f13.net

AWWWWWWW SHIT!  :awesome_for_real:

38 days.

Will be interesting to see how defending national champion Utah plays this year.

 :grin:

Did Utah lose anyone of importance from last years team?

Every single day I'm looking at a calender and counting the days.  Sept 5th can't come soon enough.

That said....UF?  Again?  Over the Sooners?  Again?  Returning their entire two deep defense and Superman himself?  Will Meyer bolt to ND after winning his 3rd national title in 4 years with Tebow graduating?  Sure, they lost some offense, but it's not like the cupboard is bare.  And also, Tebow.  As long as he doesn't get hurt, I'd be very surprised to see them lose a game.  The UF / UT game is going to be ugly.  UGLY.  Meyer has a definite mean streak (just ask UGA), and Kiffin opened up a can of worms he didn't want to open.  Only real loseable games I see on their schedule is (at) LSU.  UGA is supposed to be bringing some talent back, but losing Stafford and Moreno (sp?) has got to hurt.

SEC:
This will be the year that shows what kind of recruiter and coach Les Miles is, with all of Saban's talent now gone.  I still can't believe the AU hire with Chizick.  They've got no talent down on the Plains - no QB, a couple decent RB's but a lackluster OL.  Defense is a question mark.  I don't think Ole Miss is the real deal, and despite The Right Reverend Houston Nutt pulling rabbits out of his hat and winning some HUGE games, history shows that when his teams are expected to do really well, they tank.  Can Richt reload at QB and RB, and put a defense together?  They've still got a stud or two at WR which should make any QB look good.  Figure more of the same from UK, Vandy, Miss St (lets see how good of a coach Mullen is without Meyer/Tebow).  Kiffin is over his head at UT.  The Ol' Ball Coach can still coach, but can't recruit the talent he needs/wants at South Carolina.  Arkansas is being tagged as the surprise team of the year.

And I know, just know, the team you want to read about  :grin: : Alabama
Lost two All Americans from the OL.  Will be tough to replace them.  Lost two off defense (including safety Rashad Johnson).  Don't expect any drop on defense, however.  Absolutely loaded at DL, LB, and CB/SS.  Two straight number 1 recruiting classes.  The key to Alabama this year is going to be the OL.  McElroy (QB) was the one making eyebrows raise at a recent QB camp that included last years Heisman Trophy winner.  Incredibly smart, accurate, decent sized, and mobile.  Wide receivers, led by Julio Jones (http://photos.al.com/photos/alphotos/6a4d0e46abe2586060a2baaa68030685.jpg) should be a strong point.  Stacked at running back, including incoming freshman Trent Richardson (http://vmedia.rivals.com/uploads/880/F447830.jpg) who won the Florida High School weightlifting championship and is a running back with 4.4 - 4.5 speed.  Talk of the town is that he isn't even the best one on the team.  Can't wait to see Rolando McClain (http://trueball.files.wordpress.com/2009/06/rolando2ag6.jpg) (NFL scouts were drooling over him after his freshman year), Dont'a Hightower, and Corey Reamer smashing face at linebacker.  Three very smart, very physical, very fast LB's.  The key to Alabama this year is going to be the OL.  If it performs well?  They'll play UF in the SEC championship game, contending for the national championship.  If it doesn't, the defense is going to have to be every bit as good as advertised.  And not have a showing like they did last year against Utah.  Offense will probably be the same vanilla pro style they had last year:  pound it on the ground, eat away clock, play action pass, and keep the defense fresh.

Other:
USC - Lost a TON of talent, but probably are still loaded.  Weak conference.  Will probably drop a couple or three games, one or two of which they shouldn't lose.  Media will continue playing the Carroll Skin Flute.
ND - No more excuses for the Pillsbury Dough Boy with the bad flat top haircut.  He's got HIS talent in, and several years with the same QB under his system.  Pathetically easy schedule.  If they don't got 12-2 or so, they should run his sizeable ass out of there.  I'm hoping they tank miserably, though.  I hate hate HATE Notre Dame. 
OU - Loaded on offense.  Loaded on defense.  Will get blown out in a big game (again) by UF. 
OSU -  Will have their typical year.  Look great early, beat Michigan, and then get blown out by <random SEC team> in the bowl.
Michigan - Heh.

So what's everyone else's take?  Any surprise teams?  Anyone that's expected to do well, but you'll think will fail to live up to expectations?

Only if you consider the starting quarterback, best D lineman, best corner, offensive coordinator and defensive coordinator as "important."  :grin:

Oh.

Ow.   Sorry dude.  :heartbreak:

THAT said, any confidence in the people hired / recruited to replace them?

RTR.

R T Friggin R.

I'm excited for this season -- we were considering nuking the cable TV from orbit, but I then reminded the wife it was coming around on College Football season again...

Also forgot that we lost our All-American Kicker/Punter.  :awesome_for_real:

The coaching replacements should be interesting. They brought in a coach who has been coaching in the NFL for the last 20 years (John Pease) to be assistant head coach/d-line coach, promoted the running backs coach who has been coaching in the college ranks for 21 years to Offensive Coordinator and promoted the linebackers coach to D coordinator and he's only 34 and been coaching for 5 years but is quite the up and comer.  Everyone hated our previous offensive coordinator and thought he called shit games and the defense has always been considered to be the bailiwick of the head coach (who was the D coordinator under Meyer and the previous coach as well) so it could actually be an improvement.

On QB, there is currently a battle between a guy who has played some in the past two years in wildcat formation type stuff where he mostly ran the ball (he is fast as hell) yet he was a stud thrower in HS. He was never turned loose to throw routes, so who knows. He seems to be the inside track. The other guy is a stud out of Texas who was the national junior college Offensive Player of the Year.

We also picked up the #1 ranked JC transfer in the country by Rivals.com for our D line. Not the #1 D-lineman, #1 ranked PLAYER. James Aiono. He is a stud. 

Our D backfield won't be quite as good (Sean Smith was drafted in the second round and just signed with the Dolphins) but we always seem to come up with unreal lock-down corners every single year and Stevenson Sylvester (the guy who was absolutely everywhere in the Sugar bowl) is back at rover.  The real question is in our inside linebacker crop.

Everyone is picking TCU to win the conference this year and Utah to come in behind BYU. Utah plays both on the road so those will be tough games. BYU's QB is good but they have no speed and a crappy defense. TCU's D is unreal and they are returning absolutely everyone that beat the hell out of BYU and gave Utah all it could handle in Utah, so I think they likely take the conference. I'm hoping Oklahoma puts such a beat-down on BYU in the opener that it simply breaks their will. I would love to see them crumble.

Utah will continue to impress this year. They are the standout in a shitty conference.

The Big East will have a terrible year and complain that they had good basketball. Which they didn't in the tournament.

The Pac-10 will be won be USC. For the billionth time because nobody else is worth a damn in that pussy conference.

The Big 10 won't recognize they have 11 teams, and Ohio State will still somehow go 10-2 and win the conference.

In the ACC I'd put my money on Georgia Tech. The triple option isn't a gimmick with that squad. UGA will tell you how scoring 42 ain't enough.

The SEC is Florida's to lose. Kiffin's an idiot and will fail in a funny manner. UGA will fumble in the first two non-conference games and finish 9-3. Our D sucks ass and we still haven't fired the problem. Alabama was a one hit wonder who will drop the Iron Bowl to Auburn in a game nobody expected. Ole Miss will be expected as great, but they will suck. Miss St. will still suck. Arkansas doesn't have a team, but they might beat UGA.

I can't wait for the first Saturday.  Some fantastic games right from the get go:

Alabama vs Virgina Tech
Both are supposed National Title contenders.  We'll get an idea which is for real right off the bat.

BYU vs OU
OU should eat their lunch, but this will be one of those games everyone uses for comparison later in the season.

Georgia vs OSU
Early guage of what will likely be another season of Big 12 vs SEC for best conference (although the ACC could make a case especially if VT beats 'Bama).

Missouri vs Illinois
Might not be as exciting as the other games, but another game that will generate comparisons later.

Monday night:
FSU vs Miami
Always an entertaining game.

I'm also stoked Florida's first two games will be televised even though they're just money games.

Here's to hoping Miami can crawl out of the sewer and start playing respectable football again.  :heartbreak:

If Miami and FSU could return to some of their old-school splendor, then the ACC would at least have an argument about having a decent football conference. As it stands from the last two years,  :ye_gods:. Also, the 6-12 record in bowl games over two years doesn't help.

Pretty much every single SEC game from all schools are going to be on TV thanks to the 15 billion dollar deal ESPN signed with the SEC.

Plus, also, it's Florida.  They'd probably be on anyway.  Hell, ND has a TV contract and they're a money game for whoever they play!  :grin:

I need to go back to grad school again. Every school I attended won a National championship: Miami in '01 and LSU in '03. So what school should I apply to next?  :drill:

Anything but Florida and Ohio State.

Seriously, fuck those guys.

Just for the record, Ohio State was -this- close to winning a bowl game last year, I swear.

Ohio State had the talent to beat Texas.  But OSU spends its whole season playing Big Ten teams, which doesn't exactly prepare it for the big boys.

I DO think there is a chance- maybe 1 in 3- they can beat USC this year.  New USC QB, at the Horseshoe, and all that.  But unless Pryor learned how to throw, we are still probably in for a world of hurt.  OSU will go about 9-2 (losing to USC and some random Big 10 team, but not Michigan) and somehow go to a BCS game again, which they'll lose. 

Yep, exactly what I was going to say. I'm starting to get tired of Tressel's act. It would be nice to hang 50 on someone once in a while and have an offense that doesn't either put me to sleep or have me chucking bricks at the TV. It would be a different story if all this conservative crap had the team making fewer turnovers and mistakes, but it doesn't.

Well you can take solace in the fact that Ohio State only plays 2 hard games: Penn State and USC.

The rest of your schedule is against a slew of sub-25 suckasses.

EDIT: Also UGA is completely screwed with their schedule again this year. We have Oklahoma State, LSU, Florida, Tennessee, and Georgia Tech. All of those teams will be top 25.

UofA offered installed seatbacks for $40 this year for season ticket holders.  Sure it's more than you'd pay per game.  Sure it's taking money away from someone who sold them last year.  All worth it to keep the some sort of space for when I actually sit down and don't have to curve my shoulders inward because large assed people and drunk morons can't keep remotely close to their purchased seats.

New QB this year, no Eben Britton, and about half the D graduated last year.  Uggg.

I think my Bears have a pretty decent shot at USC this year. Oregon is pretty loaded too.

Oregon is my pick to win the PAC-10 this year. Even USC can't get over losing it's entire defense and their starting QB. My current preseason picks would be:

SEC: Florida
PAC-10: Oregon
Big 12: Texas
ACC: Georgia Tech or UNC (depending on injuries)
Big 10: Ohio State
Big East: West Virginia
Mountain West: TCU

You just called the Pac-10 for USC like 10 posts ago!

Yep, I changed my mind. USC can usually sleepwalk through that conference, but the more I read on Oregon the more I believe they can finally shake it up. The USC pick is just my kneejerk reaction before I do some delving because, well, they freaking win it all the time.

Also, Oregon was the last team to knock them off in 2001. I don't count the "ties."

The Utah/Oregon game should be a good one although I fully expect Utah to lose on the road considering their inexperience level this year.

So turns out Aiono didn't do something or other to be academically eligible so he won't play this year. Ugh.

Preseason rankings are out.  Why, oh why, does OSU start out ranked 5th?  Its just going to be more fucking embarrassing when we lose.  Penn State at 11, Michigan State at 18...an ugly year for the Big 10. 

You seem to be one of the Big 10 fans who knows a bad situation when they see it. I felt the same way about UGA being #1. Either that, or they all know the truth and deny it with massive bravado and TV coverage. I'm not sure yet.

'Bama came out ranked 5, which seems a bit high considering they lost two All Americans on the O line and the very serviceable quarterback that started for 2 or 3 years and never missed a start due to injury. 

I think Oklahoma is going to be scary good this year, barring an injury to Bradford.

But fitting where USC ended always ends up.

And wtf is ND doing on that list? Someone needs to be shaken violently.

Just to add: who the hell did Meyers blow for that cupcake schedule. and WTF? a bye week before the LSU game and LSU has to play Miss St and Georgia then FLA after then the bye? Good christ lets just christen Tebow the second coming from beating up on crap schools, give him the Heisman, and port him out to the NFL, where he'll prolly do his best impression of Eric Crouch...

Alabama, LSU, AND Ole Miss in the top 10???  :awesome_for_real:

That won't last. UGA as a 13 ahead of Georgia Tech is probably not right either. I'd have Tech at 13, and us at 15 given last year's results and this year's losses. Ole Miss has no business being top 10 until they can prove it after beating South Carolina and Vandy.

Other weird ones:

- Cal at #12? WTF? An 8-4 team in the PAC-10 last year? That's complete horseshit. There is absolutely no way they should be ranked ahead of Oregon.
- Virginia Tech at #7? Ok they have to put somebody from the ACC in the top 10, even though the conference is completely shitty, but this is a 9-4 team. If you're gonna do that make UGA top 10 while you're at it.
- Boston College not even in the top 25. Come on. They changed QBs, but the rest of the team was second in the ACC. They don't deserve to be completely knocked out when a team like Oregon State is on the list.
- Notre Dame???? WAKE THE FUCK UP MEDIA ASSHOLES! Look Ma! We were bowl eligible, so we must be in the top 25!

USA Today = coaches, not media.

I think.

That's even more unreasonable in that case.

EDIT: And yes it is the coaches. I didn't realize there were 1500 coaches that voted in this thing.

It will just be that much more hilarious when ND starts out 2-5 and Weis waddles to the unemployment line. I didn't think I could dislike Notre Dame any more than I already did, but then Weis started coaching there. What a cock.

#12, eh. Will be interesting. If Best stays healthy I think we can hang in with Oregon and USC. The biggest problem is we play Oregon on the road fairly early, and Autzen is a hard place to win a road game. Especially if it is raining.

I looked at Notre Dame's schedule. It's horribly easy, even for them.

Nevada - ridiculously easy starting game at home v. an opponent that's not even top 40
@Michigan - they are even worse than Nevada at this point
Michigan State - probably the first loss ND takes, but they still aren't top 25
@Purdue - just as shitty as Michigan
Washington - the team didn't win a damn game last season. They are the Detroit Lions of college football
USC - bend over ND, this will be a crushing beatdown
Boston College - they could beat ND, but they also aren't a top 25 team. I think they should be though.
@Washington State - they went 2-10 in the PAC-10. Yeah, I'm shaking.
Navy - they belong on a ship, not the football field
@Pitt - ND probably gets stomped in a hostile stadium.
UCONN - I hear they have a basketball team.
@Stanford - maybe if it was a debate tournament...

So out of their entire year, Notre Dame plays one ranked team. Boston College and Michigan State could be ranked by the time the game happens, but you never know. Five of those teams weren't even bowl eligible last year. Of those that went to bowl games, 5 out of 7 lost. It's a schedule of nine complete suckasses, 2 questionable programs, and USC. If Notre Dame doesn't go at least 8-4, Weiss is a dead duck.

Beano Cook was on Cowherd the other day (maybe a couple weeks ago) and they were both talking about how ND was going to be in a BCS game.  All that would have topped it would have been Corso and Mussberger jumping in to slob ND's knob.

I hope they keep Weiss.  They'll continue to wallow in overhyped mediocrity as long as he's there.  I *really* don't want them to get Meyer.  I'd rather keep him in the SEC rather than having every talking head ND knobblower talking about how ND is 'back'.  I wonder just how much they'd pay to get Meyer there?  4.5?  5 mil?

It doesn't matter what they pay him. Meyer has a stranglehold on Florida state recruiting, a possible dynasty SEC program, and a new 6-year $4M per extension. I don't care what the ties are, nobody in their right mind would ever leave a team who wins the most prolific conference in college football for a barely functional independent.

I don't know.  I think the pay increase + not having to deal with the rigors of the SEC day in and day out would be the kicker.  He's a big fish in the SEC surrounded by several other big fish (although your point about the potential dynasty is a good one).  Up there he'd be THE fish.  The only fish.  So, there's that. 

The competition in the SEC is the best, no doubt about it.  And while Meyer seems well equipped to deal with it, very few are willing or able to put up with the absolute grind that the SEC is. 

I think he's going to have to do some serious soul searching after his once in a generation all everything QB graduates.

I'd think it's possible to get Meyer to ND but not likely.

Ron Zook and the competition in the SEC notwithstanding, Florida is perfectly set up to be a dominant team. They're in by far the best state talent wise, and FSU and Miami are pissing down their legs with coaching problems. The only way would be if Meyer's ego wants to take on that monumental challenge without having the crutch of being in the most talented state. I think he has too much common sense to waste time with that though.

I'm very, very stoked about football this year.  Got my University of Texas season tix and am ready to rock. 

Zook may not be the best coach, but he's extraordinary at evaluating and recruiting talent.  The cupboard was far from bare when Meyer took it over.

ESPN ranks the conferences (http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/columns/story?columnist=schlabach_mark&id=4383167)

Their rankings:

1 - SEC
2 - Big 12
3 - ACC
4 - PAC 10
5 - Big 10
6 - Mountain West
7 - Big East
8 - WAC

1 and 2 are no-brainers. The SEC won the BCS title against OU, and won the other head to head matchup with Ole Miss over Texas Tech. The rest of them are more debatable. First off, the ACC was and is still terrible. VA Tech's days in the top 10 are numbered when they lose to Alabama in the first game. They will be just as big of a disappointment as Clemson. GA Tech, UNC, and FSU are the only other teams in there that will compete to win it. I'd have them 4th.

The Mountain West is getting stronger and stronger with Utah, BYU, TCU, and Air Force. They also get no respect as a conference even though the Utes crushed Alabama, and always have a strong bowl record. Their out of conference record is also very impressive. I'd have them 3rd.

The PAC 10 drops down to 5th in my book because one team has won it for the last 7 years. USC isn't that good, the rest of the conference is that bad.

The Big 10 is 6th, because Penn State and Ohio State are the only teams worth a damn in the conference, and they both couldn't beat the better teams of the Big 12 or the PAC 10.

