This Week in Pac-12 Football - Week 1

9/2/2026 4:36:00 PM

By: Pac-12 Conference

Full release here

WEEK 1 SCHEDULE (all times PT)

Friday, September 4
Fresno State at #14 USC                        6pm            FOX
            Connor Onion, Robert Griffin III, Alexa Landestoy

Saturday, September 5
Oregon State at #23 Houston                9am ESPN
            Anish Shroff, Andre Ware, Morgan Uber
Texas State at #5 Texas                    12:30pm           ESPN
            Roy Philpott, Brock Osweiler, Sherree Burruss
Boise State at #2 Oregon              12:30pm CBS
            Brad Nessler, Charles Davis, Jenny Dell
Wyoming at Colorado State              3pm USA Network
            Nate Gatter, Ryan Leaf, Lauren Green
Idaho State at Utah State                  4pm CBS Sports Network
            Jordan Kent, Robert Turbin, Hailey Sutton
Portland State at San Diego State       6:30pm USA Network
            Ted Robinson, Darius Walker, Dalen Cuff

Sunday, September 6
Washington State at #17 Washington 1pm NBC
            Paul Burmeister, Yogi Roth, Zora Stephenson

AROUND THE PAC-12
STRENGTH OF SCHEDULE: The Pac-12 faces 5 teams ranked in the AP Preseason Top 25 in Week 1, more than any other FBS conference and are the only conference facing two Top 5 teams in Week 1. Over the first 4 weeks, Pac-12 schools have 9 total games against teams ranked in the AP Preseason Top 25. Of the Pac-12’s 24 non-conference games vs. FBS opponents this season, 20 are against teams that were bowl eligible in 2025 including 3 that were in last year’s College Football Playoff.

CERTIFIED FRESH: 3 of the conference’s 8 teams will be represented by new head coaches this season. Pac-12 veteran Jim Mora made the move to Colorado State from UConn this offseason while JaMarcus Shepherd (Oregon State) and Kirby Moore (Washington State), who both have will be making their head coaching debuts after spending the last few seasons in the SEC. Shepherd was the Assistant Head Coach at Alabama the last 2 years under Kalen DeBoer after previous stops in the Pac-12 at Washington and Washington State. Moore, who played at Boise State, was the offensive coordinator at Missouri the last 3 years with previous stops at Fresno State and Washington.

NEW SHARED HISTORY: On the NFL side, there are 3 head coaches who played at current Pac-12 schools. After winning the Super Bowl as offensive coordinator with the Seahawks, former Colorado State safety Klint Kubiak gets his first head coaching job this year in leading the Las Vegas Raiders. Former San Diego State QB Kevin O’Connell enters Year 5 leading the Minnesota Vikings with a pair of 13+ win seasons already on his resume. Boise State’s all-time leading passer Kellen Moore, older brother of WSU head coach Kirby, will once again be leading the New Orleans Saints after winning 4 of his final 5 games in Year 1.

FREAKS OF THE INDUSTRY: 3 Pac-12 players made the annual “Freaks List” by The Athletic’s Bruce Feldman. Texas State OL Sully Burns checks in at #57 while Oregon State DL Daniel Matagi (#81) and San Diego State RB Lucky Sutton (#100) also make the list.

PAC PRIMERS
Boise State

Only FBS school to win their conference championship game in each of the last 3 years under head coach Spencer Danielson. Georgia is the only other school with multiple wins in their conference title game since 2023. They also have been bowl eligible in 28 straight seasons, 2nd longest active streak behind Georgia (29).
One of 4 FBS teams, along with Texas Tech, Utah and Western Michigan, returning 2 players that had 800+ rushing yards for their team last year. Sire Gaines and Dylan Riley combined for 1,936 rushing yards and 18 rush TD in 2025.
Looking for 2nd ever win over an AP Top 5 team after beating #3 TCU 17-10 in the 2010 Fiesta Bowl to finish the season 14-0 under Chris Petersen. The Broncos are 3-1 all-time against Oregon with the only loss coming in Eugene in 2024 on a game-winning field goal as time expired.

