No. 18 South Florida in position to join exclusive company

There has been no better story so far in college football than the No. 18 South Florida Bulls.

Previously unbeaten to begin the season, South Florida comfortably took down No. 25 Boise State, 34-7, in its opener before backing that up with a walk-off field goal to beat No. 13 Florida, 18-16, in Gainesville.

That has put the Bulls, who are ranked for the first time since 2018, in a position to join some exclusive company should they stun the No. 5 Miami Hurricanes in an in-state ranked battle on Saturday. 

If South Florida were to start the season 3-0, it would become just the third team to win its first three games against ranked opponents since 1980, per Stats Perform. Miami went on to finish the 1987 season 12-0 and won the national championship, while Michigan finished 10-1-1 and won the Fiesta Bowl in 1985.

South Florida has had a historic start

In the Week 1 meeting with Boise State, South Florida scored 34 unanswered points after trailing 7-0 in the first quarter. It forced three Boise State turnovers in the game and benefited from 253 total yards and two rushing TDs from QB Byrum Brown.

It was much of the same in Week 2 against Florida. The Bulls intercepted Florida QB DJ Lagway and capitalized on 103 penalty yards from the Gators. Florida did not score a TD until the fourth quarter, and Brown combined for 329 yards of offense and threw one TD.

The Hurricanes will be South Florida’s stiffest test yet. They opened the season with an impressive 27-24 win over a sixth-ranked Notre Dame team. Georgia transfer Carson Beck has been phenomenal so far, completing 42 of his 55 pass attempts for 472 yards and four TDs.

South Florida has a favorable schedule the rest of the way after it clashes with Miami on Saturday. The Bulls are 17.5-point underdogs in the matchup as of Wednesday, according to FanDuel, which speaks to the challenge they are up against.

While the odds of South Florida putting its name on the exclusive list of teams to open a season 3-0 against ranked opponents seem unlikely, they were not given much of a chance in their first two games either.

If anything, Miami and Michigan went on to have great seasons after their 3-0 starts. Who is to say that South Florida, regardless of whether it loses or not on Saturday, can’t do something similar?