So here we are again. These aren’t proofread yet, so consider them beta-quality.

I’ll share with you some of the reasoning I can remember:

• I don’t really see anyone passing LSU in the polls at this point unless they lose. I think the only team that has a chance is an undefeated Kansas with a victory over Oklahoma in the Big 12 Title game.
• With Boston College losing, I’m now calling for Virginia Tech to win the ACC.
• Provided it gets two teams into the BCS, the Pac-10 will probably be the only major conference unable to fulfill its bowl bids. Of course, I think other conferences would have similar issues if they had a 9-game schedule as well. Most BCS conference teams tend to win their OOC games unless they schedule real games or suck, and in the former case you rarely have a team that schedules more than one. Anyway, in the end the system doesn’t reward not scheduling patsies for all but the top teams (where scheduling makes a difference), so yeah.
• Meanwhile, the SEC, ACC, and Big Ten are all in danger of having too many teams qualify for bowls. I have Miami not even making a bowl from the ACC. In the SEC, Mississippi State sits at the 5-win mark and has a game with terrible Ole Miss remaining. Vandy also sits at the 5-win mark but will not be favored in any of their remaining games. As for the ACC, Georgia Tech would do well to finish with a 4-4 in-conference mark after last Thursday’s debacle. We probably have the easiest remaining in-conference schedule (@Duke, UNC), at any rate. I predict the following 4 teams will be clamoring for the last 4 spots in the ACC bowl hierarchy: GT, FSU, Maryland, and Wake Forest. Of those, I only see GT and Wake finishing with 7-5 (or better) records, meaning that they must be picked ahead of FSU and Maryland.
• Florida jumped from 20th to 15th place in the BCS this week, which means I’m placing them in the Sugar Bowl in place of LSU.
• Michigan didn’t rise like I anticipated them doing. Provided they don’t again this week, I will have to drop them from the Rose and figure out who is going to go there.
• Since Arizona State didn’t fall that much, I figure they’d be a good choice for the Fiesta provided they don’t lose again.

Anyway, that’s all I got for now. Questions? Comments? Feel free to leave them.

It’s that time again! Some thoughts:

• Auburn and Michigan in the BCS? “This is madness!” you say. I say, “This is Sparta the 2007 college football season!” Michigan has been soaring up the polls and the BCS rankings, and if they lose only to Ohio State in the season finale they should still meet the golden criteria (top 14, 9 wins) to get picked as a replacement for Ohio State by the Rose. As for Auburn, they’re almost in the top 14 and will continue to rise as long as they win out. Alabama could find themselves here if they win out as well. They have the best chance to qualify since the SEC East is too busy beating itself up (see: Kentucky, Florida). Also, Hawaii is getting to a point where if they win out they might get an auto-bid, but they really need to beat someone that will get them ranked in the computers. For now, I have predicted Arizona State and Kansas to be 1-loss teams that get at-large spots, though that last spot in the Sugar is something of a tossup. (The Sugar is also where Hawaii would probably fall if they qualified, since they pick last this year.)
• There are a few 6-6 teams that didn’t make it but I don’t remember who they are at the moment. The SEC may qualify both Miss State and Vanderbilt, though the latter is less likely. (Miss State should be favored to beat Ole Miss at this point, whereas Vandy will be an underdog in all its remaining games.)
• I’ve seen some projects put GT into the Champs Sports, but I think it’s more likely we fall to the ACC 5/6/7 rigmarole. Also, if nothing else, I could at least go to Nashville for a bowl game if that were to happen. But if we lose 2 more we could find ourselves out west.
• Though I think Miami will actually be lucky to qualify for a bowl at this point, they probably won’t make a return trip to Boise, so I’ve swapped them and FSU’s proper places.
• For now, I’ve reverted the Gator and Sun back to their more natural conferences, as I really doubt the Sun Bowl wants UConn.
• Intriguing projected match-ups: USC-Texas (Holiday), Michigan-Oregon (Rose; can the Wolverines not get blown out this time?). I guess that’s not that good of a list? Eh, that’s the issue with these early projections.

Week 2 of my horrendous guesses trying to put some order into this season that lacks any. Some notes:

• I really have no idea what to make of the BCS situation. For starters, who will the Rose Bowl want if Ohio State runs the table? There is no way any other Big Ten team is going to qualify for the BCS. And even outside of that, who are going to be the at-large teams? Of my at-large qualifiers, only Kansas might have 1-loss. Madness.
• The Big Ten is so mediocre this year that they will have 9 bowl eligible teams. This week I was able to fill all spots, so I gave Indiana and Northwestern the shaft. The SEC may also have another qualifier, so I gave Arkansas the shaft, especially if they end up firing Nutt.
• I still have Tech in the Music City bowl, but more realistically they will end up on the West Coast if they lose more than 1 game the rest of the way.
• These result more of what is going on right now than out-and-out predictions, which is why my stated prediction of Michigan beating Ohio State isn’t on here. Also, these try to somewhat more firmly rooted in reality.

