Welcome to Week 7 and welcome back to the Campus Talks newsletter

Put another week in the books and put another mark in the wins column for a successful weekend of college football. Week 6 had great matchups that delivered the excitement and week 7 is shaping up to be one of the best weekends of the season, so strap in and let's recap.

When we get to this point in the season, bowl talk starts to heat up. Bowl predictions are a plenty already, but what people really start thinking about is the College Football Playoff (CFP.) We start to think about what 4 teams will be in and which team is the serious favorite to win it all or otherwise known as the number 1 team in the county.

At the beginning of the season, it seemed that the majority of people agreed Alabama and Georgia were ahead of everyone else and it was either of theirs to lose. This week we had a shift in energy as it seems the Ohio State Buckeyes are starting to get more of the love as being the best team in the nation. In week 5, we saw Georgia struggle against a mediocre Missouri team and this week we saw Alabama on the ropes against what has been an underperforming Texas A&M team. This leaves open the door here for the Buckeyes to take the talk of being the best. We actually saw some movement in the AP poll this week in favor of this sentiment as Alabama was knocked down to 3, Georgia back up to 1, and Ohio State coming in at 2 for the first time this year.

The argument against the Buckeyes is that their resume isn't all that impressive as they haven't faced a strong team yet. Technically Notre Dame was ranked 5 when they played each other week 1, but it doesn't appear that Notre Dame is that strong this season. However, what they have done that Georgia and Bama have not is dismantle everyone they play. Including that Notre Dame game, their average margin of victory is 33.2 points per game.

Their offense is humming, defense is holding strong, and Quarterback CJ Stroud seems to be the easy front runner for the Heisman trophy this year. The chatter has already begun that they can take down either Georgia or Alabama, so it will be interesting to see how the season finishes out for them.

Now, let's recap last week and look ahead to a HUGE week 7. (Link to web version, can play videos directly in tweets there)

Week 6 Recaps

• #1 almost goes down (AGAIN): As alluded to earlier in our newsletter today, the number 1 ranked team in the country was on the ropes again. Texas A&M kept them close and had a shot to win the game in the last seconds, but failed to convert to the touchdown on the goal line as the clock expired on what was a questionable play call from Jimbo Fisher and his staff. It did not make A&M fans feel any better about owing Jimbo the full $95 million of that contract... Alabama didn't get out totally unscathed as they were knocked down to number 3 in this week's rankings despite the win. Alabama 24 - Texas A&M 20 (Texas A&M +24.5 covers)

• OH NO BABY, WHAT IS YOU DOING?: NC State had a little hangover coming off of their tough loss to Clemson the week before. FSU was up 17-3 at halftime and seemed to be in control of NC State going into the second half. However, Mike Norvell and his staff also face harsh criticisms this week after some poor play calls led to some poorly timed interceptions and some rather shocking miscues from the team(see below). NC State hung on to continue their impressive season so far. NC State 19 - Florida State 17 (FSU +3.5 covers)

• #PAC12AFTERDARKSTRIKESAGAIN: That's the hashtag. We're going mega viral. Please retweet using that hashtag. But actually this Stanford/Oregon State game ended up having an unreal finish. And of course it was appropriate that it was the last game of the day being played by the Pac 12 in the irrelevant time slot that no one was watching (except for me and other sickos of course.) Stanford was leading 24-10 heading to the 4th quarter, then Oregon State came marching back. Oregon State won on 56 yard touchdown pass with 13 seconds remaining. Oregon State 28 - Stanford 27 (Stanford +4.5 covers)

• "TEXAS BACK" IS BACK ON?: Had to have a quick recap of the Red River Rivalry game because the result ended up rather shocking from what we're accustomed to seeing in this game. Freshman stud Quinn Ewers made his return and showed up in a big way, throwing for 289 yards and 4 touchdowns. He makes Texas feel like a completely different team and you can see why he was one of the highest rated recruits of all time. People love to think that Texas is back if he's under center. Oklahoma looked a mess (they had 39 passing yards...) and seems everyone is ready to hit the panic button on them, but I think these growing pains are to be expected. They were without their starting quarterback Dillon Gabriel and in general a program always needs some updates when a new coach takes over. Probably most concerning for OU is that Will Venables is a defensive coach and their defense is getting cooked this season. Will be interesting to see how both teams show up this weekend. Texas 49 - Oklahoma 0 (Texas -7.5 covers)

Coaching Carousel

No new firings to report this week, but we did get an NFL head coach firing that will make the college football coaching carousel more interesting. Matt Rhule was fired by the Carolina Panthers this week. If you recall, Rhule was the head coach at Baylor and pulled them from the weeds after Art Briles left the program riddled with scandal. He never did well at the NFL level, suggesting he may want to come back to the college ranks. He definitely has become the most coveted coach for all programs with openings so it will be interesting if he decides to make the jump back. Craziest part of his firing is he will be paid $40 million to not coach the Panthers anymore...

Your New Top 25

We covered it up top already, but reminder that Georgia is #1, Ohio State is #2, and Alabama is #3. Where I really want to call our attention to is #24 and #25. Illinois comes in at #24 and is ranked for the first time in 11 years. James Madison comes in at #25 and it is quite incredible. They just moved to the FBS this season, so 5 games into playing at the FBS level and they are ranked. Remarkable.

Looking ahead to Week 6

Week 7 is going to be nuts. Strap in and get ready.

• #3 Alabama (-7) @ #6 Tennessee

• #10 Penn State @ #5 Michigan (-7)

• #8 Oklahoma State @ #13 TCU (-4)

• #7 USC @ #20 Utah (-3.5)

• #15 NC State @ #18 Syracuse (-3.5)

• #16 Mississippi State (-4.5) @ #22 Kentucky

Sights from around the league

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