The Big East and WAC are tied for 7th because they are completely irrelevant in football. The fact the Big East is tied to the Orange Bowl continues to make it the biggest yawn of the year.

Bowl records vs. BCS opponents since 2005:

League     2008  2007  2006  2005  Overall
Pac-10     4-0     3-1     3-1     2-2     12-4
SEC         5-1     5-2     5-3     3-3     18-9
Big 12      4-3     5-3     3-4     4-2     16-12
Big East    2-2     1-2     3-0     1-3     7-7
ACC         2-6     2-5     2-4     4-2     10-17
Big Ten    1-6     2-5     2-5     3-4     8-20
non-BCS   1-7     2-6    3-5      2-3     8-21

Bowl records in the Rose, Sugar, Fiesta, Orange and national championship games since 2005:

League     Record
SEC             5-2 (3 championships)
Pac-10         3-1
Big East        3-1
Big 12          3-3 (1 championship)
ACC             1-3
Big Ten        2-6
non-BCS       2-1
Notre Dame  0-2

The PAC-10 BCS record is misleading because it's all USC games. Nobody else in that suck-ass conference has been to a BCS bowl game since Washington State in 2002. I like to look at which conferences have teams that have been to two or more BCS games in the last decade. It shows who has consistent performers in the national arena, and it tosses out the teams which had one fluke year.

SEC - 5 teams (5 Championships)
Big 10 - 5 teams (1 Championship)
Big 12 - 3 teams (2 Championships)
ACC - 3 teams (2 Championships)
Other Conferences - 3 teams
PAC 10 - 1 team (1 Championship)

The last decade isn't a good measurement because it includes teams that switched conferences and a number of teams that are truly bad right now.  But if you're going to, at least keep the team with the conference they were in at the time:

SEC - 5 teams (5 Championships)
Big 10 - 5 teams (1 Championship)
Big 12 - 3 teams (2 Championships)
ACC - 2 teams (1 Championship)
Big East - 2 teams (1 Championship)
PAC 10 - 1 team (1 Championship)
Mountain West - 1 team (0 Championships unless you're asking Abagadro and he'd have a compelling but futile argument)
Notre Dame - is Notre Dame (Jack and shit)

Here's something interesting.  If you include all 'fluke' teams, here's the number of different teams sent to a BCS bowl by each conference:

SEC - 6
Big 10 - 7
Big 12 - 7
ACC - 4
Big East - 7
PAC 10 - 7
Mountain West - 1
WAC - 2
Notre Dame - sucks

I disagree with your assessment, but you are right about the Miami switchover after their national title. Out of that entire list of teams you could only really make a case that 4 of them aren't currently competitive forces: Miami, Michigan, Notre Dame, and Wisconsin. More than half of the one and done teams don't compete on a national scale at all right now.

Washington, Washington State, Colorado, Hawaii, Maryland, Pittsburgh, Purdue, Stanford, Syracuse, Texas A&M, UCLA. They are all pretty much irrelevant currently.

I don't like sounding alarms before the smoke turns out to be a fire, buuuuuut it looks like Va. Tech's season just got the big bend over.

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/news/story?id=4392725

Sad when Ga Tech is the conference front runner.

That's bad news for VA Tech indeed. I don't think they were an actual #7 team with Evans, and they probably would have lost the opener to Alabama anyway, but this takes all chances of them being ranked top 25 this season pretty much down the crapper. It's a shame that bad luck injuries don't happen to jackasses like Tim Tebow instead of a promising up-and-comer runningback.

While I really dislike Tebow for many reasons, the new shift in the NFL to a mobile quarterback seems to dovetail nicely with his senior year. Some NFL team is going to set their playbook up to fit him coming out of college, I can feel it.

Evans has time to heal and still make a name for himself at Va. Tech... but he won't be the same.

Some NFL team will take a chance no doubt. It'll just be one of the shitty ones with nothing to lose, or one of the really good ones where they already have a huge star that needs a backup to put in for a running series.

Huh?  A handful of plays a game being run out of the wildcat isn't a shift.  People will still want him to be a tight end or h-back most likley.

Sucks about that VT kid.  Just made their opener against Bama a might bit tougher. 

Georgia held it's first scrimmage yesterday, and the standout was a young kid named Richard Samuel. He's a Sophomore RB who's never started, but with Moreno going pro in the first round he's battling for the top spot. However, he did have over 100 kickoff return yards in one game last year, and he's showing potential as the standout starter.

If he can keep up with Moreno's sophomore efforts, and Cox can put up 75% of Stafford's numbers, we can beat any team in the East except Florida. Beating Florida will rely completely on our defense not being total suckasses.

Go ahead and ask Snakecharmer if we even had a defense last year.

Tebow would have to be scraped off the turf if anyone tried that single-wing business in the NFL. Defensive guys are way too big and fast to do that stuff consistently. Nowadays it seems the NFL wants guys that are mobile in the sense of shifty in the pocket but don't want them actually runnning.

To be fair, the NFL hasn't wanted mobile QBs in 2 decades.

Hmm, Utes just named a true Freshman as #1 on the QB depth chart over our backup for the last two years and the transfer JC Offensive Player of the Year. Either he is a wunderkind or they are writing this year off to get him some experience.

wat

Um, you know. That whole 41 point Tide demolishing us thing at home. Remember that? Yeah.

To be fair, I think the our defense (or special teams) put a score or two on the board.  So it wasn't entirely your D, which if memory serves, had some pretty bad injury issues early on and got better as the year went on.

Georgia Tech was at Thanksgiving. They beat us 45-42.

Our D never got better. It got worse.

Points against by game:

21
17
7
10
41
14
14
38
49
38
13
45

I won't put opponents up there, but let's just say those last 6 games were AWFUL.

/schoolgirl squeal :hello_kitty:

Yeah, pretty much.

Was laying in bed wide awake at 1 am this morning putting a gameday menu together.

i got the minifridge cleaned out and plugged in down in the big screen tv room... ready for the beer and salsa.

I'm already mentally putting together the Signature Drink Menu for our tailgate that corresponds to the teams we play at home. So far it's:

South Carolina - Carolina Ice Tea (Rum, Vodka, Peach Schnapps, Sweet Tea, Lemon)
Arizona State - The Red Devil (Vodka, OJ, grenadine, Sloe Gin, Triple Sec, SoCo Peach)
LSU - Hurricanes
Tennessee Tech - Lynchberg Lemonade
Auburn - no idea yet
Kentucky - Mint Julep

That Carolina Ice Tea sounds freakishly good.  And a helluva recipe for a major hangover with all that sugar.  What's the mix ratio?

Auburn?  Hrm.  Alabama Slammers?  Eh.  Nah. Only real connection is that AU is in Alabama...

Natural Light out of a can is kinda fitting for Auburn :drill:

The Carolina Tea is:

1 oz Rum
1 oz Peach Schnapps
1/2 oz Vodka
5 oz Sweet Tea
Splash of lemon

Stir or Shake quicky, pour into a tall glass with a lemon wedge.

EDIT: I also thought about doing Red-Headed Sluts for Auburn as a joke.

I plan on many of these (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hand_grenade_%28drink%29) during the U of Miami's games...Only in the hopes that by half time I am comatose or in the hospital as to avoid watching the travesty any longer. I hope LSU fairs better.

So the first nationally televised football game of the year is going to be on Thursday, Sept. 3rd @ 7 EST: South Carolina v. NC State. That's followed by Oregon v. Boise State at 10:15.

Predictions? Do you even care? Personally, I hope South Carolina wins, because I want them coming into Georgia cocky. And yes, that's a horrible pun. Also, I want Oregon to win because they are my pick for the PAC-10 and I don't like Boise State.

Thankfully, as an Illinois alum (and local to Champaign still), I don't have anything worth following in college football so I can sleep in on the weekends.

Zook proved how terrible a coach he was in the Rose Bowl against USC 2 seasons ago. A retarded lemur could figure out that running inside to the same side 15 unsuccessful plays in a row would not work on the 16th try, Zook, nope.

If Texas doesn't play in the BCS title game I will be very surprised.  Their schedule is the easiest I've seen from a BCS team in a long, long time.  Oklahoma is the only tough game they have. 

AP poll (http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/news/story?id=4415865)

I sooo want Florida to get knocked off by an unranked and do the USC dance this year.

I'm not sure if I care about anything in college football more this year then seeing Florida lose, that is the most obnoxious fucking school with the most annoying jesus thumping fuckwad QB ever since Kurt Warner.  Man I hate hearing about them.

Florida 2009 Schedule (http://www.gatorzone.com/sched.php?sport=footb)

My question is who has a real chance here? Charleston Southern, Troy, and Florida International  are complete throwaway games. They are complete cowards this year with their out of conference scheduling. Considering they are all home games, if I was a Florida ticket-holder I would be pretty pissed at the home schedule.

Home:

Charleston Southern, Troy, Tennessee, Arkansas, Vandy, Florida International, and Florida State. Nobody on that list is really worth a damn except Florida State. The only chance is probably going to be on the road.

Road:

Kentucky, LSU, Miss St., Georgia, and South Carolina. Essentially it's up to LSU and Georgia, and as a Georgia fan I can tell you we have pretty much no chance with entirely new QB/RB/WR options. Maybe Miss. State or Kentucky catch them napping on the road and pull an Ole Miss, but their programs are always worst in the SEC. I think it falls entirely on LSU somehow getting that Florida matchup to be a night game in Baton Rouge.

I am not counting Troy out as a complete throw away. Not saying they will win, but I think they have the best shot at an upset out of those cupcakes. Unfortunately I don't see LSU going thru this season without at least 3 losses. @ 'bama and @ Ole Miss... ugh. i just don't see them getting away with those and while Tiger stadium is a tough environment, its Florida - they know how to win there.

Mark Schlabach posts the biggest knob-slobbering Florida article I've ever read (http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/preview09/columns/story?columnist=schlabach_mark&id=4413467)


I now officially want to kick this guy to death more than Mark May. Oh and the kicker...HE'S A FUCKING GEORGIA ALUM!

Florida hasn't won in Death Valley since 2003. In 2007 LSU won in that epic night game which catapulted them to the national title hype and win. The last minute TD to take it all away from Florida and crush their hopes. I give LSU the edge there still.

how poetic would it be for Tenn to upset Florida in the Swamp and to see Kiffin giving the gator-chomp as he walks off the field. I'll call up God and see if he can make it happen, he owes me a favor.

My favorite "Fuck you Florida" moment that's not Georgia related was 2007 when the Auburn kicker nailed the winning FG twice because Florida called a BS timeout that negated the first one. Then he went crazy running around the field doing the chomp. I laughed my ass off.

My favorite "Fuck you Florida" moment from Georgia is this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xj_yqJtmE2w (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xj_yqJtmE2w)

We took SOOOO many penalties in 2008 because of that, but it was worth it to see Florida completely demoralized in that game.

Heh.  Lou 'Sufferin' Suckatash' Holtz has predicted ND and Florida in the title game.

If ND runs through that cakewalk schedule and ends up in the title game, Utah and Boise State are going to go completely apeshit.  And rightfully so. 

ND in the championship?  That's pretty fucked up.

What is far more likely is my Buckeyes somehow catch a newbie USC QB on a bad day, proceed to beat the rest of a dysfunctional Big 10 in a series of thrilling 13-7 victories, and earn the right to get roflstomped by Tebow again. 

I'd put any one loss team in there before that happens if I were voting. I would hope at this point we've collectively had enough of Ohio State's song-and-dance, fans included.

Are we there yet?
/whine

One week from today for me!

That's because the Big 12 North is pathetic. No team other than Texas or OU has won that conference since 2003. Usually whoever wins the Texas-OU game has a guaranteed shot at the championship. Except for last year's fucked-up ruling.

All the factors for an upset in the Bama Va Tech game.  Too many distractions on the Bama side:  Two best offensive players (Ingram and Julio Jones) are still not cleared by the SEC for a fishing trip they took this summer, the starting defensive end was shot in the forearm as someone attempted to rob him in the apartment complex parking lot, the flu hitting a few key players.

If Bama can make it through this game, they effectively get two weeks off to get back sorted out. 

Interesting read.  WhatIfSports simulates (http://msn.foxsports.com/cfb/story/10008250) the season.

Nice little highlight vid to get pumped up for tonight's kickoff:

http://rivals.yahoo.com/video/college-football/countdown-to-kickoff-53763;_ylt=AqQzogKNnTtbANLAfFA1vUftxLsF

I got Utah drubbing State and Oregon hanging tough in a barn burner over Boise St.

I wonder what song ESPN/ABC is going to drive into the ground in all their promotions?  Last year was AC/DC's Rock N Roll Train, before that was Daughtry's Crash. 

Can't wait for Saturday though...Really looking forward to UGA / OSU and Bama / Va Tech

Well the Utes looked a tad shaky here and there and need to cut out the turnovers, but with so many new parts overall I was happy. I think our QB will be pretty good once he gets settled in and our feature running back is set to break 1000 yards this year if he stays healthy.

The Utah game was one of the only ones with any flares of offense... of course that is only because I caught the highlights and the score, but still.

Boise St's def looked great, too bad they don't play anyone from here on out except for maybe Nevada. As for the end of the game antics, taunting is classless and while I don't condone outright retaliation, I found it fitting that a taunt followed by a smug look got dropped from a right to the jaw. Arrogance meets humility - whatever happens now is just exhaust.

So much for Oregon and a barn burner.  Blount had 8 carries for -5 yards.  Not looking good for them this season.

With the resurgence of Texas and Oklahom as powers it has really hurt the recruiting of Nebraska, Colorado and Kansas State.  All three of those teams would end up with some of the good players from Texas in the 80s/mid 90s.  The killer has been Nebraska, though.  They were expected to be a dominant force when the league was set up and they've just fallen on their face.

And one sucker punch that will hopefully get him suspended for a few games. That guy is a fucking asshole.

Heh. Utah's game in Oregon in two weeks is looking up after last night.

For real on Blount, WAP, only I would go farther and hope the university kicks him off the team and sends him packing altogether.

The rest of the story...

Blount had already been suspended by his team this year in pre-season practices for "conduct unbecoming".

Blount was quoted in the papers leading up to this game saying they (the Ducks) owed them (the Broncos) an ass whooping on account of being beaten by them last year at Oregon.

In addition to his terrible stats on the night it was he who was dragged down in the end-zone for the safety.

After sucker-punching the Bronco dude he threw at one of his own teammates (who was trying to calm him down and drag him away) and later still as the teams were leaving the field he had to be restrained from going after fans who were obviously razzing him.

Loser.  Total and complete.  But a meltdown of epic proportions, eh?

Unfortunately I can only revel in Oregon's misfortunes until they kick the shit out of the Huskies this season. I wore my UW sweatshirt to work today- I figure it is the only time I can wear it without embarrassment until basketball season  :grin:

Blount is obviously a douche, but it looked like he was provoked, I wouldn't call it a sucker punch.

I am a little less worried about Cal having to play at Oregon this year, but that's a ways off and it always sucks to play there.

I don't have much sympathy for a guy getting punched in the mouth for being low class enough to taunt another player after the game is over.  That said, even just throwing the punch should land Blount a suspension but for having to be physically restrained from going after fans and then having to be dragged off the field he should be thrown off the team.  This guy has issues he needs to deal with and a football field isn’t the place to do it.

It wasn't just any guy, however- Blount had been running his mouth in the press all week. A winning player should still rise above it, but I can definitely understand the impulse to give him a little back.

(http://img188.imageshack.us/img188/332/headbands.jpg)

Man, that Blount guy REALLY hated Loverboy.

that right there just made me lol at work.

As for this whole issue, talking trash happens and usually in abundance before games to do the little mental shit-on-you-guys dance. Once the clock strikes zero, there is nothing more to be said. Hout needed to keep it in check - they won the whole nation saw it (if you stayed up to watch). Talking trash after is just unnecessary and going so far as to make any contact outside of a handshake to an already pissed off player... like Chris Rock said about OJ, "Not saying he should have hit him...but i understand." (paraphrased to fit the scene) and as for Blount - I don't blame him for his crap game - he is not the only player out there and he sure isn't calling moronic plays. Besides, everyone who knows better knows Blount plays a lvl 80 orc rogue, so the cheapshot from the blindside is not surprising.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090904/ap_on_sp_co_ne/fbc_t25_oregon_blount

Bigger suspension than I expected, good for Oregon.

Boise dude should be sitting for a game or two himself, though.

So as some of you may know--I live in Eugene, and while I'm not attached at the hip or anything, I am a Ducks fan.

Blount is a cocky, arrogant asshole--both on and off the field. For a football player,that's sometimes accepted as part of the deal, but he has always taken it way overboard.

Some things that the press haven't really been reporting:

--he was suspended from the team in the spring for refusing to attend classes. Subsequently re-instated.
--he was suspended during fall practice for failing to show up to practice, subsequently re-instated.
--he was home on emergency leave sometime in the last two weeks (I think it was last weekend, but I'm not 100% sure) due to a death in the family.
--Sports Illustrated quoted him out of context, and blew it all out of proportion. He said what every single person on the team felt, and in fact every single fan in all of Eugene felt for what Boise did to Masoli last year (the late hit that took him out of the game--we mostly feel that guy should have been banned out of the NCAA permanently for what he did). I don't even think SI meant it to be a "here's some negative press"--I think they (as did we all) expected him to back it up.

Chip Kelly pulled the same idiotic play calling in the first three games of last year as he did this game. Note to Chip: we're an option offense. You should know. Our offensive line also sucked, and in my opinion Masoli and Blount took more heat in the press for performing badly than they should have. Sure, it would have been great if they dealt with it during the game and overcame the issues, but an RB can't do dick if the offensive line doesn't give him any lanes. Masoli made some really bad decisions as well, but he wasn't calling the same damn plays every single down either.

I feel for Blount in some ways, and this has effectively destroyed not only his NCAA career, but dropped him plenty of notches in any NFL possibilities he had (if he has any left at all). I'm a relatively even tempered person in the big picture (internet notwithstanding), and I would have probably cold cocked that dude myself in that situation--but it doesn't excuse the behavior either.

