UMass hadn't beaten a team from college football's top tier since 1978. They'd gone winless the entire season before this one. They were 28.5-point underdogs. None of that mattered on Thursday night.
The Minutemen walked into SHI Stadium and beat Rutgers 37-21, in one of the most lopsided upsets by the numbers that college football has seen in years.
How It Happened
UMass quarterback William "Pop" Watson III threw for 197 yards and three touchdowns in his first game with the program. The Minutemen forced five Rutgers turnovers — including three interceptions off Scarlet Knights quarterback Dylan Lonergan — and turned them into 17 points. UMass carried a 24-7 lead into halftime and never let Rutgers back into it.
What Made It Historic
This was UMass's first win over an FBS opponent since 1978 and its first win of any kind since October 2024 — a 677-day losing streak, snapped on the road, against a Big Ten program, as nearly a five-touchdown underdog. Vegas had this game as close to a lock for Rutgers as college football lines get.
The Fallout in New Jersey
Rutgers didn't wait to react. Lonergan, who threw the three picks, left the game with an injury in the second half — and by the time Week 2 rolled around, head coach Greg Schiano had made the call: AJ Surace, not Lonergan, would make his first career start against Boston College. Schiano's own postgame reaction to the loss: "Never saw it coming."
What It Means
One upset doesn't rewrite a season, and Rutgers still has a long schedule to recover on. But for a UMass program that entered the week with nothing — no wins in over a year, no FBS win in nearly five decades, and 28.5 points of Vegas skepticism against it — Thursday night was the kind of result that programs like this wait a generation for.