Here we go kids. Here they are. I kind of explain the process during last week’s first set. This year for our first week I’ll try to make sense of the season and take a conference-by-conference look at the predictions, as well as a BCS section. That said, this is all pretty much a crap shoot the way this season is going.

The BCS:
The BCS rules are laid out on the prediction page, so I won’t bother here. What I will say is that my process for the BCS goes something along the lines of synthesizing the current standings with what I think will happen. So for now this yields a title game matchup of Ohio State and South Florida. I don’t think USF is as illegitimate as a lot of people may think. They have out-of-conference wins over UNC and at Auburn, and a victory over still highly-regarded West Virginia.

Other potential title game contenders include the other teams in the top 5: BC, Oklahoma, and LSU. LSU was (rightly) not penalized for losing to Kentucky, with some losses by other top teams could find themselves in New Orleans. Of course, according to me, they’ll end up there anyway, but we’ll get there in a bit.

The other conference winners, according to me, will be Boston College, Oklahoma, LSU, and Oregon. While a loss in Blacksburg Thursday does sink BC’s title game chances (well, in all likelihood), it does not end their ACC Title game chances. Oregon is my pick to come out of the three-way choas created by Cal’s loss to Oregon State. So they all go to their respective bowls (Orange, Fiesta, Sugar, and Rose).

So the Rose has the first shot at the remaining eligible teams, since they lose Ohio State to the title game. And, well, I have my doubts they’ll be excited about what they see. There is history of SEC teams going to Rose Bowls in the distant past (i.e., before World War II Alabama went to a few games and Georgia Tech even went to one). So I put Kentucky there, assuming they’ll do well the rest of the way. I figure West Virginia will be able to go to a BCS game and land in the Orange (though they could end up in the Rose as well, sending Kentucky to the Orange). I like Cal going to the Fiesta, though in retrospect perhaps this should be USC, or maybe even someone else because for my Oregon scenario they each need 2 losses. I’ll re-examine this next week. Moving on, I then put Kansas in the Sugar because they’ll be the most appealing team left.

The ACC:
Since I have BC going to the Orange Bowl, then my predicted ACC runner-up will be Virginia Tech, who then will go to the Gator.

It gets a lot harder after that.

Thanks to their good record right now, I have Virginia in the Gator Bowl spot, though I doubt this will remain the status quo. Clemson slots nicely to the Champs Spots Bowl, and then we have the ACC# 5/6/7 cluster for the Music City, Car Care, and Emerald Bowls. In perhaps a bit of homerism, I have Maryland getting exiled out west while Florida State and Georgia Tech go to the Car Care and Music City Bowls. Assuming Miami loses to FSU, they’ll bring up the rear and make a return trip to Boise, though the league may send Maryland or FSU there instead.

The Big East:
I have both USF and WVU going to the BCS. The Big East #2 pick goes to either the Gator or Sun Bowls (see the page), and so this year I see Cincinnati going to the Sun Bowl (otherwise, the Sun will be stuck with Big East teams in 2008 and 2009). I like Rutgers to go Charlotte to play FSU and UConn to go up north, leaving Louisville to salvage to the remains of their season in Birmingham.

The Big 12:
The choas has hit especially hard in the Big 12, with both of the traditional Big 12 South powers losing before they played each other. Nonetheless, I see Oklahoma winning the conference and having a Fiesta. However, assuming Kansas’s only loss is to OU in the Big 12 Title Game, then they could very easily still qualify for the BCS, so I’ve slotted them into the Sugar Bowl.

The Cotton Bowl will take the aerial show of Texas Tech, sending Texas out to the official start of interest-worthy bowls, the Holiday Bowl. TAMU slots in nicely to the Alamo Bowl, followed by Kansas State going to the Gator (see the Big East for why). The sixth pick goes to one of the two games that no one will see, the Insight Bowl, due to being on the NFL Network, unfortunate if you’re a fan of the Missouri Tigers. The next slot is the Independence Bowl, where I send Colorado, and last and certainly least is the other game no one will see, the Texas Bowl, where the greatest offense on Earth, Oklahoma State, winds up.

The Big Ten:
After everyone’s favorite “whoops!” moment of the year (Michigan losing to Appalachian State), the Big Ten was written off. And it probably still should be, as it will probably only send Ohio State to the BCS, leaving the Rose without its coveted Big Ten team as none will probably qualify.

