asimsports

2014 World Cup Update: Some Stats and Other Updates

noreply@blogger.com (asimperson) — Thu, 16 Feb 2012 10:19:00 +0000

First, some quick statistics about the qualification process so far:

FIFA has 208 "member assocations", roughly corresponding to national teams
Of these, four did not enter: Bhutan, Brunei, Guam, and Mauritania
A further two have withdrawn since the start of the competition: Mauritius and the Bahamas
And, of course, only one team so far has qualified for the World Cup Final: Brazil
65 teams have been outright eliminated, which leaves 137 teams competing for a shot at the World Cup title in 2014
43 of those teams were eliminated on November 11, 2011, which makes it the deadliest day of qualification so far

On Wikipedia, you'll find a map that looks something like this:

Where teams in light blue are still in the hunt and teams in orange and red have been eliminated (orange means they still have games to play). But where else will you find a table like this? Yes, that's right folks, I've listed each of FIFA's 208 members (as of the start of qualifying) and their status.

So what's going on in the world right now? Well not much. Most confederations won't have more games until June, but there is some action going on February 29 in Asia. Let's take a look at the situation.

AFC Group B
Three teams are still in the hunt for Group B's top two spots. South Korea and Lebanon are tied at the top of the group with 10 points each, while Kuwait has 8. Most of the scenarios hinge on this: if Kuwait upsets South Korea (in Seoul, at that), then they will advance. It's not a given that the Koreans will win, of course, as Kuwait held them to a draw back in September. If both South Korea and Lebanon do no worse than get a draw, then they both advance. South Korea currently has a +8 goal differential, so most of the crazy scenarios favor them. It likely won't matter, as Lebanon plays the winless and drawless United Arab Emirates.

AFC Group D
Australia has already topped the group, but Saudi Arabia, Oman, and Thailand are all fighting for second place. The latter three have 6, 5, and 4 points, respectively. Since the Saudis are in the lead, they clinch with a win over the Socceroos, but the Aussies already beat them 3-1 in Saudi Arabia. Oman and Thailand play each other, and both ave a shot at advancing as long as they do not draw (due to goal differentials, Saudia Arabia will almost certainly clinch if these two draw) and Suadi Arabia loses or draws.

AFC Group E
Though Bahrain technically has not been eliminated yet, they need a miracle Indonesia. First, they need Qatar to lose to Iran (which is plenty possible, as Iran has clinched the group). Second, though, they need to win their match and make up their goal differential deficit (basically, they need some combination of 10 goals in their favor in both games). While improbable, it's not that far-fetched: Iran currently has a +12 differential and Indonesia is at -13. So, they've got a chance.

After that, there won't be any more World Cup action until June. In the meantime, the massive images I made for the AFC and CONCACAF have been updated. Someday I may even have a version of my massive qualification picture that I'm happen with. So stay tuned!

Bowl Games 2011: Epilogue

noreply@blogger.com (asimperson) — Tue, 10 Jan 2012 08:05:00 +0000

Wherein this post has had more advance planning than LSU's offense apparently did last night.

The final tally is up over in the usual place. This year I managed to predict 24 games correctly. I honestly didn't think I was doing that well until I looked back over the index. I've been doing this since the 1999 season, and this is the best I've ever done by a pretty decent margin. With 24 games correct and 11 wrong, I had a winning percentage of 68.57%. The last time I broke 60% was in 2006, and before this year my previous best percentage was in 2004, with 64.29%.

So, yeah, go me! Too bad I didn't allocate my confidence points correctly on ESPN, but alas.

As we prepare to enter what will for sure be another turbulent offseason, I have to say this has been one of the strangest seasons I can remember. Unfortunately, this isn't due to anything that happened on the field (2007 still holds that title), but more because it felt like each scandal that broke this year was trying to top the next. First Ohio State surprised us, then Miami shocked us (well, that was more the extent; I doubt anyone was surprised that there was a scandal at Miami), but then Penn State did both and then some.

As per usual, this site will be more dormant over the next eight months, with occasional posts on soccer and baseball. But at some point the dust from various lawsuits will settle and everyone's out-of-conference schedules will be known. Then I will rank them and tell you about them, and then try to get a post up once a week detailing that weekend's games.

So, until then.

Quick addendum: apparently this is my 400th post on this website. Thanks for reading!

Bowl Games 2011: The Last One

noreply@blogger.com (asimperson) — Mon, 09 Jan 2012 01:31:00 +0000

As usual, all times Eastern and all predictions wrong.

Monday, January 9
9:00: Louisiana State vs. Alabama (BCS Championship Game @ New Orleans, LA; ESPN): Let's get this out of the way: this isn't going to be 9-6 again. I didn't say it was going to be high scoring, mind you, just that someone is probably going to score a touchdown this time around. (Not necessarily an offensive touchdown, though.) Both of these teams are really, really good. But I can't really pick Alabama. For starters, LSU already been them in Tuscaloosa. Secondly, that game came down to special teams, and I think we'll see a repeat of that here, and that really is the Crimson Tide's Achilles' Heel.
Previous meetings: Depending on the site you look at, Alabama either leads the series 45-24-5 or 45-23-5, depending the status of either team in 1895. And of course, neither counts the game they already played this year, so really it's either 45-25-5 or 45-24-5. Anyway, both teams have been playing each other for a long time, though before the standardization of conference scheduling they tended to play off-and-on in blocks, meaning they have only been meeting consecutively since 1964. Alabama was the dominate team in the series before 2000, though, going 42-15-5. LSU is 9-3 since then, though, reflecting the reversal in fortunate for both teams over the past 11 years, including 5 straight LSU wins during the Bama Dark Ages of 2003-2007 (also conveniently bookending seasons in which LSU won national titles). Nick Saban went 4-1 against Alabama during his tenure at LSU, with the only loss coming in 2002.
Last bowl game: LSU is in their 12th straight bowl game. The first game in the streak was a 28-14 win over Georgia Tech in the 2000 Peach Bowl. Last season, they beat Texas A&M 41-24 in the Cotton Bowl. Alabama is appearing in their eighth straight bowl game, the first of which was a 20-16 loss to Minnesota in the 2004 Music City Bowl.
Fun facts: The University of Alabama SGA (Student Government Association) is known as "The Machine" due to its propensity for cranking out Alabama politicians.

Bowl Games 2011: Part 5

noreply@blogger.com (asimperson) — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 04:20:00 +0000

As the "New Year's Day" games wrap up, here's a preview of the other five games before the last one next week.

As usual, all times Eastern and all predictions wrong.

Tuesday, January 3
8:00: Michigan vs. Virginia Tech (Sugar Bowl @ New Orleans, LA; ESPN): Why is VPI in this game? I'm nominally an ACC partisan and even I'm not sure. At any rate, VPI had no answer for Tajh Boyd, and if they couldn't contain him, it's extremely difficult to see how they'll stop Denard Robinson. That's not to say this'll be a blowout like those two Clemson games, but I just think this'll be a more low scoring contest and that Michigan will make enough plays to win.
Previous meetings: None.
Last bowl game: This will be VPI's 19th consecutive bowl game, good for the 3rd longest streak in the country. The streak began in 1993 with a 45-20 win over Indiana in the Independence Bowl. Last year, they got destroyed by Stanford in the Orange Bowl, 40-12. This is Michigan's second straight bowl appearance. Last year, they lost to Mississippi State in the Gator Bowl, 52-14.
Fun facts: I call it "VPI" because the full name of the university is actually "Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University" and that's what old-time residents of the Commonwealth (like my late grandfather) called it. It also provides me a way to be absolutely clear to what "Tech" in the ACC I refer to on this website, which is to say, the one in Georgia. It's also an important reminder why the answer to the trivia question "how many schools in Division I-A football do not have 'university' in their name" is five: the three service academics, Boston College, and Georgia Tech.

Wednesday, January 4
8:00: Clemson vs. West Virginia (Orange Bowl @ Miami Gardens, FL; ESPN): The winner of this game depends entirely on which Clemson team shows up. Are going to get the offensive juggernaut that went 8-0 and then demolished Virginia Tech in the ACC Championship Game? Ore the one that went 1-3 with losses to Georgia Tech and NC State, got blown out by their in-state rival, and needed a last-second field goal to beat Wake Forest? I'm going to go with the Tigers, but very, very cautiously.
Previous meetings: Only one, back in the 1988-89 Gator Bowl. Clemson won 27-7.
Last bowl game: This is Clemson's seventh straight bowl game. They lost in last year's Car Care Bowl (now the Belk Bowl) 31-26 to South Florida. WVU is making its 10th straight bowl appearance. The streak started back in 2002 with a loss in what was then the Tire Bowl (then the Car Care Bowl and now the Belk Bowl) to Virginia, 48-22. Last year they lost to NC State in the Champs Sports Bowl 23-7.
Fun facts: Somewhat famously, West Virginia's campus features a personal rapid transit system. It's basically a mini-elevated rail system used to move students around the campus, which is separated into three distinct parts that, due to history and geography, are about two miles apart. In total, the line contains five stations and covers 8.65 miles.

Friday, January 6
8:00: Kansas State vs. Arkansas (Cotton Bowl @ Arlington, TX; FOX): K-State is 10-2, but those two losses came to a couple of the best passing attacks in the country. Arkansas is also in that category. However, Arkansas has trouble against the run, and that's what these Wildcats do best. I think both of these teams will get their points, but that the Razorbacks will come out ahead in the end.
Previous meetings: Four. Back in 1910, the Wildcats won 5-0, which they followed up with a 3-0 win in 1911. They also beat Arkansas 16-7 in 1926. The last meeting was in 1967, when the Razorbacks got on the board with a 28-7 win.
Last bowl game: This is K-State's second straight bowl game. Last year, they lost to Syracuse in the Pinstripe Bowl, 36-34. This is Arkansas's third straight postseason appearance. They lost to Ohio State in last year's Sugar Bowl, 31-26.
Fun facts: Here's how you get a stadium named after you. By 1989, Kansas State had the losingest football program in history at 299-509-41 (or thereabouts, it sort of depends on who you ask). Bill Synder has changed all that, though. In his original tenure, from 1989-2005, the Wildcats amassed a 135-58-1 record good for the 10th-winningest team in that period. Of course, the subsequent Ron Prince era was a little rocky, which is how you get invited back to coach once again.

Saturday, January 7
1:00: Southern Methodist vs. Pittsburgh (BBVA Compass Bowl @ Birmingham, AL; ESPN): Both of these schools have been in the headlines so far this offseason, though mostly for the dalliances of their coaches. Todd Grahm left for his "dream job" at Arizona State, leaving behind a locker room of pissed off players. June Jones, meanwhile, was moments away from that same job, but had his offer withdrawn at the last minute. So which is worse: abandoning your team without warning, or attempting to abandon your team without warning and then having it backfire on you at the last moment, forcing you to go back to Dallas and say "no, see, I almost got that other job but I really want to be here!" I guess we're about to find out, because on paper I'm giving SMU the edge.
Previous meetings: Five, but only one back in SMU's glory days in the 80's. SMU won the first game in 1938, and lost 34-7. Two years later the teams were locked in a 7-7 tie, and then in 1942 Pitt won 20-7. SMU then won 33-14 in 1948. They finally met again in the 1982-83 Cotton Bowl, when SMU managed a 7-3 victory.
Last bowl game: SMU is making its third straight bowl appearance. Last year they went to the nearby Armed Forces Bowl, where they lost to Army 16-14. Pitt is making its fourth straight bowl game and second straight appearance in this very bowl. Last year they beat Kentucky, 27-10.
Fun facts: Pitt is famous for its Cathedral of Learning, which is the second tallest educational building in the world. It's 535 feet tall and has 42 stories, and contains many of the school's classrooms and meeting rooms.

Sunday, January 8
9:00: Arkansas State vs. Northern Illinois (godaddy.com Bowl @ Mobile, AL; ESPN): This is almost required viewing, just for the offensive fireworks alone. (Don't let Arkansas State's 20th ranked defense fool you.) I'd say something along the lines of "well, NIU's rushing attack should let them use up the clock" except that they won a game 63-60 earlier this year without the aid of any overtime periods. I think in the end the Huskies' offense will just be too potent.
Previous meetings: As ASU began their transition back to Division I-A, the two teams met 7 straight times starting in 1990. Based on that, it's not too surprising the Huskies won the first 5 games and usually by pretty comfortable margins. The Red Wolves broke through win their only win in the series in 1995, 28-21 victory, and then went right back to losing with a 31-30 loss in 1996, the two teams' last meeting.
Last bowl game: Arkansas State is making its first bowl appearance since the 2005 New Orleans Bowl, where lost to Southern Miss, 31-19. That game was also their first ever bowl game. The Huskies, meanwhile, are making their fourth straight bowl game. Last year they destroyed Fresno State in the then-Humanitarian Bowl (now the Potato Bowl), 40-17.
Fun facts: godaddy.com is a domain registrar. I would highly recommend against utilizing their services.

Bowl Games 2011: Part 4

noreply@blogger.com (asimperson) — Mon, 02 Jan 2012 06:00:00 +0000

Happy New Year!

As usual, all times Eastern and all predictions wrong.

Monday, January 2
12:00: Houston vs. Pennsylvania State (TicketCity Bowl @ Dallas, TX; ESPNU): I think it's pretty safe to say that Penn State is the best team Houston has played all year. The Nittany Lions also sport the nation's 5th ranked pass defense against the country's top passing offense. So this is a pretty classic battle of "unstoppable force meets immovable object". Then again, Penn State's offense is just not in any realm that we could really consider "good", so even if the defense does generate a few stops (and while they're good, it's unlikely they'll completely shut the Cougars down) I don't think their offense will be able mount a convincing enough response.
Previous meetings: Two, in 1964 and 1977. Penn State won both games by scores of 24-7 and 31-14.
Last bowl game: The Cougars didn't go to a bowl game last season, so their last post-season appearance was the 2009 Armed Forces Bowl, where they lost to Air Force 47-20. Penn State is headed to their 7th straight bowl game. Last year they played in the Outback Bowl and lost to Florida 37-24.
Fun facts: Houston began life as a junior college component of Houston's school system in the 1930's. It became independent by 1945, though, and in 1953 became the first university to have its own TV station, KUHT. Also, I like calling the game the "Zombie Cotton Bowl" due to the location of the game.

