Pac-12 Football

In one of the least surprising developments of bowl season. USC quarterback Caleb Williams, the potential No. 1 overall pick in the 2024 NFL draft, will not play in his team's Holiday Bowl matchup against Louisville.

Trojans head coach Lincoln Riley told reporters as much Monday.

Williams did play in USC's bowl game last year and threw for 462 yards and five touchdowns in a 46-45 loss to Tulane that underscored the program's defensive problems that prevented it from winning a Pac-12 title and competing in the College Football Playoff.

Expectations were high entering the 2023 campaign considering the signal-caller won the Heisman Trophy last season and was returning.

However, USC lost five of its final six games following a 6-0 start and was nowhere near CFP discussions by season's end.

While Williams took a step back production wise from last year, he was still largely excellent and completed 68.6 percent of his passes for 3,633 yards, 30 touchdowns and five interceptions. Three of those picks came in a loss to Notre Dame, meaning he played mistake-free football for most of the rest of the season.

Alas, it was a disappointing season for the Trojans and the reigning Heisman Trophy winner, who will not join Ohio State's Archie Griffin as the only players to win the award twice.

Now that he is not playing in the bowl game, attention turns to the NFL draft.

He could become the No. 1 overall pick, although that may depend on which team ends up picking first. If it is the Chicago Bears or Arizona Cardinals, they may look elsewhere and decide to stick with Justin Fields and Kyler Murray.

B/R's NFL Scouting Department projected the Cardinals to select Ohio State wide receiver Marvin Harrison Jr. with the No. 1 overall pick in a mock draft last month with Williams going No. 2.

There may even be some trading and maneuvering to get to the top like there was last year when the Carolina Panthers moved up to take Bryce Young with the first pick. If that is the case, Williams' future team may not be decided until well after the NFL season ends.

Colorado football coach Deion Sanders and fiancee Tracey Edmonds have separated, she announced on Instagram.

"We have mutually decided that it is best for us to move forward in life AS FRIENDS and have made this decision with love in our hearts, respect for each other, and appreciation for the time we've shared together," Edmonds wrote.

"Please keep us in your prayers as we go through this transition. Thank you for being there for us ALL THESE YEARS! We love you and appreciate you SO MUCH!"

Sanders and Edmonds dated for 12 years and were engaged in February 2019. The pair originally met and started dating when she was producing his reality show, Deion's Family Playbook.

Sanders just finished his first season at Colorado, posting a 4-8 record. The Buffaloes started the regular season 3-0, making Sanders and his program the talk of college football, before wilting in Pac-12 play.

Edmonds is an Emmy-winning producer who was previously married to R&B artist Babyface.

Colorado defensive ends coach Nick Williams is reportedly leaving the team for a coaching opportunity elsewhere, according to Bruce Feldman and Justin Williams of The Athletic.

He's the third coach to leave Deion Sanders' staff since the team's season ended, with tight ends coach Tim Brewster resigning and offensive coordinator Sean Lewis taking over as the head coach at San Diego State.

It's been a tumultuous early offseason for Coach Prime's Buffaloes.

The program has seen five recruits between the Class of 2024 and 2025 decommit already and four players—left tackle Gerad Christian-Lichtenhan, center Van Wells, linebacker Marvin Ham II and tight end Caleb Fauria—have announced their intention to enter the transfer portal.

Colorado was the most viral story in sports after a 3-0 start to the season, but reality set in quickly and the Buffs finished the season 4-7, losing six straight to close the campaign.

Sanders, who hit the transfer portal hard and added 69 scholarship athletes to the 2023 roster after his hiring last offseason, has remained publicly confident that Colorado would again improve via the portal.

"You gonna be pleased with what's coming; I promise you that," he told reporters after the team's 23-17 loss against Utah in November. "But everything that you see that we have a lack thereof, a deficit, we're gonna fill that need."

That will apparently include the coaching staff. Williams reportedly had a big impact as a recruiter for the Buffs, making him a tough loss for a program that ranks just 65th in 247Sports' Composite Rankings for the Class of 2024.

