College football Week 8 preview: Take our pregame quiz and catch up on essential reading

The Athletic has live coverage of No. 5 Ole Miss vs. No. 9 Georgia from Saturday’s college football action.

It’s been quite a week in college football, as our midseason coverage was joined by Penn State’s James Franklin becoming the fifth Power 4 coach to be fired in the first half of the season and Week 8 began with Louisville upsetting No. 2 Miami on Friday night.

Amid all the coaching carousel speculation, there’s another big Saturday of games ahead featuring five matchups of teams ranked in the AP Top 25. What do you need to know? Test your trivia knowledge with our weekly pregame quiz and catch up on essential midseason and Week 8 reading below.

Pregame reads

Justin Williams ranks the top 10 games of the week, Manny Navarro delivers his oddly specific predictions, writers make their picks against the spread and Austin Meek delves into the world of living next to a big college football stadium. Here’s what else to know about Week 8:

• No. 5 Ole Miss at No. 8 Georgia. Lane Kiffin is 6-14 in his head coaching career against AP top-10 teams, but he’s actually won his last three — including against then-No. 2 Georgia in Oxford last year. Winning in Athens would be a huge step for the Rebels, still pursuing their first SEC championship since 1963. They have a 13 percent chance to win the SEC now, according to Austin Mock’s model for The Athletic, but that number would surely rise with a win. To pull off the road upset, Ole Miss will likely be counting on transfer quarterback Trinidad Chambliss, who led Ferris State to last year’s Division II national title, to continue his breakout SEC season after replacing the injured Austin Simmons. On the other side, Georgia will be leaning on further growth from Gunner Stockton. Is he the Bulldogs’ new Stetson Bennett?

• No. 20 USC at No. 13 Notre Dame. Is this the last USC-Notre Dame game? The future of the storied series, ranked No. 5 in our preseason rivalry ranking, remains in doubt with no agreement on future games. In the present, it’s a critical game for both teams, which still hold College Football Playoff hopes despite early losses (USC to Illinois, Notre Dame to Miami and Texas A&M). USC is coming off a statement win against Michigan, while Notre Dame continues to show defensive growth since its 0-2 start. Though the game may be decided in the trenches, it’s also a spotlight moment for rising star Irish quarterback CJ Carr, the grandson of Hall of Fame Michigan coach Lloyd Carr.

• No. 11 Tennessee at No. 6 Alabama. The Third Saturday in October series came in at No. 11 in our July rivalry top 100. It had lost national importance as Nick Saban repeatedly dominated the Vols for years, but the tide has turned recently with Tennessee wins in 2022 and 2024. Those wins, however, came in Knoxville. The Vols still haven’t won in Tuscaloosa since 2003. They have merely a 32 percent chance to make the CFP entering Week 8, according to Mock’s projections, but that could leap to 60 percent with a win. Momentum has recently been behind Alabama, which has earned three consecutive ranked wins against Georgia, Vanderbilt and Missouri behind breakout quarterback Ty Simpson. Saban set an impossible standard, but after an early stumble against Florida State, it appears Kalen DeBoer’s Crimson Tide are doing just fine.

• No. 23 Utah at No. 15 BYU. The Holy War, No. 28 in our top 100 rivalries, is one of college football’s most closely contested series, as 20 of the past 24 matchups have been decided by single digits. But this is just the fourth time — and first since 2009 — that both teams are ranked in the AP Top 25 for the game. BYU is quietly 6-0 and now has an opportunity for a marquee win behind 10th-year coach Kalani Sitake, a former Utah assistant under Kyle Whittingham who has a leadership style unlike any other head coach in the country. Brian Hamilton also checks in on life-after-college for former Utah star quarterback Cam Rising, now mentoring the next generation after injuries ended his playing career.

• No. 10 LSU at No. 17 Vanderbilt. It’s just the 12th ranked matchup in Vanderbilt history — and just the third at home since 1947. Vanderbilt is actually a slight 2 1/2-point favorite, behind standout quarterback Diego Pavia, who has sparked a program revival under coach Clark Leak. Trying to stop Pavia? LSU hoped to have the full services of the Weeks brothers, but standout linebacker Whit Weeks (ankle) may be unable to play.

Midseason reads

We are seven weeks into the regular season, with another seven weeks to go before conference championship games and the Playoff field is selected. Here’s our round-up of the best (and worst) of the first half:

• Who have been the best players thus far? Read our midseason All-America teams, All-Freshman team and All-Portal team. Indiana quarterback Fernando Mendoza tops our midseason Heisman Trophy straw poll, and personnel staffers helped us pick some underrated transfer portal additions making a big impact.

• Indiana is No. 1 in The Athletic 136, which ranks every FBS team. The Hoosiers reached No. 3 in the AP Top 25, their highest poll ranking ever.

• August doesn’t seem that long ago, but a lot of our preseason predictions haven’t aged well. So let’s try it again: 29 college football writers and editors at The Athletic make their picks for the College Football Playoff, the Heisman race and conference championships — plus some hot takes and bold calls. (Some of us may want a mulligan already after Miami’s loss to Louisville.) Stewart Mandel and Scott Dochterman also update our bowl projections, and Austin Mock’s Playoff projections continue to update every week.

• Manny Navarro has our midseason college football superlatives, while David Ubben runs through the saddest, most hopeless teams.

• Speaking of hope: Michigan may have beaten Ohio State four years in a row, but hope is flipping back to the Buckeyes among fans in college football’s best rivalry.