Week Six NATIONAL College Football Previews:

#7 Indiana at Nebraska, #1 Texas vs. Oklahoma,
#2 Georgia at #6 Alabama Among Top Matchups
(DG’s Weekly CFB YouTube Show = Below)

By David Glenn
North Carolina Sports Network
(last updated Oct. 5, 2026)

The 2026 college football campaign continues Tuesday through Saturday with a compelling Week Six schedule, highlighted by #2 Georgia’s trip to #6 Alabama.

The three most prominent games nationally — each previewed below — include the #4 Bulldogs (5-0) taking on the Crimson Tide (5-0) in Tuscaloosa in a prime-time Saturday night national television window (7:30 p.m., ABC), another Southeastern Conference showdown between #1 Texas (4-0) and long-time archrival Oklahoma (2-2) in Dallas on Saturday afternoon (3:30 p.m., ABC), and a high-profile Big Ten clash pairing #7 Indiana (5-0) and undefeated Nebraska (5-0) in an early game (noon, FOX).

Meanwhile, all seven of North Carolina’s Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) teams are in action this week, with NC State hosting Wake Forest in Raleigh, as Duke and UNC take intriguing road trips.

Here are more details on our “Three To See” selections from this week’s national schedule:

National “Three To See,” Game One

#7 Indiana (5-0) at Nebraska (5-0), Sat., noon (FOX)

Former Carolina Panthers head coach Matt Rhule is now in his fourth season as the head coach at Nebraska, and he needs a break-out campaign this year, after going just 19-19 overall during his first three campaigns in Lincoln.

The Cornhuskers’ 5-0 start certainly fits that description, but Nebraska’s skeptics quickly point out that Rhule’s teams also jumped out to 5-1 starts in each of the past two seasons before stumbling to 7-6 finishes.

Now led by former Virginia starting quarterback Anthony Colandrea, Nebraska’s offense ranks fourth in the Big Ten in scoring offense (almost 44 points per game), and the Cornhuskers are fourth in scoring defense (14 points per game), too, although it’s fair to question the caliber of the team’s competition so far. For example, the Huskers’ only two Power Four victories this season have come over Big Ten bottom-feeders Maryland and Michigan State.

The Indiana story, of course, is one of the most amazing in modern college football history.

In the Hoosiers’ first 100-plus seasons on the gridiron, they finished in the national top 10 only twice, way back in 1945 and 1967.

Now, despite taking over a program that had posted only one top-25 campaign in the 35 years before his arrival in Bloomington, former Elon and James Madison head coach Curt Cignetti had led IU to back-to-back top-10 seasons, including last year’s absolutely stunning 16-0 national championship campaign.

Here in the Bold North State, Duke recently claimed its first ACC football title since 1989 and its first outright title since 1962.

Guess what? Indiana’s waits were even longer. Prior to last season, the Hoosiers hadn’t won the Big Ten championship since 1967, and they hadn’t won it outright since 1945. Now they have their first national championship on the gridiron, too.

How would folks feel, in North Carolina, if Duke, NC State, UNC or Wake Forest were playing in the College Football Playoff, with a legitimate chance to win it all?

That’s exactly the sort of stuff Indiana football is doing right now, and it’s almost impossible to believe … at least until you watch the Hoosiers play.

Against Nebraska, Indiana (a seven-point favorite) will take the field with the more talented team, led by running back Turbo Richard, wide receivers Charlie Becker and Nick Marsh, offensive tackle Carter Smith, defensive tackles Tyrique Tucker and Mario Landino, linebackers Rolijah Hardy and Isaiah Jones, safety Amare Ferrell and cornerback Jamari Sharpe.

National “Three To See,” Game Two

#1 Texas (4-0) vs. Oklahoma (2-2), Sat., 3:30 p.m. (ABC)

The game known as “The Red River Showdown” is probably one of the top five rivalries in college football — along with Michigan-Ohio State, Army-Navy, Alabama-Georgia and maybe a few other contenders — and it’s just the third time the Sooners and Longhorns will be playing each other as members of the SEC, after decades together in the old Big Eight and the Big 12.

Amazingly, these two schools have played each other in football since 1900! For perspective, in 1900, Oklahoma wasn’t even a state yet — that happened in 1907 — and the teams weren’t even called the “Sooners” and the “Longhorns” yet.

Since 1932, this game has been played at a neutral site — the Cotton Bowl in Dallas, which is located in the northern part of Texas, so it’s almost equidistant between the UT and OU campuses. The game is typically played in the midst of the 24-days-long Texas State Fair, and this year’s matchup is expected to draw 90,000-plus to the Cotton Bowl, as usual.

It’ll be another pretty cool look on TV, because — unlike at most football games, at any level — if you look up from the 50-yard line, pretty much all the fans in one half of the stadium are in Oklahoma’s colors, and pretty much all the fans in the other half are wearing Texas’ colors.

Oklahoma actually has had the better of this rivalry lately, with 17 victories in the past 27 matchups. However, over the past four seasons, when Steve Sarkisian has led the Longhorns and Brent Venables — the former Clemson defensive coordinator — has led the Sooners, Texas has taken three of four, each by a dominant margin.

The Longhorns are significant favorites again this time, with their #1 ranking and all of their NFL-caliber talent, and the Sooners off to a mediocre 2-2 start.

Oklahoma is playing very good defense again this season, as Venables’ teams almost always do, and remember that Texas QB Arch Manning and his crew managed only 24 points in their win over #1 Ohio State and only 20 in their victory at #14 Tennessee.

The lingering question is whether the Sooners’ offense can muster anything of significance against a Texas defense that is giving up the fewest points in the SEC (13 points per game) and ranks #1 or #2 nationally in many of the defensive efficiency numbers.

Meanwhile, OU (an eight-point underdog) is next-to-last in the SEC in scoring offense, at just 22 points per game, and just couldn’t get much going in its losses at Michigan and at Georgia.

Fifth-year OU quarterback John Mateer has taken the brunt of the blame for the team’s offensive struggles, but the Sooners haven’t run the ball well, either, so they’ll likely need to win the big-play and turnover categories to have a chance in this one, after averaging only three points per game in their three most recent losses to the Longhorns.