1:00:

Michigan State vs. Georgia (Outback Bowl @ Tampa, FL; ABC): How does Michigan State rank 39th in scoring offense but 60th in yards? Well, having good special teams helps, and that just happens to be Sparty's only really clear advantage over the Bulldogs. Both of these teams sport top-5 defenses and are just good enough to get by on offense, generally. I'm going with Sparty by just a hair.
Previous meetings: Two, both in New Year's Day Bowl games in 1989 and 2009. UGA won both meetings. The first was the Gator Bowl, which they won 34-27 and the second was the Capital One Bowl, which they won 24-12.
Last bowl game: The Spartans are still trying to forget their last bowl outing: a 49-7 shallacking from Alabama in last season's Capital One Bowl. They are appearing in their fifth straight bowl game. UGA is making their 15th straight bowl appearance. Appropriately enough, their streak began with the 1997 edition of the Outback Bowl, where they beat Wisconsin 33-6. Last year they appeared in the Liberty Bowl, where they lost to Central Florida 10-6.
Fun facts: East Lansing is, of course, a college town east of its namesake, Lansing. But, did you know that Lansing is the only US state capitol that is not also its county seat? Now you do.
South Carolina vs. Nebraska (Capital One Bowl @ Orlando, FL; ESPN): I wish I could say something more insightful other than "it's hard to see how South Carolina is going to score enough points to win this game" but that's pretty much all I have for this one.
Previous meetings: Three times, and unsurprisingly, the Huskers are 3-0 against the Gamecocks. In 1964 they won 28-6, in 1986 they won 27-24, and in 1987 they won 30-21.
Last bowl game: The Gamecocks are making their fourth straight bowl game appearance. Last year they lost to Florida State in the Chick-fil-a Bowl 26-17. Nebraska is also making their fourth straight bowl appearance and just came off two straight appearances in the Holiday Bowl. They lost to Washington in the latter game, 19-7.
Fun facts: The Capital One Bowl used to be the Citrus Bowl, and is still played in that stadium in Orlando. Of course, from its founding in 1947 until 1983 it was known as the Tangerine Bowl. The name change occurred along with a notable boost in the profile of the invited teams. Confusingly, after that another game was founded that was called the Tangerine Bowl and is now played at the Citrus Bowl, but that's a story for another day. Also, while working on this a promo for this game just advertised "Steve Spurrier's bruising 'D'" which is among a list of phrases I thought I would never hear.
Ohio State vs. Florida (Gator Bowl @ Jacksonville, FL; ESPN2): It's hard to imagine that the Gator Bowl needed a gimmick to match up Ohio State and Florida, but remember, these are two 6-6 teams that have some very big issues. Specifically, on offense: both rank in the bottom 20 of total offense. Florida's defense is better in terms of yards per game, but in terms of scoring defense these teams are about identical. Even though Charlie Weis is now at Kansas, it's hard to see Florida suddenly realizing that they are allowed to, like, score points and stuff. The Buckeyes, meanwhile, have a guy in Braxton Miller who is capable of winning the game for them but also plenty capable of losing it for them. However, the Gators really no guys in the former category, giving Urban's new team the edge.
Previous meetings: Only once, in the 2006-2007 BCS Championship Game. The Gators won 41-14.
Last bowl game: Ohio State "appeared" in last year's Sugar Bowl and "won" 31-26. Depending on how you interpreted the term "vacate", the Buckeyes are making their 12th straight postseason appearance. This will be the last game in the streak due to the bowl ban for next season. The Gators, meanwhile are making their 21st-straight bowl game, the second longest streak in the nation. The beginning of the streak was the 1991-1992 Sugar Bowl, where they lost to Notre Dame 39-28. Last year, the Gators beat Penn State 37-24 in the Outback Bowl.
Fun facts: Despite occasional moments of greatness, Florida football basically didn't exist before Steve Spurrier was hired in 1990. Since then, the Gators' are the winningest football program in the country.

5:00: Wisconsin vs. Oregon (Rose Bowl @ Pasadena, CA; ESPN): Boy howdy, I sure do hope you like points! However, Wisconsin also plays that defense thing, so as long as the game doesn't come down to a Hail Mary pass as time expires this season has shown that they should be okay. Then again, they haven't played any offense that is quite like Oregon's, either. Well, okay, really anything like Oregon's at all. Wisconsin will of course have all sorts of size advantages on defense, but I don't think most people would argue that they're like LSU's defense, which held Oregon to "only" 27 points. And Oregon will be more than happy to neutralize Wisconsin's size with speed on both sides of the ball. That said, I'm going to go with my gut and take the Badgers.
Previous meetings: Four, and none have been Rose Bowls, but instead it appears that they played two sets of home-and-home series in 1977 and 1978, and 2000 and 2001. Wisconsin won the first three games, but Oregon took the last game 31-28.
Last bowl game: Wisconsin is appearing in their tenth straight bowl game, and their second consecutive appearance in the Rose Bowl. Last year, they lost to TCU 21-19. Oregon is making their seventh straight bowl game. Last year, they lost to Auburn in the BCS National Championship game, 22-19.
Fun facts: The cartoon version of Oregon's Duck mascot looks a lot like Donald Duck, owing to the popularity of the Disney character during the mascot's formative years and a handshake agreement between the Oregon athletic director at the time and Walt Disney himself. (These days, the agreement is much more formal.)

8:30: Oklahoma State vs. Stanford (Fiesta Bowl @ Glendale, AZ; ESPN): Both of these teams are good at throwing the ball and bad at defending against the pass. What does that mean? You guessed it - points! While Luck is the better quarterback, Oklahoma State really has more skill players around Brandon Wheedon, not to mention that Justin Blackmon guy. It's hard to see how the Cardinal will have an answer for him, allowing the Cowboys to pull away in the end.
Previous meetings: None.
Last bowl game: This OSU is making their sixth straight bowl appearance. Last year they handily beat Arizona 36-10 in the Alamo Bowl. The Cardinal is making their third straight appearance, and last year they easily dispatched Virginia Tech in the Orange Bowl, 40-12.
Fun facts: The (in)famous Stanford tree mascot is actually the mascot of the (also (in)famous) Stanford marching band.

Bowl Games 2011: Part 3

noreply@blogger.com (asimperson) — Fri, 30 Dec 2011 06:21:00 +0000

As usual, all times Eastern and all predictions wrong.

Friday, December 30
12:00: Tulsa vs. Brigham Young (Armed Forces Bowl @ Dallas, TX; ESPN): Tulsa sports a fun, high-flying offense. BYU comes in with a pretty decent defense, so this could be a, let's say, 35-27 kind of affair. The question, which side gets to 35 first? Does BYU generate enough stops to limit Tulsa to just 27, or does the porous Tulsa defense allow the Cougars to get there first? Actually, let's make that 35-32, Tulsa.
Previous meetings: These two have met seven times, and BYU leads the all-time series, 6-1. They last met in 2007, which Tulsa won 55-47.
Last bowl game: Tulsa demolished Hawaii in last year's Hawaii bowl, 62-35. This is BYU's 7th straight bowl game, with their last game being a 52-24 beatdown of UTEP in the New Mexico Bowl.
Fun facts: Tulsa is known as the "Golden Hurricane" because at the time (the early 1920's) Georgia Tech was known was the "Golden Tornado". Tulsa stuck with their weather phenomena moniker, but the Yellow Jackets did not.

3:30: Iowa State vs. Rutgers (Pinstripe Bowl @ New York, NY; ESPN): Dear Cyclones: while I found your double overtime win over Oklahoma State exhilarating and exciting, it did, unfortunately, doom us to LSU-Alabama Part II. I'm picking Rutgers in a close, low-scoring game.
Previous meetings: None.
Last bowl game: Iowa State last made a bowl game in 2009, where they beat Minnesota 14-13 in the Insight Bowl. Rutgers had a 5-year bowl game streak snapped last year. In 2009, they won the-then St. Petersburg Bowl 45-24 over Central Florida.
Fun facts: Rutgers was not the original name for the State University of New Jersey. Founded in 1766 as Queen's College, the Revolutionary War necessitated a new name, and Colonel Henry Rutgers was around at the time, and one thing lead to another...

6:40: Mississippi State vs. Wake Forest (Music City Bowl @ Nashville, TN; ESPN): Other than Wake's now-traditional upset of Florida State, both of these teams pretty much beat the teams they were supposed to and lost to the teams they were supposed, which is pretty much how you get to 6-6. That said, it's hard to see these Bulldogs getting blown out by Vanderbilt 41-7, so I'll have to go with the ess-eee-cee again in this one.
Previous meetings: None.
Last bowl game: The Bulldogs make their second straight bowl appearance, with the previous game being a 52-14 rout of Michigan in the Gator Bowl. Wake Forest is just breaking out of one of their "down cycles", with their last bowl appearance being a 29-19 win over Navy in the 2008 Eaglebank Bowl (which is now the Military Bowl).
Fun facts: In one of my favorite university history anecdotes, Wake Forest was originally found around what would become known as Wake Forest, North Carolina, after the college. After a sizable donation in 1946, the school began work to move to nearby Raleigh, and completed the move by 1956, leaving the town named after the university with a new Baptist seminary.

10:00: Oklahoma vs. Iowa (Insight Bowl @ Tempe, AZ; ESPN): While the Hawkeyes may get a slight spark from the retirement of their long time defensive coordinator, I feel like they kind of used their "upset of clearly superior team" card this year when they beat Michigan. I'm going with Sooners in a scoring bonanza.
Previous meetings: Just one: a 21-6 Oklahoma win in 1979.
Last bowl game: This is Oklahoma's 13th straight bowl game, with the progenitor of the streak being the 1999 Independence Bowl, which they lost to Ole Miss 27-25. Last year, they destroyed UConn in the Fiesta Bowl, 48-20. This will be Iowa's fourth straight bowl game, with their previous game being this very game, actually, where they beat Mizzou in a thriller no-one saw, 27-24.
Fun facts: Of all the Big Ten's various trophy games, by far the most amusing is the Iowa-Minnesota game, which is played for a pig known as the Floyd of Rosedale.

Saturday, December 31
12:00: Texas Agricultural and Mechanical vs. Northwestern (Car Care Bowl of Texas @ Houston, TX; ESPN): My favorite running joke of this college football season has been TAMU's second half defense. It goes something like this: "Down by more than 10 points at halftime? You've got Texas A&M right where you want them." Both these teams are more than capable of putting up points, which means what this game lacks in quality or defense it should make up for in scoring. And, well, at this point, can you really pick the Aggies? Northwestern rallies in the second half to win a shootout.
Previous meetings:None.
Last bowl game: This is TAMU's third straight bowl game. The lost to 41-24 to LSU in last season's Cotton Bowl. Northwestern is actually appearing in their fourth straight bowl game, and they lost last season's TicketCity Bowl to Texas Tech, 45-38.
Fun facts: Both of these schools apparently have satellite campuses in Qatar. I'm not sure what else to say about that.

2:00: Georgia Tech vs. Utah (Sun Bowl @ El Paso, TX; CBS): This is the toughest game for me to predict, every year. Yes, I know about the Georgia Tech bowl streak, especially with regards to our offense. Do I necessarily think there's anything to it? It's hard to say. Against LSU and Iowa, we simply lost to better opponents. Against Air Force, it looked like we were just... bad. This Utah squad sports the nation's 7th ranked rush defense but unlike in past years they haven't played any option teams. However, they did win their last three games straight against Air Force. Perhaps the best matchup for the Jackets is Utah's mediocre-to-bad offense that couldn't score against Colorado with the Pac-12 South on the line against GT's mediocre-but-improving defense.
Previous meetings: One, in the 2005 Emerald Bowl. Utah won 38-10. That's really all there is to say on the matter.
Last bowl game: GT is making its 15th straight bowl appearance, which is currently tied for the fourth-longest in the country with UGA, of all teams. The streak started with a 35-30 win over West Virginia in the 1997 CarQuest Bowl, which these days is in Orlando and is known as the Champs Sports Bowl. However, starting with the last time these two teams faced each other, Tech has lost six straight bowl game, including last year's ugly 14-7 loss to Air Force in the Independence Bowl. Utah is making its ninth straight bowl appearance. Their streak started with a 17-0 win over Southern Miss in the 2003 Liberty Bowl. Last year, they lost 26-3 to Boise state in the Las Vegas Bowl.
Fun facts: Like any good football rivalry, Utah and BYU disagree on the number of wins and losses on each side. Utah counts 6 games BYU played as the "Brigham Young Academy" in the late 19th-century, while BYU says the series did not begin until 1922. Either way, Utah leads the series, but 53-33-4 or 50-30-4 depends on who you ask.

3:30: Vanderbilt vs. Cincinnati (Liberty Bowl @ Memphis, TN; ABC): Vandy has the country's 19th ranked defense, which is starting to make me think there may be something to "well, maybe most of the offenses in the SEC are just kind of bad" train of thought. I'd make this a fun fact, but it's just too fun: Cincy's quarterback for the past few games has been Munchie Legaux. While I expect the 'Dores to put up a fight as they have for most of the season, I think Cincy has the edge here.
Previous meetings: The first meeting really goes back. I mean, really, because it was in 1898 with a follow-on game in 1899. Cincy won both games, 10-0 and 6-0. Vandy put in a one-off beat down in 1934 (32-0), and then Cincinnati got to repay the favor in 1976 by winning 32-0. A year later though, the Dores decided revenge was a dish best served hot and not over half a century later by winning 33-7. Vandy won the last two meetings in 1993 and 1994 17-7 and 34-24.
Last bowl game: Vandy is making their first bowl game appearance since 2008's Music City Bowl, where they beat Boston College 16-14. Cincinnati had a four game bowl streak snapped last year. The last game in that streak was a 51-24 loss to Florida in the Sugar Bowl.
Fun facts: One of Cincinnati's chief football rivals is Miami University (you know, the one in Ohio). The series is much more even than you might expect. Miami is 59-49-7 all-time, and also is pretty even over the past 20 years even as Cincinnati has risen through the college football ranks.

3:30: California-Los Angeles vs. Illinois (Fight Hunger Bowl @ San Francisco, CA; ESPN): Well, I hate myself enough to actually watch this game. Do you? This game is the poster child for "there are too many bowl games", as UCLA had to get a waiver to even be eligible at 6-7, and Illinois just went 0-6 to end the season. Both of teams subsequently fired their head coaches and booked travel to San Francisco. At least when UCLA got blown out to end the season, it was to teams like USC and Oregon and not, you know, Minnesota. These sorts of games tend to be sloppy affairs, the question is if it'll be of the fun sort where neither side really bothers to play defense or the kind where neither team really shows up and someone happens to win at the end. I'm guessing the latter here. For some reason I'm taking the Illini.
Previous meetings: These teams have met 11 times, so I won't go through them all. They first met all the way back in the 1946-1947 Rose Bowl, with the Illini winning 45-14. I guess they worked out some sort of scheduling agreement then, because then they played 6 times in the regular season from 1950 to 1964, with the Illini going 4-2. In 1983-1984 they met in the Rose Bowl again, with the Bruins winning 45-9, and then 7 years later they also won the Sun Bowl, 6-3. They then met 12 years later with the Bruins winning with the same 6-3 score, and then finally some touchdowns were scored in they last meeting in 2004, with UCLA coming out ahead 35-17. The Bruins lead the all-time series 6-5.
Last bowl game: UCLA's last bowl game a was a 30-21 win in the 2009 EagleBank Bowl. Illinois made a bowl game last year, where they beat Baylor 38-14 in the Texas Bowl.
Fun facts: This game dampens my spirits such that I can't think of anything fun about it.

7:30: Virginia vs. Auburn (Chick-fil-a Bowl @ Atlanta, GA; ESPN): Virginia looked for awhile to actually be kind of legit, and then they got blown out 38-0 by their in-state rival. Whoops. Meanwhile Auburn just lost their offensive coordinator to Arkansas... State. Auburn also had an awful time against teams that actually played defense, which (38-0 aside) Virginia actually does. I'm going to predict a moderate score for both sides in this game, which will probably be more exciting than most observers thing, but I'll kowtow to the ESS-EEE-CEE groupthink and go with the Tigers.
Previous meetings: Two, in 1997 and 1998. Auburn won the first game 28-17, but the Cavs shut out the Tigers 19-0 in the second.
Last bowl game: This is UVA's first bowl game since 2007-8's Gator Bowl, where they lost to Texas Tech 31-28. Auburn is appearing in their third straight bowl game. You might recall they beat Oregon in last year's BCS Championship Game, 22-19.
Fun facts: Virginia's athletic teams really are named after the historical English Cavaliers, the side in the English Civil War that was loyal to the king, and later on, the original Virginia colonists who were loyalists.

