Bill Connelly Sep 20, 2026, 04:55 PM ET Close Bill Connelly is a writer for ESPN. He covers college football, soccer and tennis. He has been at ESPN since 2019.

Everywhere you looked in college football Saturday, things just seemed off. No. 9 Texas A&M down 21 to Kentucky? No. 10 Alabama down 15 to Florida State? No. 20 Missouri down 10 to Troy? No. 19 Michigan down 7 to UTEP late in the first half? No. 25 Virginia down 17 to West Virginia late in the game? No. 4 Indiana up only 14-0 on Western Kentucky at the half? No. 12 USC up only 7 on Rutgers in the fourth quarter? New Mexico driving to tie No. 24 Oklahoma late? FCS No. 1 Montana State down 14 to Central Connecticut? Division III No. 1 North Central down 7 to North Park? Mount Union about to lose a second game?? NAIA No. 1 Grand View's 71-game regular-season winning streak in danger?? Underdogs landed a lot of early punches Saturday, and while only a few of them closed the deal -- Kentucky indeed finished off Texas A&M, West Virginia scored a nice statement win over Virginia, Mount Union fell to 1-2 and mighty Grand View fell to Benedictine -- it made for a pretty disorienting Saturday of ball. And it made the FBS' 35 remaining unbeaten teams awfully happy to simply be unbeaten. Three weeks in, nearly every team in the country has given us a few different impressions.

Some have looked great, then terrible. Some have looked awful, then good. Some teams bounce back and forth every quarter.

A few have looked mostly excellent, but haven't played anyone with a pulse yet. As is customary, it's time to rank the remaining unbeatens, and I'm doing it based on pure trust. Whom would I trust to beat whom at this point? We'll use metrics as our guide, as always, but my gut is getting a say here as well. 1. Georgia (3-0) SP+ and FPI rankings: second and third, respectively Odds of reaching 12-0, per SP+: 22.3% What the Bulldogs did in Week 3: def.

Arkansas 45-17 It feels strange starting this list with a team that hasn't even been slightly tested yet. Kirby Smart's Bulldogs have beaten teams ranked 70th (Arkansas) and 122nd (Western Kentucky) in SP+, plus the FCS' Tennessee State, by a combined 178-40 and have taken by far the fewest snaps in the country in non-garbage time. However, this is Georgia, just about the most known quantity in the country.

We know what the Dawgs typically have to offer, only this year they're offering big plays too. A lack of explosiveness has been their biggest issue for a few years now, but 12.0% of their plays have gained 20-plus yards, second nationally. Craig Dandridge and Sacovie White-Helton are averaging 19.8 yards per catch, and Nate Frazier is averaging 8.4 yards per carry.

Will those numbers go down when the competition ramps up? Of course! But even if the Dawgs have merely good explosiveness, that immediately makes them one of the two or three best teams in the country. 2. Notre Dame (3-0) SP+ and FPI rankings: third and fourth Odds of reaching 12-0, per SP+: 35.0% What the Fighting Irish did in Week 3: def. Michigan State 27-10 The Fighting Irish were my national title pick heading into the season, but I had the same major question of them as I had for Georgia: Will they make enough big plays and score enough easy points? Answers weren't incredibly favorable to start, but against what I'm guessing will be a very stubborn and frustrating Michigan State team, CJ Carr found Micah Gilbert for completions of 28, 39 and 61 yards. Very encouraging.

I'm more worried than I expected about the run game, but my trust level for the Irish is still quite high. 3. Indiana (3-0) SP+ and FPI rankings: fourth and fifth Odds of reaching 12-0, per SP+: 15.2% What the Hoosier...