Colorado has not traditionally been a powerhouse and competing in a loaded Pac-12 this season was never going to be easy, so Sanders always had his work cut out for him rebuilding the Buffaloes. He turned Colorado into one of the hottest tickets in college football in September, but now some of the realties of the job are setting in.

How Sanders responds this offseason and beyond, as Colorado heads to the new-look Big 12, will determine whether he can actually turn around the Buffaloes.

The Pac-12 certainly went out with a bang.

The final Pac-12 title game between No. 3 Washington and No. 5 Oregon on Saturday night was the most-watched in history, racking up 9.2 million viewers, ESPN and ABC announced.

Those 9.2 million viewers were certainly given a great show as the second matchup of the season between the Ducks and Huskies was one of the best games of the season—much like their first meeting back on Oct. 14.

Michael Penix Jr. and Washington once again came out with the 34-31 win and locked in a place in the College Football Playoff as it remained undefeated in its biggest game of the season.

With the Pac-12 splintering off into several different conferences, namely the Big 10 and Big 12, it was a memorable end for an incredible era of college football.

Oregon's 34-31 loss to Washington in the Pac-12 Championship Game may have been Bo Nix's final start in college.

Speaking to reporters after the defeat, Nix wasn't ready to say if he would play in the Ducks' bowl game.

"Can we just enjoy the moment right now and enjoy our season?" Nix asked. "That's not today's decision. I have no idea."

The Ducks had an opportunity to make the top four in the College Football Playoff with a win on Friday night. They entered the game 11-1 and No. 5 in the playoff rankings, with their lone defeat coming on the road against Washington on Oct. 14.

Losing to the Huskies for a second time guarantees Oregon won't crack the top 4 in the final College Football Playoff rankings that will be released on Sunday.

Nix and the Ducks did a great job of making the game competitive in the second half. Washington dominated the first half, taking a 20-3 lead at one point before Oregon got a touchdown late in the second quarter.

Oregon scored touchdowns on two of its first three possessions in the third quarter to go up 24-20. The Huskies responded by getting into the end zone on back-to-back drives to take a 10-point lead.

After the Ducks went 75 yards in two plays to make it a 34-31 game with 2:14 remaining, Washington got the ball back and picked up two first downs to run out the clock.

Stewart Mandel and Scott Dochterman of The Athletic noted Oregon will likely play in the Fiesta Bowl on Jan. 1.

Nix will likely be one of the four Heisman finalists after a fantastic season. He's thrown for 4,145 yards, 40 touchdowns and completed 77.2 percent of his attempts in 13 games.

A fifth-year senior, Nix is the NCAA's all-time leader with 60 career starts. He spent his first three years at Auburn before transferring to Oregon in December 2021. He has a 21-5 record in 26 games with the Ducks.

The final Pac-12 Championship game was a memorable one.

Two of the nation's premier offenses battled it out with a spot in the College Football Playoff on the line as No. 3 Washington defeated No. 5 Oregon by the final score of 34-31 on Friday night.

It was also a clash between Heisman Trophy-caliber quarterbacks, as the Ducks' Bo Nix and the Huskies' Michael Penix Jr. have been two of the best signal-callers in the country this season.

Penix Jr. finished with 319 passing yards while completing 69 percent of his attempts, marking the ninth time this year that he's crossed the 300-yard threshold through the air. He bounced back from a third-quarter interception to throw a touchdown with less than three minutes remaining in the game that put Washington up by 10.

It wasn't smooth sailing the whole way, however. The Huskies jumped out to a 17-3 lead in the second quarter before a furious Oregon comeback led to Washington trailing 24-20 near the end of the third.

Eventually, Penix Jr.'s heroics helped lead the team to their second victory over Oregon this year. College football fans were impressed.

Bo Nix finished with 239 yards of his own while tossing three touchdowns, although Oregon's comeback efforts fell short. He also threw an interception immediately following Penix Jr.'s turnover, just his third pick of the season.

Washington will be making its second College Football Playoff appearance in school history, and the first since 2016.