Bowl Games 2011: Part 2

noreply@blogger.com (asimperson) — Sun, 25 Dec 2011 21:00:00 +0000

Merry Christmas, loyal readers. All, um, five of you.

As usual, all times Eastern and all predictions wrong.

Monday, December 26
5:00: North Carolina vs. Missouri (Independence Bowl @ Shreveport, LA; ESPN2): Nothing quite says "mediocre bowl game" like two teams with 7-5 records and average statistical rankings, it seems like. I guess it shows I haven't paid a lot of attention to Mizzou this year, as I'm pretty shocked that they're 11th in the nation in rushing and 57th in passing, which is pretty much the complete opposite of the past few years for them. This version of the UNC defense isn't as fearsome as past editions, which makes me give a slight edge to the Tigers.
Previous meetings: Two, all the way back in 1973 and 1976. Mizzou won both games, 27-14 and 24-3.
Last bowl game: This is Carolina's fourth consecutive bowl game, with their last appearance being that that debacle of a Music City Bowl against Tennessee that they wound up winning 30-27. Mizzou makes their seventh straight bowl appearance here, but you probably don't remember their last game: the very anonymous Insight Bowl. They lost 27-24 to Iowa.
Fun facts: I'd grumble some more about 5th down, but these are supposed to be fun facts.

Tuesday, December 27
4:30: Purdue vs. Western Michigan (Little Caesars Pizza Bowl @ Detroit, MI; ESPN): The Boilermakers are pretty much here due to their miracle upset of Ohio State back on November 12th. It's hard to tell how much of a talent disparity there is in games like, this, though, as WMU's stats could be inflated by their league while Purdue's could be deflated by theirs. I'm leaning toward this being a shootout, with Purdue coming out just barely ahead.
Previous meetings: Two, which is actually lower that I would've thought given the Big Ten teams' proclivity of scheduling MAC teams as patsies. Anyway, they were both in September, but the first was in 1993 and the last in 2002. Purdue won both, 28-13 and 28-24.
Last bowl game: The Boilermakers are making their first bowl appearance since 2007, when they beat another directional Michigan (Central) in this very same game, 51-48 (though it was then the Motor City Bowl). The Broncos' last bowl appearance was actually more recent. They lost 38-14 to Rice in the 2008 Texas Bowl (which is now the Mieneke Car Care Bowl of Texas).
Fun facts: Purdue quarterbacks (a group that includes names like Bob Griese and Drew Brees) have more touchdown passes thrown in the NFL than any other school.

8:00: North Carolina State vs. Louisville (Belk Bowl @ Charlotte, NC; ESPN): Mediocrity, ahoy! Both of these teams sport anemic offenses and above-average defenses, which points to a low-scoring struggle to see who can kick the most field goals. However, NC State's kicker is 10 of 15 and Louisville's is 11 of 16, so that doesn't quite work either in terms of distinguishing these two teams. In their last two games, both teams found their offensive mojo, as NC State routed Maryland in their last game and upset Clemson before that, while the Cardinals won 5 of their last 6 after a 2-4 start. These are basically the same team, if you ask me, so I'll go with the one that beat North Carolina this year: NC State.
Previous meetings: This will be the fourth meeting between these two teams, with NCSU looking for its first win against the Cardinals. The first was all the way back in 1953, which Louisville won 26-2. In 1994 they won 35-14, and in 2007 they won 29-10.
Last bowl game: The Wolfpack went to the Champs Sports Bowl last year, where they beat West Virginia 23-7. Louisville won last year's Beef 'O' Brady's Bowl, beating Southern Mississippi 31-28.
Fun facts: I'm not entirely sure how this works, but the cardinal in the Louisville logo has teeth.

Wednesday, December 28
4:30: Toledo vs. Air Force (Military Bowl @ Washington, D.C.; ESPN): Combined average defense ranking of these two teams: 73rd in the country. Mean, both these teams are more than capable of scoring: Toledo, (in)famously lost game this year 60-63 and then came back and won the next week 66-63. Air Force's defense is really awful in all phases, though, while Toledo is mainly terrible against the pass (118th out of 120), something they won't really have to worry about against the triple-option lovin' Falcons. Toledo edges out (another) shootout.
Previous meetings: None.
Last bowl game: The Rockets went to last year's Little Caesar's Bowl, where they lost 34-32 to Florida International. Air Force is making their fifth straight bowl game, and they (sigh) beat Georgia Tech 14-7 in last year's Independence Bowl.
Fun facts: Toledo's moniker, the Rockets, apparently originated as a contraction of "Skyrockets", which was made up during in the pressbox during a massive upset in the early 1920's. The name stuck, despite the university not otherwise having much to do with rocketry.

9:00: California vs. Texas (Holiday Bowl @ San Diego, CA; ESPN): After watching the Texas-Texas A&M game, I think I described the Longhorns' offense as "the McGuyver of offenses", held together by trick plays, bubblegum, and dental floss. This is the best all-around defense the Golden Bears have played all year, and they already struggled offensively against every other decent outfit they've played. Both teams will struggle to score, but I think Longhorns are more used to that and will come out ahead in the end. (Yes, I'm aware Texas just gave up 48 to Baylor, but Cal doesn't have Robert Griffin III at QB for them, last I checked.)
Previous meetings: The Bears are 0-4 against the Longhorns, and it hasn't really even been close. The first meeting was in 1959, which Texas won 33-0. Two years later, they met again, with the Texas winning 28-0. To close the decade out, they met in 1969 and 1970, and again, it was all Texas, as they won 17-0 and 56-15, respectively.
Last bowl game: Cal previously had a good bowl streak going, but missed out on the postseason last year, making this their first game since the 2009 Poinsettia Bowl, where they lost to Utah 37-27. Texas looks to restart a long streak that was also broken last year, which was only one season after the lost to Alabama in the 2009-2010 BCS National Championship Game, 37-21.
Fun facts: One of the first fight songs I ever learned was the Cal Drinking Song. Of course, there's another Cal song that has a tune that's very familiar to most Tech fans, though I've read articles elsewhere that state the common theory about the song being lifted after the 1929 Rose Bowl to be false.

Thursday, December 29
5:30: Notre Dame vs. Florida State (Champs Sports Bowl @ Orlando, FL; ESPN): FSU's offense is also a short of make-shift outfit, but they do have the dynamic E.J. Manuel, who on his good days can put some points on the board for the Seminoles. They also have the sixth ranked total defense in the country, but as their 23-13 loss to Oklahoma showed, that doesn't necessarily matter if you still can't put up the points, which hasn't been a problem for the Irish this year. I'll take the Domers in a relatively low-scoring affair.
Previous meetings: For the all the cachet this matchup has, I was actually somewhat surprised to find that FSU and Notre Dame only met once when the former was an independent, in 1981. (FSU joined the ACC in 1992.) FSU won that game 19-13. In the 90's, the two teams played 3 times, with ND winning 31-14 in 1993 and FSU winning 23-16 in 1994. On New Year's Day in 1996, they met in the Orange Bowl and FSU won 31-26. And finally, they played again in 2002 and 2003. ND won the first game 34-24, but FSU shut them out in the latter game, 37-0.
Last bowl game: Notre Dame ventured to El Paso last year for the Sun Bowl, where they beat Miami 33-17. FSU, of course, currently owns the longest bowl streak in the nation, with this being their 30th consecutive appearance. One has to go all the way back to 1976 to find the last time the Seminoles failed to reach a bowl game. The year after, they went to what was then known as the Tangerine Bowl, where they beat Texas Tech 40-17. Last year, the beat South Carolina in the Chick-fil-a Bowl 26-17.
Fun facts: Other than the usual (and tired) jokes about FSU being a women's college until 1947, I can't really think of anything to put here.

9:00: Washington vs. Baylor (Alamo Bowl @ San Antonio, TX; ESPN): The best hope for the Huskies in this one is probably to force a shootout and hope to have the ball last, because otherwise their offense isn't good enough to keep up with the Bears, even with Baylor's really bad defense.
Previous meetings: Four, and somewhat surprisingly none were bowl games. Baylor won the first two contests in 1954 and 1955 34-7 and 13-7, respectively. They met again in 1964 and 1965, and this time the Huskies managed to win a game 35-14, but the Bears came right back in '65 and won 17-14.
Last bowl game: The Huskies snapped a bowl drought last season by making the Holiday Bowl, where they pulled off one of the most shocking upsets of last bowl season by beating Nebraska 19-7. Baylor's drought was even longer before they made the Texas Bowl last year, when they lost to Illinois 38-14. Before that, they had not appeared in a bowl game since 1994, and you have to go all the way back to the 1992 Sun Bowl to find the last time they won a bowl game. (They beat Arizona 20-15 in that game.)
Fun facts: Very occasionally, there is actually somewhat clever writing on Wikipedia. For instance, referring to Washington: "The husky was selected as the school mascot by student committee in 1922. It replaced the 'Sun Dodger,' an abstract reference to the local weather that was quickly dropped in favor of something more tangible." Well done, I say.

Bowl Games 2011: Opening Slate

noreply@blogger.com (asimperson) — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 08:58:00 +0000

Let's start off with all the pre-Christmas bowl games. The full set of winner-loser predictions are available, but more detailed previews will come closer to the games themselves.

As usual, all times Eastern, and all predictions wrong.

Saturday, December 17
2:00: Temple vs. Wyoming (New Mexico Bowl @ Albuquerque, NM; ESPN): Bowl season kicks off down in New Mexico, where anything could happen in this MAC-MWC matchup. Which, like many of these sorts of games, make it hard to predict. The matchup the Owls will be looking to exploit is their 7th-ranked rushing attack against the nation's 115th-ranked rushing defense. Temple also has a decent defense themselves, which makes me inclined to think they'll prevail.
Previous meetings: Only one, back in 1990. Wyoming won 38-23.
Last bowl game: For the Cowboys, it was the 2009 edition of this very game, where they beat Fresno State 35-28. Temple also last went bowling in 2009 despite an 8-4 record last year. They lost to UCLA 30-21 in what was then the Eaglebank Bowl, but is now the Military Bowl.
Fun facts: New for this year, I'll attempt to unearth some sort of interesting (to me, at least) fact about either or both of the teams involved in the game. Generally this means I'll look something up on Wikipedia, so hopefully the schools involved don't generally have their pages vandalized very often. But today, I will remind you that brown and gold are Wyoming's official colors. This leads to what I think are college football's most charming and, at the same time, ugliest uniforms:

When EA Sports' NCAA Football games used to have a create-a-school option I generally tried to make the home uniforms as ugly as possible. After they took that out, well, it was pretty obvious which team I had to lead to glory.

5:30: Utah State vs. Ohio (Potato Bowl @ Boise, ID; ESPN): Utah State chose pretty much the most dramatic route to a bowl game possible. After a 2-5 start including a game at Auburn that they led in the fourth quarter and a double overtime loss to Colorado State, they rallied to win five straight. Nonetheless, they only one two of their games by more than a touchdown, which means that the Bobcats will likely be in this thing to the end. Both these teams would prefer to run the bowl, especially Utah State, whereas Ohio features a more balanced offense. That said, I like the Bobcats. While their numbers are very similar, I think the MAC was a tougher conference than the WAC this year. I guess we'll find out for sure on Saturday, though.
Previous meetings: Once, amazingly, in 1994. If I had more time, I would look this up, because Utah State apparently won 5-0. (I just checked on Google, but even 1994 as a search term it still just came up with articles for this year's game.)
Last bowl game: For the Aggies, you have to go all the way back to 1997, when they lost to Cincinnati 35-19 in the Humanitarian Bowl. The Bobcats are headed to their 3rd straight game and their first win in a bowl game (they're 0-5 all-time in bowl games). They lost 48-21 to Troy last year in the New Orleans Bowl.
Fun facts: Utah State's basketball arena is known as the "Dee Glen Smith Spectrum", which reminds me that one of these days I need to figure out how "Spectrum" became used as a word for indoor sports arenas, as Idaho has the Keenan Spectrum for basketball, and Philadelphia, of course, had the most famous version.

9:00: San Diego State vs. Louisiana-Lafayette (New Orleans Bowl @ New Orleans, LA; ESPN): The Ragin' Cajuns should definitely enjoy home field advantage in their first ever bowl game. That said, I don't think that will be enough to get them past a superior San Diego State team.
Previous meetings: None.
Last bowl game: The Ragin' Cajuns have been playing major college football since 1973, and this will be their first bowl game. In that time, they only have two other seasons with more than 6 wins: 1993 (8-3) and 1976. The Aztecs are now in a bowl game two years running. Last year they beat Navy 35-14 in the hometown Poinsettia Bowl.
Fun facts: There have been numerous debates in Louisiana over the years about which school there had the right to call itself just "the University of Louisiana". While there's always definitively been one Louisiana State, the University of Louisiana system was only formed in 1974 as a conglomeration of existing campuses. That said, Lafayette is the largest campus in the system.

Tuesday, December 20
8:00: Marshall vs. Florida International (Beef 'O' Brady's Bowl @ St. Petersburg, FL; ESPN): Neither of these teams really do the "scoring points" thing particularly well, but at least FIU does prevent other teams from scoring points. The result? A situation where I'll actually pick a Sun Belt team to win.
Previous meetings: None.
Last bowl game: For the Herd, it was the 2009 Little Ceasars Bowl, where they beat Ohio 21-17. FIU, of course, made their first ever bowl appearance in that very same game, but in 2010, where they beat Toledo 34-32.
Fun facts: FIU was established in 1965, which has to make them one of, if not the, youngest universities in major college football.

Wednesday, December 21
8:00: Louisiana Tech vs. Texas Christian (Poinsettia Bowl @ San Diego, CA; ESPN): While TCU finds itself in the somewhat strange situation of being outside the top ten teams in the country in defense, they're still pretty good. And I'll roll with the MWC champs over the WAC champs any day.
Previous meetings: None.
Last bowl game: LaTech was last seen beating Northern Illinois in the 2008 Independence Bowl, 17-10. TCU meantime, is back in the Poinsettia Bowl (where they played in 2008, beating a 12-1 Boise team 17-16) after two straight appearance in BCS bowl games. Boise got revenge in the 2009 Fiesta Bowl, winning 17-10, but the Horned Frogs mustered just enough to win the Rose Bowl 21-19 against Wisconsin last year. TCU has also made a bowl appearance every year since 2004, and discounting that, every year since 1998.
Fun facts: Unlike, say, Georgia Tech, the full name of LaTech is actually "Louisiana Tech University". And they really are a university, since they have 19 bachelor's degrees in the liberal arts. If you're reading this, you likely already know the answer to this question, but I'll ask anyway: in major college football (Division I-A or FBS, that is) there are 120 teams. Five of them, one of them being Georgia Tech, do not have the word "university" in their title (as GT is the Georgia Institute of Technology). What are the other four?

