In order to win a national championship, at some point your team is going to have to slog through one of those games.
You know the ones—the college football equivalents of cold, rainy nights in Stoke, when the chips are down and your team reveals its true character. Ohio State saving its season with a fourth-down pass against Purdue in 2002. Alabama squeezing out a last-second victory over Mississippi State in 2017. Georgia rallying past Missouri in 2022.
If Indiana raises the trophy in January—this, preposterously, does not seem like a remote possibility—Hoosier fans will discuss what transpired in University Park, Pa., Saturday forever. Indiana's 27–24 win entered this genre in real time, and moved even the most jaded coach to smile.
Here's hoping that, like Hoosiers coach Curt Cignetti, your heart grew three sizes on this dark autumn Saturday. Welcome to Week 11's winners and losers.
Winner: Indomitable Indiana
"I’ve never seen anything like this," Cignetti—visibly failing to maintain his stoic demeanor—told Fox's Jenny Taft when the dust settled. What he had seen was, to date, the signature play of Indiana's 127-year major-college-football trek—a leaping, toe-tapping seven-yard catch from wide receiver Omar Cooper Jr. that survived replay review and left Beaver Stadium silent. It disguised a throw-of-the-year candidate from quarterback Fernando Mendoza, which in turn disguised a sloppy day for the Hoosiers (outgained 336–326). That can be forgiven when the show is this good.
Losers: ESPN and YouTube TV
On the most literal possible level, this dispute is easy to explain: Disney is probably not used to dealing with a company of Alphabet's size, and Alphabet is probably not used to dealing with a company of Disney's prestige. Try explaining these intricacies to the average college football fan, however. The eight-day-old dispute is beginning to have noticeable effects on ESPN's bottom line, and has dented the SEC and ACC's national profiles a bit ahead of College Football Playoff politicking season (you think SEC boss Greg Sankey is happy with this?). With economic uncertainty roiling two of the sport's core constituencies—college kids eyeing entry-level work and blue-collar fans without higher educations—it's time for these out-of-touch actors to make peace.
Winners: Jacob Rodriguez and Texas Tech
Here are the last five linebackers to finish in the top 10 in the Heisman voting: Will Anderson Jr. of Alabama in 2021 (fifth), Roquan Smith of Georgia in 2017 (10th), Scooby Wright of Arizona in 2014 (ninth), Manti Te'o of Notre Dame in 2012 (second), and Jarvis Jones of Georgia in 2012 (10th). Texas Tech linebacker and Big 12 all-time forced fumbles leader Jacob Rodriguez made a strong bid to join that group Saturday, racking up 14 tackles in Texas Tech's 29–7 blowout win over BYU Saturday. Rodriguez earned the endorsement of the Red Raiders' most famous fan, and his team earned the inside track to a potential CFP berth.
Loser: Iowa
Iowa, a team that has not set foot in the AP Poll all season, landed at No. 20 in the inaugural CFP rankings in an unusually complete break with the sport's writers. Surprising as it may have been, the rank gave the Hawkeyes a golden opportunity to vault into the CFP race against Oregon. Instead, the same old Iowa team floundered in poor weather, losing 18–16 to the Ducks on kicker Atticus Sappington's late 39-yard field goal. Once-ballyhooed transfer quarterback Mark Gronowski seemed to come alive only in the fourth quarter, underlining the eternal frustration of the Hawkeyes' effective-but-rarely-transcendent defense-first approach.
Winners: Texas A&M, the quiet contender
Let's play a game: if under coach Jimbo Fisher Texas A&M opened 9-0 in a year and poked its head in the top three, how would the college football world have reacted? Aggies coach Mike Elko is frequently noted for his low-key approach to a bombastic profession, but there was nothing quiet about the Aggies' 38–17 dismantling of Missouri Saturday. Quarterback Marcel Reed (20-for-29 for 221 yards and two touchdowns) starred, and Texas A&M's defense forced Tigers quarterback Matt Zollers into a 7-for-22 afternoon. Something will have gone very wrong if the Aggies don't arrive at Texas 11-0 on Nov. 28.
Loser: Memphis
Coach Ryan Silverfield's squad acted as an unintentional foil to Iowa this week, receiving a No. 22 ranking from the writers while getting a cold shoulder from the sport's power brokers. The Hawkeyes and Memphis had one crucial thing in common this week, though: both lost. Adding yet another wrinkle to a zany American race, Tulane took a 38–17 lead on Memphis before warding off 15 unanswered points in the fourth quarter to win 38–32. Such is life in the American that Memphis plummeted to place, with Navy, North Texas, South Florida, the Green Wave and East Carolina tied in the loss column at one apiece.
Winner: Chris McIntosh
When an athletic director sticks their neck out for a coach, glad tidings rarely ensue. McIntosh, however, knows the temperature of Wisconsin well as an All-American lineman on their 1999 team—did he play a hunch in coming out in support of Luke Fickell with unusual enthusiasm Thursday? Amid flurries in Madison, the Badgers look as motivated as they have all year, and upset Washington 13–10 despite going 2-for-14 on third down. Injuries have taken a toll on Wisconsin throughout 2025, and it'll need to beat Indiana, Illinois and Minnesota in succession to reach a bowl game. If only by necessity, however, the ground-and-pound victory served as a refreshing aesthetic break with the Air Raid cosplay that derailed Fickell's early tenure.
Loser: Northwestern—716 times over
Northwestern is faring respectably this season, which could plausibly end in its second bowl trip under coach David Braun. A tricky 38–17 loss to USC Saturday, though, gave the Wildcats a dubious distinction which demands acknowledgement in this column. With the loss, Northwestern passed the Hoosiers—the main character of college football this week, and seemingly every week of '25—to become the losingest team in the history of FBS. According to George Eisner of (a popular Ohio State site), the Wildcats have lost 716 games and Indiana 715. College Football Reference gives different figures that have Northwestern farther ahead, which only underlines the durability of the Wildcats' commitment to coming up short.
Winners: FCS blood old and new
Stump a buddy at the bar tonight by asking them to name the five undefeated teams left in FCS, all of whom won this weekend (don't be afraid to give hints). The two most obvious answers both had to fight tooth and nail for victory Saturday: No. 1 North Dakota State edged No. 15 North Dakota 15–10 for Peace Garden State bragging rights, while No. 2 Montana benefitted from a fumbled spike to beat a down Eastern Washington team. Among the nouveau riche: No. 4 Lehigh crushed Holy Cross 38-3 for its 10th straight win under coach Kevin Cahill, while No. 5 Tennessee Tech—which has been to the FCS playoffs once ever—downed Eastern Illinois on the road. Then there's No. 13 Harvard, 8-0 after handling Columbia Friday and poised to become the first Ivy to play in the FCS playoffs.
Loser: Maryland, in complete free fall
That's five Big Ten teams in the column this week, if ESPN and YouTube TV need any more motivation (we digress). There was a time when Maryland was bandied about as a sleeping giant, and it still feels like the Terrapins should be consistently better despite the Big Ten regularly pillaging their recruiting base. They will not be awakening in '25, however: Maryland dropped its fifth straight game Saturday to Rutgers, making its 4-0 start and big Oct. 4 lead on Washington look like a distant memory. Coach Mike Locksley is 37-45 eight years into his tenure, a far cry from Terrapins coach Ralph Friedgen's 75-50 clip earlier this century—which ended in his firing after finishing No. 23 in the country in 2010. Friedgen's offensive coordinator that year was a 38-year-old up-and-comer named James Franklin.
