A wild Week 2 of college football is in the books. Now we turn the page to Week 3 with some more competitive conference matchups on the slate, including some of the premier games of the season. Let’s breakdown some best best for Week 3 of college football.
I’m publishing this article on Tuesday morning with four plays for the week, and will be adding throughout the week. Be sure to check back for updates.
North Carolina at Clemson (Saturday – 12pm ET)
North Carolina faced TCU in the international game in Week 0, but has had plenty of down time since. The Tar Heels had a bye in Week 1 and easily handled East Tennessee State last week at home, 35-3. After giving up 48 points to TCU in Week 1 last season, the most ever by a Bill Belichick defense, this version of UNC has been more what we expected to see from the legendary head coach.
The Tar Heels have surrendered 13 total points on the season, and held TCU to 10 points in the rematch in Ireland. Expect Belichick’s defense to continue looking strong in its first true road game of the season. Clemson’s offense was inept against LSU in the season opener. While the scoreboard read 10 points for the Tigers, LSU practically shut them out. Clemson got an early field goal off a turnover, and then a garbage time touchdown when LSU had hung over 50 points on the board.
Clemson bounced back with a win last week at home over Georgia Southern, but it wasn’t pretty. The Tigers scored just 22 points as near three-touchdown favorites, finishing with a final of 22-7. Despite how many points LSU scored on Clemson, much of that was piled on due to the offense not being able to move the ball.
UNC is not LSU, and won’t be able to run the score up like that. The Tar Heels managed just 13 points of offense in the matchup against the Horned Frogs, and will slum this one up with Clemson. With two inefficient offenses and a couple of solid defenses, look for a low scoring game in Death Valley. Feels like a 17-13 type of game.
Bettors at DK agree, with just 27% of the bets on the under, making up a whopping 95% of the handle, as of Tuesday morning.
CFB Pick: UNDER 44.5 (-110)
SMU at Louisville (Saturday – 3:30pm ET)
I was impressed with what I saw from Louisville in the season opener, despite the loss. The Cardinals went toe-to-toe with Ole Miss on a neutral in Nashville, falling just short by a final of 41-38. They followed it up by dropping 59 points last Friday night against Villanova.
Lincoln Kienholz threw for over 300 yards and a pair of touchdowns against the Rebels, along with 69 rushing yards and another score. He repeated the 300-plus passing yards and two touchdowns against Villanova, plus 42 rushing yards and two more touchdowns. Kienholz looks the part of a dangerous dual threat QB through his first two starts.
The Cardinals struggled to establish their rushing attack with the running backs against Ole Miss, which was the backbone of the offense in 2025. However, it should come to life at home against SMU. The Mustangs should have dominated Florida State in their season opener, but allowed FSU to stay in the game and escaped with a game-winning field goal.
The only reason FSU’s offense showed any life was its ability to run the ball. The starting running back finished with 22 carries for 116 yards and a touchdown. Louisville’s backs should be able to take advantage and balance out the offense on Saturday. Kienholz should also continue to thrive on the ground, as FSU QB Ashton Daniels put up 71 yards and a score on the ground.
I expect Louisville to get their’s offensively in this game. SMU is a dangerous offense as well. Kevin Jennings topped 400 passing yards against FSU, and was extremely efficient last week against UC Davis. However, the ground game may struggle on the road against the Cardinal’s defense. Jennings has been mistake prone, and tossed two interceptions at FSU. The Mustangs were very mistake-prone in their only true road test, with silly turnovers and penalties. They won’t be able to overcome the mistakes they got by with at FSU in a game at Louisville.
Louisville played on Friday night and has one extra day prep for this huge game in the ACC. With a stronger defense, more balanced offense and home field advantage, I’m backing the Cardinals to prevail.
Bettors at DK are siding this way as well, with 59% of the bets for 88% of the money backing the home team to win, as of Tuesday morning.
CFB Pick: Louisville ML (-115)
Florida at Auburn (Saturday – 7pm ET)
Florida’s offense has looked tremendous through the first two games of the Jon Sumrall era. The Gators put up 66 points against FAU and followed it up with 52 against Campbell. But both games were at The Swamp and obviously had the Gators priced as massive favorites. Now the challenge becomes going on the road for a Saturday night game in the SEC.