Thursday, December 22
8:00: Arizona State vs. Boise State (Las Vegas Bowl @ Las Vegas, NV; ESPN): Unless Boise just comes in completely deflated and unmotivated in making their second straight Las Vegas Bowl appearance after having BCS aspirations (with this year being especially painful since they this was probably their best chance of getting into the BCS title game ever), this should be a cakewalk for Boise. The best Arizona State can hope for, most likely, is a shootout. [insert obligatory mention of Arizona State quarterback Brock Oswelier's 6'8" stature here]
Previous meetings: One, back before Boise State was any sort of powerhouse. The Sun Devils won easily, 56-7.
Last bowl game: Probably part of the reason Dennis Erickson got the ol' heave-ho is that this is the Sun Devil's first bowl game since 2007, where they lost to Texas 52-34 in the Holiday Bowl. Boise beat down Utah 26-3 in last year's Las Vegas Bowl, continuing a streak they've had since 2002, or 1999 if you discount that they went 8-4 in 2002 but didn't get an invite.
Fun facts: While I don't really mind the blue turf myself, it has invited a host of copycats. Most famous of these non-Boise surfaces is, of course, Eastern Washington:

But there's also the field donated to Barrow High School, which I believe is the world's northernmost American football field:

But this? There's just... well, I guess if you're the Central Arkansases (I guess that's the plural of "Arkansas"?) you'll do just about anything to stand out:

Saturday, December 24
8:00: Southern Mississippi vs. Nevada (Hawaii Bowl @ Honolulu, HI; ESPN): Nevada entered the season with hopes of dominating this year's watered-down WAC, but instead lost two conference games and got sent to Hawaii. Southern Miss, of course, just pulled off a pretty big upset to take the Conference USA crown, and they did it by forcing Case Keenum to have the worst day of his life. However, instead of ending up in the nearby Liberty Bowl, shenanigans occurred and they got sent to Hawaii. I mean, there are worse places to go for sure, but it's not so good in terms of having a victory lap for one of the most successful seasons in school history. They'll also need to switch gears from their stifling pass defense to their pretty good run defense, as they face the Wolf Pack's unique pistol offense. The Golden Eagles are no slouches on offense themselves, though, and they should eventually pull away in the second half for the victory.
Previous meetings: Two, in what was likely a home-and-home arrangement. Southern Miss won both legs, though. In 1997 the Golden Eagles prevailed 35-19, and then really poured it on in 1998 in a 55-28 win.
Last bowl game: Southern Miss is on a pretty long bowl game run themselves: every year since 2001, and 1997 if you discount that. Last year they lost 31-28 to Louisville in the Beef 'O' Brady's Bowl. Nevada's made a game every year since 2005, and last year beat Boston College 20-13 in the Fight Hunger Bowl.
Fun facts: In 1923, California finished 9-0-1 and claims a national title for that year. The only blemish was a 0-0 tie to Nevada. The Golden Bears had a 50-game winning streak at the time as well, making this one of the most unlikely upsets ever.

This Weekend in College Football: Week 15

noreply@blogger.com (asimperson) — Sat, 10 Dec 2011 00:00:00 +0000

The regular season is technically over, but we'll cover the Army-Navy game as well as the various playoff games that are actually on television (not to mention the others that'll be on the Internet).

As usual, all times Eastern and all predictions wrong.

Friday
8:00: Northern Iowa @ Montana (Division I Quarterfinal; ESPN): These teams entered as the 5 and 4-seeds (respectively) in the tournament, and thus both received byes to the second round in the 20-team bracket. The Grizzlies thumped their second opponent, Central Arkansas, 41-14 while UNI ended up winning 28-21 with some help from probably the most boneheaded play of last weekend. Nonetheless, Montana has all the cards here, with superior offensive and defensive rankings as well as a projected game time temperature of about 25 degrees in their home stadium, which looking at attendance figures will probably be sold out. Meanwhile, UNI plays their home games in a dome. I think I know who I like here.

Saturday
Noon: Montana State @ Sam Houston State (Division I Quarterfinal; ESPN): Sam Houston State is the #1 seed in the tournament, but they're last in spelling, because apparently they are officially the "Bearkats". I mean, at least "dawgs" is usually an unofficial nickname, but nope, it's right there on their ESPN page. In protest, I refuse to write anything further about this game.

1:00: Alabama Agricultural and Mechanical vs. Grambling State (SWAC Championship @ Birmingham, AL; ESPNU): I really debated putting this game on the list. It's on TV and all, but... I don't know, maybe I just don't fully understand the traditions of the SWAC that would cause them to want to have their own title game and not participate in the playoffs that so many of us at the top level of the sport of would love to have. Not only that, but the SWAC has 10 teams and plays 9 conference games, which means that a title game is wholly unnecessary. Oh, and speaking of rematches, A&M beat Grambling 20-14 back in September. If anything, the game should be the resolution of the three 7-2 teams that all beat each other in the regular season (Jackson State, A&M, and Alabama State).

2:30: Army vs. Navy (@Landover, MD; CBS): This has not been a banner year for these two academies. Navy is 4-7 and Army is 3-8 and is, last I checked, narrowly favored for what has to be the first time in awhile. Both have been undone by very mediocre-to-bad defenses. That said, though, Navy's schedule was a lot tougher than Army's, with Navy's only really bad loss to San Jose State, then again, that's countered by Army's upset of Northwestern (which probably says a lot about how far the Wildcats have come more than anything else, since we can properly call it an "upset"). I'll stick with the Midshipmen to continue their nine game winning streak.

Look for bowl previews starting next week!

Bowl Predictions 2011: Shenanigans

noreply@blogger.com (asimperson) — Mon, 05 Dec 2011 00:40:00 +0000

I didn't forsee Virginia Tech getting into the Sugar Bowl, but who did? Updated predictions are now available.

Bowl Predictions 2011: Final

noreply@blogger.com (asimperson) — Sun, 04 Dec 2011 11:57:00 +0000

This is it. I'm going and writing this up now. We'll see what's still true later today.

I have come up eight possible scenarios based on the outcome of the BCS today. Basically, these are the three most important variables:

Whether Oklahoma State moves ahead of Alabama to #2 in the BCS
Whether Michigan moves from #16 to #14 or better in the BCS
Whether TCU moves from #18 to #16 or better in the BCS

This means that it is currently very difficult to nail down exactly what will happen with the Big Ten, Big 12, or Mountain West. (The SEC is unaffected because Alabama will go to a BCS game if it falls out of the top two.)

For each set of scenarios, there are constants. You can see those constants here. Also common in most of these scenarios is that I do not think Boise State will get a BCS at-large bid. If TCU does not make it, then I think that's that for the mid-majors this year - unless Michigan also does not make it, thus limiting the available/attractive at-large bids.

Which do I think is most likely? What I call "Scenario 1": a LSU-Alabama rematch with Michigan in and TCU out. This is currently what is available on the main page. Each scenario is also available in its entirety:

Why do I think the first is the most likely? I don't think enough voters will suddenly decide to put Oklahoma State ahead of Alabama and Stanford to pass them in the standings. Also, while many thought the Cowboys would pass Alabama in all the computers, the first poll out of the gate is the Sagarin ratings, which puts Alabama 2nd and Oklahoma State 3rd. While the highest and lowest positions for each team are thrown out, if any of the other five polls break that way then we will not have agreement among them. Also, all these teams in front of Michigan lost yesterday: Virginia Tech, Houston, Oklahoma, and Michigan State. The last two, specifically, are likely to fall behind Michigan in the new poll. The questions is: will they also fall behind TCU? The closest loss in the rankings to TCU was Georgia, which will fall behind them, but around them in the rankings are Baylor (which just beat Texas) and Clemson (which just demolished Virginia Tech). Also, I think many of the newly-minted two-loss teams today could settle in ahead of TCU. So in other words, it doesn't look good for the Horned Frogs. And given the general leanings of the folks who control the BCS, I don't think they'll give out a bone to Boise State, even though they could be as high as 5th in the new poll.

I'll start with the conferences that are well-defined in my template. Again, regardless of what happens at the top of the polls, that will likely not have any effect on these, and are constant across all scenarios.

ACC
With Clemson back to its old ways in the ACC title game, this makes the Chick-fil-a a very good bet to grab Virginia Tech, which means the FSU-Notre Dame matchup is back in play for the Champs. There's still some room for FSU to go to Atlanta, but I don't think VPI will fall past the Champs even though they got blown out. The rest of the conference looks pretty straightforward: Tech to the Sun, NC State to the Belk, Virginia to the Music City, Wake Forest to the Independence, and North Carolina to the Military.

Big East
The Champs Sports Bowl will almost certainly use its option to take Notre Dame this year. After that, only news searches revealed my least favorite bowl scenario is going to happen. Read the article if you want the gory details. The upshot is that other online search put Louisville as a solid lock of the Belk, Rutgers in the Pinstripe, and Pitt to the Compass, which leaves Cincy to the Liberty.

Conference USA
Houston losing was really bad for the conference. Due to the wacky Big East/SEC Liberty Bowl thing it also looks like Southern Miss won't be going there. While there supposedly is an "order" for the C-USA bowls that I found today, it still doesn't make much sense to me. Either way, they will fall a team short, most likely in the New Orleans Bowl. I put Southern Miss in the Compass Bowl and Houston in the TicketCity. I put SMU in the other Dallas bowl game, Marshall in the Beef 'O' Brady's, and shipped Tulsa out to Hawaii. But of all my picks, short of guessing at-large teams, I generally always feel the least confident about C-USA. Well, and the Big East.

Mid-American
With their win in the title game, NIU should be bound for the godaddy.com Bowl in Mobile. I saw a rumor say that Western Michigan would get the nod for Pizza Bowl, so I put conference runner-up Ohio out in Boise, with Toledo and Ball State waiting nervously by the phone.

Pacific-12
I think Stanford is a lock for a BCS at-large berth, which leaves the Pac-12 short a team or two, even with UCLA's waiver. As the best remaining team on the board at this point, I put Washington in the Alamo and Cal in the Holiday. Utah is the only other team with a winning record, so I stuck them in the Sun, and figured that left Arizona State for the Las Vegas Bowl. This leaves, of course, UCLA, which a trip to the Fight Hunger Bowl.

Southeastern
Since LSU and Alabama will both be in the BCS in any scenario, we can go ahead and figure the rest of the BCS. I like Arkansas to get the nod for the Capital One, which also lets the SEC bowls switch things up. Georgia and South Carolina, then will end up in the Outback and Cotton bowls, and maybe even in that order. Auburn is pretty solidly next on the plate, and with the worry of an Auburn-Clemson rematch gone, they'll get a trip to Atlanta. I think the Gator, regardless of scenario, will try to set up the Urban Meyer thing, so they'll probably take Florida. At this point, what's left is Vanderbilt and Mississippi State. I like both to stay home, relatively speaking, with Vandy going to the Music City and Miss State to the de facto capital of Mississippi, Memphis.

Sun Belt
Arkansas State, Florida International, and UL-Lafayette are all set. It's not looking good for Western Kentucky to get their first every bowl bid, though.

Western
Hawaii lost to BYU, so unlike UCLA, they will not be bowling at 6-7. Utah State and Louisiana Tech are set with bids already. There are some rumblings Nevada may work out an arrangement to play closer to home (say, the Fight Hunger), but without anything more concrete I'm sticking with putting them in the Hawaii Bowl.

Okay, cool, so what about the conferences that are affected by the BCS? Well, let's start with the Big 12.

Big 12
Whether Oklahoma State gets into the title game doesn't matter here, as they will be in the BCS either way. The question is whether Kansas State will get an at-large berth. Oklahoma, Houston, and Virginia Tech all lost in front of them and will probably fall behind K-State, which may make them an attractive candidate generally for lack of better options. The only team that threatens K-State in this regard is Boise State. I am perhaps not giving Boise enough credit for the BCS folks here, but I think the Wildcats would be an attractive option for the Fiesta or Sugar, while Boise is probably more attractive to the Fiesta. So in all scenarios where either Michigan or TCU do not make it, or both, I have Kansas State in over Boise. The BCS bowl committees may surprise me, though! It's happened before.

Outside of that, I think Oklahoma is a pretty safe bet for the Cotton in any scenario where K-State is in the BCS, but if K-State is not in the BCS I think they are bound for Arlington. From there, things pretty much just go in this order for me: Baylor, Texas, Texas A&M, Missouri, and Iowa State. Just push them up or down a slot depending on who gets into the BCS, basically.

Big Ten
Wisconsin is in and Michigan State is out, in all scenarios. The question is Michigan. If Michigan is in, and I think they will be, I think the Capital One jumps at the chance to grab Nebraska for the second time ever and the first since 1990. If Michigan is not in the BCS, however, then I think they will go to the Capital One. Either way, I think Michigan State is a good bet for the Outback Bowl, followed by Iowa if Michigan is in or Nebraska if Michigan is out. (If Michigan is out, some of my scenarios have Texas-Nebraska in the Insight Bowl. That'd be a fun one, I'd wager, but probably not likely.) I have Ohio State in the Gator regardless of scenario as well.

Then things start to get interesting. The Big Ten has too many teams for its bids, the questions is if this will be one or two extra teams. If Michigan is in, I think that will put Penn State in the Car Care Bowl, Purdue in the TicketCity, and Northwester in the Pizza with Illinois waiting anxiously. If Michigan is out, then I like Iowa to the Car Care, Penn State to the TicketCity, and Purdue in the Pizza, with Northwestern and Illinois waiting.

Mountain West
If Boise is not in, then all indications are they will go to the Las Vegas Bowl. If TCU is not in then they will go to the Poinsettia. The only way TCU goes to the Vegas, it appears, is if Boise gets into the BCS. If TCU is in the BCS, then it looks like (as of the wee hours of Sunday) that the Poinsettia will not take the hometown San Diego State Aztecs and instead take Wyoming. All scenarios put Air Force in the Independence again, while Wyoming goes to the New Mexico if they're still available, and San Diego State if they're not. With the former scenario, SDSU will need an at-large berth.

The leftovers
In no scenario do I have Ball State or Western Kentucky making a bowl game. (Sorry Hilltoppers.) Basically, all these scenarios have an affect on how many teams need at-large bids. In cases where the Big 12 gets two teams in, I have Temple in the Military Bowl and Iowa State if not. I also have Illinois going out west to the Fight Hunger Bowl in all scenarios. That leaves the New Orleans Bowl and New Mexico Bowl needing teams, which depends heavily on if Boise/TCU and/or Michigan got BCS bids. If both do, then I have Toledo and Temple in those games. If the former but not the latter then I have Northwestern and Temple, with Toledo out completely. If the Michigan gets in and Boise/TCU do not, then I have Toledo and San Diego State occupying those slots. If neither get in, then I have Northwestern and Toledo in those slots.

Note that when it comes to the at-larges, the situation tends to be extremely fluid and there can also be horsetrading (like I alluded to with Nevada).

I will update all 8 scenarios throughout the day as the bids come in, so stay tuned. If you really care about how I determine whether I predicted the matchups correctly, I will probably go with the scenario that most closely matches out the BCS actually turns out. I'll be keeping track of the final destinations here in a separate directory, even.

This Weekend in College Football: Week 14

noreply@blogger.com (asimperson) — Fri, 02 Dec 2011 00:30:00 +0000

As usual, all times Eastern and all predictions wrong.

Thursday
8:00: West Virginia @ South Florida (ESPN): The very last edition of Thursday night college football comes to you from "beautiful" Tampa, where "South" Florida will attempt to not lose to the Mountaineers. After starting 4-0, the Bulls have gone 1-6, so I can't say I really like their odds. Also, if WVU wins, they will probably get the Big East's BCS bowl bid if Cincinnati also wins.

Friday
7:00: Ohio vs. Northern Illinois (MAC Championship @ Detroit, MI; ESPN2): Unlike the other conference title game on this night, these two teams actually are the best teams in their league. Both teams can score, but the Bobcats seem to actually play defense sometimes, so I'll take them. I will say that I think this game will probably be close, unlike...

8:00: California-Los Angeles @ Oregon (Pac-12 Championship; FOX): This game. The only question is not if Oregon will win, but by how many touchdowns. By the way, UCLA did in fact get a waiver to go a bowl game at 6-7. Bruins fans: get your Kraft Fight Hunger Bowl tickets now!