Regardless of the outcome of the game, that was a pretty impressive 99 yard TD drive by Navy just now.

EDIT: Heh, way to not take the 3 to make it a 3 possession game Tressel. No wonder you get your ass beat every time you pay someone decent.

That just shows how absolutely wretched OSU's offensive line is. When you outweigh the opposing line by 50-60 lbs per man and can't get 2 yards you suck. I don't know what kind of pics Jim Bollman has of Tressel but they must be good. He wouldn't have lasted one season in the SEC.

And yeah Ohio State's defense sucks as well. And they probably win the Big 10 again this year. Sigh...

Heh, pick off with 3 minutes to go down 8. This game is getting very interesting.

EDIT: Oh man.

OSU will drop to 8th next week. That was horrible. Tenn looked strong against that high school team though.

Paelos is off kicking a cat somewhere.  UGA has given the game away thus far. 

What an ugly game.

God, I leave the sports bar to pick up a grill at halftime, come home to watch the last minute online and I see that Illinois again gets trounced. Everyone will in town will go on treating Zook like he walks on water too.

Of course, they get to beat up on Illinois State next week, and everyone will say "Thank god we don't have to play Mizzou the first game of the season anymore."

Jesus ESPN are you going to force me to listen to that Kenny Chesne crap 25 times a day just to watch some college football?

Don't you have a game to go to?

If you bailed on that I will be crushed. I so wanted to go to RioTinto but have no money for a one day trip to SLC.

Ya, didn't end up putting it together so I'm not there.

Could Max Hall be any bigger of a douchebag?

Yup.  I wondered what the song ESPN/ABC would run into the ground this season.  I was actually wondering if it was local, but if they're showing it where you are (Utah?), then newp.  Everyone gets to hear some country.

Bama 9 VT 7.  Shouldnt even be close if McElroy could calm down a bit and hit his receivers.  He's so geeked up he's over throwing everyone by about a yard or two.

WTB QB and OL. PST.

Dammit Oklahoma, do you know how insufferable BYU fan is going to be now? Fuck.

Christ LSU looked sloppy. Washington was just too far IN the game for a team supposed to go far this year. It was almost like watching the 'Bama/VT game - but at least those two teams were supposed to have a slugfest. Bama game was definitely the most entertaining as I didn't give a shit who won, but the result would end up affecting one of my favs. Miami, the door is now open (a man can dream).

Good start to the season so far. Though I am getting tired of all this talk about next week's OSU/USC game. After this first offering, why even mention this as being a good one? USC's frosh QB did not look too frosh (yes, i know..playing a cupcake with that kind of team to play on will make anyone look good) but OSU's defense getting raked by Navy? Not putting down Navy, but still...

As for the OK/BYU game... I thought I heard Nelson (http://ep.yimg.com/ca/I/fridgedoor_2066_228679713) somewhere in the crowd as the last second ticketed off run up to the kicker and point and HA-HA.

Ugh, as a Gators fan I have no love at all for OU, but I really hate seeing Bradford go down like that and OU lose a game because of it.  It's a reality of football, but I still hate seeing the outcome of a game affected by injury.  Hopefully Bradford can get back at it fairly quickly.

I've been out of the loop a bit, but I did watch the second half of this.

Overreact much Snake?

Me?  Overreact?  About Alabama Football?

Never.  Surely you jest.

However, you should have seen the first half, which was about when I posted that.  Our backs couldn't gain any yards, McElroy was running for his life and couldn't hit the broadside of a barn.  He overthrew 3 surefire touchdowns, and a couple more for big time gains.  At went point, he threw 9 straight incompletions to open receivers.  I was begging for Star Jackson, Thomas Darrow, or AJ McCarron

52-13 and we only let Best carry the ball 10 times? Shit, I think we could have hit 70.

Yeah and that was an upset pick according to all sorts of talking heads.

Joe Cox is not the man yet. A 50% completion rate for ~170 yards with a TD and a pick? That's not going to fly against a team not known for defense. The funny part is that OSU was just as shitty on offense. If you look at the box score, nobody looks good at all. You wonder how in the hell it was that much of a scoring difference. Georgia played well on the first drive and then never put their foot on OSU's neck. Here's where we lost the game:

First possession from our 20 - TD
Second possession from our 16 - 5 plays and punt
Third possession from our 34 - Holding call makes us go 3 and out
Fourth possession from our 20 - we get to the 50 and punt
Fifth possession from our 9 - 4 plays and a punt

So basically for 27 minutes of football, our defense has played well and shut out this OSU high-powered offense. However in 5 possessions we have 7 points. If Georgia could have even made 2 of those into field goals, this game has a totally different feel. Then right before the half they toss the bomb for the TD, and they get the fumble and take the lead. Georgia was done at that point. They were mentally fucked because the offense was pathetic.

Maybe he will be at South Carolina, but that's basically his last chance in my book. If we are going to lose games, I'd rather do it with a freshman who will be around next year that needs the experience.

I watched a pretty good bit of that game.  Cox seemed to get weaker as the game went on (wasn't he sick?).  Losing Sturdivant (sp?) is going to hurt.  Also, I'll never say one play cost a team a game, but when UGA got flagged for unnecessary roughness in the 4th quarter (I think), that seemed totally take the wind our of their sails.  I don't know what that ref saw, but it was a clean hit (shoulder to chest), no head to head contact.  Take that penalty away, and OSU is stopped, and the big hit turns the momentum around.  Maybe.  There were a couple bad calls that didn't go UGA's way that game, but that might just be the SEC homer in me coming out.

And with losing Sturdivant, I doubt Richt is going to put in one of your younger guys at QB to get pounded on.

Cox had the flu. That's probably a good excuse for why he got weaker in the second half. That doesn't excuse how shitty he was in the first half after showing he could take the ball down the field. OSU wasn't playing that good on defense.

Also, we went from AC/DC last year to fucking Kenny Chesney and Dave Matthews? What kind of pussies did the song selection this year? That DM song they picked has absolutely nothing to do with football and sounds totally out of place.

Way too early to say they are back, but that was a hell of a showing from "the U" against a Fla.St. team that is supposedly back this year for a BCS bowl berth. All night I had to hear the ESPN staff basically stroke Ponder's cock all night and hear how FAST the Seminole defense was... and in the end, I liked watching Miami laugh after the replay. It was a hell of a game.

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/news/story?id=4454758

BYU vaults into the top 10. There are no words for this type of silliness.

I hope BYU and Boise State finish in the Top 3 just to throw a monkey wrench into the whole stupid BCS thing. Playoff plskthx.

While I would agree wholeheartedly, no way in hell Boise St. will crack the top 5 even if they win out. Their schedule is too weak.

They might if everyone else above them drops a couple of games!  :grin:

So how badly will USC embarrass Ohio State? The spread is low at 6.5 and I'm taking USC all the way.

Another shellacking - I'd be surprised if USC runs for under 300y and drops under 35pts on OSU. Maybe next year Terrelle, maybe next year

edit: double negatives removed  :uhrr:

Holy cow...REALLY?

I might just put a fairly sizeable bet on this game.

Edit:  Nevermind.  I'm smoking crack.
Edit again:  If you can get it at 6.5, take it.  That line is going to move come Friday.  Fuck it. 

That line really is crazy, if you can find 6.5 bet the farm, what a stupid fucking line that is.

Ehhh my guess is OSU sells out against the run so 300 yards will be tough. It'll be Barkley's coming out party instead.

My prediction is this game is the beginning of the end of the Tressel era, and that -6.5 is ridiculous. USC should be a 2 TD favorite at least.

While I see your point, Navy almost dropped 200y on Ohio St with OSU guarding more for the run with Navy's retarded flexboner scheme. I don't think the OSU def is what it was ever supposed to be and I doubt there will be any containment after quarter 1, not with the USC RB rotation. OSU will stack 8 in the box in quarter 1 and realize when its 21-nothing and Barkley has over 200y passing that they need to adjust. Of course, the reason they play the game is to prove me wrong.

I am actually more looking forward to week 3... soo many big games. Hopefully the U will prove they are semi-back or that they are just indian killers.

It's moved to 7 for USC, but there's still not the big shift I would expect. I'm locked at 6.5, but I'd be shocked if it's not 10.5 by tomorrow night.

EDIT: Also wow, did Clemson even get off the bus? This looks like the last game they played in Atlanta against Bama.

Well that should shut the Notre Dame fans up for a bit. That was a hell of a good game along side the UCLA/Tenn game.

And wtf happened to OK.St.? lmao...@home as well.  :uhrr:

I am really... REALLY surprised that Carroll is going all Tressel with Barkley so far. Short slants and outs on the outside, a fly pattern, nothing over the middle. I know he's a freshman but Carroll has never been shy offensively.

Tressel loses the game, sure Pryor didn't go out and win it but WHAT A FUCKING PUSSY YOU ARE TRESSEL jesus, you wonder why you can't beat top teams?  Your pathetic desire to not lose the game doesn't cut it against top teams.  Fucking stupid fuck.  The outcome of this game was pretty clear when USC goes for it on 4th for the td and Ohio State settles for 3 in their own building in the same situation.  Fuck you Tressel, fuck you very much.

Quoted for Damn Truth. I was thinking the exact same thing. Closer than some here would have let us believe it would be, but I thought it was a given seeing how we were playing at home and not in USC's building.

Three classic games in one weekend... love this game.

OSU/USC - regardless of outcome, it was a great game to watch.
ND/Mich - fuck them both, but god damn that mich kid at QB looked clutch and i love hearing the hot air from every ND fan thinking their team is back go *poof*.
UCLA/Tenn - Sloppy game, but still a see-saw battle.

I fear for LSU...they can't afford to squeak by in these gimmes. Makes people nervous.

As a Wolverine, yesterday was awesome.

Michigan State choked. OSU choked. ND lost. To us. (we have lots of rivals :)

May the Forcier be with you folks, this kid could be something.

Brother's engagement party was last night and there were several OSU fans there watching the game. They were all less than pleased when we watched the same play run 3 times in the red zone. Gee, wonder why it didn't work after the first time.

We flipped back to the Cincinnati game for a few plays during Time outs/ commercials, and each time we did we got to watch a scoring drive against a really, really pathetic looking Southeast Missouri State.   I decided it was some sort of Karmic justice when the game ended 70-3 and I learned SMS had run up the score to 72-3 against their previous week's opponent, Quincy.

Not kicking the field goal from 53 was another pussy move by Tressel since Pettrey is a stud that can hit them from 60. Hell, since Rodriguez has a quarterback now it could be a 3 loss season.

Yeeeeeaah. 

This didn't work out too well. 

The awful 3rd and short and 4th and short failures from the previous week against Navy were probably weighing on his mind (OSU was brutalized in the press over that) even though the difference in their Offensive and Defensive lines was pretty much night and day compared to the previous week (for most of the game anyway).

This coming from a U of M guy, should actually be an interesting game this year for a change.   :grin:

All I can say is, In Forcier We Trust.

Shouldn't that be 'May the Forcier Be With You'?

Maybe he's calling him God.

Fuck it, I'm on the bandwagon!

I'm probably the only one here that will find this hilarious, but I'm inflicting it upon you anways:


Bwahahaha!

I hope the Gators put 70+ on Kiffin's punk ass.  Go Gators!

I loathe everything there is about Florida, but even I will enjoy watching Kiffin's smug ass get handed to him.

So tonight we see if Miami is truly back in some sense of the word or just beat an overrated FlaSt team. I am hoping for the former. And who schedules a bunch of frosh and sophomores to play this kind of opening schedule...@Fla St / Georgia Tech / @ VaTech / OK?  :ye_gods:

------------
edit: color me impressed. Still a rought schedule ahead, but great start for Harris and the boys down there. Wish I was still in Coral Gables... I bet the Grove was hoppin' last night.

This Boise State/Fresno game is nuts.  Did the defenses get off the buses?

In a word, no. It was a freaking 50 yard dash out there every time I looked at the TV.

So besides Tenn / Florida, any other games of note today?  (edit)  Not that that game is going to be remotely competitive.

So, Georgia / Arkansas, Texas / Texas Tech, USC / Washington, and ND / Mich St.   Not too bad of a Saturday...

USC/Wash is going to be better than people suspect I think. As for the nd/MichSt game... I think if ND loses, every game after will be deemed Weis-watch.

Utah/Oregon and BYU/FSU should be decent games.

BYU (a really good team) should blow out FSU (a really bad team). 

I'm not convinced BYU is all that good. And FSU played Miami pretty tight.  BYU is good, but they are sloooooow. TCU tore them a new one last year based almost exclusively on their fast defensive ends.  I think FSU may have a shot if they are able to pressure Hall because he does not react well to it and tends to throw interceptions when he gets rushed.

looks like I was onto something - poor USC   :awesome_for_real:

Ugh. The Ute prove you can have a +3 turnover margin and still be down in the last 2 minutes of the game.

Heh.

No kidding.

My football prognostication is waaay off this year.  But hell, FSU needed last minute scores to beat Jacksonville State University last week, a D I AA team that got throttled the week before by Ga Tech. 

Didn't see this coming, at all.

Well at least my weekend is not a total loss with the pummeling the Zoobies took.  I should root for them against non-conferemce opps but I just can't do it.

Georgia is making SEC games look like WAC games.

We're setting offensive records I'd love if it weren't for the fact we're giving up 40 a game and taking 100 yards in penalties. How the fuck are we winning???

Cal-Minnesota was making me  :uhrr: :ye_gods: :angryfist: for a while there.

In particular the pass interference call where there wasn't even any contact didn't help my mood much, but it all worked out in the end. The ESPN commenting crew we got for that game was AWFUL too.

With USC losing to UW I guess that puts us in the driver's seat for the Rose Bowl? Until we lose to Oregon next week.  :oh_i_see:


I have that same problem with USC.

Oh my fuckin' God, my father and I FLIPPED OUT over that call. It was hrrbl. I don't normally bitch about officiating (I cannot say the same of my father), but even I said that was bullshit, what the fuck are they even seeing, etc.

I enjoyed the game, but Ingmar only likes when Cal wins in a blow out. Otherwise he's convinced they'll lose ANY SECOND.  :why_so_serious:

As for officiating... would someone explain to me the rule about "simulating" a knee being the same as taking a knee? I don't give two shits about TexTech or Texas, but watching the end of the half and seeing Tech attempt some trickery only to have it fucked by a "rule" is just beyond me. Does that mean no matter what you do, the officials can conclude whatever they wish about your play? Seems to me to be a bullshit rule. Anyone know when and why that clownshoes rule is in the books?

That Cal game was crazy style, wish it would have been against a bigger team than Minn, but still was pretty good. I think Georgia is letting things all hang out now that they are not grooming a QB for the NFL. big points =  :grin:

I think the simul-knee thing is a new rule, like the completely assinine "no helmet to helmet contact" rule. It's supposed to protect the players from getting hurt, plus it is to prevent UNDERHANDED TRICKERY or some crap. The no helmet-to-helmet thing annoys me just because a) sometimes you're not going to be able to help it, therefore b) it's going to be enforced stupidly.

A) Steve Sarkisian is a coaching genius

or

B) Ty Willingham is the worst coach to ever disgrace a sidelines


Personally I am thinking more B than A, but Sark does have the lads playing much harder and better than last year. Ranked for the first time in 6 years! It is a sad state of affairs that I am excited about that.

Willingham seems to have a case of the RonZookitis.  Great recruiter.  Great evaluator of talent.  Lousy coach.

Aaaand another pretender bites the dust.  Not really surprising, although I expected a better performance from Jevan Snead.  (USC 16 - Ole Miss 10)

I couldn't figure out wtf Ole Miss was doing that high in the polls to begin with.

Man, another team ahead of Cal loses. Saturday is going to be so stressful.  :ye_gods:

And you are playing in Autzen.  That's the only way we're going to make points.

Here's your formula to win: Make our shitty QB nervous.  Yeah!  You win!  I seriously dislike that assclown.  I do not understand Kelly's love with Musoli.

Yeah I know, I haaaaaaaaaaaaaate when we have to play in Autzen. Worst place in the entire conference to play on the road.

For years Bobby Bowden didn't want to schedule South Florida for fear that it would give credibility to the Bulls if we pulled off the win.  Florida State finally agreed to a home and home with the first game this year, so in the first ever Florida palindrome bowl USF travels up to Doak Campbell and with a freshman QB making his very first start we come away with a big win against FSU.  That 17-7 score actually makes the game look closer than it was.

This is the third year in a row we beat a ranked out of conference BCS opponent early in the year, and like before I expect USF to be ranked after this win.  We'll probably end up around 22 or 23 and may even sneak into the teens in the coming weeks before we inevitably go on a 3 or 4 game losing streak to conference opponents on our way to a thrilling postseason game in the PapaJohns Pizza Bowl.

To the extent that makes BYU look even worse, I approve.

Just getting my "what the fuck, Cal?" in early.  :uhrr:

There goes the Pac 10.  I guess we get to enjoy killing another Big 10 team in the Rose Bowl.

Well Utah's squeaker loss to Oregon last week doesn't look quite so bad now.  :awesome_for_real:

Someone replaced our offensive line and our entire defense with pod people.

UGA looked like shit in the second half, gave the ballgame away, got it back, and won with a last second field goal. All this against an unranked PAC-10 opponent. Ugh.

On the high notes from yesterday here are some of my favorites:

1 - Tebow gets laid the fuck out, goes home in an ambulance with a concussion. I can't watch that hit enough times.
2 - Iowa proves yet again that Penn State are still overrated bitches coached by a fossil.
3 - Oregon just CRUSHES Cal, adding to the rotating door that is the top 10.
4 - In the top 10 - 4, 5, 6, and 9 all lose. Beyond 1-3 of Florida, Texas, Bama, I don't think anybody is an actual title contender or safe at their spot.

That hit on Tebow was nasty.  

Bama has a free ride to the SEC title game.  Barring some major upset where the entire team just decides to not show up, there's not a realistic loss on their schedule.  The difference between this years team versus last years team really is that much.  They're good, man.  Scary good.  Losing Dont'e Hightower is going to hurt, but we've got enough horses that it really won't matter.  Trent Richardson is a god among mortals.  They have so many playmakers, it's just not fair.  The only real chink in Bama's armor is the kick off coverage.  