Colorado State

In his 10 seasons as an FBS head coach (UCLA, UConn), Jim Mora’s teams have reached a bowl game 8 times with 8+ wins in 6 of them. Mora’s teams saw a +5 win improvement in his first season at UConn (2022) and a +3 improvement in his first season at UCLA (2012).
Added 76 new faces to the program this season with 41 of them being transfers, including 18 that followed Mora from UConn. After starting 3 different QB’s last year, CSU added K’saan Farrar (UConn) and Hauss Hejny (Oklahoma State) to compete for the starting job. The 6 QBs on the current roster have combined for 135 career pass attempts with 107 of them coming from the returning Darius Curry.
The 118th Border War will feature the first time since 1923 that CSU will open at home against rival Wyoming. The Rams and Cowboys have played in the season opener 13 times prior to this with CSU going 9-2-1 in those games.

Fresno State

Owned the 2nd best pass defense in FBS last season at 153.8 YPG allowed by holding 11 of their 13 opponents under 200 yards passing. It's the 2nd time in the last 30 seasons the Bulldogs have held 10+ opponents to under 200 yards passing in a season (2004).
Return their top 3 rushers from last season in RB Rayshon Luke, Bryson Donelson, and Brandon Ramirez who combined for 312 attempts for 1,640 yards and 14 rush TD. The team rushed for 170.5 YPG, their most since 2014 (182.4). Went 8-0 last year when attempting 32+ rush attempts in a game.
After missing last season due to injury, Jayden Mandal was named the team’s starting QB ahead of Week 1. Mandal started the 2024 Idaho Potato Bowl, the only career start by any QB on the current roster. From nearby Clovis, Mandal originally committed to the Bulldogs to play baseball before switching to football.

Oregon State

Named Braden Atkinson their starting QB who won the 2025 Jerry Rice Award last year at Mercer as the FCS Most Outstanding Freshman (an award previously won by Shedeur Sanders and Cam Ward). Atkinson set Mercer’s single-season records for completions, pass attempts, pass yards (3,596) and pass TD (34). This is the 8th straight year OSU will have a different starting QB in the season opener.
Open their season with 3 straight teams that won 10+ games last year. Houston went 10-3 last year with a win over LSU in the Texas Bowl. Texas Tech was 12-2 and reached the College Football Playoff as the Big 12 champs while Montana finished 13-2 and an appearance in the FCS Semifinals.
In last year’s overtime loss to Houston in Corvallis, Cornell Hatcher Jr. had a career-high 93 rushing yards on 17 attempts including an 18-yard TD run in the 4th quarter. Hatcher is the Beavers’ leading returning rusher and they added Vanderbilt transfer AJ Newberry who has rushed for 3 scores in each of the last 2 seasons.

San Diego State

Had a 6-win improvement from Year 1 (3-9) to Year 2 (9-4) under head coach Sean Lewis last season, reaching a bowl game for the first time since 2022. 1 of 9 FBS teams last year with a 6+ win improvement and matched their best year-to-year in program history (1960-61).
SDSU’s defense held 8 of their 13 opponents last season to 10 points or less, tied for the 3rd most in FBS last year behind only Ohio State and Indiana. Their 3 shutouts last season led FBS and were the most in a season since 2023 (Navy & Penn State). The Aztecs scoring defense was down 14.2 PPG from 2024, the 3rd best improvement in FBS.
RB Lucky Sutton finished 13th in FBS last season with 1,297 rush yards last season and was a Doak Walker Award semifinalist for the nation’s top RB. The Aztecs were 5-1 last year in games Sutton rushed for 100+ yards with the only loss coming in 2OT to New Mexico.

Texas State

QB Brad Jackson had one of the most unique college football seasons in history last year as a redshirt freshman. He’s the first FBS QB to have 3,000+ pass yards (3,224), 20+ pass TD (21), 700+ rush yards (744), 15+ rush TD (17) while completing over 70% of his passes (71.3) all in the same season.
Only FBS team to return 2 WR’s that had 1,000+ receiving yards in 2025 with Chris Dawn Jr. and Beau Sparks. The 2 combined for 149 receptions for 2,207 yards and 14 rec TD last season. They’re the first FBS team to return two 1,000 yard receivers since 2023 (Washington, Ohio State).
Despite the roughly 30 mile distance between campuses, this will be just the 2nd ever meeting between Texas State and Texas with the previous matchup occurring in Austin in 1930.