Saturday
Noon:

Southern Mississippi @ Houston (C-USA Championship; ABC): Southern Miss may arguably be the best team Houston has seen all season, which is one of the reasons why the Cougars haven't been getting a lot of national attention. A win here does seal a BCS bowl bid for them, though, along with a large payday for the rest of Conference USA. Fortunately for the conscience of everyone involved, I really don't think they'll have that many issues, as the game will probably play out a lot like their game against Tulsa: a slow start and then pulling away in the second half.
Connecticut @ Cincinnati (ESPN): So it turns out the Big East can potentially end in a 3-way tie, among Louisville, Cincinnati, and West Virginia. Louisville is in the clubhouse with a 5-2 league record. If Cincy wins this game and WVU loses tonight, then Cincy wins the league outright due a head-to-head tiebraker. If Cincy loses this game, then Louisville wins the league outright by either having the best record (WVU loss) or due to their head-to-head tiebreaker over WVU. If there is a 3-way tie, then it will go to the BCS, and right now that benefits Cincy. In any case, I think Cincy is going to win this game.
Syracuse @ Pittsburgh (ESPN2): Do you want to see two 5-6 Big East teams attempt to sneak into a bowl game? Probably not, but in case you do, Pitt should win this game. The Orange have lost 4 straight after a 5-2 start and don't look to be getting any better.

12:30: Iowa State @ Kansas State (FSN): You what they say, "You don't just walk in to Bill Synder Family Memorial Stadium and expect to win." This applies to the Cyclones especially, as no one else has succeeded in beating the Wildcats at home this year expect for Oklahoma.

2:30: Nevada-Las Vegas @ Texas Christian (Versus): UNLV is awful. TCU should clinch the MWC title easily.

3:30: Texas @ Baylor (ABC): Texas basically McGuyver'ed a victory in College Station last week. Texas's offense hasn't shown enough ability to score against the other generous defenses of the Big 12, though, and while their defense is competent I don't think it'll be enough to prevent Robert Griffin III from doing his thing. If Texas had any offense at all, this would be a shootout, but instead I really like the Bears' chances.

4:00: Louisiana State vs. Georgia (SEC Championship @ Atlanta, GA; CBS): Georgia's good and all, but their best win of the year may, technically speaking, be over Georgia Tech. LSU is the best team in the land and should clear this hurdle, and probably easily.

7:30: Brigham Young @ Hawaii (ESPN2): BYU visits Hawaii! Why? Because they can! They should also get a victory for their efforts, though Hawaii does need the win to get bowl eligible.

8:00:

Wisconsin vs. Michigan State (Big Ten Championship @ Indianapolis, IN; FOX): Here's one rematch I can't say I mind too much. I think even the first time I liked the Badgers, and I'll stick by that here. Both of these teams are "pretty good" but not "great" and this should be a close, fun game once again.
Oklahoma @ Oklahoma State (ABC): Oh, what could have been. The mind still reels trying to comprehend how Texas Tech beat Oklahoma in Norman. I mean, at least OSU had the decency to get upset on the road. Anyway, this is still Bedlam and it's still in Stillwater. I always think "hey, this matchup is always pretty crazy!" but this ignores the historical reality. Anyway, we also know both of these teams can score, but Oklahoma can sort of/kind of actually play defense sometimes. That said, I've liked these Cowboys all season to win this game, and I'm not changing my mind now.
Virginia Tech vs. Clemson (ACC Championship @ Charlotte, NC; ESPN): Clemson has lost of its last four, with, as I've grown fond of saying, that one win being a last second FG to beat Wake Forest. This Clemson team shouldn't have any business needing last second field goals to beat Wake Forest, but here we are. Virginia Tech, meanwhile, easily beat Wake Forest and just finished routing their cross-state rival while Clemson lost to theirs, continuing to look lost on offense. What I'm saying is this: I really like the Hokies to prevail in this rematch.
Fresno State @ San Diego State (CBSS): SDSU likes to score points, and Fresno State doesn't like to play defense. Blowout, ahoy!

Check back in starting Saturday night for bowl predictions.

Bowl Predictions 2011: Week 7

noreply@blogger.com (asimperson) — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 07:55:00 +0000

Almost everything went as expected this last weekend, which means while there were a few changes in the predictions there wasn't a major upheaval like there was last weekend. Let's start with the BCS this time.

Note that most bids will be announced very closely after Saturday's games. The last major hurdle is the final BCS standings, everyone should know where they're going for the holidays by the end of the day Sunday. And, as per usual, the predictions are available here.

BCS
I'm left with no other choice but to call LSU-Alabama. The only way I could see a change is a major uprising by poll voters to put Oklahoma State ahead of Alabama with a victory over Oklahoma on Saturday. In the other games, the major change is Michigan appearing in the Sugar Bowl. Wolverine fans should be pretty jazzed about beating Ohio State, but there is a slight problem: they are currently 16th in the BCS. However, Georgia and the loser of the Big Ten title game should fall behind them, allowing them to rise up to 14th by next weekend. If Michigan doesn't make it, then the Sugar may take Kansas State. Otherwise, there's nothing shocking about the rest of the BCS bowls.

ACC
The winner of the ACC title game will go to the Orange Bowl. Virginia Tech has a very outside shot at a BCS at-large even if they lose. With Clemson now having lost 2 of their last 3 games (and the 3rd was a last-second field goal over Wake Forest), a loss in the ACC title game may push them out of the Chick-fil-a now. For that reason, I've put Florida State above them in the pecking order, putting FSU in Atlanta and Clemson in the Champs Sports. (Also, I have Auburn in the Chick-fil-a game and though I've seen some things to the contrary I really don't think they want a rematch.) The Sun Bowl has said they will take Georgia Tech if available, so that's pretty easy. (A GT win against Georgia was necessary to raise our draft stock any higher.) With NC State's strong finish, they are a good candidate for the in-state Belk Bowl, which leaves Virginia for the Music City. This will stick the Independence Bowl with Wake Forest, relegating 3-5 North Carolina to the Military Bowl.

Big East
Who knows? I'm assuming West Virginia wins at this point and going from there. Oh, and ESPN's Big East blogger raised the scenario that I fear most, which that the Liberty will have a say in the Big East bowl picture. For the sake of my sanity, I'm assuming the Liberty will stick with Southern Miss whether they win or lose to Houston. Oh, and yeah, Notre Dame is almost certainly going to the Champs Sports instead of a Big East team.

Big Ten
The winner of the Big Ten will go to the Rose Bowl, and the loser of the title game will likely go to the Capital One Bowl (especially if Michigan gets a BCS at-large bid). From there, I have Nebraska breaking into their newfound ability to go to the Outback Bowl and then, as the last team that isn't 7-5 or 6-6, Penn State will probably end up in the Insight Bowl. (And frankly, the Insight Bowl may be the most anonymous bowl that features two BCS confernece teams, likely due to their previous TV contract with the NFL network. They could probably use the press.) I had to adjust my preliminary bowl predictions because the Gator said they really want to match Ohio State and Florida. (Remember folks, the bowl games exist mainly for themselves, not for you. The Gator is just the most brazen about it.)

Big 12
The Oklahoma-Oklahoma State winner will go to the Fiesta. If OSU loses they may still get a BCS bid (this depends on Michigan and Houston), however if the Sooners lose they are out of the BCS picture. I'm picking OSU to win that game, so I have K-State in the Cotton and Oklahoma in the Alamo. That leaves the rest of the conference picking up the scraps, with Texas at the top of the heap for the Insight, Baylor getting a nice trip to San Diego, TAMU getting a slightly less nicer trip to Houston. Oh, and Mizzou ends up in New York.

Pac-12
The Pac-12 is a mess with USC ineligible for a bowl game. Oregon and Stanford are probably both in, meanwhile UCLA (barring the biggest upset of the year) will probably be 6-7 and ineligible. While there were some reports they could get waiver, I haven't seen this confirmed yet. (If they do, they will almost certainly be in the Fight Hunger Bowl.) So with the two best teams in the BCS, that leaves everyone else to fight over the Alamo Bowl bid. Arizona State looked to be that team, but their epic collapse is complete and their coach fired, so Washington gets the nod. The Holiday will probably then take that chance to grab Cal, and so I'm left with Utah and Arizona State for the Sun. I figure the former's fans are going to feel a little better about themselves because I don't think anyone had them getting a winning record in Pac-12 play this year, so I'll put them into the sun and the Sun Devils in the Las Vegas Bowl.

SEC
The SEC will have two teams in the BCS. (If Georgia beats LSU and LSU falls to #2 and Bama rises to #1, they could even have three teams in the BCS, since UGA would get the Sugar auto-bid.) Since Tennessee lost to Kentucky, they will not have enough bowl eligible teams this year. For now, I have Arkansas going to the Capital One Bowl, which leaves the Cotton in a predicament of having to pick a SEC East team. I have them getting Georgia and leaving South Carolina to the Outback, though that could go either way. (Or Arkansas could fall past the Cap One, but I don't know if they would really want UGA, and it's not like Arkansas isn't going to have other chances to go the Cotton Bowl.) This leaves Auburn as a good choice for the Chick-fil-a (since they'll have equally attractive options on the ACC side to avoid the Auburn-Clemson rematch). I then have Vandy staying close by to go the Music City and Miss State going against Southern Miss in the Liberty.

The Rest
Some bids have come in already (indicated by the asterisks), but otherwise this is pretty unclear. The WAC has completely fooled me so far and it's not clear what the Hawaii Bowl will do if Hawaii loses to BYU this weekend. (I.e., they may decide to not take Nevada.) There's lots of guesses for C-USA and the at-large bids indicated by the question marks, but we will have enough teams. (I have 71 on this table, 72 if UCLA gets a waiver.)

Anyway, bowl bids will continue to trickle in throughout the week most likely, with a furious wave Saturday night and Sunday. What I usually do is make one last set of predictions Saturday evening and then watch the carnage unfold. A final post like this will probably go up really early on Sunday (or Saturday night, depending on your perspective). So until then...

THWG Thought of the Day: 11/26

noreply@blogger.com (asimperson) — Sat, 26 Nov 2011 08:00:00 +0000

Men, Georgie's a fine football team, a very fine football team. Georgie's bigger and faster than we are. Probably a little tougher, too.

That's okay, because we're smarter than they are.

Now, let me tell you what's going to happen. That Georgie team's going to come running out of the tunnel screaming and foaming at the mouth and smashing one another upside the head just to get warmed up.

We won't do any of that. While they waste their energy, we'll conserve ours. I've told you that they're bigger, faster, and tougher than you. That's true. But we do have that one big advantage.

We ... are ... smarter.

Think about what I teach you. Play field position. Play great defense. Make no mistakes on offense. Be great in the kicking game. Do that and we'll keep it close.

As the game goes on, they'll start to get tired because they wasted so much energy in the beginning. Because we're smart, we'll have plenty of energy left, and at some point in the fourth quarter they'll make a mistake.

When they do make that mistake, we'll get the football. And when that happens, I'll think of something and we'll win!

Coach Bobby Dodd, as told by Bill Curry

This Weekend in College Football: Week 13

noreply@blogger.com (asimperson) — Sat, 26 Nov 2011 03:19:00 +0000

As usual, all times Eastern and all predictions wrong.

Noon:

Ohio State @ Michigan (ABC): Ohio State has won seven straight, but for the first time that I can remember Michigan has all the advantages. They play good enough defense, and while their offense is spotty it's more consistent than the Buckeyes'. Add in the fact it's in the Big House and the Wolverines have to be a clear favorite.
Iowa State @ Oklahoma (FX): Iowa State rocked the college football world in Ames last weekend, however, this contest is in Norman. Oklahoma, provided they learned anything from Baylor, should take the Cyclones seriously enough so as to not have any trouble with them.
Georgia @ Georgia Tech (ESPN): To hell with Georgia.
Rutgers @ Connecticut (ESPN2): I guess Rutgers is going to win this? I dunno. No, really, I don't.
Rice @ Southern Methodist (FSN): Neither of these teams are particularly good, but SMU is just slightly less bad.
Michigan State @ Northwestern (BTN): Spary's already clinched a spot in the Big Ten title game, but they shouldn't overlook the Wildcats. I don't think they will.
Tennessee @ Kentucky (SEC): Oy. This is a SEC East slapfight. Both teams of these teams are also pretty bad, but again, the Vols are just slightly less bad.
James Madison @ Eastern Kentucky (NCAA Tournament; ESPNU): I like giving props to the NCAA football tournament, and this is the the only game on national TV. I know even less about these teams than I do even Rice and SMU, so I won't offer up a pick.

12:30: Maryland @ North Carolina State (ACC): Maryland is still simply awful this year and NCSU has rallied in the second half of the year, making the Wolfpack an easy choice.

3:30:

Alabama @ Auburn (CBS): While this will likely be closer than the line, I just can't really imagine a scenario where Auburn can win this game.
Oregon State @ Oregon (ABC/ESPN2): It's the Civil War! This is an underrated rivalry game, but the Beavers have just had an awful time of it this year. I really like the Ducks.
Virginia Tech @ Virginia (ABC/ESPN2): UVA has exceeded every expectation for this year. While VPI still had legitimate offensive issues, it's hard to see how UVA will prevail.
Pennsylvania State @ Wisconsin (ESPN): Well, Penn State has exceeded at least my expectations these past couple of weeks. But Wisconsin has regained at least some offensive swagger, though they were a little slow to really get going against Illinois last week. However, I just can't see how Penn State's offense can keep up.
Missouri vs. Kansas (@Kansas City, MO; FSN): Probably one of the last meetings of these two bitter rivals, but this KU team is simply awful. Mizzou all the way.
Vanderbilt @ Wake Forest (ESPNU): Vandy needs this to get bowl eligible, and for me it's a difficult call to make. Both of these teams are undermanned the vast majority of the time, so it's hard to say what will happen when they meet each other. I'm leaning toward Vandy though.
East Carolina @ Marshall (CBSS): The winner goes to a bowl game. The loser doesn't. I think it'll be ECU heading off to some far-flung C-USA bowl game.
Illinois @ Minnesota (BTN): It would be the most Ron Zook thing ever for them to lose to Minnesota, right? I'll go with that.
Purdue @ Indiana (BTN): This is rivalry game, of sorts. Another game where neither team is very good but Indiana is just awful. I like the Boilermakers.
Duke @ North Carolina (ACC): Duke and UNC meet once again, but it'll be another couple of months before they meet in a fashion anyone in the Raleigh-Durham area really cares about. I'll take the 'Heels.

7:00:

Florida State @ Florida (ESPN2): Florida can't score, but sort of plays defense. FSU, meanwhile, just suffered a bad loss to Virginia. Provided FSU actually shows up for this one, though, I have to take the Seminoles here.
Mississippi @ Mississippi State (ESPNU): Houston Nutt's tenure at Ole Miss will not go out with a bang, but with a whimper.
Texas Tech vs. Baylor (@Arlington, TX; FSN): Robert Griffin the III singlehandedly lead Baylor to their biggest victory ever against Oklahoma. Provided he's not looking forward to a trip to Manhattan (New York, that is) he should have considerably less trouble against the Red Raiders.

7:30: Washington State @ Washington (Versus): It's the Apple Cup once again! Udub lost to Oregon State somehow last weekend, but I have a hard time figuring out exactly how they could lose to equally morbund Wazzou. I like the Huskies here.