Michigan, at the rate they are going, may well finish runner-up in the conference and end up with a nice payout in the Capital One Bowl, a nice finish after the way they started. I sent Penn State to the Outback, followed by Illinois going to San Antonio. Indiana finishes their surprising season in Orlando. Wisconsin finishes its disappointing season in Tempe, with Michigan State staying local and going to the Motor City Bowl.

“But wait!” you may say, “what about Purdue and Northwestern?” Indeed. Purdue has 5 wins and Northwestern has 4, and both should/could qualify. In the past, the Big Ten has had trouble filling its 7 bids but this year appears not to be the care. Parity is good for the old bottom line, it seems. I see Northwestern getting the shaft and Purdue (spoiler alert!) going to the Armed Forces Bowl to fill in for a Pac-10 team.

Conference USA:
Conference USA has a hearty 5 bids, the most of any mid-major. I predict East Carolina to win the whole shebang and earn a bid to the Liberty Bowl.

More than anywhere else, mid-majors generally have teams picked out-of-order to increase the chance of the game actually selling tickets. This is why I almost always pick Southern Miss to go to the GMAC bowl in Mobile, as it’s about a 2 hour drive away. My predicted title game runner-up, Tulsa, then ends up in the Papajohns.com Bowl, which always makes me wonder why they just don’t drop the stupid “dot-com” like everyone else did 4 years ago (c.f., “insight.com Bowl” -> Insight Bowl”). The last two bids are held by geographically-named bowls (New Orleans and Hawaii), where the conference might be represented by UTEP and Central Florida.

Independents:
Navy will easily qualify for its berth in the Poinsettia Bowl. At 1-6, Notre Dame will probably not reel off a 5-game winnings streak and miss a bowl game for the first time since 2003. Were I a lesser man, I would make a quip about how this helps postpone them extending their consecutive bowl games without a win streak. I’m not, so I won’t.

The MAC:
The Mid-American Conference has 3 bids. Though it says its champion can go to either the Motor City or GMAC Bowls, due to geographic proximity the champion almost always goes to the Motor City. This will probably happen again, with Central Michigan heading to Detroit. I then like Miami of Ohio to go Mobile and Ball State to go to Toronto.

The MWC:
The Mountain West Conference has 4 bids. Its champion goes to Las Vegas, and BYU is destroying most of its conference foes so far, so I’ll send them there. Wyoming goes to San Diego, Air Force to the Armed Forces Bowl, and then New Mexico to the New Mexico Bowl. Falls into place nicely, I’d say.

The Pac-10:
Though this will probably change next week, I have both Oregon and Cal going to BCS games. I like Southern Cal then to go to the Holiday Bowl against Texas. Traditional powers, usually good game, etc., etc. Next up is the Sun Bowl, where I’ll send Arizona State.

After that, the Pac-10’s games aren’t all that great, in terms of stature. I like UCLA going to the Las Vegas Bowl and Oregon State to the Emerald, leaving the Armed Forces Bowl without a team. (Of the current 2-win teams, Washington probably has the best chance of winning 6.)

The SEC:
LSU and Kentucky will both go to the BCS in these projections. “However,” you say, “didn’t South Carolina beat Kentucky?” Why yes they did! But I never said that Kentucky would go to the SEC title game, did I? Late losses usually kill teams, so South Carolina’s loss will probably know them out of the top 14 of the BCS and send them to the Capital One Bowl.

The SEC groups their 3-5 and 6-8 picks, presumably to give the bowls more flexibility who they chose. I like Auburn, Florida, and Tennessee to finish in the 3-5 cluster and end up in the Peach, Outback, and Cotton bowls respectively. I like Alabama in the Music City to face Tech, Arkansas in Memphis, and Georgia in Shreveport.

The Sun Belt:
Troy has won 4 straight and I like that trend to continue. FAU also has a shot, but Troy has just dominated everyone since that Oklahoma State game.

The WAC:
The WAC has three bowl bids, all primarily designed to give their remote teams somewhere to go if they qualify. In a rare move, the Humanitarian Bowl actually gains its old name back after being known by it’s sponsor (Micron) for the past few years. (Hint, hint Chick-fil-a Bowl.) Boise State will almost certainly end up there. Then there’s the Hawaii Bowl. Hawaii is 18th in the initial BCS, so even if they do win out I highly doubt they’ll be able to climb high enough to qualify. So Hawaii stays there. For the New Mexico Bowl, I pretty much threw a dart and it landed on Fresno State, so there you go.

Anyway, that’s all for this week. I’ll update these every Monday the rest of the way, with the the release of each new BCS. This season has been wacky so far, so these are very subject to change.