I don't know if you've seen them play, but wow, they're impressive.

Favorite picture thus far:

(http://media.al.com/alabama-sports/photo/cody-leaps-over-mallett-med-almondjpg-eaeb1d487a6179b2_medium.jpg) 

6'5, 360 lb's isn't supposed to be able to move like that.

That's a pretty bold statement given the teams you've played thus far. You beat VA Tech convincingly, but that's your only real quality win. You still have to play Ole Miss on the road, who is nowhere near as bad as they looked at South Carolina, and you have to play LSU. Either one of those games could bite you realistically. Tennessee probably won't hurt you, but they played Florida pretty close and are still developing. Then there's always the Iron Bowl. Who knows if Auburn is any good? They are undefeated still.

Auburn hasn't played anybody and their defense is really bad.  I mean, seriously bad.  
Ole Miss is overrated.  You know as well as I do, that despite the fact that The Right Reverend Houston Nutt is a great coach, his teams have a tendency to fold when they're expected to contend.
Same for LSU (who is going to get throttled by UGA and UF (assuming a healthy Tebow), possibly by Auburn).  They've risen to number 4 mostly because everyone else has lost (Ole Miss, OU, OSU, Penn State..who else?).  They've jut kinda fallen into that ranking.  
We play at Vaught Hemingway against Ole Miss, and at Bryant Denny for LSU, Tenn, and South Carolina.  Away for Auburn.
If Bama can get through the next 4 games without a loss, and without another significant injury, that puts them at 8-0 at the break.  Then it's LSU (home), Miss State (away), Chattanooga (homecoming), Auburn (away).  With the exception of the AU game, we've got every significant, tough game at home.  

THAT said, even though I do expect them to run the table, the Ole Miss and AU games do scare me the most.  TRRHN generally sneaks up and wins one he shouldn't, and despite what everyone says about a rivalry game, Auburn's offense is scoring alot of points (albiet on crap teams, but it's building confidence).  Plus it's Cheezenips first year, where things generally just kinda magically go right.

Edit:  I am worried about injuries this year though.  It seems, and maybe I'm being paranoid, but teams are doing alot of kneehunting against Alabama.  It's something I noticed first against VT, but chaulked it up to VT just being a dirty team (which they are).  But, it is something I've noticed and worry about long term (as far as the season goes, anyway).

I'd say regardless of the rest of the season, Miami going 3-1 thru that murderer's row of a front end schedule could be considered respectable (and yes, Bradford being out probably helped, but a win is a win)

and is it me or does LSU play just enough to win every weekend without making a scene?

I don't know.  I felt like they were handed that game by the refs to some degree.  That was a bullshit excessive celebration on AJ Green.  Yeah, they turned around and gave it to the LSU RB that scored after UGA forgot how to tackle.  But still, that's two games UGA has had their momentum killed by bad penalties. 

I'm not convinced LSU is worthy of a #4 ranking.  We'll see in a few weeks though.

i'd say one actually   :awesome_for_real:

Depends on if Tebow plays.

Speaking of, this was sent to me today:

Tebow making progress!
(http://i197.photobucket.com/albums/aa251/snakecharmer_04/tebow.jpg)

Man, I so totally hate living in western DuPage Co. When I was in Chicago, I could reliably go to our local version of The Houndstooth and catch the games. Now, I'm forced to read box scores for untelevised games. I'm just not gonna spend twenty-odd bucks on Gamecast to watch one game about which I care and ignore the rest. Add to that the fact that I don't think I can DVR the game on Gamecast (my Saturdays are busy), it just makes it a big bowl of "meh."

I'm so pissed that LSU beat UGA. I was hoping they'd lose and give Bama the #1 spot in the SEC West.

Pod people infection has definitely spread to our QB. SEND HELP.

You really need to check out ESPN 360, its free and quality feeds of a bunch of the 2nd tier NCAAF games.  It can provide a fix and lets you at least catch halftime highlights.  I watched the OU v Miami game and the USC v Cal game (well 1 quarter of it, fucking cal) on 360 Saturday with no problems.

360 access depends on your ISP.  Comcast just got it turned on recently, and it's been hugely awesome having random games running in the background while at work.

Nope, the refs thing is just typical of how UGA does things now. We're totally undisciplined and it's obvious every week. If we lose to Tennessee, the season is officially over. And if that happens I hope we go 6-6, play in the Gaylord Hotels Music City Bowl against some other shitty team like Clemson, and we get stomped. Why? Because I'm sick of 9-3 and losing to Florida and Georgia Tech considered good enough to keep the same asshole coordinators that have fucked up our special teams and defense for the last few years.

Heads should fucking ROLL when you average giving up 28 points a game in the SEC.

I don't know.  The head of SEC officiating came out (http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/news/story?id=4534433) and said it was a bad call.  Just seems like UGA gets deflated easily.  I'll admit, even without it, LSU could have scored just as easily but I know it didn't help things.  To be honest, I halfway expected CMR to call a surprise onsides kick.  If UGA recovers, game over.  If LSU scores, there is plenty of time left to do something with it.

But, that's easy to say in the comfort of my living room.

Notre Dame almost killed that kid at the end of the game (ok exaggerating, but it was a hell of a hit). Band played on, no one seemed to care. I dont know why but I couldnt stop laughing seeing the Washington guy knocked out, hit the ground, roll over to his side still knocked out and the commentators couldnt care less...

They were too busy clawing each others eyes out to see who was going to be the lucky one to go blow Jimmy Clausen after the game.

There was an interesting discussion on one of the OSU boards today about the lines on Buckeye games this season. It looks like there are some high-roling sharps that are making a ton of money on the Buckeyes' crappy fan perception. Case in point the USC game: Vegas took in millions from schlubs (like us) that thought USC - 6.5 was too good to be true. Despite all that money going in on the USC side, the line hardly moved. Why? Because all the sharps were laying down big money on the Buckeyes.

Now witness this week's line vs. Wisconsin: It started the week at OSU -14. The Badgers are unbeaten but haven't played anybody, and probably shouldn't be in the top 25. That being said, Wiscy has historically been a tough game for OSU the last several years so this looked like another "no brainer". Plus OSU's offensive line been hit with the flu and at least one starter might miss the game. The result so far? The line's moved to -16. I'm a diehard OSU fan and there is no way I would give 16 points in this game, but it looks like there is again a lot of "smart" money on the OSU side. Should be interesting to see how it pans out.

The Big 10 threw a big monkey wrench into the betting system last week on the "obvious" picks. I hate that conference even more now because the results are completely unpredictable.

FIFM

Giving up 45 to UT this season is cause to fall on your sword.

Anyone watch the Florida / LSU game?

For the first time ever, Tebow looked...scared.  He just had this dazed look on his face, and he looked to juke more than try and bulldoze people like he used to.  Possibly shellshocked/gunshy?

Yeah I was thinking this too. I was a bit surprised he was playing but Urban doesn't seem the type to err on the side of caution.

And oh yeah OSU wins 31-13 on 2 defensive and 1 special teams TD's. Offense is god-awful but they still cover. Crap like this is why I don't bet a whole lot on football games.

Tebow scared?  Come on.  He played within the gameplan given him and played smart by avoiding leaving himself open to unnecessary hits.  Gators tried a few different options on 3rd/4th and short, but when his number was called Tebow lowered his pads and got the first down.  The coaches will feel better/more comfortable with that first game back out of the way and after each of the next few games.  I'm sure each game they'll open up the playbook a bit more, but why rush it/take chances when the other team can't even stop you on a simple dive play?

If we don't beat Vandy, I'm going to call for some rope and a bunch of boys with shotguns. Georgia is full of those.

Prediction is right on track!  :oh_i_see:

We should put our resident Buckeyes on suicide watch.

Watching the Buckeyes lose fills me with joy.  This is especially true on weeks where the Hawkeyes win.  Notre Dame is about the only team I hate more than THE Ohio State University. 

Nah, this was just a matter of time with that putrid offense. It's been this way for 9 years - 2006 was an aberration because of a Heisman Trophy winner backed up by 1st round draft picks at every skill position. The natives are getting tired of his act though. This native included.

"The primary duty of the offense is to not put the defense in a bad position." - Can you imagine hearing that from an SEC coach?

Honestly that would all work fine if Pryor wasn't having a terrible terrible year.  He's just not Troy Smith.  Not even close.  He can't even manage a game and create one drive versus USC to give them that win.  Today he looked fucking terrible and the defense played its one bad game of the year.

Even when it's not playing well (which is pretty much all the time) you can tell he's a good athlete.  He's just a really, really bad fit with the Ohio State offense.  If he'd have gone to an offense like say, West Virginia I bet he'd have been a lot more successful.

Of course, I'm not sad at all about how things ended up because I love to see Ohio State lose.  They're one of only 5 teams I really can't stand, so it's always fun to see them lose.

Ohio State covers the last two games when I don't see it even close to happening, then they lose when I pick against them.

I'm seriously about to call shenanigans on these assholes.

To be fair, the "THE" is to avoid confusion with Ohio University.  Yes, people make that mistake all the time. No, I have no fucking idea why.

It's amusing to me as an alum to see UC ranked above OSU. Tee hee.

We have Utah and Utah State universities (like oh, probably 20 other states have two schools like that) and no one seems to have a problem distinguishing between the two without a pretentious "the"  mainly because one has the word "state" in its title.

Florida had no business winning that game.

The Florida game is sickening on many levels. Arkansas can't put a Florida team away who gives up 4 fumbles. The refs giftwrap a TD for Florida, and then on top of that, the Arkansas kicker sucks ass.

Oh and the refs haven't called a damn thing against Florida in their last drive. Not offensive pass interference, not movement on the line, both of which happened. Ten penalties v. three called against UF.

Whatever, this season is total nonsense at this point. Everybody looks like shit from top to bottom. If Texas and Florida are the best we have to sport this year, fuck that noise.

Oh, Texas and Florida aren't the best. 

Bama is  :grin:

That said, our offense has gone into the tank the last two games.  Not so much the offense as a whole, as IngramRichardsonUpchurchGrant are still running over everything in their path, but McElroy has gone into a bit of a funk.  Should work itself out though.  But with the defense we've got?  Not worried about it.  They're big, fast, smart, and will knock the snot out of you.  And deep at every position.

But yeah, Arkansas and the refs gift wrapped that game to UF.

Bama looked the least shitty yesterday. That's not saying a lot though when Florida needs missed FGs and penalties on the other team to squeak out a win, and Texas couldn't find any offense against a team who lost their starting QB on the first drive. Oh and Ohio State dropping a game to a 1-5 team. I mean holy crap the Big 10 is worthless outside of Iowa.

Out of teams that are going to move up, I think Bama, Texas, Florida, Iowa, and Miami should be the top 5 in the nation. USC will be top 5 because of media whoring, but they lost to WASHINGTON for god's sake. Boise is undefeated, but by god they play in the biggest lame duck conference in the land. Did we all forget what happened when they put Hawaii in the big bowls? I guess we did.

The real shitter is that Cincy can almost stroll to being undefeated in the Big East, since they already beat USF now. That will totally cock up national title talk if either Florida or Bama takes a loss. The way Florida played against Arkansas, they could lose to a mildly competent offense if they don't fix it quick. The good news is they don't play any. Miss St couldn't put up more than 3 on Vandy, Georgia has a shitty QB and a freshman back, and Vandy's well, Vandy. The only trap game left is South Carolina because of the Old Ball Coach.

Cincy still has to play both West Virginia and Pitt, both of whom are now ranked.

Not that it matters, because they can't realistically put that team or Boise into the championship game.

Worry not about Cincy.   We're too small to keep this up and one of the bigger schools that cares more about sports than education will be scooping up Coach Kelly soon enough with far more money than we can ever hope to throw at him and with the promise of a much much bigger budget, too.   Hopefully BEFORE the silly e-mails I keep getting about Logues and Skyboxes at UC stadium can ever begin to come to fruition.   (If you'd ever been to the stadium and the school you'd understand WHY this is such a ridiculous notion.)

You could always pull a Georgia Tech and be one of the few teams that actually had to reduce the size of their stadium due to suckass play.

So another Saturday...

Picks anyone?

LSU 20, Auburn 10
BC 27, ND 24
UF 31, Miss St 3
UA 17, UT 14
Minn 20, OSU 17
Oregon State 24, USC 17
Michigan 20, Penn State 13

Arizona is now ranked. Kiss of death.

Wow.  Totally missed that one.

It's the Big 10, nobody knows what the hell is going on. Stat of the day: OSU's longest run from scrimmage this season now belongs to the 5th string tailback on his 3rd career carry.

Alabama - wtf?

End of an 8 game grind, and UT has gotten better.  But we've regressed in some ways.  McElroy has a bit of happy feet after getting tattooed a couple times in the Ole Miss game.  But his receivers aren't helping him, with some really glaring drops. 

That said, the offensive playcalling in this game was atrocious.  It's actually been pretty bad the last couple of games.

Am I the only one that thinks that this call the play, get to the line of scrimmage, look back at the sideline to get the go ahead or audible out bullshit that UF, Auburn, and several other school does should be outlawed?

It's really stupid.  Utah has started doing it too and it drives me nuts. Doesn't seem all that effective and half the time the linemen end up jumping because they've been down in their stances for 20 seconds.

Reminds me of a bunch of prarrie dogs popping their heads up.  With the elaborate handsignals that are used and everyone on the sideline having headsets, they can (and do signal) what to do to everyone (QB, WRs, RBs).  May as put receivers in their helmets and let them talk directly.

My 5-year old is now saying "BYU sucks!"  The beauty of it is that I didn't teach it to him, his cousin did so I have total deniability with the wife.

Face facts, your offense all-around played like ass. The playcalling wasn't great, but you should still be able to make passes if you want to be #1 in the nation. You got beat on first downs, you got beat on yardage, you got beat on time of possession. What you didn't do was get beat on points. In the end, that's what matters, but damn if all three top teams haven't had MAJOR games where they struggled offensively.

On the plus side, your team isn't taking penalties, they aren't making many turnovers, and they are standing strong on 3rd down defense. If the offense can get back on track, you have a major rock to hold onto there with good discipline.

Oh, no doubt, the offense has definately been playing like ass.  McElroy isn't playing with any confidence, his receivers are dropping the ball, and the playcalling has been questionable at best.  With our defense and special teams, all the offense has to do is halfway show up and they aren't even doing that.  Our QB is going through his reads way too fast.  Perfect time for a bye week though.

UCLA may have the worst offense I've seen in quite a long time. Even though Arizona only won by a couple TDs, it never felt close.  They scored 13 points (no offensive TD) and we turned the ball over 5 times.  Their lone TD came on a audibled quick out that everyone knew in the stands was coming, along with the UCLA linebacker that jumped the route (seriously, he used the same hand signal twice).  :awesome_for_real:

Brutal game to watch.  Hopefully we put up 50 on WSU like we should have on UCLA. 

Last 4 games of the season will be a nightmare.  Cal, Oregon, USC and ASU. 

Re: Cal/UofA, if you can stop our offense you're golden, since our defense really kind of sucks outside of a couple guys.

So glad to see Neuheisel fall on his smarmy fucking face.

(http://i9.photobucket.com/albums/a78/nursetpd/PAC%2010/Ducks_Hunt_Trojans.gif)


 :awesome_for_real:

I definitely feel better about the Ute's 7 point loss at Oregon earlier this season after that dismantling.

That.  Is.  Awesome.

Nice game Oregon. That defense is solid.  :ye_gods:

Also, good lord Alabama. Do you really need the starting QB and corner to go down, have the officials overturn an interception, and have the other team's defense self-destruct in order to win? I'm not loving anything I'm seeing here from the best teams in the SEC in the second half of the season at all. If Texas wasn't so inept on offense as well, I'd think they'd have a cakewalk ahead of themselves.

This season is literally the worst I've seen in a decade. Nobody can name an obvious Heisman, nobody is stepping up as a decent balanced force on offense and defense, and we've got suck-ass teams like Boise State and TCU in the mix because everyone else can't get their shit together.

I feel bad for Iowa because they got bent over by an injury, and that will screw them now. Congrats again on taking the back door to the title in your pathetic conference, Ohio State.

TCU is good and would beat 80% of the SEC with ease.

This year, I agree. And thus I'm pissed. That's how far the major conferences have fallen off.

You'd rather just have one team completely dominate? Yawn.

No I'd rather that we have two teams that look remotely competent in all facets of the game against decent competition.

A couple points:

(1)  Michigan loses to Purdue, slips to 5-5.  With dates at Wisconsin and OSU, in serious danger of losing bowl eligibility.  Rich Rodriguez MIGHT hold on if that happens, but start the next season 1-3 or something and he's gone.  

(2)  Charlie Weis is in similar danger, losing to Navy again.  If they end their season on a fail streak and lose a bowl, he's gone.

(3)  I don't trust Alabama or Texas at this point.  I trust Florida more than anyone else.  I pray they get to play a big boy in the big game, and that somehow a Cincinnati or Boise State doesn't sneak in and get routed.  

(4)  Re:  OSU and the Big 10- I still think the next two weeks are incredibly dangerous.  If Stanzl is still injured next week, OSU is probably safe- unless they totally overlook the game and Prior reverts to his usual self.  But when you lose to Purdue at home, anything is possible.  

Michigan has serious upset potential the final week of the season.  If they are playing for a bowl game (and I THINK Ohio State clinches the Rose Bowl if they win, seeing as they own the head to head against both Penn State and (hypothetically at that time) Iowa) at Ann Arbor, and Forcier and Robinson play to full potential, a win is possible.  Especially given the game is in Ann Arbor.

And if OSU gets to the Rose Bowl, I have high hopes for a victory against anyone but USC.  OSU has a monkey on their back against big name out of conference programs, but that'll be gone if they play an Oregon or Arizona.  

EDIT:  Wisconsin has two Big 10 losses as well, but OSU beat them earlier in the season so OSU would also win that Rose Bowl tiebreak.

Texas is damned good when McCoy is on his game.  I look for them to beat whichever SEC team they play in the BCS game.