7:45: Clemson @ South Carolina (ESPN): I've been grappling with how to pick this game all week. South Carolina is now an offensive non-entity, but Clemson has lost two of their last three, and the third was a last-second FG win over Wake Forest. I'm sitting here in my family's living literally scratching my head over my head over this. I think this is basically a toss-up. If Clemson shows up, then they have the offensive firepower to win. However, based on the last few weeks I have to think this will be a defensive struggle that favors the Gamecocks.

8:00: Notre Dame @ Stanford (ABC): ND may put up a fight, but I really like Andrew Luck and Stanford here.

10:00: California-Los Angeles @ Southern California (FSN): Boy howdy USC has looked good the last couple weeks haven't they? And besides, it'll make for good trivia for UCLA to represent the Pac-12 South next week at 6-6 and likely to be multiple touchdown underdogs.

THWG Thought of the Day: 11/25

noreply@blogger.com (asimperson) — Fri, 25 Nov 2011 19:30:00 +0000

Posting this video has been a tradition that I’ve done for each of the past three years here. With the recent death of Larry Munson, however, I debated whether not doing so again this year would be in good taste.

I’ve thought about it for a few days and come to the following conclusion: he was beloved by UGA fans for telling it like was, and all this video really captures is one of the very few times in the past 40 years in which his team has been underdogs to Tech.

And, in the end, I’m sure he’s not the only one who thought they were getting beat “like we were Wake Forest or Maryland or somebody”.

THWG Thought of the Day: 11/23

noreply@blogger.com (asimperson) — Wed, 23 Nov 2011 07:19:00 +0000

First, I just rediscovered this gem of an animated GIF from September and had to bring it back:

(From RjTheMetalhead, purveyor of fine single and multi-frame images.) Anyway, hoping to see a lot of that this weekend.

With that out of the way, let's talk about Uga. No, not the school, the dog. New breed standards were recently developed for the English bulldog, and Uga's breeders aren't happy about that:

"I don't care what the British do," said Sonny Seiler, owner of the bulldog line that has become the most celebrated sports mascot in the United States.
Critics in England and in the United States, however, said breeders have transformed bulldogs and some other dog breeds into genetic monstrosities prone to chronic disease and sometimes early death.

This what the original bulldog mascot, Yale's Handsome Dan, looked like in 1890:

The underbite is there, but notice the overall lack of wrinkles and muscular frame. I'd paste an actual Uga here, but you've probably seen them before and if you haven't: remember that the past few Ugas were not terribly mobile and generally spent most of their times at the game laying on a block of ice due to respiratory issues. There's also been the notable short lifespan of the previous two. The current Uga, of course, isn't actually an Uga because he's not nearly in-bred enough and actually has a brown spot (because Ugas also have to have a perfectly white coat). Even by today's degraded standards, other Bulldog mascots (think Miss State and the current stand-in for UGA) look relative healthy compared to the last few Ugas.

I swear, these "inbred redneck" jokes just about write themselves.

This Week in College Football: Week 13

noreply@blogger.com (asimperson) — Tue, 22 Nov 2011 22:19:00 +0000

As usual, all times Eastern and all predictions wrong.

Tuesday
7:00: Miami @ Ohio (ESPN2): Ohio has already sealed up the MAC East, but nonetheless shouldn't overlook their in-state rivals in Miami. I like the Bobcats here.

Thursday
8:00: Texas @ Texas Agricultural and Mechanical (ESPN): I'm not sure what Texas fans were expecting this year, though they have probably found this season frustrating nonetheless. Texas A&M fans, though, well, suffice it to say I'm not sure they expected to lose 2 games, much less 5. The culprit has been defense, especially their well-publicized issues holding a double-digit lead in the the second halves of games. That said, can the Longhorns even generate enough points to have a second half lead, much less a double-digit one? In their last two games against Mizzou and Kansas State Texas has only scored 18 points. Scoring has not been the issue for the Aggies. I wasn't sure about this earlier, but now I just don't know how Texas is going to score enough points to win this game.

Friday
11:00:

Louisville @ South Florida (ESPN2): The Big East will trend toward any scenario that makes there conference tiebreaker more complicated, so Louisville basically guaranteed to win this game.
Eastern Michigan @ Northern Illinois (ESPNU): Toledo needs a EMU victory here to have a shot at the MAC West, but I don't think they're going to get it.

Noon:

Iowa @ Nebraska (ABC): ALL HAIL THE CORN BOWL. No, really. That said, I think the Huskers can get back on track in the game and earn the world's first trophy that features REAL CORN. (Just don't tell Artur Boruc.)
Houston @ Tulsa (FSN): Tulsa may be the most formidable obstacle Houston has played to date, if for no other reason than because they're the first team they've played that can keep up with them on offense. Of course, with a BCS now on the line for the Cougars, there's just that much added pressure. I still like them to prevail, but this will be their stiffest test of the year, I think.

2:30: Arkansas @ Louisiana State (CBS): I've been saying this all year: the Razorbacks feature probably the only truly competent offense in the SEC. No other team in the SEC has been able to put up 30 as often against quality opponents. The problem is, the best team they've played so far, Alabama, held them to just 14. LSU's defense is as good as Bama's if not better. The question for LSU is, of course, the offense. They've been more potent this year, but the whole operation feels as though it's just a few Jordan Jefferson fumbles or Jarret Lee interceptions away from total disaster. Do I think this disaster will occur in Baton Rouge Friday afternoon? No, probably not. This game is usually pretty great though, and comes highly recommended from me.

3:30:

Boston College @ Miami (ABC): Speaking of total disasters, if the Miami locker room is really disappointed about the Canes not going to a bowl game that's exactly what this could turn into. Then again, I'm not convinced BC could score enough points to win this game even Miami didn't even come out on defense at all.
Colorado @ Utah (FSN): Fun fact: Utah now has the inside track to win the Pac-12 South. Yeah. They should be able to beat a Colorado team that just lost 45-6 to UCLA.

7:00:

Pittsburgh @ West Virginia (ESPN): It's the Backyard Brawl! And maybe for the last time in awhile. Against, for maximum Big East chaos I think WVU needs to win for the 4-way tie to be preserved, so that's probably what will happen.
Texas-El Paso @ Central Florida (CBSS): I have UTEP winning for the purposes of my bowl predictions, so, yeah, I guess I'll take the Miners here.

10:15: California @ Arizona State (ESPN): Cal has been awful on the road this year, with their only such win a 36-33 overtime win against a Colorado team that is usually paired with adjectives like "hapless". Therefore, I have to go with the increasingly, erm, hapless Sun Devils here.

Have a good Turkey Day and weekend predictions will go up on Friday!

Bowl Predictions 2011: Week 6

noreply@blogger.com (asimperson) — Mon, 21 Nov 2011 22:18:00 +0000

Chaos reigned supreme last weekend. Now we stare down the barrel as someone will most likely play someone they already played in the BCS Championship Game. Remember folks, every game counts, unless it doesn’t.

I’m writing this as I go. Since this is an electronic document I could, of course, actually just move things around to their customary order first, but that would be too easy. So let’s start off with the little guys. The final predictions will be up at their usual place.

Mid-majors
The first announcements of the year that I saw where that UL-Lafayette and Arkansas State have accepted bids to the New Orleans and godaddy.com bowls, respectively. I also have FIU and Western Kentucky qualifying as well.

BYU also formally accepted its bid to the Armed Forces Bowl.

Hawaii could’ve gained eligibility but only managed to put up 21 points against one of the worse defenses in college football. Since they play 13 games, they must have a winning record, and so at 5-6 now they will need to beat Tulane (extremely doable) and BYU. While they can beat BYU, I don’t think they will. Elsewhere in the WAC, Nevada lost a pivotal home matchup to Louisiana Tech, but that may not really matter that much as the WAC moves teams around based on what they think will work best for their games. Therefore, I still sent Nevada to the poinsettia, LaTech to Boise, and 6-6 Utah State to Hawaii.

In the MAC, I don’t see Kent State or Eastern Michigan winning their final games to get eligible. Ohio has already clinched the MAC East, and I think they will go ahead and play Northern Illinois in the MAC title game. The MAC champion goes to the godaddy.com bowl, but I always figure it’s best for a MAC team to actually play in the Midwest. Nonetheless, I’m guessing Ohio will go down to Mobile, NIU will go to Detroit, and I’ll pick Toledo to go out to Boise. That leaves Temple, Ball State, and Western Michigan as eagerly anticipating at-large bids elsewhere, which should materialize.

The Mountain West is going about how one would expect now that Boise is not going to the BCS. TCU will win the conference even if they sleepwalk through the UNLV game and get themselves an invite to Vegas. Boise will be a slam dunk for the Poinsettia unless an utter collapse elsewhere in the BCS occurs and they get invited as an at-large. Then it comes down to the Independence Bowl, which will likely have to choose between Wyoming and San Diego State. (Air Force should get eligible, but they do need to beat Colorado State Saturday since they played 2 DI-AA teams this year.) I’m just going to go in standings order for now (Wyoming to Independence, SDSU to New Mexico), leaving Air Force as a potential at-large for later.
Since it’s next on my list, the other two service academies will not be bowling this year after Navy’s loss to San Jose State. Notre Dame will be bowling somewhere, and I think it’s likely that somewhere will be the Champs Sports Bowl (otherwise, it will be the Pinstripe Bowl).

In Conference USA, East Carolina and Marshall will play this weekend for a bowl bid, and I like ECU in that game. Southern Mississippi, despite an inexplicable loss to UAB, should clinch the division. Houston will win the conference, of course, and should be in line for a BCS bowl bid, but they will need to beat Tulsa Saturday and USM next week to clinch it for sure. I have UTEP beating UCF Saturday to get to 6-6, giving us 6 total C-USA teams. I like USM to the Liberty bowl, but after that it’s all guesswork. C-USA does not explicitly order their bids, so I look at the payouts, with the TicketCity being the highest, followed by the Hawaii Bowl and the Armed Forces Bowl. The New Orleans and Beef ‘O’ Brady’s Bowl sit at the bottom. I’ll go ahead and send Tulsa to the TicketCity and SMU to the hometown Armed Forces (literally, as it’s at their home stadium). That leaves us 2 6-6 teams for 3 bowls. Let’s pencil in ECU to go to Hawaii and UTEP to St. Petersburg, leaving us needing another team in New Orleans.

BCS
A LSU-Alabama rematch seems nearly inevitable at this point, unless all hell breaks even more loose this weekend. I highly dislike the idea of the rematch, after all, the college football is regular seasons is so short it’s not really interesting for teams to play each other twice. This year, more than ever, shows how difficult it is to resolve differences between teams that play vastly different schedules over only 12 games, and why we really need a playoff.

In the Rose, I’ve got ahead and put in Wisconsin and Oregon, though both will need to play conference championship games this year. For the other autobids, I’ve put in Oklahoma State to the Fiesta and Virginia Tech to the Orange.

The Sugar gets the first at-large pick because it lost its autobid champion to the national title game. This is where it gets tough, though. Unless some other weird stuff happens, the SEC can’t get a third team into the BCS, which limits the sort of teams that the Sugar typically picks. I will go ahead and put in Kansas State there, since Oklahoma I have Oklahoma losing to Oklahoma State this weekend. (Note that if Bedlam goes the other way around, both teams could still get into the BCS.) Now the Fiesta has a difficult choice, but I think the area’s NFL fans will flock to see Andrew Luck, so I will put Stanford in there. Now we still have to put whoever the heck is going twin the Big East as well as Houston somewhere. Due to proximity, I figure the Sugar will fall on that sword and take the Cougars. I have the Big East finishing in a 4-way tie for first, so I’m taking West Virginia out of that group.

ACC
Even with their inexplicable loss to NC State blowing their BCS hopes, Clemson will likely still be attractive enough for the Chick-fil-a Bowl. Following that, there are 4 ACC teams that will finish 5-3 (most likely): Wake Forest, Florida State, Virginia, and Georgia Tech. Of this group, FSU is probably the most attractive for the Champs Sports at the ACC #3 slot. Also, if they take Notre Dame is creates a huge “name” matchup. ACC #4 is the Sun Bowl and I think it’s likely GT will end up there. The Belk Bowl will probably use its option to take a 4-4 NC State team over UVA and Wake, but the Music City will probably have no issues with taking UVA. (This is where I had Miami going previously, but with their announcement that they won’t accept a bowl bid it’s sort of a moot point now.) With Carolina at 3-5, this means Wake can’t fall any farther than the Independence Bowl, with the Tar Heels then ending up in DC for the Military Bowl.

Big 12
If Oklahoma doesn’t make a BCS game, they will be a very obvious candidate for the Cotton Bowl. At this point, the Alamo will probably have no choice but to take Baylor. This leaves the rest of the 7-5-/6-6 Big 12 misfits to fight over the remaining bids. I’ll go ahead and put Texas in the Insight Bowl and Missouri in the Holiday, leaving TAMU to the Car Care Bowl (of Texas) and Iowa State to the Pinstripe.

Big East
Again: I really hate picking the Big East. As I said above, I have 4 teams finishing with a 5-2 conference record currently. Since the Champs will probably take Notre Dame, that leaves the next selection to the Belk Bowl, where I guess Cincy has the best chance of going except that they already played NC State this year, so I’ll switch that to Louisville instead. Rutgers likes to think of themselves as “New York City’s college football team” so I’ll send them to the Pinstripe. I’ll pencil Cincy in for the Compass Bowl and so that leaves only Pitt for the Beef ‘O’ Brady’s.

Big Ten
I’m not sure the Big Ten will get two teams into the BCS this year. If they do, it will be Michigan. Since Michigan State will suffer a third loss in the Big Ten title game they won’t likely be eligible, which means Michigan could sneak into the top 14. If they don’t, the Capital One Bowl is good consolation prize, especially after the past few years. Fret not, Sparty supporters, as I just have them landing softly in the Outback Bowl. From there, I’m sure the Insight Bowl would love to match Nebraska back up with Texas, and given the Gator Bowl’s scruples I doubt they would hesitate to take Penn State. Iowa’s large traveling fanbase should be a slam dunk for the Car Care Bowl (of Texas!). Form there, there’s a bevy of unattractive options at 6-6 and 7-5, such as Northwestern, Purdue, Ohio State, and Illinois. The only two bowls left are the TicketCity Bowl and Little Ceasar’s Pizza Bowl, so I’ll go ahead and take the biggest “names” for those two, with the Buckeyes going to Dallas and Illinois to Detroit, leaving Purdue and Northwestern to fend for themselves.

Pac-12
With Oregon and Stanford in the BCS and USC ineligible, the picture looks pretty bleak if you’re a bowl affiliated with the Pac-12. I actually have Utah winning the Pac-12 South and getting to an 8-4 record, so you know what, I’ll go ahead and put them in the Alamo. The Holiday is next up. I want to put Washington there but they went to San Diego last year. UCLA is also 5-4 in conference but they’re also actually awful and may fire their coach after the season. I’ll go ahead and put them there though and send Washington El Paso. That leaves me 6-6 Arizona State and Cal, so I’ll send the Sun Devils to Vegas and let the Bears stay in their temporary home for the Fight Hunger Bowl.

SEC
Arkansas is the jewel of the remaining SEC teams and will certainly end up in the Capital One Bowl. Of course, that means we have to figure out someone else to send to the Cotton Bowl. That’ll be between Georgia and South Carolina most likely, so I’ll put UGA in the Outback and send the Gamecocks to Dallas. Auburn’s the only team left at this point with a winning record, so I’ll set up Tigers-Tigers in the Chick-fil-a. The Gator is the next up, and well, it’s so easy to put the Gators there. (Almost… too easy.) I’ll go ahead and put the Vols in the Music City, leaving us 2 teams and bowls! Memphis is basically the capital of Mississippi anyway, so that makes Miss State a natural fit for the Liberty and relegates Vandy to the Compass.

