Year In Review: Top college football storylines in 2024

The 2024 college football season has been filled with memorable moments.

There were plenty of upsets: from Georgia Tech’s “stunning” win over Florida State in Week 0 (not so stunning after all) and Northern Illinois’ unexpected triumph over Notre Dame in Week 2, to Vanderbilt’s memorable victory over Alabama in Week 6 and Michigan’s remarkable win over rival Ohio State to close out the regular season.

There were plenty of individual highlights: from Ashton Jeanty’s 267-yard, six-touchdown performance in Week 1 to Travis Hunter’s regular-season finale, finishing with 10 catches for 110 yards and three touchdowns on offense, while adding an interception on defense.

And yes, there were plenty of coaching changes that took the college football world by storm: from Rich Rodriguez returning to West Virginia and Scott Frost heading back to UCF, to Bill Belichick being named the head coach at North Carolina.

But what was the single biggest storyline in college football this year?

FOX Sports college football writers Laken Litman, RJ Young and Michael Cohen are here to answer that question as we get set to flip the calendar to 2025.

What has been the biggest story of the 2024 college football season?

Laken Litman: Bill Belichick being named North Carolina’s new head coach. 

When the news broke, it was a totally wild, head-scratcher moment. After everything he’s accomplished in his legendary coaching career, he’s decided that now he wants to jump into chaos. NIL and the transfer portal are reasons why his good friend Nick Saban left the game. But given that Belichick spent years navigating salary caps and free agency, maybe this won’t be so new for him after all.

Given the experience he has building a front office, and how he’ll try to replicate it at UNC, maybe Belichick will be further ahead of most schools than everybody thinks. Regardless of how this new era in Chapel Hill goes, the hire was a shocking move this season, and what he does with a college program will be fascinating to watch in 2025.

RJ Young: Travis Hunter became the first bonafide two-way superstar of the 21st century after achieving what no other player has: at least 10 receiving touchdowns, 90 catches, 1,000 receiving yards and four interceptions in a single season. For his efforts, he was crowned the 2024 Heisman Memorial Trophy Winner. Like Shohei Ohtani in Major League Baseball, I don’t believe we’ll see another player as prolific on offense and defense in the sport for a long time — perhaps ever.

Michael Cohen: This program probably doesn’t get talked about enough because it’s tucked away in the Pacific Northwest, a part of the country not known for its college football prowess, but Oregon’s rapid ascension toward the absolute upper echelon of the sport under third-year head coach Dan Lanning is worth noting. For the Ducks to navigate their transition from the Pac-12 to the Big Ten with relative ease, breezing through the regular season as the only FBS team with an unblemished record, and enter the College Football Playoff as the No. 1 overall seed reflects the yeoman’s work being done in Eugene by Lanning, his staff, the administration and Nike co-founder Phil Knight, who continues to spearhead the school’s NIL efforts. There are few programs in college football better positioned than Oregon to compete for national titles on an annual basis.

Consider the assembly of this year’s roster, which included the No. 3 high school recruiting class in the nation and six of the top 101 players in the transfer portal — most notably quarterback Dillon Gabriel from Oklahoma, who developed into a Heisman Trophy finalist during his lone season with the Ducks, and former five-star quarterback Dante Moore from UCLA, who will replace Gabriel as the starter in 2025. Which brings us to the assembly of next year’s roster, a group that includes the No. 5 high school recruiting class in the nation — and one that has the highest average player rating of any FBS school — along with early commitments from four of the top 62 players in the 2025 transfer portal rankings, according to 247Sports. If the Ducks can beat Ohio State in the Rose Bowl to notch a second victory over the Buckeyes this season, that would place Oregon squarely atop the Big Ten hierarchy entering next season. 

Laken Litman covers college football, college basketball and soccer for FOX Sports. She previously wrote for Sports Illustrated, USA Today and The Indianapolis Star. She is the author of “Strong Like a Woman,” published in spring 2022 to mark the 50th anniversary of Title IX. Follow her at @LakenLitman.

RJ Young is a national college football writer and analyst for FOX Sports and the host of the podcast “The Number One College Football Show.” Follow him at @RJ_Young.

Michael Cohen covers college football and basketball for FOX Sports with an emphasis on the Big Ten. Follow him at @Michael_Cohen13.

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