Sports Then and Now

Just because Andrew Luck is the best player in college football doesn't mean he will win the Heisman Trophy.

Excitement is high as the kickoff to the 2011 college football season is finally upon us. After all the off-the-field scandals of the past several months, it will be nice to finally be able to talk about action happening on the playing field.

Since many with far greater insight and knowledge of college football than I have spent the last several months analyzing all BCS teams and ranking them for the upcoming season, I don’t see the need to just regurgitate information you can find elsewhere, but I do want to kickoff the 2011 season by looking ahead and making five “bold” predictions for some of the things I anticipate will happen in 2011.

Prediction 1: A team from the SEC will not win the BCS Championship

Considering that a team from the SEC has claimed each of the last five BCS championships I guess you can say that I am starting out with a pretty bold prediction right out of the gate.

Don’t get me wrong, the SEC will continue to be the epicenter of college football, but given the deficiencies in each of the top programs, it is difficult to believe that any one team can withstand the brutal conference schedule to come out unscathed. It is certainly possible that a one loss SEC team could reach the BCS title game, but that will only happen if other teams across the country falter. But given the parity in the SEC, I think it will be a challenge for any team to even complete the season with just one loss in this tough conference. Read the rest of this entry →

The scoreboard tells it all as JMU becomes the second I-AA team ever to defeat a ranked Division I-A opponent.

While the teams at the top of the rankings were able to pull out victories in the second week of the college season, there still were some big surprises and interesting stories during the weekend. Of course the biggest was the shocking upset of Virginia Tech by I-AA James Madison University, but other teams are starting to provide some interesting storylines for the 2010 College Football season.

JMU KNOCKS OFF VIRGINIA TECH AND BOISE STATE IN ONE GAME!

When the James Madison Dukes became the second Division I-AA team ever to defeat a ranked Division I-A team with their 21-16 victory over Virginia Tech, they didn’t just knock out the Hokies, they likely took potential BCS bowl buster Boise State down with them.

Given the overall poor performance of the ACC in the early season, even if Virginia Tech is able to turn things around and run the table within the conference, their power ranking isn’t going to be high enough to give Boise State the boost they are going to need if they hope to score many points for strength of schedule come BCS formula time.

Consider that while Boise State needed a late touchdown to defeat the Hokies by three points at a neutral site, James Madison led for nearly all of the fourth quarter to win by five points in a game played in front of Tech’s home crowd.

With Georgia Tech losing to Kansas, Miami getting knocked around at Ohio State and Florida State getting blasted by Oklahoma, it is very possible that the ACC won’t have a team ranked in the top 20 in the next poll. That doesn’t help Boise State at all as their hope for earning a spot in the BCS title game was in part based on Virginia Tech being considered a top 10-15 team throughout the season and the ACC being given some overall respect. Read the rest of this entry →

The Mighty Zultan Tells Football Fortunes...

Zultan, the mighty soothsayer, hibernated soundly after a glorious conclusion to Big Ten Football Bowl Season last January.

The all-seeing one remained zoned out for months after admittedly over-indulging in some exotic-looking orange punch with the kick of a kangaroo.

The Big Ten pounded its way to an impressive 4-3 record during post-season play which included wins over some very highly ranked BCS teams at the conclusion of the 2009 football season.

The action culminated with the Iowa Hawkeye’s victory over the Ramblin’ Wreck from Georgia Tech. After the Hawkeyes rolled over them, GT may still be putting their “wrecked” offense back together.

When the mighty one’s eyes snapped open this week, ready to dig in for another season of football prognostication –– low and behold, the news was delivered.  The Big Red Machine was going to be joining the Big Ten. What a blow!  After years of living in the shadow of the God Almighty Nebraska Cornhuskers, the all-seeing seer now must feel the singe of the hot poker once again––as Nebraska closes in on the neighboring Hawkeyes starting in 2011.

Putting aside his feelings of betrayal, the all-seeing one now marshals the massive skills that allow him to predict the outcome of football contests.  The Big Ten Conference will be a force to be reckoned with in 2010 along with other highly touted football contests each week.

What he wishes to know is––can you outguess him?  Do you feel lucky, well, do you?  If so click here and you can pit your puny predicting powers against the great Zultan.  If you outguess him, then he will announce that you beat him in next week’s column, plus entering your name for a prize to be awarded at the end of the season.

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Tyrod Taylor and the Virginia Tech offense struggled until the last minute, then pulled out a dramatic victory.

It will be pretty hard for the rest of the college football season to have an afternoon like we saw this Saturday. If you were lucky enough to be sitting in front of the TV or at a sports bar for the games that started at 3:30 p.m. EDT, you really got a treat.

Just picking which game to focus on was quite a challenge. Though the Virginia Tech/Nebraska game was the only one pitting top 25 teams, there were several other intriguing games during the time period on national television including Oregon/Utah, Notre Dame/Michigan State, USC/Washington and Florida/Tennessee.

As it turned out, all five games went down to the wire with big plays deciding the outcomes.

For 58 minutes it appeared that Nebraska would get its first road win in more than a decade against a ranked opponent. They led 15-10 and had an anemic Virginia Tech offense pinned deep in their own territory.

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Defenders have a hard time catching Tyrod Taylor.

Overview: In recent years, the ACC has been a solid conference, but maligned nationally because it rarely has a team in contention for the BCS Championship. Two-time defending champion Virginia Tech is looking to make a mark on the nationally scene in 2009 with a tough non-conference schedule, but they will likely end up simply fighting for another ACC title. Once dominant Florida State is starting to show signs of life again, but anything short of a league title is considered a bad year in Tallahassee. Georgia Tech, Wake Forest, Clemson and North Carolina State are all solid teams that will battle it out each week.

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