At-large Resolution
At this point, I still need four teams for the New Mexico, New Orleans, Military, and Fight Hunger Bowls. Northwestern and Purdue will probably go somewhere, so I’ll put Northwestern in the Military and Purdue in the Fight Hunger. I figure 8-4 Temple will get a bid somewhere, so let’s go with the New Orleans Bowl. That leaves us the New Mexico bowl… this is a guess, but I’ll go ahead and put 8-4 FIU there.

THWG Thought of the Day: 11/20

noreply@blogger.com (asimperson) — Sun, 20 Nov 2011 19:30:00 +0000

It is time, once again, for To Hell With Georgia week here.

As usual, this opening message will be short, and sweet. I will leave you with one succinct thought: To Hell With Georgia.

This Weekend in College Football: Week 12

noreply@blogger.com (asimperson) — Sat, 19 Nov 2011 11:28:00 +0000

Before we begin: what the heck, Oklahoma State? With that out of the way...

As usual, all times Eastern and all predictions wrong.

Noon:

Nebraska @ Michigan (ESPN): This could well be the most interesting game of the weekend, in terms of competitiveness. I think, however, Michigan's ability to play some semblance of a defense (imagine saying that any of the past three years) will allow them to prevail in the end.
Wisconsin @ Illinois (ESPN2): Dusting themselves off after two straight losses knocked them out of the nation title picture, the Badgers have got their offense rolling again. Meanwhile, Ron Zook is walking out of press conferences. I like the Badgers.
Kansas @ Texas Agricultural and Mechanical (FSN): If there's one team TAMU probably won't blow a double-digit second half lead to, it's Kansas.
Cincinnati @ Rutgers (ESPNU): Speaking of walking out of press conferences, that's what I'm tempting to do anytime anyone asks me to make sense of the Big East. I'll take the Bearcats out of a sense of hope and desperation.
Indiana @ Michigan State (BTN): Three low-level Big Ten games! Sparty looks to preserve its lead in the Legends division, which they should do easily.
Minnesota @ Northwestern (BTN): Minnesota's shown flashes of maybe not being a complete doormat these last few weeks, but Northwestern should still win in the end.
Iowa @ Purdue (BTN): Outside of their shocking win over Ohio State, Purdue hasn't really shown they can score any points. Iowa doesn't score a lot but it should be enough.
Kentucky @ Georgia (SEC): Will the dogs suffer a letdown against the SEC's second worst team? No, probably not. Unfortunately.

12:30: Georgia Tech @ Duke (ACC): Well, what can I say about the Virginia Tech game that hasn't been said? Yeah, that's what I thought.
This will be the 79th meeting of the Yellow Jackets and Blue Devils. Duke is actually Tech's third most-often played team, behind Auburn (92 games) and Georgia (105). The only other teams Tech has met even more than 50 times are Clemson (76) and Alabama (52). Somewhat surprisingly, the Jackets still sport a better winning percentage against Clemson (65.8%) than Duke (60.9%). However, while the Clemson series has been mostly even since the early 70's, the Duke series has not been. After Georgia Tech's low-point in the 70's and early-80's, the series has been all Tech - Duke has only won twice since 1990.
Duke is not the ACC's most awful team this year - that honor lies with Boston College. However, that doesn't mean the Jackets can overlook them. One need look no further than Ames, Iowa after the events of last night to remember that anything can happen on any day in college football. Virginia Tech came out against the Blue Devils and, were it not for 3 missed FGs, could have nearly lost the game. It will be critical for Tech to be on their game and press their advantage against one of the few teams they will are physically superior than. Other than special teams, Tech's Achilles's heel this year has been pass defense. After a heroic effort in the Clemson game, Virginia Tech continually got behind our secondary and was able to stretch the defense. Duke is 27th in the country in passing yards, which is partially due to necessity. However, Sean Renfree is a decent quarterback who can burn us pretty easily if the secondary allows him to.

3:00:

Tulsa @ Texas-El Paso (CBSS): UTEP is up to its old tricks again - lose to Rice one week, beat East Carolina the next. That said, Tulsa should have little trouble dissecting them.
Maryland @ Wake Forest (ACC/FSN): I think we can pretty safely call Maryland awful at this point. Wake Forest should get their sixth win here.
Mississippi State @ Arkansas (CBS): Miss State should be able to score, but they just... can't. One of my favorite football writers said on Twitter last weekend that he thinks Dan Mullen tries to get too "cute" with the Urban Meyer-style spread offense, and I'm inclined to agree. Arkansas, meanwhile, fields one of the few actual offenses in the SEC and should win easily as long as they're not looking forward their huge showdown with LSU next Friday.
Texas Tech @ Missouri (ABC): As everyone on the Internet is saying, Texas Tech's victory over Oklahoma is becoming more and more inexplicable by the week. In their three games since then, they have been outscored 159-33. It wasn't just Oklahoma State, either - Iowa State put up 41, and Texas's moribund offense managed 52. Mizzou should win easily, even without Gary Pinkel on the sidelines due to his extremely ill-advised trip to Chili's.
Clemson @ North Carolina State (ABC/ESPN): What better way to follow up a loss to the worst team in the ACC than by an explicable upset over Clemson? Yeah.. I'm not seeing it either. Though after Wake the Tigers are almost just begging to lose again, aren't they?
Pennsylvania State @ Ohio State (ABC/ESPN): Okay yes Ohio State may have just lost to Purdue but still it's hard to imagine Penn State winning any more games this year.
Southern Methodist @ Houston (FSN): Well, based on the number of times I've said "win easily" so far it's not hard to see why Gameday decided to make its annual mid-major trip out to Houston this weekend. And that was before Houston because the last remaining undefeated mid-major last weekend, and before the events last night that made them one of the only two remaining undefeated teams in the country. Meanwhile, SMU has lost to the other two decent C-USA teams it has played by pretty wide margins and just lost to Navy last week. So... this may end up being a blowout too.
Miami @ South Florida (ESPNU): One of these schools is actually in a geographic region I would call "south Florida" and it's not the one named "South Florida". With that out of the way, USF did nothing between its upset of Notre Dame the first weekend of the year and beating Syracuse last weekend. I would expect them to get right back on the losing side of the ledger in this one, though.
Colorado State @ Texas Christian (Versus): The Missed Field Goal Heard 'Round College football resonated and wide (... right) last weekend, but now TCU has to keep up their 5 game winning streak against the less notable segments of the Mountain West in order to clinch their last mid-major conference title.

4:00: Boston College @ Notre Dame (NBC): I would say that BC is probably the single worst team on Notre Dame's schedule this year, and keep in mind this is a schedule that includes Purdue, Navy, and Maryland. They should win easily.

7:00:

Louisiana State @ Mississippi (ESPN): The SEC's two most colorful coaching personalities clash in what should be a LSU rout, but does Houston Nutt have one last trick up his sleeve? (I.e., "lose to Louisiana Tech and then suspend 3 of your offensive skill position starters for the game and win".) Well, no, probably not, but if Ole Miss does win the final score will be something like 9-8.
Central Florida @ East Carolina (FSN): This is been a down year for both teams, but at least ECU managed to beat UAB. (Yes, I know they just upset Southern Miss.)
Vanderbilt @ Tennessee (ESPNU): Let this sink in: Vanderbilt is favored to beat Tennessee. But I still don't know if I can pick the 'Dores because the last time Vandy was supposed to win this game they didn't. My heart says Vandy but my brain says Vols, so let's go with the latter.

7:30:

Virginia @ Florida State (ESPN2): Both of these teams have beaten Miami, which says something but I'm not entirely sure what. Nonetheless, FSU has their offensive mojo back and Virginia is not Wake Forest so the Seminoles should come out with a win.
Colorado @ California-Los Angeles (Versus): Note: even with a 25-point loss to Utah last weekend, the Bruins still have a shot to win the Pac-12 South. That said, Utah is better than Colorado, I'm pretty sure. This will be a terrible, sloppy, "defensive struggle" sort of a game but UCLA should still win and Rick Neuheisel will probably still get fired.

8:00:

Southern California @ Oregon (ABC): Oregon established pretty firmly last weekend that they are, in fact, still the team to beat in the Pac-12. USC has the talent to compete, but not the depth to stay with the Ducks. Expect the usual Oregon blueprint against good teams: a close first half followed by the Ducks simply wearing out the opposing defenses in the second half.
Oklahoma @ Baylor (ABC): Welcome back to the BCS title hunt, Sooners! Okay, yes, now beating Oklahoma State won't have the cachet it used to. Anyway, Baylor's all-everything QB Robert Griffin III will try his best to singlehandedly keep the Bears in this one but I just don't see how it can be enough against the Sooners.
Kansas State @ Texas (FX): Okay yes they didn't play in 2008 and 2009 but Kansas State has won three straight against Texas. I'm not sure if it's an upset at this point, but K-State has shown they can at least run with TAMU and Oklahoma State, and unlike Texas, those teams actually can play offense! So I'm taking the Wildcats.
Boise State @ San Diego State (CBSS): Boise once again finds itself picking up the pieces after a game gone horribly wrong, made even more painful by Oklahoma State's loss last night. San Diego State is not exactly chopped liver, but this is not last year's fiesty version either. I suspect the Broncos are once again the sort of team that picks up the pieces by laying waste to their next opponent, so I'll take them here.

10:15:

California @ Stanford (ESPN): The Big Game! Stanford Stadium is about 5 miles from my apartment out here, but by the time you read this I'll be more like 2000 miles away. Anyway, speaking of picking up the pieces from a bad loss, you really have to like Andrew Luck and company in this one, right?
New Mexico State @ Brigham Young (ESPNU): I'll confess I don't know that much about BYU, but they don't have one of the worst defense in the country, in stark contrast to Fresno State will let these Aggies put up 48 last weekend. So, yeah, I'll the Stormin' Mormons here.

And that's that. Bowl predictions may be delayed this weekend due to chaos.

Bowl Predictions 2011: Week 5

noreply@blogger.com (asimperson) — Tue, 15 Nov 2011 20:00:00 +0000

Here you go. This'll be another quick post, though.

Also, please appreciate I spent a lot of time fixing the HTML for the predictions page so the file is about half the size of what it's been in the past, which means you can now load the predictions even more quickly regardless of what platform you use to view them.

BCS: I expected Stanford to lose, so I sort have been accounting for that. However, I didn't really expect Boise to blow their shot again, so mid-major autobid now falls to Case Keenum and Co. in Houston. If Oklahoma State or, God forbid, LSU lose? Then I have no idea. I really don't want to see a rematch, and personally if Oklahoma beats Oklahoma State they may well be the best one loss team in the land - especially as it becomes easier to chalk up their loss to TTU as a complete and utter fluke.
ACC: Things again went pretty much according to plan here, and I still have a surplus of ACC teams.
Big East: There is no plan here. The Big East is the opposite of a plan. Much like matter and anti-matter, if the Big East and Plans ever met it they would cancel each other out and likely result in a serious explosion.
Big Ten: I guess Wisconsin will win? Who knows? Anyway this is pretty much a one-bid league this year. I actually have both Purdue and Northwestern making bowl games, but I had to put them in as at-larges for bowls that can't fill their slots.
Big 12: Oklahoma and Oklahoma State are likely both in if everything goes according to plan. But in what order?
Pac-12: I have both Oregon and Stanford in, as this seems like it'll be an especially dire year for the BCS at-large pool. The Pac-12 bowl teams pool is shallow as well, but it would be interesting to see how bad UCLA would lose to TCU.
SEC: I went ahead and put Vandy up to the vaunted 6-6 mark, but I don't think even the hometown Music City Bowl would take them over the fervent fans of Miss State.
Everyone else: Notre Dame seems to me to be on a collision course to get a pretty good "name" game in the Champs Sports Bowl. If you're wondering about Boise, they could still get in, but they need TCU to lose twice because according to the rules you need to be a conference champ to get in as an at-large mid-major team. (It's right there on the page, even!)

This Weekend in College Football: Week 11

noreply@blogger.com (asimperson) — Sat, 12 Nov 2011 04:49:00 +0000

As usual, all times Eastern and all predictions wrong.

Noon:

Florida @ South Carolina (CBS): Why is this game on CBS? Who knows! Suffice it to say, if this game ends up 9-6 it will be a pretty safe bet to chalk it up to offensive ineptitude than to defense. Florida has speed but no apparent idea of how to use it, while South Carolina is decimated by injuries, suspensions, and dismissals. In the end, though, I still expect the Gamecocks to prevail.
Oklahoma State @ Texas Tech (ABC): I think we pretty thoroughly know the answer to which Texas Tech team showed up against Oklahoma: not the one that has showed up for their other 8 games. Cowboys roll.
West Virginia @ Cincinnati (ABC): Flip a coin. The coin has about as much of an idea about the Big East as I do at this point. I'll take Cincy for the sake of my bowl predictions.
Texas @ Missouri (FX): I don't think either TAMU or Mizzoui's Big 12 finales are going quite how they expected. Texas should get one last parting shot.
Nebraska @ Pennsylvania State (ESPN): All I can say about this is: Nebraska has advantages both on the field and off, losses to Northwestern notwithstanding.
Michigan State @ Iowa (ESPN2): The Big Ten is almost as befuddling as the Big East. I, uh, I'll take Sparty here I guess?
Marshall @ Tulsa (FSN): Marshall doesn't score a lot and can give up points in bunches. Not good things against Tulsa.
Wake Forest @ Clemson (ESPNU): This Wake team can bite you, but the Tigers shouldn't really have any issues.
Ohio State @ Purdue (BTN): Buckeyes, I guess.
Rice @ Northwestern (BTN): This is not a good Rice team. Northwestern should roll.
Kentucky @ Vanderbilt (SEC): It's your yearly SEC East slapfight! Both enter at 4-5, but Vandy has generally at least been able to hang with the SEC powers this year while Kentucky has, for the most part, been getting blown out. I like the Dores to get to 5-5.

12:30: North Carolina State @ Boston College (ACC): This BC team is just plain hapless. Wolfpack should roll.

3:00: Duke @ Virginia (ACC/FSN): Virginia Tech can clinch the Coastal now with a UVA loss, but despite me being generally down on UVA I don't think they'll lose to Duke.

3:30:

Auburn @ Georgia (CBS): I personally thought that putting Texas A&M in the SEC East is really lame. The only reason, it appears to me, that the SEC has "designated rivals" is because Alabama wants to play Tennessee every year and Auburn wants to play UGA every year. Why not just move Auburn and Alabama to the East and scrap the designated rivals thing altogether? It'll be made up for because then the divisions will cycle through each other more quickly. Anyway, I guess I have to take Georgia here.
Miami @ Florida State (ABC/ESPN): Boy, this is sure isn't what it used to be, eh? FSU should roll.
Michigan @ Illinois (ABC/ESPN): Well, Michigan looks to regain its offensive mojo once again. Luckily for them, Illinois has been especially hapless as of late.
Texas Agricultural and Mechanical @ Kansas State (ABC): TAMU looks suddenly vulnerable defensively, but I'm not really sure K-State has the offensive talent to take advantage. Nonetheless, TAMU's second half woes are well documented at this point and so only with some hesitation I'm picking them.
Navy @ Southern Methodist (FSN): SMU has looked pretty good against the teams they've been expected to beat whilst getting clobbered by the powers of Conference USA. Meanwhile, Navy just hasn't been, well, good this year at all. I like the Mustangs here.
Texas Christian @ Boise State (Versus): It's kind of funny that the Mountain West bent over backward to move this game from Fort Worth to Boise in response to TCU's then-move to the Big East. In the meantime, Boise is now probably going to move to the Big East, so in the end it sort really didn't matter. Either way, I don't really like TCU this year at all - so I'll take Boise to continue their run.
Rutgers vs. Army (@New York, NY; CBSS): Because the world needs more football games at baseball stadiums! Rutger's never ending quest to become New York City's college football team continues as they should probably win easily over Army.
Wisconsin @ Minnesota (BTN): Minnesota's shown some signs of life over the past couple of weeks, but I can't really comprehend how they can beat Wisconsin.

