Red Zone Defender: Twelve lessons we learned

Here are the 12 things that were discovered on this opening weekend of the college football season by Eric the Red Zone Defender.

Lesson No. 1

Five straight days of college football is just so cool.

Former Div. I-AA schools didn't have much success Saturday, with Cal Poly pulling the lone upset. (AP)

From Thursday night to through to Monday night, we are in the middle of college football nirvana without any break at all. Nice. Wish all weekends could be like this. Oh and the bonus to it all? There is no NFL stuff in there to mess up all of our scholastic fun.

Can't wait to see what Sunday (Louisville-Kentucky, Colorado State-Colorado) and Monday (Fresno State-Rutgers, Tennessee-UCLA) have in store for us.

Lesson No. 2

The team of the day was, without a doubt, Alabama.

The 24th-ranked Crimson Tide plastered No. 9 Clemson 34-10. Put it this way: Even with talents like James Davis and C.J. Spiller, the Tigers rushed for an aggregate of zero freakin' yards against the 'Bama defense. And freshman phenom Julio Jones caught a couple of passes, including a touchdown.

Best of all, quarterback John Parker Wilson was a very efficient 22-for-30 with two TDs and not a single pick on the night. This was a Crimson-colored beatdown. Nice work, Mr. Multi-Millionaire Coach.

Lesson No. 3

The SEC is good. Like, really damn good (at least so far).

Ya don't say? Really now. Of course. You gotta hand it to the southern monster conference in Week 1. Only Mississippi State laid an egg with its inexcusable loss at Louisiana Tech.

Elsewhere, No. 24 Alabama "upset" No. 9 Clemson, South Carolina abused North Carolina State on Thursday, Ole Miss blitzed Memphis 41-24 to signal that they are back and Florida and Georgia bombed Hawaii and Georgia Southern, taking away any drama early on. The SEC was 9-1 heading into Sunday. Strong work.

Lesson No. 4

The ACC? ... Not so much.

As mentioned above, N.C. State and Clemson were clobbered in embarrassing fashion. Also, Virginia Tech was beaten by East Carolina, Virginia didn't show up against Southern California and North Carolina nearly got beat by li'l ole McNeese State, escaping 35-28.

Take heart ACC, at least your field hockey teams pulled off a pair of upsets as North Carolina beat No. 9 Michigan and Wake Forest beat No. 5 Iowa. Yay!