All four of Florida’s wins came at home last season. While it’s a new program with Sumrall at the helm, the Gators went 0-5 on the road in 2025. All five losses were by double digits, with an average margin of 17.4 points. I expect more fight out of this version of the Gators, but Auburn will be a tough task.
The Tigers opened up the season playing in a grinder against Baylor in Atlanta. Auburn escaped with a 17-16 victory, but left a lot of points on the table. Byrum Brown threw three interceptions and had multiple drives stall in Baylor territory. Against the level of competition that Florida has been facing, Auburn got back on track, scoring 43 points against Southern Miss. The Tigers took their foot off the gas late, and didn’t score any of those points in the fourth quarter.
The Gators have been shredding the ground game in the early going, and that’s something I believe Auburn can take away. Using the Baylor game as reference, the Bears handed it to Dawson Pendergrass 25 times in the opener. He was held to 3.5 yards per carry, and the backup managed just 2.8 YPC on 12 runs.
I like that Auburn already has a test under its belt this season, even if there were some speed bumps. I also feel home field advantage in this one is very valuable, particularly with Florida going on the road for the first time. We’ll learn who the Gators really are on Saturday night.
While I like the coaching hire of Sumrall, he wasn’t able to add much talent to what Florida had last year. I have questions about how successful the Gators can actually be this season, and those questions remain until I see them put it together against quality competition. I had Auburn ranked the better team in the preseason, and am not backing off that now. I made Auburn the favorite in the game prior to the season, when we had this one priced as a pick’em on DraftKings GOTY lines. Now we get Auburn as the home dog because of Florida’s success against lesser opponents. I like the Tigers to get the win at home.
Apparently, I’ll be strongly against the grain on this one. As of Tuesday morning, Auburn has just 1% of the money both on the ML and ATS at DK. All Florida money so far.
CFB Pick: Auburn +2.5 (-105)
LSU at Ole Miss (Saturday – 7:30pm ET)
This has the potential to be the atmosphere of the college football season. There will be a lot of hate and revenge in the air when Notre Dame hosts Miami in November after how the College Football Playoff selection process wound up last season, but Lane Kiffin’s return to Oxford just might top it.
We know how things ended. Kiffin took the LSU job at a brutal time. Ole Miss rallied best it could and got a huge win over Georgia in the CFP before Miami ultimately took it down. Now the Rebels get a chance to stick it to Kiffin for leaving. But we know Lane Kiffin, and he’s going to want to return to his old stomping grounds and shut the crowd up. This was going to be a rowdy one no matter what, but the fact that it’s also a top-10 matchup with CFP implications just puts it over the top.
I’m fading the hype with LSU. I understand how amazing the Tigers looked in the opener, but it came at home against a Clemson team that simply could not get out of its own way. Now, LSU’s defense is for real, don’t get me wrong. But Clemson never even gave it the slightest test. The combination of Trinidad Chambliss and Kewan Lacy absolutely will.
Given the coaching matchup, this will be a chess match. Kiffin knows Pete Golding’s defense. Golding know’s Kiffin’s offense. Who will have more tricks up their sleeve? It’ll be fascinating to watch. A lot has been made of LSU’s No. 1 transfer class. Let’s not forget that Ole Miss brought in the No. 2 class in the country, including a lot of highly ranked defenders.
This should be a high scoring game, and we’ve seen lots of over money come in and the total tick up. I’m tempted to go that way and ultimately might. But my play on this game will be the home dog.
We had a GOTY line on this one of Ole Miss -2.5. I think what we saw in Week 1 speaks much more to the issues Clemson has than how good LSU is, making this an over adjustment. Ole Miss put up 41 points on what I feel is a solid Louisville defense, and will be able to score in this game.
Again, LSU will get there’s, but I trust Ole Miss to be better at home, fueled by a crowd that will make things very difficult on the Tigers. Bettors at DK are buying into the LSU hype, with 72% of the tickets on the Tigers both ML and ATS. I’m fading the public on this one and buying low on Ole Miss, who I believe has done nothing to show it isn’t the team we thought it would be.
CFB Pick: Ole Miss +3 (-110)
For more analysis check out our College Football homepage on DraftKings Network.
