Big Ten Football Roundup, Week 2: Bryce Underwood Under Pressure, Rutgers' UMass Disaster, and Ohio State-Texas
By Owain Jones
Week 1 had barely finished before the Big Ten gave us something close to chaos.
Michigan escaped Western Michigan by the narrowest of margins in one of the strangest endings modern college football has seen, only for the argument over the final second to become almost as significant as the game itself.
Rutgers somehow found a way to make things worse, suffering a historically embarrassing loss to UMass, while UCLA gave us the first real evidence that Bob Chesney might be capable of changing the trajectory of the programme much quicker than expected.
Now the attention shifts to Week 2, where Ohio State travels to Texas for one of the biggest games of the season, Iowa enters another Cy-Hawk rivalry carrying new questions about its offense, and Michigan suddenly has considerably more to prove than anyone imagined seven days ago.
Here are the five Big Ten conversations that matter most entering Week 2.
How Did Bryce Underwood Go From Unquestioned to Under Pressure?
A statement regarding the results of tonight's game between Michigan and Western Michigan. pic.twitter.com/DzJVN2ZLTc
— Big Ten Conference (@bigten) September 6, 2026
Clock-gate has swallowed almost everything surrounding Michigan and college football this week.
The Wolverines officially beat Western Michigan 13-12 after replay restored one second to the clock, allowing Bryce Underwood to find JJ Buchanan for a 47-yard touchdown on a Hail Mary on the final play. The Big Ten then released a statement, as well as the officials’ audio. Now the MAC is arguing that replay protocol was incorrectly followed and has asked for Western Michigan to be recognised as the winner for ranking and evaluation purposes, although Michigan remains the official winner because the NCAA cannot overturn the result.
It is an extraordinary story. But while everyone argues over one second, Michigan has a much bigger problem to solve moving forward.
How did Underwood go from “QB1, without a doubt” in March to Kyle Whittingham saying “he’s our QB right now” after one game?
The change in rhetoric is striking. During fall camp, Whittingham specifically praised Underwood’s processing and decision-making, saying his internal clock was working faster. He also warned that live contact would reveal whether those improvements held up.
The first evidence was hardly convincing.
Underwood completed 12 of 22 passes for 170 yards, one touchdown, and an interception while also losing a fumble. More concerningly, PFF reportedly charted five turnover-worthy plays and zero big-time throws.
Michigan did little to make his life easier either. The Wolverines ran only 48 offensive plays, rushed for 106 yards after averaging 210.2 per game last season, and reached the Western Michigan 40-yard line just twice. Whittingham admitted they “didn’t run the ball well enough at all.”
But that context does not absolve Underwood. It explains why the passing-down numbers matter so much. Michigan had a 50% success rate on standard downs, but that fell to 28.6% on passing downs. When Underwood was asked to solve the problem, he rarely could.
Up next is a top-10 team in Oklahoma, which ranked first nationally in sacks and third in rushing defense last season. And their blueprint looks straightforward: stop the run, create obvious passing situations, make Underwood process pressure. It is almost perfectly designed to test everything that went wrong for Whittingham in Week 1.
One game does not erase an offseason of development, and teams rarely look the same in November as they did in Week 1. But Michigan has gone from unquestioned optimism to Whittingham publicly leaving the door open. Week 2 was already earmarked as an important game on the Wolverines’ schedule, and it has become considerably more important for Underwood than anyone expected a week ago.
The UMass Loss Was Every Bit As Embarrassing as It Looked
Michigan may have taken over as college football’s favourite punchline this week, but Rutgers should not be allowed to hide behind the distraction. The 37-21 loss to UMass was every bit as embarrassing as it looked.
UMass entered the season having gone 0-12 in 2025, ranked 136th of 136 nationally in both scoring offense and scoring defense, and riding a 16-game losing streak against FBS opponents. Its last FBS victory came against Army in October 2023. Rutgers, meanwhile, entered as a 29.5-point favourite.
Instead, UMass scored 30 unanswered points and recorded its first win over a power-conference opponent since moving to FBS. By the point spread, multiple reports identified it as the biggest FBS upset since Kansas beat Texas as a 31-point underdog in 2021.
Greg Schiano did not try to hide from the punishment in Piscataway. “We were the national punchline,” he said this week.
The easy explanation for the loss is turnovers. Rutgers finished minus-four after Dylan Lonergan threw three interceptions and lost a fumble, an extreme swing for a team that lost only nine turnovers across the entire 2025 season.
But that does not explain what happened at the line of scrimmage.
UMass outrushed Rutgers 200-30, held the ball for more than 36 minutes and, in one public model, posted a 48% success rate compared with Rutgers’ 35%. Perhaps the most damning number is that Rutgers managed only 30 rushing yards against a UMass defense that allowed 221.3 per game last season, despite having an established playmaker in Antwan Raymond. That is getting physically outplayed.
And that is especially concerning because Rutgers entered 2026 with reasons to expect progress. KJ Duff and Raymond gave the offense proven playmakers, while the defense was supposed to take a step forward and create a more complete football team.
One game does not prove Rutgers is one of the worst teams in the Big Ten. But after being pushed around by a team that had spent nearly three years forgetting what an FBS win felt like, Schiano’s claim that “this team is a good football team” now comes with a much heavier burden of proof.
Maybe We Underestimated How Quickly Bob Chesney Could Change This Team
There is, rightfully, optimism in Westwood. We predicted UCLA would go 6-6 in our 2026 Big Ten Predictions because Bob Chesney could raise the floor immediately. The biggest part of that belief was his ability to create a functional running game that makes life easier for Nico Iamaleava, instantly improving an offense that averaged only 18.2 points last season.
We didn’t have to wait long for evidence.
