Dame has stumbled so frequently despite arguably having more talent than the vast majority of the teams in college football that I don't think it's unfair to call them pretenders, at least in reference to really high expectations some might have. When you have a good season that isn't filled with lucky wins against Purdue or Pitt and you actually look better than legitimately good teams we can reassess what we think of Notre Dame.
The same goes for my team, Nebraska, except we don't recruit nearly as well. I still don't expect anyone to think we're world beaters because we drilled FAU. If a team has a history of stumbling against good (or bad) competition then people aren't going to expect much from them and it's up to the team to prove the naysayers wrong on the field. They get 12 (maybe 13 or 14) chances to prove their worth every year but Notre Dame and Nebraska have yet to prove themselves to be worth considering Top Tier programs. One day we'll clear that last hurdle and be where we want to be, where we once were, but until then it's best we remain level-headed and recognize both the strengths and weaknesses of our respective teams and continue to cheer, and hope, for the best. There's a whole season of college football ahead of us after all.
I hate how ESPN is trying to make this Michigan and Notre Dame game a big rivalry. They've only played 41 times. Here's a non-exhaustive list of rivalries with more basis in history. Nobody gives a shit about Notre Dame and Michigan.
Minnesota and Wisconsin - Apparently this is the matchup with most meetings between teams at 123.
Miami of Ohio and Cincinnati - 118
Tennessee and Kentucky - Here is a real historic rivalry at 109 meetings.
Illinois and Northwestern - 108 and I don't even think people in Illinois care about this.
Missouri and Iowa State - 104
LSU and Tulane - 98
Boston College and Syracuse - This one is actually close in number to Notre Dame and Michigan, but even they have a more historic rivalry at 47 meetings.
Nebraska - OU : 86
I miss playing OU. :'(