Utah State

Head coach Bronco Mendenhall has 146 career wins, 4th most among active FBS head coaches (Ferentz, Swinney, Whittingham). In his first 2 head coaching jobs, Mendenhall has seen great success in his 2nd year of the program with BYU improving from 6-6 to 11-2 in his 2nd season in Provo (2006) and Virginia boosting their record from 2-10 to 6-7 in Year 2 in Charlottesville (2017).
Starting QB McCae Hillstead returns to the Aggies after spending the last 2 seasons at BYU. Hillstead started 4 games as a true freshman at Utah State in 2023 which included the school’s freshman record 399 pass yards with 4 pass TD against James Madison in his 1st career start.
Returning WR Anthony Garcia had 20 receptions with 2 receiving touchdowns and another on the ground. But even more impressively, the former QB was 6-7 as a passer with 4 pass TD last season to become the only FBS player since at least 1956 to have 4 pass TD in 7 or fewer attempts for a season.

Washington State

Kirby Moore will make his head coaching debut in the Apple Cup against Washington, a school he was a graduate assistant in 2015 & 2016 under Chris Petersen, who coached Moore at Boise State. This will be the 118th matchup between the in-state rivals and the first time facing each other in the season opener.
Starting QB Caden Pinnick threw for 3,206 yards and 32 touchdowns last season as a redshirt freshman at UC Davis as he was named a finalist for the 2025 Jerry Rice Award for the top freshman in FCS.
Tony Freeman, last year’s Pac-12 Top Special Teams Performer, returns after setting the school’s single-season record with a 17.3 average on punt returns with 5 returns of 40+ yards. Freeman is also the team’s lead returning receiver after catching 54 passes for 590 yards and 3 scores last season.

PAC-12 IN THE WEEKLY NATIONAL RANKINGS
(AP, Coaches, CFP- starting Nov. 3)

	Boise St	Colorado St	Fresno St	Oregon St	San Diego St	Texas St	Utah St	Wash St
Pre	RV/RV	-	-	-	- /RV	-	-	-
Wk 1

(S&P+, The Athletic, CBS Sports 138)

	Boise St	Colorado St	Fresno St	Oregon St	San Diego St	Texas St	Utah St	Wash St
Pre	49/21/43	107/115/101	73/57/75	89/116/94	65/43/71	77/82/85	96/104/97	86/83/88
Wk 1

PAC-12: A TOP 5 LEAGUE

Over the last five seasons since 2021, and considering conference compositions beginning with the 2026 season, the new Pac-12 has stacked up competitively as a Top 5 conference across a number of notable datapoints, including:

The fourth-best overall winning percentage (.537) for any league behind only the SEC (.612), Big Ten (.591) and Big 12 (.554).
- Six of the Pac-12 eight schools have a .500 or better record over that span, tied with the Big 12 for highest percentage (75%)
The fifth-best average FPI ranking (78) behind the SEC (28), Big Ten (40), Big 12 (46) and ACC (52).
The fifth-best average SP+ ranking (74) behind the SEC (29), Big Ten (44), Big 12 (52) and ACC (58)
The fifth-best SportSource Analytics Team Success average rating and ranking (42.9, 74) behind the SEC (65.6, 33), Big Ten (60.1, 43), Big 12 (55.3, 48) and ACC (49.8, 59).
One of only five conferences to have seen more than half their football membership ranked at some point in the AP Top 25 poll over the last five seasons (75%, 6 of 8), including the SEC (100%, 16 of 16), Big 12 (94%, 15 of 16), ACC (88%, 15 of 17) and Big Ten (83%, 15 of 18).
One of only five conferences to have seen more than half their football membership ranked at some point in the CFP Top 25 over the last five seasons (63%, 5 of 8), including the SEC (94%, 15 of 16), Big 12 (94%, 15 of 16), Big Ten (78%, 14 of 18) and ACC (71%, 12 of 17).

In addition, the new Pac-12 saw 75% of its collective membership (6 of 8) reach bowl eligibility and participate in the postseason in 2025, the highest percentage of membership for any conference last season.