Lincoln Riley and the USC Trojans made a big addition to their coaching staff Friday as they hired D'Anton Lynn away from rival UCLA as their new defensive coordinator, according to ESPN's Pete Thamel.

Lynn, 34, is a rising star in the collegiate coaching ranks following an excellent first season leading the Bruins' defense in 2023. He took a unit that was ranked No. 89 in total defense the previous year and made them the No. 11 group in the country.

He will have his work cut out for him as he replaces Alex Grinch, who was fired during the season following the Trojans' loss to Washington back on Nov. 4.

Grinch and the rest of USC's defense struggled mightily this season, allowing 34.92 points per game as well as a whopping 438.8 yards of total offense—both of which are bottom three marks in the Pac-12.

Prior to his stint at UCLA, Lynn had nearly a decade of experience working at the professional level with a number of NFL teams. His most notable position came with the Baltimore Ravens from 2021-22 as the team's safeties coach.

Lynn will help lead the Trojans into a new era as they enter the Big 10 next season. He'll look to compliment an offensive side of the ball that is normally elite thanks to Riley and Co.

Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones is among the believers in Colorado quarterback Shedeur Sanders.

Shedeur and his dad Deion were in attendance for the Cowboys' 41-35 victory over the Seattle Seahawks on Thursday night. A video uploaded by Well Off Media included an exchange involving Jones and the Sanders family in which Jones said Shedeur "very easily could be the top pick in the draft."

Shedeur has yet to announce his decision for next season, but Deion signaled in November he expects both of his sons to declare for the 2025 NFL draft rather than forgo their college eligibility in 2024.

Were he to stay at Colorado, there's a chance Shedeur could climb to the top of draft boards by the spring of 2025.

Sanders made a strong impression in his first season at the FBS level. He threw for 3,230 yards, 27 touchdowns and three interceptions with the Buffs, though his draft stock slipped a bit amid the team's second-half slide.

Sanders is the No. 68 overall prospect and the No. 5 quarterback in Bleacher Report's 2024 big board. However, The Athletic's Dane Brugler ranked him 24th overall on Nov. 1, and ESPN's Mel Kiper had him sixth on his big board.

"Having watched Sanders' tape from 2021 and 2022 and the improvement he has shown this season, I see future top-10 pick potential," Kiper wrote. "He's that good. He's only a true junior, which means he could return to school next season and compete to be the No. 1 overall pick in the 2025 class."

Based on the projections, Sanders would probably be a Day 2 pick at worst if he were to declare for the draft now. Suiting up for Colorado in 2024 could take him to even greater heights.

Deion Sanders' first season at Colorado was one that began with plenty of hype and hope but that ultimately ended with a whimper.

Sanders' Buffaloes captured the imagination of the college football world following an electric start to his tenure with wins over TCU, Nebraska and an overtime thriller against Colorado State.

The program ended just winning one more game all season and endured several ugly losses.

But Sanders believes the bet is yet to come.

"This was a season of hope," Sanders said while appearing on Amazon's Thursday Night Football pregame show. "... But next year is a season of expectation."

Sanders' squad was led by a handful transfers from his time at Jackson State as well as other FBS programs, namely his son Shedeur as well as former five-star recruit Travis Hunter.

While the Buffalos' skill players were great, they lacked physicality on defense and in the trenches. It's what cost them when they came up against some tougher competition like Oregon, USC and others.

Nonetheless, Sanders led a major improvement to a program that had won just one game the season prior and breathed life into a community that had loss some hope in the football team.

Sanders also went on to emphasize that he and his staff are recruiting "our butts off." He has been known as a master recruiter in the past but this year's recruiting cycle has left something to be desired.

Colorado currently has the No. 64 ranked recruiting class in the nation, according to 247 sports composite. The program also loss some recruits earlier in the week as 2024 three-star quarterback Danny O'Neil and Class of 2025 three-star running back Jamarice Walker withdrew their commitments Monday.

That came just one day after 2025 quarterback four-star recruit Antwann Hill decommitted.

So, Sanders definitely has his work cut out for him ahead of early signing day on Dec. 20.