3:45: Washington @ Southern California (FX): U-dub put forth a valiant effort against Oregon last weekend. Will a valiant effort be enough against USC, though? I'm not really sure. I like the Trojans a lot at this point, though their lack of depth is always a concern.

6:00: Tennessee @ Arkansas (ESPN2): Tennessee has no offense. Like, I think they just let the other team play offense the whole time and hope to run back punt returns and interceptions. This is not a good recipe against what looks like the most competent offense in the SEC.

7:00: Western Kentucky @ Louisiana State (ESPNU): I think LSU's going to win this one. I know I'm going out on a limb here, but...

7:30:

Louisiana Tech @ Mississippi (SEC): Ole Miss might not win this one. After all, we need Houston Nutt's last ride around the SEC to be as hilarious as possible, and so they need to be as bad as possible when they play LSU next weekend. And, with losses to Miss State and Southern Miss already, can LaTech afford to go 0-3 against the state of Mississippi? I think not. Bulldogs maybe pull off the upset. Probably. Well, perhaps.
Maryland vs. Notre Dame (@Landover, MD; NBC): I meant to look up if this was really a neutral site game or just a Maryland home game played over in Landover. Either way, I like the Irish here as Randy Esdall's dismantling effort continues. (I assume that's the oppose of a rebuilding effort, right?)

7:45: Alabama @ Mississippi State (ESPN): Yeah... yeah... Alabama will rain fire down upon the Bulldogs on this night, and blow them out... 24-3.

8:00:

Oregon @ Stanford (ABC): Okay, here's the main event folks. And, frankly, all season I've liked the Ducks better. Stanford's year should have been last year, when they were more well-rounded on both sides of the ball. Stanford has been challenged really only once all year, when they needed Andrew Luck to just about singlehandedly beat USC. Now, if you had to pick a guy who do that for you, you could could certainly do worse than Andrew Luck. But I just don't think it will be enough against Oregon.
Central Florida @ Southern Mississippi (CBSS): UCF picked a good week to have a good old-fashioned recruiting scandal. Regardless, USM should continue their march to the C-USA title game.

9:15: Idaho @ Brigham Young (ESPN2): Idaho is not very good and stuff. The BYU team isn't exactly awe-inspiring or anything but they should still win easily.

10:15: Hawaii @ Nevada (ESPNU): Now here's the WAC-tion you want right here. Expect points, and lots of them, but also expect the Wolfpack to emerge victorious at the end.

10:30: Arizona State @ Washington State (Versus): Arizona State losing to UCLA may be one of the more inexplicable upsets of the year. Will Sun Devils get upset again in Pullman? Well, probably not.

This Week in College Football: Week 11

noreply@blogger.com (asimperson) — Wed, 09 Nov 2011 04:01:00 +0000

A special edition, looking at the weekday games for this week.

As usual, all times Eastern and all predictions wrong.

Tuesday
(Just pretend this was posted on time for these games.)
8:00:

Northern Illinois @ Bowling Green (ESPN2): The weather may be getting colder, but rest assured the MACtion is just heating up. Both of the teams involved last week's torrid 63-60 affair return tonight, but this time with different partners. However, Bowling Green has not displayed the same proficiency in the offensive arts as NIU has, which is likely bad news for the home team here.
Western Michigan @ Toledo (ESPNU): Now, if you're looking for a repeat of last week's game then this is the place to be, most likely. That said, the Rockets looked pretty unstoppable in the MAC until they ran into NIU, so I'll go with them.

Wednesday
8:00: Miami @ Temple (ESPN): The MACtion isn't just confined to Tuesday nights, though. Oh no. Miami is dead last in the country in rushing, but rest assured they can throw it around, though against the only solid MAC team they've played (Toledo) they lost 49-28. Temple is the opposite - yes, they've lost to Toledo as well, but they are 8th in the country in rushing but 115th in passing. Ohio exploded for an unheard of 35 points against the Owls last weekend, so we may be in for more scoring than Temple's stingy 12.8 points allowed per game may make you think. I still like the Owls though.

Thursday
7:30: Ohio @ Central Michigan (ESPNU): Remember, Central Michigan is the bad directional Michigan this year. Bobcats should roll.

8:00:

Virginia Tech @ Georgia Tech (ESPN): [N.B.: "Tech" refers to Georgia Tech here. -ed] Every year there's been a Coastal Division of the ACC, there's been this game. And the winner of this game has been the Coastal Division champ. Twice has the good Tech won this one. The 2006 game I remember because my old cell phone still has a text message from my brother on September 30, 2006 on it: "Omg 21-0 gt" - I got said text because I was out of town that Saturday and wasn't able to watch but the last 10 minutes or so of the game.
The marbles are once again on the line with those one - though it should be noted due to GT's loss to Virginia that Tech cannot clinch without another Virginia loss. Both teams are coming off bye weeks, which may well not be what Tech needed because the worst thing that happened in that Clemson game was halftime. (Well, other than the offsides non-call.)
In way, these teams could not be farther apart going into the game, in terms of the game they played going into this. Georgia Tech played their best game since 2009 against Clemson, dominating in all phases in the game. VPI meanwhile struggled to put points on the board against Duke. The Blue Devils missed three FGs as well, any two of which could've allowed them to pull off the upset.
Not that it matters, of course. Going into a Thursday night game in Atlanta is, objectively, much more exciting than going into Wallace Wade Stadium at any time. Add in the ticket to a rematch against Clemson being on the line and that puts together a recipe for a huge game. Who will win? I don't know. I like our chances if we play like we did against Clemson, but the odds us playing as good as we did against the Tigers and VPI playing as bad as they did against the Blue Devils is low, as I just said.
It will come down to the usual things: defense and special teams. Special teams have been a tremendous concern for Georgia Tech this year, while it looks like Beamerball has been back in full force in Blacksburg. Even if Tech managers to avoid punting or kicking field goals (the ideal scenario), kickoff coverage has still been horrendous outside the Clemson game. The Georgia Tech defense, meanwhile, played its best game since John Tenuta was let go after 2007. They were able to confuse Tajh Boyd with a variety of zone and corner blitzes, which worked mainly because the secondary (and Jamea Thomas especially) played the games of their lives out on the Isles of Man Coverage. It feels funny to type this when you consider that Clemson still ran up nearly 400 yards of offense, but outside of one Sammy Watkins TD catch their offense was kept in check. (17 points was, and probably will remain, Clemson's lowest point total of the season.) The other key: they weren't on the field that much. The GT offense held on the to the ball for nearly two-thirds of the game, including the soul-sucking nine minute drive in the fourth quarter that saw Clemson get the ball back down two scores with two minutes to go.
Suffice it to say, I think the Jackets will need similar heroics to prevail over the Hokies.
Houston @ Tulane (CBSS): Houston should be able to name its own score against the hapless Green Wave.

Friday
8:00: South Florida @ Syracuse (ESPN2): USF has had a very symmetric season, but not in a good way: they started off with four straight (including an increasingly more inexplicably upset of Notre Dame) and now have dropped four straight. Inexplicable is a pretty excellent word to describe the Big East as a whole, though. The Orange have dropped two straight after their dominating upset over West Virginia and sits at the precipice of bowl eligibility. They'll probably get it, but the problem is when? I say here, most likely, because I've really given up on trying to predict anything about the Big East - the 'Cuse could lose this one and go knock off Cincinnati next week, which, let's face it, is probably the most likely scenario.

Enjoy the rest of your week, and see if you can't catch the tail end of the Toledo-WMU game. That looks like a good one. Otherwise, I'll be back with Saturday's games sometime Friday or Saturday.

Bowl Predictions 2011: Week 4

noreply@blogger.com (asimperson) — Mon, 07 Nov 2011 11:08:00 +0000

When will I ever learn that "it'll probably be easier this week" is pretty much a surefire way to make sure that isn't the case?

Let's get down to business and see why. You can follow along with the picks in their usual place.

BCS
The BCS was the single hardest thing to pick this week. With the chaos in the Big Ten, figuring out the last team into the BCS picture was extremely difficult. Here's why.

Currently, I still have LSU and Oklahoma State running the table. I am not entirely convinced about the latter but trying to figure out which 1-loss team is most worthy, or if Boise State is, is even more difficult to figure out. (If Stanford beats Oregon this weekend, that will make my job easier.) I immediately slot Alabama into LSU's vacated Sugar Bowl spot but even figuring out who will replace Oklahoma State in the Fiesta is difficult. I have the following automatic bids: LSU (BCS #1), Oklahoma State (BCS #2), Boise State (MWC champion ranked in top 12), Oregon (Pac-12 champ), Wisconsin (Big Ten champ), Clemson (ACC champ), and Cincinnati (Big East champ). This accounts for 7 of the 10 available BCS bids. Currently, I only have 8 undefeated or 1-loss teams (not counting Houston), and the only two I didn't mention above are Alabama and Stanford. Due to the Andrew Luck effect, I assume Stanford will be a desirable at-large team and thus will get Oklahoma State's Fiesta Bowl bid.

Now, at this point the only remaining bids are the 3 at-large bids in the Fiesta, Sugar, and Orange bowls. The selections go in that order. There are two remaining automatic qualifiers: Boise State and Cincinnati. This means that there will be a 2-loss team somewhere in the BCS. But who? This could affect who the bowl picks. And this is where the Big Ten shenanigans come in.

With Nebraska's shocking upset to Northwestern, this means there will be no Big Ten team with less than two losses at the end of the year (I think it's safe to assume Penn State will lose one of their remaining games (I have them losing two more, actually)). This also means Nebraska has two conference losses. Michigan State only has one conference loss, and I don't think they will lose again this year. So they will win the Legends division, where I have them losing to Wisconsin in the Big Ten title game. That would give Michigan State three losses. Whereas Nebraska - having continued winning through the end of the season - should be able to rise back up into the top 14 of the BCS.

So, yeah, it's probably unfair, but them's the breaks. Thanks to BCS hot-potato and backroom dealing, I went ahead and figured the Fiesta would suck it up and take Boise, setting up a game that sounds epic, at least in name: Alabama versus Nebraska in the Sugar Bowl. (I wasn't surprised to find the two schools had met in the Sugar Bowl before - in 1967. Unfortunately, it apparently wasn't much of a classic as the Tide won 34-7.)

In any BCS scenario, I figure the odds of the Orange avoiding an ACC-Big East matchup are slim.

ACC
The only ACC team that can possibly have only 1-loss is the ACC champ. I currently have this team as Clemson.

Thanks to unexpectedly strong seasons from Wake Forest, NC State, and Virginia the ACC should fill out its primary bowl obligations this year and then some. The first slots after the BCS are easy: Virginia Tech to the Chick-fil-a and Florida State to the Champs Sports bowl (setting up a good "name" matchup if the Champs uses their option to select Notre Dame). This brings us to the Sun Bowl. According to the ACC selection rules, the Sun can choose from the following: Wake Forest, Georgia Tech, Virginia, NC State, and Miami. Miami went to the Sun Bowl last year so I figure they're out. I don't Virginia or Wake are known for traveling terribly well, and so I've put GT there. This allows the rest of the dominoes to fall into place. I've put NC State into the Belk Bowl (formerly the Car Care Bowl), followed by Miami to the Music City and Virginia to the Independence. Wake Forest finally gets picked for the Military Bowl, mostly because ACC rules prevent a 3-5 UNC from being picked above them. This allows North Carolina to be shipped out to the Kraft Fights Hunger Bowl in San Fransisco, fulfilling the ACC option as a backup for the Pac-12 or Army.

Big East
If it seems like the Big East selections were drawn out of a hat, well, they very well could have been. For the sake of my sanity, I picked Cincy to run the table followed by Louisville, WVU, and Pitt. Oy. They will have an extra team, though, since I have Syracuse getting 6-6, so I put them in the Military Bowl slot the Big 12 won't come anywhere close to filling.

Big 12
The Big 12 is pretty much the two Oklahoma schools and everyone else. Texas seems to have gotten its act together so I slotted them into the Cotton. Everything else straightforward, though Baylor kind of gets the shaft. If Iowa State or Texas Tech and manage to win another game that would really be a boon for the conference but considering their schedules I don't see it happening.

Big Ten
The Big Ten is a mess right now. I talked about the Nebraska thing above, and that was mostly just me going "well, someone has to have a 2-bid conference that probably doesn't deserve it" and so I figured a 2-loss team from the Big Ten would fit the bill. Michigan State will probably still land in the Capital One Bowl, so that's not a huge deal. I have both Michigan and Penn State going 9-3, with the Outback bid going to the Fightin' Paternos and shipping Michigan off to Arizona. The rest of the slate is pretty "meh" and straightforward, though even after four weeks it still feels weird projecting Ohio State into second-tier bowl games.

Pac-12
Boy does this conference miss USC being eligible or what? Speaking of crazy upsets, Northwestern over Nebraska was shocking, yes, but not Earth-shaking (well, metaphorically considering recent events in Oklahoma). UCLA over Arizona State, though? Now there's an upset. Consider this: the team that got pantsed by Arizona only a few Thursdays ago and had all but officially announced they'd fired the head coach is now in a 3-way tie for the Pac-12 South lead. Now, I figure Arizona State will still win the division in the end, but still. Also, don't look but Utah should get to 6-6 pretty easily over the next few weeks, if not 7-5. I tried to resist it, but it was just too easy match them against TCU in the Las Vegas Bowl if for no other reason than to get Utah partisans to say, "wait, we joined a BCS conference and we still ended up in the Las Vegas Bowl... and playing one of our former MWC rivals?" I had some hesitation though because that meant Cal ended up in the Fights Hunger Bowl, which is being played in the stadium that's serving as their home field this year. Well, if nothing else I guess they'll be used to it.

SEC
SEC partisans will no doubt howl about the 2-team limit for BCS participation, because if Arkansas's only losses are to LSU and Alabama then they should easily stay in the BCS top 14. Nonetheless, the BCS slate was pretty straightforward, though I am hoping I'm wrong and Vandy gets up to 6-6.

Everyone else
The Sun Belt and MAC will benefit, as usual, from having surplus eligible teams. I still have Western Kentucky on track to make their first ever bowl game. Overall, though, there's nothing Earthshattering going on here other than an undefeated Houston being stuck in the Liberty Bowl, but at least that makes it a good bet for Conference USA to make it two straight in the game. This week not having enough teams does not appear to be a concern, and from what I remember while doing the predictions, it appears we'll be okay this year. (Though honestly one of my favorite bowl system doomsday scenarios that no one talks about is the specter of a team with a losing record making it into a bowl game.)

Anyway, next week probably be just as difficult and confusing, though which way it ultimately goes may be decided just up the road from me here in California. Until then...