Predictions - Week 2

• Baylor plays Northwestern State in Robert Griffin's first start of many, I hope. Pick - Baylor.
• The Eastern Washington Eagles complete their two-fer special with a game against the Buffaloes. Two years ago, the Buffs lost to 1-AA Montana State. My exhaustive research of Eastern Washington identified that this is the team that lost to Appy State in the 1-AA Championship game. Pick: Colorado.
• Iowa State looks to avenge last year's loss to Kent State. The Kent State - Iowa State rivalry has been played every year since...last year. ISU is 4-1 against KSU. Since the Cyclones looked so good against the JackRabbits of South Dakota State, I'm picking Iowa State this weekend.
• Kansas is a 20-point favorite against Louisiana Tech this weekend, who is coming off an upset of Mississippi State. La Tech is 1-1 against the Jayhawks; with the W coming with the legendary Carl Torbush as the head coach in 1987, and the loss coming last year. I'm not sure I'd take the points (though I'm sure I wouldn't actually bet money as I'm too scared to lose it), but I expect a Jayhawk W.
• Willie and Friends host Montana State, where they'll hopefully be the second Big XII team in a row to beat the Bobcats. In 2007, TAMU avenged the 06 Buffalo loss. Kansas State has never lost to a team from the state of Montana. FWIW, the Wildcats are also undefeated against the Kansas City Veterinary team, with the lone W coming in 1907. If Chattanooga backed out, the Sooners would have kicked some KC Vet but last week. Pick: K State
• Missouri takes on SEMO. The Redhawks, who copied Miami of Ohio while fleeing from Native American names, were 3-8 last year in 1-AA. This has the makings of a OU-Chattanooga rout. Tiger fans, pray for rain.
• The Bugeaters play San Jose State. The Spartans are looking to avenge their 2000 loss to the Huskers. I don't see that happening. Pick: Bugeaters
• Boone State hosts former Sooner and Cash Machine assistant coach Kevin Sumlin and his Houston Cougars. The Pokes are a 16.5 pt favorite. I'd take the points. I think this will be a scoring fest...the Pokes are potent on offense, and I think the Cougars will fare well against the "rebuilt" Poke defense. Pick: Boone State, while cheering heavily for the Cougars.
• Cash Machine U travels to New Mexico. The Aggies are reeling from the loss to the Red Wolves, but I expect them to rebound. The Lobos are still bitter about the Aggies running up the score when the teams last met in 1926. Mike Lupica's grandfather was p***** until the day he died. Pick: Aggies.
• Texas Tech travels to Nevada in a game that is more intriguing than one would think. Nonetheless, I'm going with Leach and the Dust Pirates. The Wolfpack have never beaten a current Big XII conference member.
• Texas travels to El Paso to play the Miners. The teams have not met since 1933. Mike Price didn't even know what strippers were back then. Pick: Longhorns.

So you're wondering how Cincinnati matches up to the

Sooners on the gridiron?

Offense		Cincy lost their top three leading rushers and their QB from last season, master appellate Ben Mauk. The Sooners returned a healthy DeMarco Murray and Sam Bradford.
Defense		Cincinatti returns 6 defensive starters, the Sooners return 5. The top 4 Sooner tacklers left. Nonetheless, I believe it's a more talented squad.
Special Teams		Both placekickers are a little shaky. I'm giving the Sooners the nod based upon a stronger return game.
Parachute Landings		We've never strung the mascot up on a parachute and got them stuck on a wire. On the other hand, can you imagine doing that to Boomer and Sooner. The PETA folks would be mad.
Coaching		Brian Kelly is well regarded, but I'm sticking with Bob.
Bowl Record		I've read several places where Cincinnati has gone to bowl games in six of their last eight seasons. They've beaten Southern Miss, Western Michigan, Marshall. They lost to North Texas, Toledo and Marshall. I'd rather be ofer against LSU, SC, Boise State and West Virginia, who lost three games between them in the seasons we played 'em.

While the Sooners hold the edge in all categories, real or imagined, the gap is closer than one would otherwise think. The Bearcats will provide a much more formidable opponenent than the Mocs.

