Each week this article will
focus on some of my predictions and insights for the coming
week and discuss some of my previous, faulty predictions.
The article will also feature pictures of a different
college football stud that defines the term “Eye Candy.”
Angles
What did we learn this past
weekend in college football? There is a team from New
Jersey, one that no one really cared about prior to this
season outside of the year
1869
or the state from which it hails, that played in one of the
most exciting college football games in history. There is a
team from the hills of western North Carolina that managed
to get an offensive coach from another team all but
fired.
There is a team out
West
that, in not so many words but rather in the quality of
their game Saturday night, that said they didn’t want to
play in the biggest
game
of the year. Then there was a team from Texas that
proved
losing in the second to last week of the season hurts your
national title hopes twice as much as losing in the
second
week of the season.
The season is starting to
wind down as the
Apple Cup
is being played on Saturday. (Washington State should
manage to find a way to lose that game and not make it to a
good bowl accordingly; Washington has nothing to play for
except intrastate bragging rights.) All the conferences but
the Big East have their pecking orders pretty much
solidified and a few teams (Hawaii and Navy) have already
accepted bowl
invitations.
And the BCS “experts” are coming out of the woodwork to tell
us how things are supposed to shape up and why, or why not,
this is a great system to decide a national championship.
What we have this coming
weekend, however, is a game that will be played for the
national championship, almost six weeks before the actual
title game is played! It is going to feature two powerhouse
teams from the Big Ten who have never met on the field of
play before ranked #1 and #2. All this anticipation has
built up over the past three or four weeks for a game that
only a small number of college football experts accurately
predicted back in August. You already the teams involved
and you’re probably sick of reading about this at the other
various college football sites, so I’ll just jump to my
prediction: Michigan will lose to Ohio State by only a few
points and create a huge BCS mess.
And it doesn’t matter if my
prediction is correct. Regardless of the outcome, as long
as the loser of the game keeps it close, the worst of all
possible scenarios will unfold for the BCS, but only if
Boise State and Rutgers manage to win the rest of their
games, something they should be able to accomplish.
If these two teams do manage
to win out, the mess ensues where three unbeatens will
remain and only one will play for the national title. Ohio
State and a bevy of one-loss teams will get more love from
the pollsters and the computers will not be kind preventing
Rutgers and Boise State from having a chance at playing for
the national title. It’ll be Ohio State and either Michigan
(oh, what a rematch!), USC (oh, how passé!), or dare I say
it, Notre Dame (oh, how lame!). There will be a huge uproar
by the public, and rightfully so. Let’s just hope the worst
of all possible scenarios unfolds and the BCS goes the way
of the Dodo bird and we get the beginning of a playoff
system for Division IA college football. You know,
something that will truly make this sport great once and for
all!
Something New,
Something Blue
Congratulations to the
University of North Carolina. Dick Baddour, the Tar Heels
athletic directory, finally figured out that a school cannot
have a top-notch football team without a top-notch coach.
After years of suffering though horrible seasons when Mac
Brown left Carolina for Texas, Butch Davis was
hired
to replace John Bunting. Davis will do a great job for the
Tar Heels as he deserves all the credit for turning the
Miami Hurricanes program around after it was in tailspin due
to probation and NCAA levered sanctions. Heck, with the job
Larry Coker is doing this season, the Canes title in 2001
should be credited to Davis since it was all of his recruits
that Coker coached. Things will be strange seeing Davis
donning that lovely shade of shade of blue but we’ll all get
used to it. Now about those Blue Devils from up the 15/501.
Random Predictions
I stated it earlier in the
season, probably in the Outsports message board, that
Pittsburgh would beat WVU. I thought Pitt would be a better
team than they are this season, but I’m going to stick by
that prediction. The Panthers don’t have much of a home
field advantage and are 2-3 in conference games, so they
will be playing for respect and a chance for a better bowl
game. Look for a close victory, perhaps a last minute TD or
field goal, to win it for Dave Wannstedt’s team.
After the game last week, I’m
not so sure Cal will be able to beat USC, something I stated
in the Top 25 preview. The Golden Bears are going to come
into this game with a chip on their shoulder and the Trojans
will get them to leave with their tails between their legs.
I don’t think it’s going to be a fun game to watch, unless
you’re a card carrying member from the Tribe of Troy.
Arkansas will stake its claim
to the SEC West title with a victory over Mississippi State
on the road. Most of the nation won’t find this to be an
interesting game to watch, which is a shame. It’s not often
that Arkansas has such a great team.
In a game which really hurts
me to suggest it, Wake Forest will get a second big upset in
a row as Frank Beamer’s West Virginia Hokies are going to
come up short. The game will be a defensive battle, but
with the lack of Hokie offensive output and a few costly
penalties, the Demon Deacons will get the bigger number in
the stat that matters the most: the final score.
Ralph Friedgen’s Maryland
Terrapins are going up to Chestnut Hill to take care of the
Boston College Eagles by 10 points.
Dangles
Two weeks in a row I
correctly predicted the No. 3 team in the nation, and
highest ranked Big East team, would fall on the road. In
last week’s prediction, I said that Rutgers would find the
drive and desire to win that game whereas Louisville would
just expect to win it. Sorry Louisville … thanks for
playing, and here’s your parting gifts…
The other predictions last
week came in almost exactly as I thought, except for the
Boise State game. The Broncos beat the San Jose State
Spartans by a last minute field goal instead of a huge
margin. Not missing a beat last week gave me a second
shutout on the season.
Perks
So I don’t know who this guy
is, what position he plays (if any!), or what the other guy
really is measuring. What I do know is this Oklahoma Sooner
is ready for his Sean Cody tryout!
Click for the evidence.
Related:
Week
10 recap
Week
9 recap
Week
8 recap
Week
7 recap
Week
6 recap
Week
5 recap
Week
4 recap
Week
3 recap
Week
2 recap
Week
1 recap
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