College football Week 5 storylines: Early ‘must-win’ for Alabama vs. Georgia; get over it and move on, Auburn

A year ago, Kalen DeBoer looked like the perfect replacement to fill Nick Saban’s huge shoes and keep Alabama atop college football.

A year ago, Ryan Williams looked like one of college football’s top new stars when he turned in a dazzling six-catch, 177-yard, two-touchdown performance that included an acrobatic 75-yard game-winning score, one of the best plays of the season.

A year ago, the future of Alabama football looked so bright, the transition from college football’s greatest coach to his successor was as seamless as possible.

A lot can, and has, happened in the year since Alabama beat Georgia 41-34 in a thriller inside Bryant-Denny Stadium. In the last 365 days, DeBoer has lost five games — all away from Tuscaloosa — to Vanderbilt, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Michigan and Florida State.

Since Williams exploded onto the national scene in the Georgia win, he hasn’t lived up to the massive hype. He never broke 100 receiving yards again in 2024 after that Georgia game, averaging fewer than 45 yards per contest over the final nine contests. He struggled in the Florida State loss to start the 2025 season, though he looked like his old self in a dominant 165-yard and two touchdown performance against Wisconsin in Week 3. 

Can DeBoer and Williams deliver some more of the magic that made them the toast of Tuscaloosa a year ago? Or will the complaints about DeBoer, especially his road struggles, ratchet up with another loss?

Those are just some of the stakes for No. 17 Alabama at No. 5 Georgia inside Sanford Stadium on Saturday night (7:30 p.m. ET). No September game should probably be a “must-win,” but it sure feels close for Alabama. With the Tide already trying to recover from a season-opening loss to Florida State, there isn’t much margin for error as SEC play begins. Saying Alabama has to win at Georgia isn’t particularly fair, but it badly needs a marquee victory after how everything has played out since last year. DeBoer needs to remind people how brilliant his offense can look when everything is humming, not how disjointed and disappointing it has previously been on the road.

There’s plenty to prove over in Athens, too, even if the stakes aren’t quite as high. In a frequently repeated statistic this week, Kirby Smart is just 1-6 lifetime against Alabama since taking over the Georgia program. Five of those losses, of course, came against his mentor Saban. Smart beat Alabama in the 2022 national championship, the highlight in many ways of what is already a Hall of Fame career, but the narrative that he can’t defeat the Tide hasn’t gone away. If Georgia loses Saturday night, Smart falls to 0-2 against DeBoer, and it feels like a real issue for a coach who has otherwise dominated everything in his path.

This is the kind of game that can help DeBoer, already feeling pressure, turn doubters into believers again. It’s the kind of game that can allow Smart to rid himself of his Tide demons and give Georgia its first home win over Alabama since 2003. The stakes may be higher for Alabama, but the result could alter the season trajectory for both programs.

Can Franklin get over the ‘Big Game James’ moniker?

The record seems to follow Penn State coach James Franklin wherever he goes. No matter how much overall success he’s had in Happy Valley, no one can forget his abysmal record against top opponents. He is 1-13 against top-five teams, 3-17 against top-10 teams and 17-26 against top-25 opponents.

In fairness to Franklin, especially against top-five teams, plenty of those games came when he didn’t have the better, more talented roster. It still doesn’t excuse all the losses, though, and Penn State certainly had more talent than Notre Dame last season and still choked away a College Football Playoff semifinal.

This feels like his best chance in a while to get a top-10 win, with Oregon coming to Beaver Stadium. The Ducks are hot, but Dante Moore will be tested in what should be a raucous “White Out” environment. If Franklin can’t get it done this year, with all the returning starters who came back for one last ride, he likely never will. He could really use a win over Oregon, or the derisive “Big Game James” label will be everywhere Sunday.

Keep an eye on Indiana, Illinois

How a team handles great success or a devastating loss can be telling. That’s why Indiana and Illinois are worth watching this weekend after the Hoosiers walloped the Illini 63-10 last week.

Both have tricky matchups. Indiana travels to Iowa, while Illinois hosts No. 21 USC. Can the Hoosiers move on from a dominant win over a top-10 opponent and not get caught up in the hype and praise — especially with new Heisman Trophy frontrunner Fernando Mendoza in the spotlight? Can Illinois flush its awful result and restore the feisty version we saw last season that finished with 10 wins?

The big wins and losses get the headlines, but how you handle them often determines how your season unfolds. This weekend is big in that regard for both Indiana and Illinois.

Playoff expansion still stuck in the mud

The odds of an expanded playoff in 2026 continue to shrink as the Dec. 1 deadline approaches. CFP leaders met in Chicago this week, but only spent about 20 minutes of a four-hour-plus meeting on the future format. CFP executive director Rich Clark said commissioners haven’t had much time to dig into specifics with everything else going on in college athletics.

Clark didn’t say it, but part of the issue is that it really only matters what the Big Ten and SEC want — and they’re at an impasse. The Big Ten has pushed for a model heavy on automatic qualifiers that could include up to 28 teams, while the SEC is more interested in a 16-team format with five automatic bids and the rest at-large.

There has been little progress in recent months, according to sources, and limited group discussion about what the format should look like. Clark said Wednesday the group is comfortable staying with staying at 12 teams. If the Big Ten and SEC can’t compromise, the CFP will stick with the 12-team playoff already approved for 2026.

Salty Talty

Each week this space will be my airing of grievances, my opportunity to let the audience know what has been really grinding my gears. Hopefully it’ll be mostly college football-related, but it’s a good bet travel, family and other day-to-day life annoyances will find a way in. 

Less than 48 hours from a road game against No. 9 Texas A&M, Auburn athletic director John Cohen was still thinking about Oklahoma.

It had been five days since the Tigers lost to the Sooners, 24-17, but Cohen evidently couldn’t get over a controversial officiating call that went against his football program. Game officials missed a “hideout tactic” in the second quarter that should have been called an unsportsmanlike penalty and instead resulted in a touchdown. Cohen issued a statement on Thursday that said, in part, Auburn remains “extremely disappointed” and that “Saturday went beyond judgment calls” against the Tigers.

“As the SEC acknowledged, the Auburn family and student-athletes deserved better,” Cohen wrote. 

That statement is justified if it comes out on Sunday or Monday, but waiting all the way until Thursday afternoon is absurd. Perhaps Cohen was getting pressure from boosters and trustees to say something over a call that played a role in Auburn’s loss to Oklahoma, but it comes off as small-time and lame to do it now. 

George Perles, the legendary defensive mind and former Michigan State coach, had a “24-hour rule” that Nick Saban later adopted at Alabama. Essentially, you had 24 hours to celebrate a win or mourn a loss, and then you had to move on. Cohen would be wise to follow that strategy moving forward. 

Still complaining about a loss five days after the fact shows the priorities aren’t what they should be, especially with a critical top 10 road game coming up this weekend. There’s nothing that can be done at this point. The SEC admitted its fault in the officiating error, but it isn’t changing the final result. This wasn’t a last-second officiating call that doomed the Tigers. This happened in the second quarter, and while it is beyond unfortunate it played out the way it did, Auburn had ample time to overcome it and couldn’t do so. 

Cohen sending out that statement might appeal to an upset Auburn fan base, but is embarrassing for a veteran AD who should know better.