Cincy Motivational Poster

I decided to do some more motivational poster. At least for the non-conference foes. Chattanooga was too hard to find a pic for that jostled the imagination.Cincy wasn't much easier.

Also, the Cincy Bearcat parachuting in didn't go off that smootly. If you haven't seen the video, click here.

What is a Bearcat?

gobearcats.cstv.com has the info. To summarize, I still have no idea. Could be a panda; could be a fictional character created from a 1914 game.

Rankings Info

If you're curious how the AP poll works, and want to see how the AP voters vote, pollspeak.com is an interesting little site. If you want to analyze who voted for a team, or how a particular AP voter voted, it's all there.

Chattanooga Review

I left the game early on Sat. the primary factor was my father-in-law wasn’t feeling well. The second factor was the Sooners were ahead 50-0 with about 2 minutes to play in the first half, and storms were headed towards the arena. Here are the five things we learned from Saturday night’s game.

1) Chattanooga is not winning the FCS Division championship this year.

2) At $49.00 per seat, the Sooners netted about $3.5 million from this slaughter.

3) If the Sooners ever play a team this bad again, I’m staying home.

4) The new video screen is cool, and the sound system is awesome.

5) The scoreboards on the sideline added little value; the scroll of scores telling us that Maryland beat Delaware would have been a nice touch, but they never gave us the final score of the Boone State game, and there were rare updates on Missouri-Illinois or Alabama-Clemson.

You may be wondering, then, what we actually learned about the team.

Nada.
Zip.
Nothing.

This was a complete mismatch. This whole matchup was courtesy of Middle Tennessee State pulling out of a commitment to be our cupcake for a home and home series with Mississippi State. Ones vs twos would have been a better matchup. Evaluating the Sooners after this would be like trying to evaluate the Harlem Globetrotters after a game against the Washington Generals. You leave knowing Curly Neal can dribble well, but you knew that before the game also.

Cincinnati should be a much more entertaining contest.

Around the Big 12, Week 1

• Reveilli VIII attacked by Red Wolves, euthanized Sunday Arkansas State roared from behind to defeat the Texas Aggies to avenge their 2003 loss to the Aggies and spoil the debut of Reveille VIII and new football coach Mike Sherman. I asked Reveille VII if he’d like to comment on the game, but he was laughing to hard to come up with his unique perspective.
• Boone State spares Enid from certain destruction, beats Washington State. The Daily Oklahoman praised this as a great defensive showing against the Cougars. Apparently the Cougars, who had a losing record last year, became a national powerhouse over the summer and the Pokes vanquished them. My father-in-law was drinking the orange kool-aid even, until I reminded him that membership in premier conference does not make a premier team.
• Mizzou dominates border opponent, at least from the offensive side, beating the Illini 52-42. Juice Williams, Illini QB, had a previous career high of 245 yards, but passed for 451 yards against the Tiger D.
• Texas beats up on Florida Atlantic. Colt McCoy ran for 103 yards. I love it when they subject Colt to additional contact. It reminds me of the Coach Fran version of Stephen McGee. Lamarr Houston celebrated the victory over the Owls by getting arrested from DWI. Brown has suspended Houston from the team for at least the trip to El Paso, which also prevents him from the after hours party in Juarez.
• Texas Tech clipped the wings of the Eastern Washington Eagles, albeit only slightly; the new, improved Red Raider defense gave up 24 points to Eastern Washington, seventeen of those in the first half.
• Colorado beat Colorado State. Don’t care.
• North Texas gets drummed by Willie and Friends 45-6. It was the lowest passing yardage total (100 yards) of the Todd Dodge era at North Texas. The previous low was against Arkansas State. Take heart, Aggie fans!
• Nebraska gave up a few points, but beat the Western Michigan Broncos, 47-24. The Bugeater D gave up 342 yards passing, but the majority of that was in the second half when the game was in hand.
• Kansas beat Florida International 40-10, as the Big 12 swept teams you’ve never heard of from Florida.
• Iowa State dominated – dominated, I say – the South Dakota State Jackrabbits. If I would have done enough research on this game to know that SD State’s nickname was the Jackrabbits, I wouldn’t have picked them for the upset.