To win, in any game, you've got to be prepared, talented, stay healthy, and a little bit lucky at times.  Would LSU have done anything with that interception?  Maybe.  Or they might have coughed it up right back on a turnover for a TD.  No way of knowing.  One play doesn't lose a game.

You can play 'what if's' all day long with every game.  What if he'd just caught the ball?  What if the ref got the spot right?  What if...

In the end, all that matters is the win column. 

I still can't figure out what Bama is thinking on some play calling though...

And yeah, TCU looks good.  Weak schedule though.  We'll see if they're for real next week.
ND getting beat by Navy was :heart:

I agree with you about what-if's Snake, but your QB is horrid. Maybe nobody will exploit that, but it's blatantly obvious and right there for anybody who wants to make you one-dimensionally terrible. My what if is, what if he actually didn't overthrow about 4 receivers that were so wide open they could have done the moonwalk into the end zone?

You have Ingram, you have a defense, and you have a good bit of luck on your side. I question whether or not it's enough at the end.

What's odd is he was really good early - like the first four games.  Lit it up.  Good velocity, stood in the pocket, made the right reads, accurate as hell.  Then before the Ole Miss game, he got asked why Julio Jones wasn't getting the ball, and he got pissed, answer the question (I've got 4 other awesome receivers, why would I throw it to 8 when he's double covered and someone is open somewhere).  THEN, Ole Miss lit him up, followed by South Carolina using him as their own personal punching bag.  Then comes UT making him their bitch.  Ole Miss shook him up, and he hasn't been the same since.  I'd almost go back to the North Texas game where he got popped running in a touchdown and suffered a hip pointer on his left side.  His velocity hasn't been the same since then (looks to be about 75 percent as to what it was).  As a righty, he's got to plant that left and pivot off it to generate some power.  He's not doing that.  The UT game, he was flaring his right foot off the ground because of that left side.  He's also just been going through his reads waaaay too fast (happy feet from getting beat up in a couple games).

To be fair, his receivers aren't helping him.  There has been some really glaring drops (notably Jones, Peek, and Hanks).

But yeah, we've got Ingram (and Richardson and Upchurch).  And our defense.  And special teams (Leigh Tiffin is just about the best kicker in the country, IMHO).  And some luck.  All McElroy has to do is manage the game (he usually does) and not lose it (hasn't yet).  Saban needs to get the OC's head straight because he's making some really bad calls in crunch situations.  McElroy looked better against LSU than he has in about 5 games.  So that IS encouraging.  Warm up games agsint Miss State and Chattanooga will do some good before Auburn, which will be a good primer for Florida.  I'm not worried.

Yah, keep thinking that.  OSU has typically had trouble with teams built on speed, and Oregon and Arizona have that at every position.

The Pac 10 is just brutal this year.  We're eating our own and there's a lot of solid teams.

The PAC 10 is what the ACC was last year. You'll get no respect this year in the Rose Bowl since it'll probably be a 2 loss squad vs. a 2 loss squad. At best.

Does that mean you suck? No, but you can still do better than the Orange bowl snooze we had last season.

As a LSU fan, I was actually pretty happy 'Bama got the win. I think they might have a shot at FL in the SEC championship. LSU has looked shady from the start but getting beat by two top 3 teams, meh, I can deal.

And is anyone else suspicious that all the Florida talk that was rampant early this fall has gone silent? Attention has shifted to bama and texas with a fair share to the BCS "busters." I am actually looking forward to the games with Cinn, TCU, and Pitt (PITT?? WTF?)

More specifically, speed on the offensive and defensive lines is OSU's bugaboo. I think they have a good shot of beating Oregon but we're the last fans that should be counting any bowl opponent as an auto-win at this point.

You people are confusing me with your calling Ohio St. OSU, everyone knows OSU is Oregon State.  :oh_i_see:

Or Oklahoma State!

Ohio State is tOSU.

Wow.  How 'bout Stanford?

WTG Cardinal :awesome_for_real:

(Yes it's singular as it's the color. Yes it's stupid.).

Ohio State going to the Rose Bowl thanks to an MLS reject.

Arizona sure can lose in incredibly fucked up ways.  Arizona QB tries to pass again after catching own batted ball.  5 yard spot foul, loss of down for illegal forward pass.  :facepalm:

Granted, we have a horrid kicker and any field goal attempt would have been dicey.  Blah.

Man, I felt the bitch-slap that TCU put on the Utes all the way here in SLC. That team would give any team in the country all that it could handle.

Shamefully, I did not even comprehend that score at first. I saw the names and then the scores and my mind immediately went dyslexic. After I pulled up the ESPN page I sat there for a moment astounded.

I thought it funny that reporters and Pete Carroll were complaining about the points being scored on them - most noteably the 2 point conversion.  It's not like USC has ever run the score up people.  Nah, that's never happened.

TCU looked damn good again.  ND lost  :heart:, though I do think the officials botched that fumble (looked like a forward pass to me).  UF looked flawed playing South Carolina.  Ole Miss took it to UT.  Bama regaining form and looked very very solid in beating up on MSU.  Didn't see the Texas game, but throttling Baylor shouldn't be all that difficult.

What games of note are left?  UF v FSU, Bama v Auburn, UGA v GT...What else?

You left out UGA beating Auburn  :grin:

How the hell did I forget that??  Yeah, I was loving it once UGA got their shit together.  They actually seemed to play better once no. 8 went down.

Is it just me or is there an extremely high number of really bad concussions this year?  That Rambo kid made a pretty clean hit, mostly with his shoulder.  I did see his head snap to the left pretty quickly, though.  Which is pretty much what causes a concussion more than a direct impact; the brain bouncing around inside the skull (I think).  I honestly thought that kid from Cal broke his spine last week.

That kid?  Best is by far and away the top RB in the country right now.  Will be top 3 RB picked in the draft, I think after that play he has to go early.

You're out of your mind.

I've been watching him for 3 years, he does some absolutely jaw-dropping stuff. He's been limited a bit this year due to a weak OL (and now the injury.) Trust me, Hoax is not really living in much of a state of hyperbole. He's easily fast enough to be an Olympic sprinter, and he has moves too.

The only thing that will hold him back is durability. After that hit he's either got to go into the draft early or go back to track and just give up on football, that was his 2nd concussion in a week and the long-term consequences could be rough.

I so wish they had gone with the Robber Barons. :(((((((((

Whoever said earlier this is a boring year is right.  I can't remember ever being less excited about following the various storylines.  And Michigan sucking isn't nearly as fun as I thought it would be- don't get me wrong, puppy-kicking them is mildly amusing, but the game is more meaningful when they are a power. 

Who is with me in thinking Richrod gets another year (or at least three or games in one), even if there is a blowout loss next weekend?  Michigan isn't the type of school to kick to the curb after two years, even though he tries his hardest to be as douchebaggy as possible. 

I've been rooting for Michigan all year, I do that every year until the end.  Beating them when they are down isn't nearly as satisfying.

I would like to see Notre Dame and Michigan good again.  It's no fun when my least favorite teams suck.  I like having good enemies.  However, I hate Standford with the intensity of a thousand burning suns doused in gasoline, so maybe with their resurgence I will have someone new to hate in FB.

The only thing that will get Richrod fired this year is NCAA violations. If Michigan gets put on probation in football (first time in 100 some-odd years) then he's gone.

Real pleased with the Rose Bowl berth. Tressel pisses me off something fierce sometimes but his teams are extremely consistent, even with a lot of inexperience on offense. If he loses again and the offense gets shut down the bitching will start up again. Everything I've heard from C-bus has said that Tressel is probably gone in 2-3 years anyway.

In other news, how awesome was it that Stanford went for 2 in the face of USC? Oh, you don't like it when teams run up the score, Pete? Fuck you. Ask around how other teams felt when you put up 69-0 on them last year instead of just running the clock.

 :why_so_serious:

I actually think Bettis said (http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2009/writers/jerome_bettis/11/16/week.10/index.html) it best when he was talking about this.

If you get walloped by a then unranked 6-3 team the way USC did, you don't belong in the top 25.  Yet, there they are ranked no. 18.

I wonder if Colin Cowherd broke a leg falling off the USC bandwagon after this weekend...

Stanford is playing really, really well right now.  I'd like their chances against anyone. 

Of course, being in the Pac 10, they'll lose to Cal next game.

oh god I hope so

Stanford became ranked when they beat Oregon.

Weenie! :awesome_for_real:

 :ye_gods:  WTF was I looking at then...Maybe Cal.  I dunno. 

STILL. 

Point being, USC shouldn't even be ranked right now, much less 18.

Eh, USC is a good team, as much as it pains me to defend them. #18 is probably about right.


It's going to be so cold at Big Game - I sort of miss the good old days when we both sucked so the games would start at 12:30.   :oh_i_see:

Someone please beat Cin as this is getting ridiculous.  I may have to root for them to get this to stop.

@ Pitt soon enough.

My upset radar is going haywire thinking about Saturday's OSU/UM matchup in Ann Arbor.  Michigan is playing for bowl eligibility and some shred of respect.  OSU has already locked up the Rose Bowl, and are probably reading the "Another ho-hum blowout of imploding UM" headlines everywhere.  All the classic upset factors are there. 

Prediction- Pryor half-asses it and throws two or three picks, and Michigan gives its best effort of the season in a field goal extravaganza.  Michigan 16, OSU 10. 

If Michigan was still Michigan and was just young and didn't have extensive personnel problems I'd agree, but I don't see any way they win that game. Brandon Minor is officially out, and their offense simply doesn't function well when he isn't there. Other than Brandon Graham and Mike Martin on the line, that defense is just flat out horrible. Their starting free safety is a freshman walk-on who made the team in a tryout. Their starting middle linebacker was benched for two games in favor of another walk-on.

A Michigan win would be a bigger upset than the '69 game IMO given the talent disparity.

Les Miles just screwed his team over again because he doesn't understand time management. Hang that ENTIRELY on the coaching staff.

Agreed. But I give credit to Snead... holy shit he looked damn good today.

 :drill: :drill: :drill: :drill: :drill: :drill:

And it wasn't even THAT cold.  :awesome_for_real:

So the second-worst team in the Big 10 (sorry Michigan) puts up 476 yards of offense and 36 points on the supposed #5 team in the country, and yet it's being spun by ESPN that Cincinnati is this fucking juggernaut. What a joke.

Whoever draws Cincinnati in the BCS ought to put a little bit extra in the collection plate that Sunday.

They will stick TCU in that game with Cincinnati/Pitt and TCU will annihilate them.

Snake is seven or eight sheets to the wind right now. Cmdr Slack might have had a coronary. I think my Futbol indoctrination saved me from the massive  squeeky bum time that was all of this years Iron Bowl.

The Big East is a joke.  Whoever plays Cincinnati will bulldoze them like a watermelon.

They really did look awful against an Ilini team that is awful and had nothing at all to play for.

The ND AD's daughter is hot. More Irish controversy please.

I'll take a bad win any day given the horrible losses we (Arizona) had this year. A shoe tip and Jermiah Fucking Massoli away from 9-2.  

ASU fans suck, so I don't feel bad for them in the slightest.

So, I'm guessing we'll play another Utah based team in a bowl game regardless of the USC outcome. Woo hoo.

Holy frick on a stick, was I ever.  What happened in that game is about what I expected, but my ass was so puckered up a greased BB wouldn't have squeezed through it.

Bring on Florida in the National Championship game  :grin:

I is a very sad panda.  :sad_panda:

The SEC delivered the ACC an all around ass whooping this weekend.

It's going to be a loong week waiting for the Florida vs Alabama game next weekend.

Yes the SEC refs did all they could to make sure we had a 'bama/Gators matchup. 

Maybe in earlier games, but the refs had nothing to do with the outcome of either game this Saturday. Auburn completely self-destructing and coughing up two AWFUL turnovers made all the difference.

EDIT: Also, HAHAHAHAHA at the ACC, Clemson, and Georgia Tech. You triple option bastards thought you had it soooooooo easy against a weak SEC opponent, and you never led the entire game. Also, Clemson got dickstomped by a supremely average South Carolina team.

Have fun in your "Championship" game after losing to a couple of 7-5 SEC teams. The Orange bowl is going to be a fucking joke yet again this year.

I'm not defending the few bad calls that were made, but yeah...

(http://www.gwally.com/news/photos/catintinfoilhat.jpg)

Too early to breakdown UF vs Bama? 

Nah.

To me, it's a fantastic matchup.  It's strength against strength.  You've got the premiere defensive mind (Saban) vs the premiere offensive mind (Meyer).   The best offensive playmaker (Tebow) vs the best defensive player (McClain).  Both teams excel at special teams.  Bama has the edge on punt/kickoff returns with Arenas, but loses some points in weakness on the kick coverage (prone to getting out of their lanes and giving up huge returns).  Bama has a clutch kicker, and above average punter, so in the end, I figure special teams are a break even point for both teams.  Bama losing Hightower in the second or third game of the season is really going to hurt them in this game, though, since he could do everything.  Without him, they have to rotate players in at his position depending on the situation.  That gives away what their intent on defense is for that particular play.  Cody won't be a factor in this game because the scheme Bama will run against the spread offense, which is just so frakin' hard to defend against.  Bama's greatest strength (speed, pursuit) is also it's biggest liability (misdirection by the spread), and this was exploited a bit in the Auburn game.  To be fair to Bama, the first touch down Auburn scored was a result of busted coverage, as was the third one.  The second touchdown Auburn scored was earned.  But Bama settled down after the first 7 minutes, and effectively shut Auburn's offense out (with the exception of the busted coverage on the 3rd touchdown).  Auburn has a pretty good offense, and has racked up a bunch of points and yards on everyone else. 

The weakness is the Bama offense that went back into hibernation for all but about 10 minutes of the Auburn game.  I'm still wracking my brain at the playcalling of Bama's offensive coordinator who insisted on calling middle and middle left runs when time and time again it didn't work.  Bama's bread and butter has been what I call 22 Slide Right or 3 Slide Right - the RB takes the handoff, starts up the guard slot, then slides around the right tackle/tight end to space.  I don't recall them calling that but a couple times and it was successful when they ran it.  It's what they've done all year long with 22 or 3.  And because AU was starting a frosh LB at the left side, they thought they could exploit it - and they couldn't.  But they kept calling it over and over.  The fuck you thinking, OC? 

That Bama offensive weakness goes against a spectacular UF defense.  Plus, Tebow has been there, done that for the last 4 years.  Bama's QB, McElroy, is a first year starter playing in his first SEC championship.  Factor in Tebow's experience in big games, his receivers, and his multitude of X factors, I think it's just a bit too much for Bama.  McElroy did show some serious chutzpah in the game winning drive against Auburn (hostile environment, 80 yards to win and goes 7 of 8), but one drive doesn't a big time big stage QB make. 

Early line, if I remember right is 5 1/2.  I honestly think it's bigger than that.  I wouldn't be surprised to see the line move to 8 by gametime on Saturday since I expect people to start laying it heavy on Florida - especially in light of Ingram's injury in the Auburn game.  Richardson is a beast, and Upchurch has some wheels as well, but you just can't potentially lose a playmaker like Ingram and not feel it.  Maybe it will force Bama's OC to be more creative and use more of the playbook to get more people involved, but if Ingram isn't 100 percent, that's a HUGE blow. 

The only way Bama wins (or keeps it close) is to have success running the ball even in the face of an 8 man front - which is something they've been 50/50 on this year.  UF is going to have the very best defense Bama has played all year.  Bama is going to have to have some key turnovers and calls go their way.  They're going to have to have a big game out of Arenas to flip the field in Bama's favor.  And McElroy is going to have to play out of his mind.

As much as it pains me to say it, I just don't see UF losing this game.  Tebow is not going to suddenly become a bad quarterback; confused by what he sees from Bama's defense and have his arm go south on him.  His receivers aren't going to get a case of the drops, and his offensive line just isn't going to forget how to block.  On the other side of the ball, Bama's offense really isn't that hard to figure out, so it's not like their defense is going to see things that confuse them.

Early pick? 

Tebow gets 2 TD passing, 1 TD running, and TD on kick return/special teams.  Two field goals from special teams. 
Bama gets a TD from Arenas on a punt return, one TD from Richardson, one TD from Maze.  One field goal.  Bama has a game changing TD on a punt return called back for a block in the back by Cory Reamer, and UF blocks a field goal.

UF 34, Bama 24

Then UF goes and beats the bajeezus out of Texas on Jan 7th, 2010.

I expect to see alot of this (http://blog.al.com/tide-source/2009/09/medium_V_Saban_angry_4th_quarter_Almond.jpg) from Saban, and alot of this (http://blog.al.com/birmingham-news-sports/2009/08/large_touchdown%20paycheck.jpg) from Meyer.

I want Bama to win. I just keep waiting for the other shoe to drop with their team.

You can win, you just have to win the short battles on the line and have a healthy running back. You can beat the Florida defense with strong running up the gut off the blocks and some dink and dunk to the middle. Control the clock, win the turnover battle, rely on good defensive play against the pass. Florida has a weakness on D, and it's NOT running outside as many teams have tried.

Fuckity fuck fuck.  Carlos Dunlap just got arrested for DUI.  That could be quite a blow for the FL vs AL game if he gets suspended.  Thankfully we have a lot of depth on defense, but losing a player like that will still be felt.  What a fucking idiot.

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2009/football/ncaa/12/01/dunlap.dui/ (http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2009/football/ncaa/12/01/dunlap.dui/)

Well Tebow looked shaky earlier this year and was not his usual self during the LSU game coming off his headringer. Key to Alabama, rattle him - put him on the grass a few times and pressure him early. Or the entire Alabama team could put evil bible verses on their eye tape like REV 2:28 - that might just get in his head a bit.

I like Florida in this one.  You stay with the champs until given a concrete reason otherwise.  Florida knows how to win these type of games. 

Won't matter.  UF is deep enough that someone else will take his place and they won't miss a beat.  I doubt very seriously that Meyer does anything anyway (We're going to wait until all the facts are in place, innocent until proven guilty, yadda yadda yadda).

He'll probably suspend him for the first set of downs.

