College Football Chaos: Week 8 Provides Big Upsets and Rivalry Thrillers

College football isn’t without its problems: astronomic coaching-contract buyouts, largely unregulated free agency, an unsatisfying national championship process.

And a single October weekend is sometimes all it takes to overshadow all those looming uncertainties.

Oct. 18, 2025 was one of those special college football Saturdays that comes along every few years and packs all that we love about the sport into a single day. Well, into a couple days.

A chaotic Saturday really began with Louisville’s 24-21 upset of No. 2 Miami on Friday, setting a tone for a Week 8 with nine Top 25-ranked teams falling. Four lost to unranked opponents, including No. 7 Texas Tech — rolling through the first six games of its schedule — dropping a 26-22 decision at Arizona State with just 34 seconds remaining.

The reigning Big 12 Conference champion Sun Devils’ prospects of a College Football Playoff return seemed cooked just a week ago after a 42-10 blowout loss at Utah. Maybe Arizona State is no closer to this season’s Playoff than it was after the Week 7 setback, but the Sun Devils demonstrated that every Saturday is its own story.

“You have to self-correct when you realize maybe you’ve miscalculated and steered something in the wrong direction,” Arizona State coach Kenny Dillingham said. “It might be you’re five degrees, seven degrees off. Good programs, they don’t turn left or right; they just turn a little bit.”

As coaches get fired earlier both in the season and earlier into their contracts, the room for those slight course-corrections to which Dillingham alluded aren’t always there.

The dramatic turn of firing a head coach is hardly a cure-all; cutting bait with James Franklin after a 3-3 start and paying him a staggering $50 million buyout didn’t save the Nittany Lions from a fourth straight loss with a 25-24 final at Iowa.

On that note, LSU would owe Brian Kelly a reported $53.3 million if it fired the coach; the topic of Kelly’s buyout was a top Google search result minutes after the Tigers’ 31-24 loss at Vanderbilt.

Changing direction hardly guarantees LSU, or any other program making a midseason change, a quick fix. But for UAB, its first game back since Trent Dilfer’s dismissal underscored just how disastrous the Dilfer hire was.

Week 8 marked a throwback to the Bill Clark era when UAB was consistently one of the best stories in the sport. Under interim coach Alex Mortensen, and with first-time starting quarterback Ryder Burton controlling the offense, the Blazers shook up the Playoff race with a 31-24 win over unbeaten and No. 22-ranked Memphis.

Burton’s journey from BYU to West Virginia to UAB offers a reminder that not every, nor even most of the transfers around college football are breakout players leaving the programs that gave them an opportunity for bigger NIL paydays and brighter spotlights.

In plenty of cases, the transfer portal provides the opportunity a player didn’t see elsewhere.

“I’ve been at three schools in three years, and it’s tough when you’re not playing the game you love,” said Burton after his 251-yard, three-touchdown performance. “But I’ve prepared like I’m the starter for three years, and I think tonight [paid] dividends.”

UAB’s win is made all the more reflective of college football’s spirit with the Blazers taking home a unique rivalry trophy. They’ll own the 100-pound, bronze rack of ribs awarded to the winner in the Battle of the Bones.

From baby back ribs to the Jeweled Shillelagh — which Notre Dame kept with its 34-24 defeat of Southern California — a wild Week 8 crowned champions. The Playoff isn’t the only place in college football where a winner takes home a trophy, and its many rivalry games contribute to the sport’s magic that keeps us coming back.