On the heels of a highly interesting weekend of games only one thing is certain. Any and all debates about the BCS are back. I love college football!
Troy 42 at Middle Tennessee 13
The Tuesday & Wednesday games were horrendous but hey you could turn them on and see some guys playing football in the middle of the week. The return of Dwight Dasher mattered not. The magnet for SEC leftovers and castoffs that is Troy dropped the hammer on Dasher and the Blue Raiders.
UAB 7 at UCF 42
The Fighting O’Leary’s ran wild on the Blazers in this one. Whatever.
Nebraska 48 at Kansas State 13
Who wants a piece of the Huskers right now? This looked like it might be a decent game on paper but the Huskers absolutely crushed K State and the Cats are a pretty good football team. The Husker defense was solid and QB Taylor Martinez looked like the most dangerous QB in the country not named Denard Robinson. Martinez got off to the tune of 15 carries for 241 yards and 4 TD’s. He also completed 5 of 7 for another 125 and a TD. I will be very curious to see what Will Muschamp has drawn up for him this weekend.
UCONN 24 at Rutgers 27
This game was so lame I didn’t even bother to watch it. Apparently Rutgers scored 10 pts in the last 3 minutes to win.
Texas Tech 45 at Baylor 38
This game quickly turned into a pretty entertaining track meet that featured almost 900 yards of total offense and nothing resembling a defense. It also featured one of the most bizarre special teams plays that I have ever seen. Tejas Tech kicked an onside kick that went about four yards. As three Tech players were standing there scratching their heads, staring at the ball and trying to remember what to do next, some kid from Baylor scooped the ball up and booked for six. I laughed for a good 5 minutes at that one. Despite the miscue Tubs triumphed as Teen Wolf lookalike QB Taylor Potts threw for 462 yards and 4 TDs on 59 attempts. Oh yeah, the Cotton Bowl appeared to be about 50% full as predicted.
Alabama 21 at South Carolina 35
I suppose I will now have to stop calling Williams-Brice Stadium cursed. The Ol’ Ball Coach finally picked up a signature win by knocking off Little Nicky and the #1 Crimson Tide. I had this one up on TV #3 while I was watching the ND game and kept a pretty decent eye on it. I kept expecting Bama to come back and steal this one but South Carolina played a great game and kept them at bay. Consider this stunning blow #1 to the BCS offices. Good stuff.
Michigan State 34 at Michigan 17
I really only had two big takeaways from this game. Mighigan State is a good football team. Michigan has zero defense. Every time I glanced at this game I lamented Dayne Crist missing the 1st two quarters of the Michigan game with his "vision issue." Damn.
Pittsburgh 17 at Notre Dame 23
This was a huge win for Notre Dame. It wasn’t pretty by any stretch of the imagination, and I was sweating right up until Gary Gray knocked down that last Sunseri pass, but this was a big, big win for ND. The difference between 3-3 and 2-4 is enormous and despite leaving much to be desired the Irish found a way to overcome their mistakes and pull out a victory. That would not have happened in the last three years.
Crist still isn’t quite where he needs to be and that coupled with some drops and few untimely/ controversial penalties made this one a lot closer than it should have been. That said the defense played pretty well minus one busted coverage that resulted in a Baldwin TD catch and another loss of the edge that let Dion Lewis rip off a 30 yard gain on a 4th and 1 play. Overall the D held a strong Pitt rushing attack to 110 yards which is noteworthy.
Special teams play made the difference and placekicker David Ruffer continued his money streak with three field goals to include a 50 yard bomb that made my head spin around. The second half of the season is going to be fun.
Oregon State 29 at Arizona 27
If you let Oregon State play enough top ten teams they are eventually going to beat one of them. Unfortunately for Arizona they ended up being that team.
LSU 33 at Florida 29
Les Miles is like the killer that won’t die at the end of a movie. Just when you think he’s done he pops back up for one last scare. He cannot be stopped. I told my Dad this weekend that I hope Miles coaches forever. He is guaranteed entertainment every weekend.
Urban Meyer and the Gators were the latest to fall victim to Miles in what was an extremely entertaining game to watch. With his team down by 3 and facing a 4th and 3 on the Gator 36 yard line with 35 seconds to play The Hat threw caution to the wind and ran a risky as all hell fake field goal. The holder fielded the snap then blindly tossed the ball backwards over his head to a streaking 90lb kicker who scooped it up on the luckiest bounce of all time to advance it 5 yards for a 1st down.
Urban almost had a massive stroke on the spot but managed to challenge the play as a forward pass. After the play stood up to review by the slimmest of margins Tiger QB Jarrett Lee threw a 28 yard strike to Terrence Tolliver that set LSU up on the Gator 3. After 2 incompletions Lee found Tolliver in the corner of the end zone for the game winning TD.
Only Les Miles could pull that off in Gainesville. As a side note I kind of liked the Florida orange jerseys.
USC 35 at Stanford 37
I didn’t think the day could get much better by the time this one wound down but watching USC lose on a last second field goal for the second straight week was pretty damn satisfying. The Trojans actually showed up for this one and gave Stanford a serious run for their money but after having their spirits broken for the second consecutive week I’m not so sure they have the fortitude to keep fighting going forward. They have depth issues, a couple of tough losses and Lane Kiffin at the controls. This could get ugly.
Florida State 45 at Miami 17
The Noles won what many thought would be version 1.0 of the ACC Championship game in convincing fashion. No telling how that mess is going to shake out.
What do you think?