The college football season draws ever closer, roughly two months away at this point. College football has become much more of a passing-dominated sport over the past 20 years, after being a run-first sport for most of the 20th century and especially through the early 1980s. More recent evolutions in college football have placed a primacy on being able to pass the ball and spread the field against overstretched defenses. Which groups of wide receivers, in tandem with their quarterbacks, have the best chance of exploding for a big season in 2018?
North Texas
The first thing to realize about a ranking of the best receiver corps is that the quality of a receiver does not exist entirely in isolation. A good quarterback is often needed to make a receiver especially good. This is not an attempt to say that a receiver can’t be great independent of his quarterback – he can be. However, a receiver certainly will not maximize his talent or reach very great levels of statistical production if his quarterback can’t regularly put the ball in the right spot and on time. For this reason, receivers have to be assessed in combination with the quarterbacks they will have. This applies for every team on this list, some more than others.
North Texas has the trio of Jalen Guyton, Rico Bussey, and Michael Lawrence – with quarterback Mason Fine. North Texas is part of Conference USA, which has long been a wide-open league. The level of defenses in the conference, plus the veteran experience of Fine under center, should be able to make this one of the top five receiver groups in the country in 2018.
Oklahoma
Odds To Win College Football Playoff: +2500
The Sooners no longer have Baker Mayfield to throw to a group of receivers, but Kyler Murray – the transfer from Texas A&M – is an experienced quarterback who should not wither in the spotlight. That should be more than enough to get a lot of value out of the talents of Marquise Brown, CeeDee Lamb, and Mykel Jones. Brown and Lamb are extremely fast – they have sprinter-level speed and are lethal in open space when they get a running start. Expect OU coach Lincoln Riley to use them a lot on bubble screens, flat passes, and short crossing routes to get them in the open field in mismatches so that they can run after the catch.
North Carolina State
Odds To Win College Football Playoff: +12500
The Wolfpack were a stronger defensive team than an offensive team last year, but this year, the offense will be expected to carry the group… and it has the tools to do so in the passing game. Kelvin Harmon, Jakobi Myers, Stephen Louis – they are all elite receivers which veteran QB and former Boise State transfer Ryan Finley should be able to use well all season long. Finley has so many options to work with, which will keep secondaries off balance and often out of position this autumn.
Ole Miss
The Rebels were supposed to be horrible last year, but they weren’t. Coach Matt Luke, who was retained for this season, knows how to use the talent at his disposal. In the passing game, that talent will be formidable when the 2018 season begins. A.J. Brown, DaMarkus Lodge, D.K. Metcalf, and Dawson Knox should all be able to make the Rebels’ passing attack sing with efficiency.
West Virginia
Odds To Win College Football Playoff: +5000
The combination of possession receiver David Sills and speed threats Marcus Simms and Gary Jennings – with elite 2019 NFL Draft prospect Will Grier throwing to each of them – should give the Mountaineers their best passing attack in many years. Head coach Dana Holgorsen has an embarrassment of riches which he can unleash on the rest of the Big 12 Conference, which has very few legitimately good defenses.
*Odds provided by BetDSI Sportsbook.