Seems a bit more than that. Possibly played his last game in college as it stands. Either way, what a horrible taint this is going to be for the SEC championship. FLA loses, blame it on the distraction... FLA wins, they tout the "over come adversity" mantra... Blah. I still hope they lose.

I have a feeling Florda is going to destroy whoever they play.

Whatever, he has to do it because he got horribly burned by the last "distraction."

At least he didn't hold up a gas station.

Heh.

So its Ohio St. vs Oregon in the Rose Bowl.

Ducks have a damn good offense. It'd be nice for OSU to get back some credibility by shutting them down.

Maybe, but I don't believe Ohio State can shut them down.

Oregon is 7th in points per game in the nation, and they are in the top 10 running the ball. They could put up 40 on anybody at the drop of a hat in the last half of the season. The top 3 scoring offenses Ohio State faced was Wisconsin at 29th, Penn State at 43rd, and Michigan State at 45th. If you looked at the average offense you played this year, it's somewhere in the 50-60 range nationally in putting points on the board. To make matters worse for Ohio State, Oregon is also 18th in sacks, and can put a ton of pressure on the QB. If they can key on Pryor and make him hurry, they will force him to make mistakes.

The good news is that Ohio State's defense picks off more passes than anyone in the country. The bad news is that they way Oregon has been running the ball, why in the world would they take a bunch of chances by putting it in the air?

The main reason why is OSU is a stop the run first defense. OSU is 5th in the nation against the run. Yes, the Big 10 isn't exactly an offensive juggernaut but Joe McKnight didn't get much running room either. USC only had 118 yards rushing total.

Here's the opponent yardage breakdown of OSU's last 3 bowl losses:

Florida: 214 yards passing. 156 yards rushing. Leading rusher: Deshawn Wynn 69 yards.
LSU: 174 yards passing, 152 yards rushing. Leading rusher: Jacob Hester 86 yards.
Texas: 414 yards passing, 54 yards rushing. Leading rusher: Chris Ogbonnaya 42 yards.

Mack Brown didn't even bother running on OSU, he recognized that if he had Colt McCoy it was a waste of time. Navy is 3rd in the nation averaging 279 yards per game on the ground, and they almost beat Ohio State early in the season but it wasn't because of the run. They got 186 yards passing (season high, I'm pretty sure) vs 156 yards on the ground.

Oregon needs Masoli to throw to open up the run. It's somewhat risky because of OSU's secondary sure, but if Florida and LSU couldn't run at will on OSU's defense (which were not as good as this year's edition), I don't see Oregon being able to do it. The other thing Oregon needs to do is tighten up that defense and sell out to stop the run. If Ohio State has the same holes that the other OSU had against Oregon, Masoli and James will be on the bench watching for most of the game. Get up early, make Pryor beat you through the air, and tee off with the pass rush against the young o-line, and Oregon wins.

This just in: Notre Dame declined all bowl invites (http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/news/story?id=4713316)

Seriously, what a bunch of bitches. They get owned in the second half of the season against teams that can't crack the top 25, they fire their head coach, and then with the slight chance of maybe salvaging a winning season in a minor bowl, they just say fuck it and close up shop. That's REALLY going to help your recruiting guys. Do you think Clausen or Tate want to come back to a team that just gives up when they can go first or second round in the NFL?

Pussies.

They can't afford to feed Weis for another trip.

I don't really think 6-6 teams should be in bowls anyway, frankly. Especially not ones that have no coaches and that will end up losing money just to make the trip.

I thought that was why Kansas fired Mangino. They ran out of buckets of fish.

EDIT: Ingmar, I agree about 6-6 teams and that there are WAY too many bowls, but Notre Dame loves to tout themselves as a premiere program with massive history. They can afford to lose the money on the bowl trip when they can afford to pay a coach $18M to go away. They are just afraid, and they are quitting. They don't want to go on a national stage and get blown apart by a MAC school.

Clausen (and therefore Tate) were gone when they fired Weis.

I think the punch in the face sealed it, honestly.

Cin-Pitt game = insta-classic. My god that was amazing

GODFUCKINGDAMNIT

I'll be hearing about this for weeks. /sigh

Totally did not expect this score in the FLA/ALA game.

I did, but was too nervous to utter is. Simply Glorious.

I feast on Tebow's tears!  :awesome_for_real:

Also, roll Tide and all that. I'm ok with yall making the SEC a champion for the 4th year in a row.

Your teams turn will come, provided you don't screw it up.

But we must keep Florida in their place, lest their smugness kill us all.

Tebow tears are a delicacy.

I'm absolutely floored.  Seriously, no words.

 :why_so_serious:

I really don't know what to say.  Totally didn't see this coming.

Other than to say they put it all together at the right time and played like I knew hoped they could.

What the fuck was Texas thinking? 

Nebraska just got robbed.

Bama is going to stomp Texas.  TCU would have been a much better game.

Nebraska's offensive play calling was atrocious. They ran the exact same plays on first and second down nearly every time. "Hey guys, we ran for 1.5 yards the last 8 first downs we had, how about we try a run to the same place? That'll work!"

I'm just happy Arizona beat USC.  Holiday Bowl.  Please let it not be Nebraska.  That Suh guy is a nightmare.

Texas is going to get stomped.  It it some sort of rule that the Big 10 and Big 12 take turns getting pasted by a SEC team?

Edit: ahh shit, it will likely be Nebraska. 

This. And if we do not have an Alabama bound Heisman, then fuck that whole deal right in its ear.

I'm afraid my Horns are going to get absolutely destroyed by Bama.  Florda and Texas look very similar right now.  Floundering offenses and moderately competent defenses.

Stop having a national championship game. When #1 v. #2 face off, just call it the winner and move on.

Suh needs a Heisman ceremony invite, badly- nobody on the defensive side of the ball since Charles Woodson has been more deserving (I don't think he's at Woodson's level, but he's the next best thing).  That was some damn good pressure on McCoy.

And yeah, fuck you Florida. 

Ugh, my ass hurts just from watching that game.  I expected the FL offense to struggle, our Offensive Coordinator Steve Addazio is fucking terribad as he has shown the entire season (fuck I miss Dan Mullen).  I was blown away by how our defense played, however.  That was shocking.  Credit Alabama with a monster game plan and McElroy's balls dropping at the most opportune time possible.  Winning the toss, electing to take the ball first, and coming out in the Spread?  Awesome.  All our Off. Coordinator can do is run the same plays Mullen came up with last season.  Addazio's game plan?  Pass the fucking ball on every down when your team averages 250+ yards a game on the ground.  Brilliant!  :uhrr:  I'd like to point to the absence of Dunlap as an excuse for our defensive woes, but with him in the game at best you can take 7-10 pts off the scoreboard, still a win for the Tide.  We got jacked, no way around it.

The Title game is going to be a complete joke if Texas gets in.  Roll Tide!

The idea that Texas is clearly better than TCU, Cincinnati or Boise State is ridiculous.

TCU and Boise need to square off. I don't think CIN could run with anyone given their defensive is a tad shady - put them up against a great def from the SEC and they'll die.

USC 4 loss season... tastes great! FLA... meh, the Tide win was made all the sweeter given Teabow's tears at the end. I mean seriously? At least he manned up at the end and told the reporter FLA just flat out got beat by a better team. Texas... christ, barely winning against Nebraska? not to take anything away from the cornyhusks, but really? That should make Tx a tad more suspect.

I like when season's get to this point, it just makes it all the more apparent that college football needs the bowl games to be filed into a playoff bracket. Texas, TCU, Boise St, Alabama, Cincinnati, Ga Tech, Ohio St, Oregon. I'd watch that.

Well here's what we know:

National Championship - Bama v. Texas
Rose Bowl - Oregon v. Ohio State
Orange Bowl - Georgia Tech v.  :oh_i_see:
Fiesta Bowl -  :grin: v.  :awesome_for_real:
Sugar Bowl - Florida v.  :uhrr:

We also know Boise State, Cincy, TCU, and Iowa will all get at-large bids. What's the best matchup for those remaining 4?

My vote would be to do it:

Florida v. TCU - this is for two reasons. One, I think TCU or Boise are the only teams who can actually beat Florida's defense. Two, Boise gets locked into the Fiesta Bowl most likely due to the proximity and tradition. Also, this is the only way for TCU to actually prove themselves.
Georgia Tech v. Cincy - it's boring, it's lame, it's the Orange Bowl, and I don't really respect either of these conferences or teams.
Iowa v. Boise State - Iowa could have a healthy Stanzi at this point, and could actually give Boise a run for their money if that's the case.

What will actually happen:

TCU v. Boise State - The Fiesta Bowl will want to take the first two undefeated teams to not play in the National Championship for the controversy.
Florida v. Cincy - this game will flat suck. The Sugar bowl gets the last pick of the remaining at-large teams, and Cincy will be the last left
Georgia Tech v. Iowa - Orange goes with Iowa because they want the Big 10 $$$ over the Big East $$$. Nothing can make this game good, though.

Iowa stuffing that annoying Navy running scheme would be kinda fun but yeah if the espn predictions are correct this is bullshit.  All of America wants to see the 3 "lesser" unbeatens play a bcs conference power.  Matching two against each other is such a dodge.  From the analysis I've read it comes down to the Orange Bowl to save us, by not picking a big10 team and taking Cincy or Boise versus Gtech.  The problem is both of those teams you want to see their offense on the field and Gtech doesn't allow opposing offenses many plays.  So I can't fault them for taking an Iowa/Penn State for the extra monies.  Also taking Boise or Cincy and having them roll over Tech would only prove how worthless the ACC really is.

I wrote all that and then remembered the bowls were picked, checked on them and what do you know, Orange Bowl pussies out big time.  God I hope Iowa stuffs the shit out of Tech's offense.

Does it seem like total bullshit that Cincy gets Florida when Cincy is by far the weakest of the 3 bcs buster teams?  I'm really really wishing Pitt had knocked them off now and I'm usually a fan.  Ofc having their coach start playing footsies with ND before he finishes out the big challenge of a bowl game really turned me off.  TCU v Florida or even Boise v Florida are much more compelling match ups in my mind.  Instead we're going to see a defense that can't help but make Tebow look incredible again so we can all start sucking his dick again, oh joy.

I think Penn State can beat LSU, Northwestern over Auburn though feels pretty unlikely.

It also has the convenient effect of ghettoizing the non-automatic qualifiers so those teams can't go in and whoop one of the Golden-Boys.

What's even more bullshit is that TCU and Boise St. played in the Poinsettia Bowl last year. If it was 2 BCS conference teams there is no way they would schedule a rematch.

I edited in a bunch of how this is such a bullshit matchup to my earlier post but the one positive is that game was pretty awesome.  Boise took a big lead but then TCU just shut them the fuck down and Boise almost won it at the end.  This time around the whole country will see it and now the winner is back to needing another year undefeated to qualify for some respect.   :awesome_for_real:

There isn't a single interesting bowl game in the entire lineup:

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/news/story?id=4111912

Normally I'd watch quite a few of them in the coming weeks, but looking over this schedule the only one I have any desire to watch is the Florida game and even then only because I bleed Orange and Blue and can't help myself.  Fuck the BCS in its stupid ass.

Fake edit:  Ok I lie, I'll probably watch the National Championship game up until Alabama puts its second string in.

Interesting Games:
Byu/Utah v Oregon State/Cal -- can the Pac-10 stop tripping on its own dick for a second and smoke these guys?  Tedford kind of needs a win here this season was pathetic.

BC v USC -- how high will Carrol run the score up?  Seriously I think the over/under has to be 70+ just to take into account him potentially taking out his frustrations on BC.

UK v Clemson -- Anything with CJ Spiller in it is worth watching.

Miami v WISC -- These match ups are always fun, one of the most "athletic" teams versus one of the least.

OU v Stanford -- If Stanford just stomps on their throats will there be pressure on Stoops?  Can they stomp them?

VT v Tenn -- I can't decide who to root for but I know I'm watching it and reading anything Kiffen has to say ahead of time, during or after the game.

NW v Auburn -- I never miss a SEC v Big10 matchup.

Penn State v LSU -- See above, also what is up with LSU and can Penn State actually develop a gameplan for a big game?

Ohio State v Oregon -- Classic, how can you be a college football fan and not love this matchup?

Arkansas v ECU -- It would be so awesome if ECU wins.

Boise v TCU -- These are really good teams.

Texas v Alabama -- On the off chance Colt McCoy decides he wants to be a #1 draft pick and pulls a VY.

Texas v Alabama -- On the off chance Colt McCoy decides he wants to be a #1 draft pick and pulls a VY.




This years Bama would go rogue on that years Texas. In the British sense.

They're all interesting in the sense of conference dick waving.  I'm mostly annoyed that we won't get to see Boise and TCU match up against traditional powers so we can really see what they're made of.  The outcome of that game tells us nothing.  I suppose it's interesting in that they're both undefeated, but meh.  Ohio State vs Oregon?  My initial reaction is OSU gets their dicks stomped in a blowout.  But College Football is always full of surprises.

The BCS is obviously total bullshit. The fact that you can win every game and not even get a shot to be champ is a joke. It's hard to think of too many other sports where your performance on the field is only part of the equation and the rest is silly crap like preseason rankings and historical strength of program.

I had a free weekend in Vegas set up if the Utes went to the Vegas Bowl.  :sad:

With the way scheduling is handled currently going purely by won/loss would tell you even less though.  The only reason a 'top 25' team plays anyone decent is so they can hit the strength of schedule mark.  Do we really want to watch whole seasons of power-house schools reaming I-AA programs?

If it means standardizing the schedule to make the computer calculations pointless and thus highlighting the politics and unscrupulous behavior of the BCS? Then yes. It was be a shit season for the fans, however in the long run we would not have this circus we have now of picking teams out of a magic computer full of fairy dust and bile.

Texas pretty much already did that this season.  Florida too, though at least they had a bad FSU team on the schedule.

I still think the regular old fixed conference matchups with no championship game is the way to go. Who gives a shit about having a "real" champion, that's not the point of college football. :geezer:

I think they should do a uefa style conference seeding and force people to play at least 2 decent out of conference games a year.  Not sure how to work it exactly but something to improve the final product (bowls) and create more conference strength drama (awesome).  Nothing is more boring then a season where its only powderpuff games and the conference schedule.  I've really enjoyed Ohio State's 2 games versus Texas and 2 games versus USC, even if they should have won the USC game this year.  Having such a big game early in the schedule gets me excited about the whole year.

The SEC doesn't have a lot of good matchups, or many upsides in most of their games.

The Good:

Tennessee v. Virginia Tech - This one is probably the most lopsided game in favor of the ACC. A Tennessee win would really stick it to the conference.
LSU v. Penn State - Any chance to get Penn State fans to shut the hell up is one that should be taken seriously.
Ole Miss v. Oklahoma State - Ole Miss was the one who shocked Big 12 fans last year by taking down Texas Tech. Doing it again would be something.

The Bad:

Alabama v. Texas - Bama's going to be so hyped and so favored given Texas' last two games, a loss here would be a staggering blow.
Auburn v. Northwestern - Auburn's bad, but it would look pretty silly to lose to the 5th team in the Big 10.
South Carolina v. UCONN - This one is probably a closer matchup than it should be, but it still doesn't approach interesting.
Kentucky v. Clemson - The Gamecocks already made the statement about how bad Clemson is. This would just be kicking them in the junk.

The Why-The-Hell-Are-We-Playing:

Georgia v. Texas A&M - There's no blood, no history, and both teams are equally shitty this year. Georgia fans won't even go to this game.
Florida v. Cincy - Florida can't win this game in the public eye unless they blow Cincy apart by 40 or more. Anything remotely close, or an unlikely loss would be a gigantic failure. This one is akin to the Sugar Bowl where UGA played Hawaii.
Arkansas v. East Carolina - Wow, you get to play second place in Conference USA! Try not to fuck it up.

The only real complaint I have on the bowls is that they take so goddamned long to get here.

If Bama and Texas played this weekend?  Bama would likely wipe the floor with them and have the 2nd stringers in by the start of the 4th.  31 freakin' days from now?  That's a long time for the team to get full of itself and come out thinking their shit doesn't smell like everyone else's.

Also, any better place to get tickets than stubhub or ebay (worries about conterfeits)?  Ticketmaster is only getting something like 250 tickets.  Seriously considering going if I don't have to sell a kidney to do so.

Oklahoma State is terrible.  They beat no one this year. Ole Miss will kill them.

And yet, still 19th. Go figure. You can say they beat Georgia at 13, but as a Georgia fan even I go  :oh_i_see:. Ole Miss beat LSU recently, but it was a damn fluke entirely held up by Les Miles once again unleashing his inner retard. Then they got their ass KICKED by Mississippi State. Yeah, that team that's not even going to a shitty bowl.

I'd say it's very up for grabs.

I think Rasix was pointing out the same thing I was going to when I read your post, who cares if OkSt gets beat at this point?  Ole Miss was a bust this season compared to the stupid over hyping but OkSt was an even bigger bust no?

It's a down year for college football. We have to look at the bowls in that regard. Is this a premiere matchup? No, but it's a better head-to-head draw than most out there. I think most of the bowls are crap, honestly, and the SEC has everything to lose with almost nothing to gain.

Pretty much.  If the SEC wins their games, it's 'oh well, they should have, they're the SEC'.  If they lose their games, it's 'What?  The SEC is sooo overrated'.

UT should win, LSU will lose, Ole Miss will get spanked, Bama will win, Auburn will win, SC is a toss up, KY should win, UGA should win...maybe, UF will lose (their DC is likely headed to Louisville), Ark should win.  So that's 5 wins, 3 losses, 2 toss ups.  7 and 3 or 5 and 5. 

LSU has problems.  Ole Miss has problems and are likely to be without Houston Nutt (rumored to be going to KState...KANSAS FUCKING STATE, Nutt?  Really??), South Carolina could go either way, same for UGA as long as they don't just toss in the towel and start immediately looking to next year. 

I don't know.  My prognostication has been way the fuck off this year, with exception of Bama winning out.  But I was dooming and glooming the UF game, which may have been me trying to psych myself out of it.