UCLA rushed for 277 yards, averaged 8.7 yards per carry, and scored six touchdowns on the ground in a 45-24 win over a good Cal team. For context, the Bruins averaged only 139.7 rushing yards per game last season and scored eight rushing touchdowns across the entire year. It means they produced 75% of their 2025 rushing touchdown total in Chesney’s first game.
More importantly, the performance looked recognizably Chesney.
His James Madison offense averaged 241.5 rushing yards per game and 5.5 yards per carry in 2025. UCLA also spread the workload around in a similar fashion, with Anthony Woods rushing for 118 yards on only eight carries, Wayne Knight scoring three times, and Iamaleava adding another touchdown.
It is proof that the Bruins don’t need Iamaleava to be spectacular in 2026 in order to succeed. He completed only 14 of 22 passes for 184 yards and threw a red-zone interception. Yet UCLA still scored 45.
That may be the biggest reason for optimism. “The offense made my job easy out there tonight,” Iamaleava said afterwards.
However, UCLA was not flawless. It committed 12 penalties for 110 yards, allowed Cal to tie the game 24-24 late in the third quarter, and needed two fourth-quarter interceptions to help create separation. But the Bruins then scored 21 unanswered points and won by three touchdowns anyway.
We thought UCLA could be feisty because Chesney would give this offense a clearer identity. If the Bruins can clean up the mistakes without losing the explosiveness, they have the ability to cause problems in conference play.
What Has Changed Since Ohio State Last Beat Texas?
Ohio State and Texas are becoming increasingly familiar with one another.
The Buckeyes lead the all-time series 3-2 and have won the last two meetings, beating Texas 28-14 in the College Football Playoff semifinal following the 2024 season before grinding out a 14-7 victory in Columbus to open the 2025 season.
However, the teams meeting in Austin on Saturday look considerably different.
Julian Sayin made his first collegiate start in last season’s meeting, completing 13 of 20 passes for only 126 yards as Ohio State leaned on its defense and protected its young quarterback. Twelve months later, Sayin is a Heisman finalist coming off a 3,610-yard, 32-touchdown season and opened 2026 by throwing for 320 yards and three scores against Ball State.
Arch Manning has developed too, opening this season with 305 yards and four touchdowns against Texas State. And unlike last year, he will be attacking an Ohio State defense that is replacing eight starters from a unit that allowed only 9.3 points and 219 yards per game.
That may be the biggest change of all, but there is also the Jeremiah Smith problem. Texas has held arguably the best receiver in college football to seven catches for 46 yards and no touchdowns across the last two meetings, repeatedly using extra coverage attention to limit him.
Even so, Ohio State won both games anyway. If Texas continues dedicating resources towards him, the question is whether Ohio State can punish it elsewhere. Devin McCuin opened the season with six catches for 97 yards and a touchdown, while Arthur Smith’s arrival as offensive coordinator places even more attention on a rushing attack that averaged 154.4 yards per game last season.
If Ohio State can run effectively against lighter boxes and Sayin consistently finds the space created by Smith’s coverage, Texas faces a much harder offense to solve.
On the national stage, the stakes are obvious. Ohio State enters No. 1 in the AP Poll, Texas No. 4, and the winner will leave Austin with the strongest early claim to being the best team in college football.
Ohio State already knows it can beat Texas. Week 2 tells us whether the Buckeyes have changed enough to do it again despite losing much of the defense that carried them in this matchup last season.
What if the Iowa Quarterback Never Needed To Provide the Spark?
We sided with Jeremy Hecklinski in Iowa’s quarterback battle this offseason because the Hawkeyes needed more explosiveness to take their offense to the next level. His mobility and aggression appeared capable of giving an offense that averaged only 143.2 passing yards per game last season something different.
Week 1 offered another possibility: Maybe Iowa does not need the quarterback to provide the spark at all.
Hank Brown was hardly spectacular in the 40-0 win over Northern Illinois, completing 12 of 20 passes for 129 yards and a touchdown. But his first three possessions all ended in touchdowns, and Iowa produced 283 yards and 27 points across his five drives. He was clean, composed, and kept the offense moving, which was considerably more than Hecklinski managed in the opener.
Iowa still needs electricity on offense. That said, the equation changes considerably if the explosive plays can come from elsewhere.
Kamari Moulton rushed for 183 yards and two touchdowns on only 11 carries, including scores of 50 and 37 yards. Tony Diaz added seven catches for 84 yards and a touchdown, while producing 55 yards after the catch.
If Diaz and Moulton can keep that up, Iowa does not necessarily need its quarterback to repeatedly attack 25 yards downfield if a safe completion can become an explosive gain after the catch.
Week 2 could be the litmus test. Iowa officially leads the Cy-Hawk series 46-25, but Iowa State has won three of the last four meetings and the last two played at Kinnick. The last eight games have all been decided by 10 points or fewer, while the last four have been one-score contests.
The quarterback battle is not over, and Northern Illinois’ massive roster turnover means Week 1 should not be treated as proof that Iowa has suddenly solved its offense. Instead, if Brown can provide the composure while Moulton and Diaz create the explosive moments, we may have been looking for Iowa’s missing spark in the wrong place.
Big Ten Football Roundup is published every week throughout the 2026 college football season, breaking down five of the biggest stories shaping the conference.
OWAIN JONES
COLLEGE FOOTBALL & NFL DRAFT ANALYST
OWAIN jones COVERS EVERYTHING college football & NFL DRAFT. COMING WITH PLENTY OF EXPERIENCE, OWAIN was PREVIOUSLY a writer for pfsn, and WAS THE NFL DRAFT EDITOR AT NINETY-NINE YARDS, WHERE HE CREATED DRAFT TALK. YOU CAN FOLLOW HIM ON TWITTER @OwainJonesCFB.
