I was ready to do my college football wrap-up post lauding the USC loss and laughing over the fact that they were more than likely out of the national championship race already. Then Saturday’s games happened and it’s clear, the fix is in. The NCAA, in order to save itself some money after having already engraved the crystal trophy with USC’s future win, must have pulled some strings to have the rest of the top teams dropping like flies. First, Florida loses to Ole Miss in the Swamp. I could see it at Ole Miss, but in their own house??? Then Wisconsin loses to an inept Michigan team. The ACC’s only undefeated team (although they should have lost last week), Wake Forest loses to NAVY. Yes, I said Navy! Then GA gets waxed by Alabama at home. I could have picked GA to lose, but not to get dominated the way they did. You watch, USC will be ranked something like #5 despite their loss because of all these other teams going down.
Oh, one more USC/Oregon State comment. Jacquiz Rogers is the man and now my second college boyfriend behind Knowshon. In order to be my college boyfriend, you have to be awesome and have a very cool name. It doesn’t get much cooler than Knowshon and Jacquiz. Congrats boys, you have been selected for a high honor. Knowshon didn’t get much of a chance to shine tonight, with GA falling behind 31-0 at halftime, but I don’t think that hurts his Heisman chances. It’s not like he’s a QB costing the team the game!
Returning to the aforementioned Florida game, I only have one thing to say: HAHAHAHAHAH!!! That was awesome. Alright, I have more than one thing to say, but the overriding emotion is sheer hilarity. Why did Florida lose? Because precious Tebow could not convert a 4th and 1/2 with 50 seconds left. That was funny in and of itself, since UF fans will swear to you that Tebow walks on water and converts said water into wine in his spare time. But even worse was the fact that they were in field goal range. I realize their kicker is not the best on the planet, and they had the extra point that would have tied it blocked, but they could have at least made the attempt. But no, the hubris of Urban Meyer bit the Gators on the ass. Yeah, Tebow is f’in Superman. Tell me a new one Gator fans. Just remember, you still lost 4 games when Mr. Perfect was handed the Heisman. He can keep winning Heisman’s and losing games, that’s just fine by me.
Wisconsin was once again exposed as a pretender when they lost at Michigan today. They had a big lead but couldn’t maintain against a team that’s had as an anemic an offense as I’ve seen. The Big 10 just can’t compete on a national stage running their old school offenses anymore. Penn State remains undefeated, for now, and they seem to have an offense, but wake me when they play someone decent. IL is ok but hardly a powerhouse. I believe Northwestern is 5-0 but they’re unranked so that tells me something about the quality of teams they’ve been playing.
I like a couple of teams in the Big 12 but I don’t yet know for sure how good they really are as they’ve played nobody. OK, Missouri and Texas are all undefeated, but we need them to start playing one another to have a true measuring stick. And no, OK beating up on TCU does not count for me. They’re the Horned Frogs, nuff said.
My Noles should be 4-0 this week. I said last week that Wake didn’t win that game, the Noles lost it and I stand by that this week. Especially with Wake having gone down to NAVY of all people. If Wake doesn’t get turnovers, they don’t win, period. My Noles were pretty good against Colorado today. The defense is for real, and they have still been solid in recent years, but they were dominant most of the game. Two late scores for Colorado made it look less respectable, but we were in prevent at that time. I hate prevent by the way. Christian Ponder didn’t play very well in the first half but he seemed to have found his confidence in the second half. He was greatly helped by the running game. For the first time that I can remember the Noles ran for over 200 yards. Antoine Smith had a great game, including a 60 yard TD run and 2 other rushing TD’s. We need to cultivate that running game to offset the inexperience at QB. There were a few less penalties this game too, certainly no backbreaking ones like last week. Nice to see. If only we had had just one of those special teams plays last week, we’d have won that game against Wake. Woulda, coulda, shoulda. Sigh.
I thought Miami might be the cream of the crop in the NCAA but then they lost at home to UNC. I must say, that game was very exciting. Miami was throwing for the winning TD and somehow the UNC corner plucked the ball out of the WR’s hands to seal off the game. Awesome. I don’t know who the best team in the ACC is, though arguing that might be futile anyway. With no undefeated teams left, the ACC is hardly in the running for best conference.
Ohio State had Beanie Wells back today and he and Pryor combined to have a decent game. One can only wonder what they would have done with Beanie and Pryor against USC. I guarantee it would have been a lot closer than it actually was.
LSU was decent against Miss State. There was a time there when they were only up by 7 and it looked like Miss might hang with them but they pulled away in the second half. I bet they’ll move up to #2 behind Oklahoma. Looking forward to whenever they play Bama, whomever wins that one might have the inside track to the SEC championship.
I honestly think it’s safe to say that parity reigns in college football. I mean, truly, who is a powerhouse anymore? USC, clearly not. OK? Can’t say yet. UF, nope. AL? They look good but they’re not scary. There is no air of invincibility like teams like Miami had in the 80’s and early 00’s, FSU in the 90’s, Nebraska in their heyday. Maybe they should make a movie called On Any Given Saturday, because it sure feels like anybody could be had these days.
Well, I’m going to thoroughly enjoy today’s results because I’m sure LSU isn’t going to go undefeated either. But I’ll save worrying about that for another day–today is about celebrating Florida and Georgia losing! At home!
And is there any reason why we should not still be celebrating USC losing to Oregon State? I think not. I think verily not.
Well at least in the SEC, with the title game, you can still come back and win the championship even if you do have a loss. But right now LSU is undefeated and looking pretty good!
Hee, there is no reason not to celebrate USC losing! I just figure the pollsters will keep them in the top 10 to thanks to all the others choking this week. Still, I love when the BCS is in chaos. I’m already preparing for the one loss teams to start their howling in December. Hopefully some of those that suffered their first loss today will be suffering another loss soon (lookin at you Gators!).
Awesome college football weekend!