You can't claim to be so superior to all other conferences every year thanks in no small part to ESPN's SEC tv deal AND whine about being treated like every other dominant entity in sports.  The SEC better go at least 6-4 with Bama and UF winning otherwise I'll be the goddamn chairman of the SEC is overhyped bullshit bandwagon around here.

I am sure the zebras will make sure the SEC does not look suspect in the bowls this year. Think of the children!  :why_so_serious:

The point I'm making is that we're not in any real marquee matchups besides the Bama / Texas game.  With the exception of that game, the rest are trap games - they're games the SEC should win with no problem, but holy shnikies the sky will be falling if the SEC loses any of them.

Fuck em, let's just win all of them with the exception of Florida.  :grin:

White smoke coming out of South Bend. Brian Kelly got the ND job.

Yeah the rage on WLW has been epic.  I've been giggling all afternoon.   Kelly has been called everything from a liar and a cheat to a traitor and an unethical douchebag.

Buahahaha

Sooo, in 2004, Notre Dame was terrible at defense and they fired Willingham because they were chasing Urban Meyer. Then Urban spit right in their eye and took the Florida job, so they hired an "offensive guru" in Charlie Weiss. For the next two years they won a bunch of games because the offense could cover up their defensive problems, but they still got murdered in both bowls.

Then, the Clausen era began and they go 16-21 where they lost games to powerhouse teams like Navy, Air Force, Syracuse, Purdue, Michigan, and UCONN. Why? They had a hard time keeping any team under 25 points. So, they pay Weiss to go away in order to fix the problem.

What do they hire? A coach known primarily for his offensive schemes winning games. Way to keep it consistent Irish!  :awesome_for_real:

I'm thinking about going to the Utah v. ND game next year. Hopefully the cupboard will be bare and the place in chaos (the game is in November for some reason) but that team has a habit of being good for the first year of a new coach's era.

ND has zilch.  No QB, no WR, no RB, and worst of all - no defense to speak of.  

BTW:  "Let's go be champions, boys..." (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vg-eXlOCeT4&feature=player_embedded)

ND needs to give up on being a national powerhouse.  Their era has come and gone.  The recruiting hotbeds are on the west coast and across the south.  Most of those kids would rather play locally than move to hick-town Indiana.  Especially one that gets really cold in the winter. 

Personally, I'd love to see Notre Dame disappear.  Their fans expect WAY too much. 

While I agree there's no way for ND to be perennial national champion contenders they still can be a top ranked team. When Charlie Weis had Ty Willingham's players (i.e. Brady Quinn) he did pretty well (and of course ND fucked themselves by giving Weis a huge contract after winning big his first season with Ty's players). When he coached his own players he obviously sucked but that means there may be somebody out there who is the combination of the two and can keep ND in the Top 25 more or less every year.

If Suh doesn't win the Heisman it will overshadow any absurdity that exists in the BCS system.  He is clearly the best player in the country. 

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/news/story?id=4732583

Seems McCoy is taking home a lot of hardware -again-.  :oh_i_see:

This season has sucked, as I've said...a lot. The media is scrambling to put a face on it so they can salvage it. Enter Colt McCoy, from last year... :why_so_serious:

All the hardware except for the one that matters...
(http://dl.dropbox.com/u/85685/heisman-trophy-winner-mark-ingram1-300x260.jpg)

Alabama's First Heisman

If Bama wins the BCS, you know it's going to be a good four, five years before you'll get their fans to shut up, coming from one.  :drill:

Hell, we haven't shut up in the 17 years since the last one  :grin:

Nevertheless, great award for Mark Ingram.  Seems like a really good kid, and I'm so happy for him I could just about cry - which I hate to admit that I did just a bit when I saw his reaction. 

RTR!!

Fuck if that did not make me feel old.

Congrats to Ingram and the Tide.  They have really re-built their dynasty and have a great program there.
But hopefully next year UT will beat 'em at Neyland Stadium!

Grats to Ingram, he sealed it with the game against Florida.

That being said, Toby Gerhart got screwed and we all know it. Every Bama fan at my party admitted they expected him to win. That's what you get for being white and playing at Stanford.

I expect being white probably gained him votes rather than lost him votes. His real problem is he plays on the West Coast at a school not named USC.

Stewart Mandel talking about Big 10 expansion:

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2009/writers/stewart_mandel/12/15/bigten-expansion/index.html

I think it would be awesome for Nebraska to join the Big 10, but I don't remember reading about the Huskers being unhappy with the Big 12.

I don't know why they would.  They are well positioned to dominate the sucky B12 North and the B12 contract  is second only to the SEC in dollars if I am not mistaken, so it would be a lousy move.

If the Big Ten expands and keeps the same name I will from then on refer to them as the Little 12.

Some of the talk is taking a team like Rutgers or Pitt. I don't really care which one, because lord knows Notre Dame won't take it.

That'd be cool if they got Pitt.

Fuck Jersey.

Oh man, the Big Ten needs to work on getting their collective heads out of their asses, not expanding. Also, living in a city with a Big Ten university in it, having to go through what will be even worse than the media circus surrounding the Penn State entry and how it would fuck with the name etc. etc. etc. etc. will make me very stabby.

It is probably just the league wanting to find another subscriber base to hawk their terrible television "premium" network on.

They want the extra game that 2 divisions with a championship gets you.

Actually the Big 10 contracts are a close second to the SEC in total dollars. Per team its actually more (11 vs 12 teams though, obviously).

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2009/writers/stewart_mandel/07/24/tv-deals/index.html

Interesting. I guess that is why conferences are all trying to get their own networks since that is where the money obviously is.

There are some rumblings about Utah joining the PAC-10 in its drive to get to 12 teams.

Who would #12 be? Boise State? BYU?

Fresno State wouldn't be a bad call, either.

They would never take BYU. They are talking about Colorado although I could see Boise St. except the don't have quite enough of a research presence and their women's sports isn't all that developed, both of which are important to the PAC-10 presidents.

Like anything will ever come of this (http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/news/story?id=4755867)...

There sure is a whole lot of fucking smoke out there, and not all of it is coming from Snoop Dog.  Let USC go 7-4 a couple of years here and see how the NCAA gobbles them up.  They certainly won't do it while the USC gravy, I mean money, train is hopping along nicely.

Woooo, 9 straight bowl wins for the Utes!

Ute defense made us look like a HS team out there.

Ya. Stephenson and Johnson are NFL material and probably Misi too. Plus, the Utes apparently don't lose in bowl games. Ever.  When Wynn through that awful, awful pick-6 I thought it was going to be a rough night, but the team has icy veins and just kept plugging.

SMU put on a clinic last night... that was a tad shocking given Nev's offensive prowess.

I want to thank Nevada for blowing the biggest spread in all the bowls, and many people's #1 confidence pick in many pools.

Like mine!  :mob:

Holy crap...
Urban Meyer resigns from Florida (http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/news/story?id=4772952)

Someone hold me...

:cry2:

/sniffle

wow... speechless.  I hope he's going to be ok.

I hope he recovers and there are no lasting health problems.  Big-time college football coaching is one of the most hours-intensive professions there is, and combined with screaming at kids all day long must be a pretty toxic brew.  From what I've read about coaches' lives at big programs, I'm surprised any of them have intact marriages or don't have heart attacks.   

Wow. Stunning news.

Yep, it's rocked the college world. A man on top of his game has to leave because it's slowly killing him. As a human being, this news saddens me.

As a Georgia fan... :awesome_for_real:

Hahaha folks started dancing too soon , it's just a leave of absence. while he recovers. THEN  he can coach himself to a slightly later early grave.

Recruiting ploy. Half of Florida's incoming class was about to decommit before that announcement.

Agreed, he's never coming back to coach. Lying to recruits is like breathing.

Where has the conference bowl record trolling been?  I'll start.  Big10 is 1-0 after Wisconsin pretty decisively whipped Miami.  God, is it too much to ask to give the SEC a losing record this year?  :heart:

(http://images.google.com/url?source=imgres&ct=img&q=http://www.duvarpaper.com/main.php%3Fg2_view%3Dcore.DownloadItem%26g2_itemId%3D20024%26g2_serialNumber%3D2&usg=AFQjCNEAn5DZTnNpaqNMlq1-lwDTxchPRw)

(http://i152.photobucket.com/albums/s183/ec1016/ShiitakeMushroomTreeShii.png)(http://i152.photobucket.com/albums/s183/ec1016/ShiitakeMushroomTreeShii.png)

The games have been boring. You want trolling? Ok.

Clear winner atm - The Mountain West at 3-0. The Wyoming upset over Fresno was hilarious. The absolute raping of Oregon State and Cal was just icing.
Clear loser atm - The ACC at 1-3. We all knew they were terrible, but now they are proving it with style. Clemson winning might be their only win of the bowl series.

Everything else is unclear at the moment. The PAC-10 could be really shitty if they continue to get beat, but they salvaged a win with UCLA beating Temple. The Big 10 won a game against the ACC; wake me up when I care. The Big East is 2-0, but their games are ridiculously easy outside of the Cincy-Florida matchup. WVA v. FSU? Please. The SEC is 1-1, Georgia whomping A&M, and Kentucky as the 10th ranked SEC team losing to the 2nd ranked ACC school. I'm not sure how that was a remotely even matchup, but Kentucky kept it very close.

 :ye_gods: :uhrr: :ye_gods:

Nebraska's D-line is sick.

Yeah, holy shit, yeah, holy shit, yeaaaaaaaaaaah.

And Texas Tech has fired Mike Leach. This has been one weird, fucked up season.

That whole scenario makes me want to scream "crybaby".  Ohh no, spending practice in an equipment room. I got worse during soccer practice when I was 13 for flinching during free kick drills.

Leach may be an unapologetic nutball, but Craig James should be relegated to MAC conference games for the rest of his career.  And money played probably the primary role in his dismissal.

It's not the punishment itself, it is the concept that he was punishing players who couldn't/wouldn't practice because of being concussed. The implication being that you keep that to yourself and gut it out, something that recent medical studies have shown is very dangerous.

Gut it out... or else you have the horrible torture of spending practice in the equipment shed texting away on your phone.  Tough choice; one fraught with peril.

There's still a lot of details yet to come out and a lot of angles to this.  Not to mention the university got to save themselves 2.8 mil for firing a coach they hate.

You don't think being isolated and humiliated in a sport like football is a negative that players would seek to avoid by shading their self-reporting of injuries?

I'm with Ab, how in the fuck is it appropriate to punish a player in any way for being injured? Especially the type of humiliating punishment that will encourage other players to play injured?

Concussions are not something you "gut out."

If you didn't watch the 4th quarter of this NWestern v Auburn game you screwed up.

I really wanted NW to win at the end just because of the irony of Auburn having rushed the field twice already thinking they had won.  That NW kicker had a very, very bad day on multiple levels.

Well, the Vols were game but VT was just too much for them.  Glad to see Crompton turn into the QB I never thought he could be.  I think the VT bomb and then kick at the end of the half turned the game.

I can't wait to see my Vols next year!

Ha ha. Gary Crowten is such a moron. I really wish he was still coaching BYU.

WOOOHOOOO!!! It was excruciating as usual to watch but the Buckeyes win the Rose Bowl. Outstanding defensive effort.

If Pryor can learn how to read the middle of the field Bucks could be great next year.

They really shut down Oregon. I haven't seen that offense look that bad since the Boise State game.

Ow ow ow ow. Arms are not supposed to go that way.

that entered GI Joe kung fu grip levels of  twisting.

Love Fox, "That's something  noone will want to watch happen. (Pause) And here's the replay on Demps' injury..."

And the horsewhipping of Cincinnati continues...

Aaaaaand, Cinci gets exposed as not ready for prime time.

Yeah, no joke.  All their shit talking all season long and they clearly had no business being #3.  BCS needs to go. 

Also, finally I can feel proud of my Buckeyes in a bowl game.  It's been too long.  :)

Go Bucks!  I expected that effort out of their defense, but I was sure the offense was good for about 13 points max.

Could not have been THAT big of a surprise... they beat Pitt with a lucky play to end the game. Cinn was never great, besides the fact their coach prolly couldn't have given a shit less at that point. I am just glad Teabow is out of the NCAA. So sick of seeing his self righteous bible versus every weekend. Maybe when he tanks in the NFL, the Osteens will scoop him up.

So the Big Ten is (almost) 4-0, sign of the apocalypse? Y/N?

Since when is 3-2 "almost 4-0"?

The big  ten must be  big on moral victories.

What I've seen so far:

The Pac 10 is balls, the dropoff after the top of the SEC is steeper than in other conferences, and this bowl season has been shitty. I'm sure UCONN is stoked though, that first touchdown was a terrific reception. So much so, I'd be checking those gloves for illegal substances.

I'm sorry, I must not be keeping up? What's the second loss? Mich St hasn't played yet have they?

Minnesota and Northwestern have both lost, although both in close games.

The SEC is pretty shitty in the middle this year it seems. Here's my current breakdown:

Florida just curbstomped Cincy, and I reserve judgement on Bama v. Texas...but we all think the same thing.
LSU should have just looked at the field and declared they wouldn't play. So should Penn State. That wasn't football, it was farming.
Spurrier can't win many bowl games with South Carolina. I don't feel sorry for him.
Auburn players and coaches are assholes. Rushing the field 3 times against a team you should have put away in the 3rd quarter made you all look like fools.
Ole Miss crushed the Big 12 again. They really shouldn't match them up anymore. It's not fair.
Arkansas had to go to OT to take down East Carolina. That's pretty pathetic, but it's a win.

So what's that leave us? 5-4 with the national title left? It could be a hell of a lot worse for the SEC given how many Vegas underdogs won in this bowl season.

Not sure what they could have done - not playing is forfeiting a whole lotta dollars I would think. But yes, those were not even adverse field conditions - that's the kinda game you play in the neighborhood with family teams and you purposely soak the field to have fun under the guise of football rather than the game being the sole focus. That was just stupid to even watch. Would have rather watched bears playing hockey  :awesome_for_real:

I also find it a tad suspicious the Meyer decides now that its Tebow's last college game to take a leave of absence. Those two were joined at the hip to begin with and now that Tebow is leaving, Meyer is stepping aside? Not saying that is the reason, but the timing raises my eyebrow a bit.

edit: for more Tebow  :oh_i_see:

The poor widdle Southerners had to play in Northern-style football weather, for once?  I shed a single tear.  That reminds me of another reason I hate it when the SEC talks shit- its like if half the NFL got to play every single playoff game at home and then talked shit about the other half. 

Um, what? Who gives a fuck who won the game, it was shitty football because the field was totally destroyed. If LSU won 19-17, I wouldn't be declaring it the best thing ever. It looked like they went 4 wheeling through the stadium followed by a bunch of plow horses.

Oh, and your team plays on field-turf, assclown. Cram that Northern weather shit.

How is a field in Orlando not designed to deal with rain?  That was not "northern style field conditions," it was a swamp.

Man TCU looks terrible.

And I swear this director is driving me nuts. We don't need three crowd reaction shots after (and sometimes during) every single play, no matter how pedestrian. I WAN TO WATCH THE DAMN GAME NOT A BUNCH OF YAHOOS IN THE STANDS!

Way to shit the bed TCU.

Big 10 really stepped up this year. I really didn't think Iowa had it in them considering how shaky they looked all season.

Jesus fucking tapdancing Christ, is the bowl season STILL going?

GMAC Bowl, C. Michigan vs. Troy

Really? Who the hell is going to sit down and watch that? And it gets a spotlight date after New Year's Day? CBB will have finished its second week of CONFERENCE play before the BCS NC game. Fucking clownshoes.

You are correct - no one gives a shit about the whatever bowl or buy-my-shit bowl.  Honestly, its helps to just give the finger to the money grab BCS along with all the other meaningless bowl games and stick with who won their respective divisions. Grab NCAA20XX and make your own bracket and let the computer play it out for you. As for the BCS Bowl to crown who the same computers think should be fighting at the top, doesn't matter really... Either way, the process remains mostly the same.

I'm surprised that you guys don't complain about the NIT as well.  If you think the Bowl system is bad, the NIT is a playoff for 65th place. 

It's all about keeping the money wagon on the road and helping scouts get as many looks at kids as humanly possible. 

I've heard rumblings that the Big 10 is going to try to raid the Big East's big media markets and basically kill it as a football conference by scooping up 3-5 teams so the BCS pie is divided into fewer pieces.  Seems far out there but I could see them trying it.

I would bitch about the NIT too but it usually flies under the radar. It would be relevant and cool if it was done before the conference season started though.

I don't think I've ever sat through an entire NIT game.  It doesn't exist for me.

I'm almost done with basketball as a whole.  I never thought I'd say this, but I'd rather they get rid of the one year in college thing.  I don't want to watch players that have no desire to be there.  All these one and doners seem to bring with them is one season of elevated wins followed by inevitable sanctions for the program.  The NBA sucks, so any impact there is negligible for me.

You can thank the fact that a sizable percentage of ESPN's crew has roots in Mobile Alabama that there's a GMAC Bowl at all.

I haven't checked, Has Ivan Maisel let slip that everyone in his family except for him are so deeply in bed with the University of Alabama as to be conjoined?

This (http://frankthetank.wordpress.com/2009/12/27/the-big-ten-expansion-index-a-different-shade-of-orange) is one of the more interesting articles I've read on it. I know it's just some dude with a blog but really, he knows just as much as some dude at the Chicago Tribune.

Ultimately I don't think Texas will go but it's an intriguing theory.

Thanks for the link. Interesting stuff in there and the follow-up post.

Turned out to be a  rather entertaining game.

Did Saban hit his head coming off the bus or something?

If McCoy doesnt come back this game is over.

This  could get  hideously ugly if Texas cannot put something together and soon.

I want Colt back, because I don't want any excuses.

Texas  just  imploded.

What the fuck were they thinking?

I wanted to see 'bama win, but not like this.  I feel terrible for McCoy.

I don't watch college football -- whose that old fuck that just said that Alabama is better than Texas because McCoy is gone?

Lee Corso? 

Ugh- didn't want to see the championship go down like this.  I feel for McCoy.

Yup. Wonder how much he's being paid to say such stupid shit?

Some bad, bad coaching in this game.

ZOMG if Texas wins I'm going to laugh my ass off.

