How each BCS league did on opening weekend so far
by ckmneon on Sep 4, 2011 9:45 AM EDT
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PrintIt's the opening weekend. Lots of cupcakes and lots of new faces. That's the grain of salt for what you are about to see. That being said, it was real college football. So how did each league do?
1. Big Ten: 10-2
Games they could have won but didn't: Minnesota 17 USC 19, Indiana 20 Ball State 27
Games they won but could have lost: Purdue 27 MTSU 24
Most impressive win: take your pick between OSU 48 Akron 0, Wisconsin 51 UNLV 17, and Penn State 41 Indiana State 7. OSU and Wisconsin both played their starters much longer than PSU did, all had their fair share of miscues, all had "this game was not in doubt late in the first quarter" wins over cupcakes. Difficult to be impressed by any of it, but there's something to be said for taking care of business easily against a vastly inferior opponent. DO YOU HEAR ME MICHIGAN STATE?
Overall impression: There's a handful of top 10 contenders in this league. Purdue and Indiana are bad, but even Minnesota looked like a very solid team on the road against a talented top 25 team. This league is probably too brutal for anyone to go undefeated, maybe even finish with only 1 loss, but there are about 8 legit top 25 contenders in this league and about 4 or 5 top 10 contenders.
2. SEC: 10-2
Games they could have won but didn't: BYU 14, Ole Miss 13
Games they won but could have lost: Auburn 42 Utah State 38, Kentucky 14 Western Kentucky 3
Most impressive win: LSU 40 Oregon 27, more dominating than the final score indicates
Overall impression: Auburn is 16-0 in their last 16 games but could easily be 6-10, and that's infuriating. LSU and Alabama are legit MNC contenders. Other than that, there's a handful of legit top 25 teams and a handful of bad teams. Same old SEC.
3. Big East: 6-0 (2 games yet to come)
Games they could have won but didn't: none
Games they won but could have lost: USF 23 Notre Dame 20, Syracuse 36 Wake Forest 29 (OT)
Most impressive win: Syracuse over Wake Forest. A team most pick to finish in the middle of the Big East overcoming a ton of early miscues to get a win over a BCS school. Not bad at all.
Overall impression: solid. No real MNC contenders here, but a very solid overall performance. Even the games they could have lost were fairly impressive, with a great comeback and a road win over a top 25 team.
4. Big 12 9-0 (1 game yet to come)
Games they could have won but didn't: none
Games they won but could have lost: Baylor 50 TCU 48, ISU 20 UNI 19, KSU 10 Eastern KY 7
Most impressive win: Baylor over TCU. Gritty win over a good team
Overall impression: Meh. Could easily be 9-3, and a couple of the wins by alleged good teams (Mizz 17 Miami U 6, Ok St 61 ULL 34) were just not impressive. No defense, very little good offense, but inexplicably undefeated.
5. ACC 8-2 (1 conference game yet to come)
Games they could have won but didn't: Syracuse over WF in OT, Richmond 23 Duke 21
Games they won but could have lost: none
Most impressive win: VT 66 App St 13. Start to finish domination over a very good 1AA team.
Overall impression: Duke is Duke, so losing to a good 1AA team is kind of whatever. Nothing impressive to see here, but could still be 10-0 at this point with a little more luck.
6. Pac-12 8-4
Games they could have won but didn't: Houston 38 UCLA 34, Sacramento State over OrSU in OT
Games they won but could have lost: USC 19 Minnesota 17, Washington 30 Eastern Washington 27
Most impressive win: Stanford 57 San Jose St. 3. The only game where a Pac-12 team took care of business on both sides of the ball from start to finish.
Overall impression: Terrible. I think Iowa's about the 6th best team in the Big Ten, and they would be no worse than the 3rd best team in this league and could win it. Just terrible. Colorado lost by 17 to Hawaii. I'm not sure Colorado is better than Indiana State right now.
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Big Ten and Big East
1. Indiana and Purdue both looked really bad. Unless one of them plays Minnesota at home we could be looking at 1 conference win between the 2 of them.
2. USF’s win at ND was much more impressive than Syracuse’s victory. Wake is the 2nd worst team in the ACC and the game was at Syracuse. USF was on the road against an allegedly top 20 team (not by me certainly but by so-called experts.).
"You can't handle the truth!"
USF
And at the worst possible times for USF, the weather picked up and ND got a 2 hour and 45 minute timeout to get their play calling in order. If you’re the underdog on the road, you depend on momentum, and at each of the worst possible times the evacuations forced them to start over and give ND a heavy advantage on offense. ND probably scripted their last 4 minutes on offense to make a comeback.
Brian Kelly put on quite a show. A grown man in charge of young adults throwing full blown temper tantrums on national television. It was glorious.
Anyway, the flashlights eat our human power grids, our souls if you will. So i destroyed them, and if a few precious panties were burnt or soiled in the reckoning then so be it
His handling...
and ND’s handling of the poor kid who died when that scissor tower fell was just shameful. Told me all I need to know about Kelly.
"I'll keep it short and sweet. Family. Religion. Friendship.
These are the three demons you must slay if you wish to succeed in business."
"You don't want to analyze it...you want to admire it!" - Play by play guy on O.J. McDuffie TD catch against Ga. Tech.
by Esteban d' Amur on Sep 4, 2011 1:21 PM EDT up reply actions
USF got doubled up in total yardage and ended up settling for FGs a few times
If ND just makes 1 or 2 fewer atrocious mistakes, they could win that game easily, and they aren’t good. Also, Rees shredded them. That’s why I’m not as impressed as I am with the Syracuse win.
