Week 2 of the college football season was pure whiplash. South Florida walked into The Swamp and left with Florida’s pride in their back pocket. Mississippi State humbled a ranked Arizona State squad, and Oregon turned the Oklahoma State game into a blowout with that 69–3 beatdown. Ohio State’s Julian Sayin looked like a cheat code with his diabolical accuracy. Arch Manning’s Heisman hype train already hit a red light. But the biggest curveball? A former Heisman winner just slid a Group of Five QB to the top of his Heisman list, leaving the usual Power 4 suspects in the dust.

The name at No. 1 isn’t Manning, Klubnik, or even Nussmeier. It’s South Florida’s Byrum Brown. The Bulls QB who spent last year rewriting USF’s record book and now has his Bulls sitting at No. 18 in the nation after back-to-back upsets of ranked teams. When Robert Griffin III dropped his Heisman frontrunner rankings on September 8, Brown sat on top of the mountain like it was nothing. And suddenly, the kid nobody outside of Tampa was talking about is the one everybody needs to pay attention to.

RGIII’s list flipped the whole script. Arch Manning, who opened the year with the best odds in Vegas, didn’t even crack the top tier. Garrett Nussmeier? Slid to five. Carson Beck? Hovering in the middle. But Brown? He’s balling with receipts. Through two weeks, the USF quarterback has thrown for over 470 yards, accounted for multiple touchdowns, and not coughed up a single interception. Efficiency, swagger, and wins. It’s the exact cocktail the Heisman committee loves.

Griffin wasn’t just tossing names around. Behind Brown at No. 2 came Florida State’s Thomas Castellanos, fresh off a win over Bama and a 3-TD torching of East Texas A&M. At No. 3, Georgia’s Carson Beck is steady flexing with an 89.4 QBR. Baylor’s Sawyer Robertson slid in at No. 4 after his thriller against SMU, while Nussmeier landed at five. Further down, Auburn’s Jackson Arnold, Arkansas’ Taylen Green, A&M’s Marcel Reed, and Texas Tech’s Behren Morton rounded out the top nine. Big brands? Sure. But the ex-Heisman winner put his respect on a Group of Five QB’s name first.

The crazy part? Brown’s résumé already looks like a Cinderella script. He holds 12 USF program records, including single-season passing yards and touchdowns, and he just dragged the Bulls back into the AP Top 25 for the first time since 2016. Add the Walter Camp Watch List nod, and you’ve got a kid who’s not just living in the conversation. He’s shaping it. RGIII putting him at the top isn’t a gimmick, it’s validation.

Now, with USF sitting 2–0 and Brown cooking defenses like Sunday barbecue, the question is simple: can he keep this up when the lights get brighter? Or will the schedule down the road expose the hidden cracks?

Byrum Brown and USF’s perfect start to the season

In their opening night against No. 25 Boise State, the Bulls pulled every trick out of the bag. A fake punt touchdown here, a smothering defensive stand there, and Byrum Brown running it in like he owned the joint. Final score: 34–7. That was an ambush. And it marked USF’s first ranked win since 2016. Brown didn’t just manage the game, he stamped it, finishing with 2 rushing scores and setting the tone that USF wasn’t here to play around.

Then came Gainesville, and boy, did things get loud. Facing No. 13 Florida in The Swamp, Brown went for 263 passing yards and a touchdown, while his kicker Nico Gramatica iced it with a clutch 20-yarder at the buzzer. 18–16, Bulls on top. First-ever win over the Gators, first back-to-back ranked dubs to open a season in school history, and the first time USF cracked the AP Top 25 in seven years. You couldn’t script a better two-week stretch if you tried.

Brown’s fingerprints are all over it. Robert Griffin didn’t just give Byrum Brown flowers. He gave him a whole garden. And for a Bulls program starving for national respect, that’s priceless. Now, the mission is clear. Keep balling, keep shocking, and make sure nobody can call you a “non-Power QB” with a straight face ever again.