You'd have every reason to.

Hell I'll laugh my ass off.

*edit* Fortunately I won't have to  :awesome_for_real:

Well it was interesting while it lasted :awesome_for_real:

Heh, "they haven't given up a sack yet". BOOM!

Typical Saban assholery to not just take a knee.

The team took care of that when they smacked him upside the head with the gatorade bucket  :grin:

Looks like Jim Leavitt was fired today.  I've been of the opinion for a couple of years now that he'd hit the ceiling as far as how far he could take the program, but it's still a shame to see him go under these circumstances.

I'm sure it would be amusing to Auburn fans if they knew how much people here want to see USF hire Tommy Tuberville.  Personally, I think Charlie Strong would have been a great fit but he's already gone to Loiusville.  Oh well.

ESPN reporting that the Seahawks fired Jim Mora and that Pete Carroll is their choice for coach and that Carroll is trying to convince Jeremy Bates to go with him. Chris Mortensen is saying it's just about a done deal.  :awesome_for_real:

Just a guess, but I'll be shocked if Carroll stays and when he goes NCAA sanctions are sure to follow. His AD has been stonewalling the NCAA for years on Reggie Bush but any coach they hire isn't going to want to take the fall for it.

This is a funny bit (http://www.theonion.com/content/news_briefs/colt_mccoys_unusually) from the Onion. But then again, I am a Bama fan. YMMV if you're a fan of the Horns.

OMG please be true, Pete Carroll news.

USC's SID:

"At this point, we have nothing to report. Perhaps check with the Seahawks."   :drill:

If this happens, I gotta feeling Stanford will be the new USC...only smarter!  :why_so_serious:

Not a chance. Stanford gets these up years from time to time but they don't have the institutional commitment to turn it into a perennial powerhouse IMO. They'll have a good run though.

ummm

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/news/story?id=4809698

 :ye_gods:
 :uhrr:

can't wait to see thepeopleofwalmart pics next to that...

For Stanford it's like the lottery. Every so often they'll find some top recruits with the academic backgrounds to be accepted to Stanford who aren't playing football just to have a shot at an NFL career (unless it's a QB). If the stars align and they have enough of them all playing at the same time and they have a good coach they can be competitive but you can't expect the kind of consistency Carroll nurtured at USC at a place like Stanford.

Sometimes I hate my state.

Edit: I suck at typing, more so when tired.

Irony.

Shush. I 'm having some difficulty focusing tonight. The typing disorder is extra strong with me and spell check is not working.

SURPRISE! (http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/news/story?id=4810861)

You stay classy 'bama!

Just now getting over the hangover I had from Thursday night.  Surreal.  Totally surreal.

One part of me is disappointed that McCoy went out early.  The other part says injuries are part of it; suck it up, Nancy.  Bama had or was dealing with key injuries as well.  There's no way of telling how the game would have gone.  May have beaten them worse, may have lost the game, may have gotten blown out ourselves. 

And the placement of the $30,000 BCS trophy at WalMart?  WalMart??  What the fuck are you thinking, whoever decided that was a good idea?

Key players gone after this year:
Offense:
Mike Johnson (LG)
Drew Davis (RT)
Colin Peek (TE)
Roy Upchurch (RB)

Defense:
Brandon Deadrick (DE)
Terrance Cody (NT)
Lorenzo Washington (DL)
Eryck Anders (LB)
Cory Reamer (LB)
Rolando McClain (LB) - likely going pro as a JR
Kareem Jackson (DB) - likely going pro as a JR
Javy Arenas (DB, KR)
Marquis Johnson (DB)
Justin Woodall (DB)
Chris Rogers (DB)

Special Teams:
PJ Fitzgerald (P)
Leigh Tiffin (K)

All starters or significant contributors.  Defense is going to be hurting for leaders next year, especially if Dont'a Hightower's knee doesn't allow him to get back to 100 percent.  Losing the entire defensive line, 3 out of 4 LB's, and pretty much the entire defensive backfield that includes the best return man in college football?  Yeesh.  If they go 9-4 next year, I'll be really surpised.

Weird year in college football.  Sad it's over. 

Carroll to Seahawks?  Yeah, totally saw him leaving after this year.  USC is, or should, be getting bitchslapped by the NCAA.  If they don't?  There's something seriously crooked at the NCAA.

Both you and Florida pretty much lose your entire defensive core. I don't think Florida has a snowball's chance in hell of winning the East next year with all their losses. It will come down to either Lane Kiffin actually living up to all the talking he likes to do, or Georgia finding a decent coordinator on D while hoping that their red-shirt phenom QB is actually worth his salt. I think this is Georgia's best chance to get back to the title game in years.

In the West, I think it's still down to Alabama and LSU, and unless Bama drops the early game to Penn State, they will be favored all the way.

About that WalMart tour...Not UA's idea (http://blog.al.com/bamabeat/2010/01/attention_the_wal-mart_trophy.html).

Thanks Dr Pepper....You fuckers.

The comments on that page are concise  explanation of exactly why our state sucks so damn hard.

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/news/story?id=4820028

I am thinking in a few years, they'll be playing with flags.

Yeah god forbid coaches should have to act like functioning adults.

A lot of things will have to change within a group of people who are change adverse.

One could say this goes much deeper, and wind up in a discussion about the inherent problems that American football  has in modern society. If one wanted to start a fist fight, that is :)


I can see a future without American football dominance. No this is  not a soccer troll. Ok so it is, but I'm  thinking more of a fractionalized society and marginalization, as the supply of athletes finds other ways to make money.

Possible. American football didn't become truly dominant until the 1960's. However I submit that whatever would take its place would be even more violent and macho.

Gladiators! or... FEMALE Gladiators!  :awesome_for_real:

Back to point, does this mean anybody can play football now? Meaning, will this start opening up to women linebackers and shit? Since everybody gets a trophy now to keep people happy, I figure its the next avenue to wander down.

You're going to have to explain the logical leap from "coaches can't punish players for getting injured" to "women linebackers", because I'm not following it in the slightest.

Lane Kiffin to USC. You have gotta be fucking kidding me.

Proof that Lane was not that smart. The banhammer will come down mightily at USC soon as the instigators have  all moved on.

Kiffin got a look at the SEC, realized it was a hard place to play, and decided he could run off to greener pastures where you can dominate at will if you understand California players at all.

In other words, he's a horrible coward, and the University of Tennessee (whom I hate) still doesn't deserve this idiot's desertion. Add it to the list of fucked up coaching decisions this year, and there are plenty.

Well, this has little to do with punishing a player for being injured but rather an overall "can't say anything bad about a player or touch a player in an aggressive manner or else you can go work for the local PD" situation(s) that seem to be rising up everywhere. Once that happens, tackling will be looked at and re-evaluated and a conclusion will be that flags can and should be used for certain positions (qbs) which will then translate to everyone. Men will start quitting and women will have to fill in the gaps. And that is the logical leap you get when on peyote!  :why_so_serious: (honestly, it was an over-the-top knee-jerk reaction to player whining about how a coach slapped them in a game that gives them a green light to violently throttle other people)

And what the fuck Kiffin? Seriously? First time my jaw physically dropped in a long time. WTF? I can't even form the words to address this situation...

edit: Leach should go to Tenn. (gut reaction)

FUCK YOU KIFFIN.  Unbelieveable.  This just shows his true integrity.  As a life-long UT fan I'm shocked and disgusted.  I feel like driving down to Knoxville and punching him in the neck.  If he was smart, he bolted town last night. 

So pissed.

Having some time to digest things... I dunno how bad this is for Tenn. They are coachless at the moment yes, but this was Kiffin, and not Monte either. Lane really has nothing to show for himself in way of a winning record as a HC of any team (7-6 is meh) other than he's really energetic. Who the fuck cares how energetic you are when you are a mediocre coach? Tenn is actually good to be rid of him in the long run. As for USC - its a no cost coach. I truly think the NCAA is going to throttle USC soon so trying to hire a big name coach right now with so many dark clouds gathering on the horizon might not be a great idea. Kiffin allows a few years to be under sanctions with a hometown coach to keep the seat warm until the sanctions end. I quite honestly believe its Kiffin's mistake leaving a good home for a soon-to-be train-wrecked one.

Seems pretty clear to me why he'd have an interest in a California coaching job... even if he is a fellow Minnesota boy. 

If they bring Norm Chow back they could be pretty damn good depending on how the NCAA finds.

Also lol at the he say how big and tough and mean the SEC was so he ran like a pussy!@!! RAWR bullshit.   :oh_i_see:

Given all the recruiting violation shit he did at Tennessee you guys should be happy he's gone now. His actions that are still being investigated might still bring sanctions upon the program but at least he can't do anymore damage.

USC is also a step up the prestige ladder, incoming sanctions or no.

That should spice up the thread nicely.   :awesome_for_real:

I hate USC, but come on. 11 national titles, 7 Heismans. It isn't up for debate.  :-P

I agree, but you do need to be careful.  Notre Dame also has 11 titles (if I remember right) and the 2nd highest winning percentage in NCAA history but I'm not sure I'd consider it a step up from Tennessee. Especially with today's recruiting environment.

After a day brooding on this at work I'm decidedly less upset.   UT may not win national championships a lot (last was in 98), but they are in the best conference in the country and play the best (Ala, Fla, etc.) every year. 

So maybe we'll be a .500 team for a while longer.  Maybe, just maybe we'll get our integrity back.  Our basketball team just beat the #1 team and the game was sealed by a humble kid from Grainger County who turned down other offers just for a chance to walk on at UT.  HE is the future of UT, not the thugs and ganstas brought in.  At least I hope.

SEC circle-jerks always make me roll my eyes.

Whatever helps you cope with all the spooge in your eyes.

Go wait in line at fucking WalMart to see your beloved trophy.

So really, and this is an honest question, what would it take for you to say the SEC is the best conference in college football? What would they have to do? Would they have to win more championships? More BCS games? More bowls? More Heismans? More top 10 teams?

Is there a criteria you have where you would believe any conference would be head and shoulders above the others? Or would you never admit that any conference is better under any conditions?

I don't care which conference is "teh bestest", but the elitist attitude of the SEC and fans of the teams in the last 10-15 years has been pretty fucking silly.

Historically speaking you can't give it to any conference other than the Big 10, IMO (and I'm saying this as a Pac 10 guy). The reason I say this is neither the SEC without Alabama nor the Pac-10 without USC amount to anything special, and I'm not going to give a gold star to a conference based on one team. The Big 10 has a much better top-to-bottom level of performance historically.

As for what conference is best in any given year, who gives a shit? This year it probably is the SEC. Do you want a cookie?

Well given the SEC has won as many BCS Championships as all of the other conferences *combined* (6) I would say their attitude is justified.

1)  Counting Ohio State's well documented failures versus the SEC (0-9) the Big10 is still .500 against the SEC in the two bowl games that match relatively even opponents that they play every year.  I see no conference dominance.

2)  The fact is though during that run USC only lost a big game to VY being unstoppable, most of the west coast believes and since I watched most USC regular season games out here I find it believable that USC would have had a good shot at beating LSU in '03, UF in '06, LSU in '07 or UF again in '08.  If there is any school that was fucked by the lack of a playoff it was USC over the last 10 years since they have won every single big game they've played up until this season except when VY went super saiyan on them.

3)  The SEC is the greatest bullshit is really a house built on two things, Ohio State fails every time they play them and ESPN owns the SEC tv rights and has a huge sway on public opinion with a financial motivation to have the nation think SEC games are the best football games.

The SEC has more national championships than the other BCS conferences combined.


So you can tell yourself the SEC isn't dominant in college football, and in some twisted sense you may be right, but it's just like saying  Aston Villa is stronger than Valencia when Real and Barca take turns smacking  premier league champs around in champions league.  No one's going to buy a word of it.

I'm not going to argue SEC vs. Big 10 or Pac 10 or anything like that, however...

The whole SEC! SEC! SEC! thing a bit silly. If the Steelers get knocked out of the playoffs I don't go AFC NORTH! AFC NORTH! when the Ravens beat the Patriots. Nor do I go AMERICAN LEAGUE! AMERICAN LEAGUE! when the Indians don't make the playoffs.

Doesn't bother me but I find it odd. In the Big 10 we hate each other. OSU fans want Michigan to go 0-12 and then hire Greg Robinson as coach. Likewise for all the other schools.


 

Pride in the SEC is a cultural thing.  

Fact of the matter is, other than football, we don't have too much down here.  The South has the lowest cost of living relative to the rest of the country due to lowest wages being paid for <any number of factors> for a comparable job.  There's not much industry to be proud of (a few automobile manufacturing plants), and with the exception of our universities and private schools (that will stand up against anyone), our school system is probably the worst in the country.  It's not that we're a half step behind everyone else, we're two steps behind, and in some places (Mississippi especially), it's four steps behind.  

And that's not even really the tip of the iceberg as to the 'problems' of the South.  I love it here.  I wouldn't live anywhere else.  But I'm not blind to our inadequacies, and wish like hell we could change it.

What we do have, is the finest football in the country.  And we're proud of that.  We have exceptional athletes that do exceptional things at our Universities.  We take ownership into schools we've never attended, much less even stepped foot on campus.  And it's driven into your head that if you're born in Alabama, you root for Alabama or Auburn.  If you're born in Mississippi, you root for Ole Miss or Miss State.  In Georgia, it's UGA.  It's rabid.  Borderline obsessive.  And when it comes down to bowl season, or any sort of comparison of our conference versus everyone else, that's how we see it.  Us vs You (generally speaking).  

I don't know.  It's hard to explain the mentality of it if you're not born and raised here.  You're the butt of all sorts of jokes, some good hearted, others mean spirited and everything in between.  Everyone laughs at your accent.  Whatever the case may be.  Hell, maybe it goes all the way back to the Civil War, who knows.  Maybe a large part of it is some sort of inferiority complex we have.  

But football is the one thing we can say 'Yup, we're better'n you'.  <tobacco spit on a dirt road>

Football to us, honest to God, is bigger than religion.  And that's saying something.

SEC has some of the best tailgating I have ever been privy to be at. LSU, Alabama, UGA, FL, ole Miss, and Tenn are ones I have been to and while the list is shorter for other conferences (OSU, MICH, CO, Cal, Miami, Va Tech, Northwestern) I have never seen anything like SEC tailgating anywhere. When I was at LSU, my parking lot would be rammed with RVs on Weds thru Monday morning for home games - completely different culture. Maybe partly due to culture, weather, employment, etc... but you can't deny their love of the pre-game festivities.  :awesome_for_real:

As for who is a better conference... bleh. Easier to argue religion these days.

There are four religions in the South. Evangelical Christianity (otherwise known as the God Asshole), High School Football, College Football and all-you-can-eat buffets.

The twin churches of Barnhill's and Golden Corral.

I'd have said Waffle House.

Now, I don't follow college football, but this Kiffin stuff is just gold to me. Apparently, Ed Orgeron (who used to coach at Ole Miss and is universally hated there) was on the phone to already-signed recruits during the meeting Kiffin had to tell his players he was leaving. And while on the phone, he was offering these kids scholarships to USC.

Wow, what a set of dirtbags.

Historically, the Big 10 was the better conference.  In the modern era, I don't think that the Big 10 is as good on the top end as the SEC.  I think that it's going to be very tough in terms of recruiting for the Big 10 to stay competitive against the Pac 10 and the SEC.  Their only hope is to keep drawing underrated linemen from the corn belt and LBs/QBs from Pennsylvania.   I played in the Big 10 over 20 years ago and is has been interesting to watch the mystique of the conference fade.   The game is much different now than it was in the 80's. 

The style of play is the big thing that has left the Big 10 behind more than the recruiting, I think. Big Ten schools are all in places where it gets fucking cold, the speed/long bomb game that is what they like to play in the south and on the west coast is just not really feasible in a climate where at least 4 of your games are likely to be played with a gametime temp below 40. Add to that the fact that EVERY team gets pumped up and brings their best game to the plate for Ohio State and Michigan, and you have a conference where almost invariably the Champ is going to have 1 loss if not 2.

You add into that the fact that the rust belt cities where a lot of the players came from are either declining in population heavily (like Detroit), or have had huge demographic shifts over the last 20 years (like Chicago) and it changes things quite a bit. Football is a very expensive sport and less and less kids are playing it in the midwest.

The Tennessee job is strangely toxic. Utah's Kyle Whittingham apparently turned it down despite it being a 300% raise.

Even people who live in Utah don't want to live in Tennessee?

When the coach of Duke turns you down, that's saying something.

In news that no one but me cares about, the Skip Holtz hire at USF looks like a good one.  I saw him at the rally today and he has great, positive energy, he's a good speaker and is very personable.  He has a solid track record (some shaky years at South Carolina notwithstanding) and has a lot of local ties.  Can he bring some consistency to the Bulls and take them to the next level?  Time will tell but he has a better shot at it than his predecessor did.

Derek Dooley from LA Tech is going to take the Tennessee job.

You might know him better as "That guy who's Vince Dooley's son."

I really wish you'd tell more people that, we have assholes like you moving down here all the time.
Yes, TN sucks, stay away.

Dooley eh?  Not a good record at LT, but we'll see.

No I'm pretty sure most of the assholes like me (which is to say, native Californian assholes) who move to states who don't want them go to Oregon and Washington.  :why_so_serious:

Nah, too much rain, too many hippies, and too much bad football.  :awesome_for_real:

But seriously, Knoxville does suck. Nashville, however, is one of the cooler towns in the South. If you can't have fun there, you're broken.

Not all you can eat.

I don't have much to add to the whole Lame Kitten kerfuffle so I'll just leave you with the wise words of one Charles Barkley on how Lane continues to get jobs:

"Lane Kiffin has got to have pictures of somebody having sex with a monkey."


http://backporch.fanhouse.com/2010/01/15/charles-barkley-shares-theory-on-lane-kiffins-new-job/

Don't get an abortion, he might be the next Tim Tebow! (http://rivals.yahoo.com/ncaa/football/news?slug=ap-tebow-superbowlad&prov=ap&type=lgns)   :awesome_for_real:

Suddenly, I am pro-choice. 

:facepalm:

The comments on that are bleedingly stupid.