"I play for Penn State, we don't celebrate after TDs." - Penn State's Derek Moye, on being asked to act like he's celebrating a TD during a BTN shoot.
I'd switch the BEast & Big 12, but other than I agree w/ everything
A mid tier BEast team beating the lowest of the low in the ACC doesn’t impress me much, at least not as much as beating TCU. OU dominating Tulsa was expected, but again, Tulsa>WF imo. Beating ND is nice, and is probably better than beating TCU, but ND did gift wrap the game, since their TO"s were more mental mistakes than USF actually making a good play
"We're going to do all we can to get this team right, to go after that national championship" - Devon Still
by ICEICETHATGUY13 on Sep 4, 2011 10:48 AM EDT reply actions
3-5 could be justifiably rearranged in any order
"I play for Penn State, we don't celebrate after TDs." - Penn State's Derek Moye, on being asked to act like he's celebrating a TD during a BTN shoot.
Considering they were Persaless, you could be right
The problem is guessing at how good BC is. If we could fast forward to December and BC is an 8-4 team, maybe it was the most impressive win. But if BC is a 5-7 team then, not really all that impressive.
"I play for Penn State, we don't celebrate after TDs." - Penn State's Derek Moye, on being asked to act like he's celebrating a TD during a BTN shoot.
Yeah, how this wasn’t the most impressive win by a Big Ten school is beyond me. A road win over a BCS school – and one that is generally decent – is always more impressive than beating up some crap team at home.
Boston College has what should be a solid set of linebackers
and nothing else whatsoever. They might be a bargain bin 2004 Penn State.
"I play for Penn State, we don't celebrate after TDs." - Penn State's Derek Moye, on being asked to act like he's celebrating a TD during a BTN shoot.
I want to be impressed with the Gophers...
But I have a nagging feeling that the SC team they played is further away from the Pete Carroll machine than I’ve thus far factored.
"The limits of my language mean the limits of my world" -- Ludwig Wittgenstein
Gophers
weren’t bad considering they have a new QB. Now 3 games at home-only one decent opponent among them (MAC Miami). Start B1G play at Michigan and at Purdue. 1-1 to start in confernce is possible. But then it gets rough-won’t be favored in any of their last 6 games (no Indiana).
"You can't handle the truth!"
Seeing Brian Kelly's reactions during the game..
makes me wonder what kind of pressure ND is putting on him to win. He was making Bo Pellini look like a choir boy out there.
Either way, I can’t stand Notre Dame. Was very glad USF won that game.
Notre Dame has 1 Sagarin top 10 team in the last 17 years
Puts them in the same category as teams like Air Force, Hawaii, Maryland, and Louisville. At some point, that’s just who you are, no matter what TV contracts you have or how good you were pre-Vietnam War.
"I play for Penn State, we don't celebrate after TDs." - Penn State's Derek Moye, on being asked to act like he's celebrating a TD during a BTN shoot.
They've had what, 1 bowl win in the last 20 years or so?
It’s amazing that they’re able to recruit as well as they do …built on a legacy that is truly hollow over the last few decades.
Before someone accuses me of riding my Elite High Horse, I know PSU isn’t what it was in the 80’s, though at least we’ve got some recent BCS appearances to show for.
by Artiefufkin10 on Sep 4, 2011 12:01 PM EDT up reply actions
Few programs have ever had a 9 year run as good as PSU did from 1978 to 1986
but I’ll put PSU’s superiority over ND like this: the 2009 Penn State team would be no worse than the 2nd best ND team of the last 17 years, and might be the best. It’s the 3rd best team of the last 6 years for Penn State.
"I play for Penn State, we don't celebrate after TDs." - Penn State's Derek Moye, on being asked to act like he's celebrating a TD during a BTN shoot.
by ckmneon on Sep 4, 2011 12:24 PM EDT up reply actions 6 recs
This a thousand times.
ND hasn’t been truly relevant since before the Dark Years. They managed to squeak their way into three BCS level games since 2000 and got pounded in all of them. They’ve had seven season which they’ve won 9 games or more since 1993. We’ve had twelve in the same amount of time, with Five coming since 2005 alone.
They are not relevant. They haven’t been relevant, and they will continue to be irrelevant until their NBC contract runs out. At which point they will join the Big East or cancel their football program altogether.
"This is being a Penn State fan. We’ll prove it, or we won’t. It’s not about proving it to them, it’s about proving to ourselves."
ND..
has reached the point where they can no longer recruit based on its history. Today’s recruits are unaware/don’t care that ND was really good a long time ago. ND’s ceiling is somewhere just north of jNW and much further south than the top tier programs.
"I'll keep it short and sweet. Family. Religion. Friendship.
These are the three demons you must slay if you wish to succeed in business."
"You don't want to analyze it...you want to admire it!" - Play by play guy on O.J. McDuffie TD catch against Ga. Tech.
by Esteban d' Amur on Sep 4, 2011 1:26 PM EDT up reply actions
The same problem I see...
As each year passes, I find it more and more difficult to find a plausible path for Notre Dame’s return to preeminence.
"The limits of my language mean the limits of my world" -- Ludwig Wittgenstein
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