CF Overload: Conf Grades, AU report, and more

Here's another big college football post. I'll give you my conference report cards, my report on the Auburn baseball game (oh wait...football ), my thoughts on "the big one", and some other tidbits. Let's begin with my upset of the week.

Upset of the Week: Maryland 35 Cal 27. Let's see, last week the Terps lose by ten to Middle Tennessee State. Meanwhile, Cal beats Washington State 66-3 and are ranked no. 23. That's an upset right there. It seems like the theme of upsets this year is that they aren't close and up in the air until the end; it seems that ECU, Vanderbilt, Maryland, and others have upset teams in dominating fashion and had the game in hand most of the way.

Maryland scored on its first three possessions and didn't let Cal score a TD until the closing minutes. ECU beat Virginia Tech up and down the field and halted WVU's offense to a stop with three points. Vanderbilt was obviously the better team over South Carolina. I think that's pretty interesting in comparison to last year with Appalachian State winning on the blocked field goal and Stanford beating USC on that dramatic TD pass in the final minutes.

Conference Report Cards: ACC - North Carolina dominated Rutgers and Duke beat Navy 41-31. Of course Maryland had their big win and FSU dominated. Virginia, though, got beat bad by uConn, 45-10. In in-conference grades, which don't count for or against them, Va Tech beat Ga Tech like they should and Clemson beat NC State. ACC did better than they have been. I GIVE THE ACC a A.

Pac-10 - Of course USC killed OSU, we'll get to that later. But besides that the Pac was terrible!! Stanford, Washington State, and Arizona all lost. UNLV upset ASU, their second-best team. UCLA had their worst loss since 1929 to BYU, 59-0. Oklahoma beat Washington, but that was expected. The only team besides USC to win was Oregon, who beat Hawaii. Pac had their best win this season but everyone else slacked off! I GIVE THE PAC-10 a C+.

SEC - Conference went undefeated. In conference games, which again don't count, were Auburn-Miss. State which we'll get to later and Georgia surviving South Carolina. Outside that, everyone did what they were supposed to. Tennessee, Alabama, and LSU all were in big blowouts. Combination of their scores was 116-13! Ole Miss and Vanderbilt did their duty, the 'Dores are 3-0 and sittin pretty! I guess the only disappointment, and you can't even call it that, was Kentucky struggling with Middle Tennessee. But a win is a win and everyone else did great. SEC GETS an A.

Big 10 - Of course Ohio State got totally embarassed for what, the third time in three years? Wisconsin barely got by Fresno State, but both were ranked so that helps their grade. Penn State kept their offensive rythm and beat Syracuse 55-13. Iowa, Minnesota, and Northwestern and Michigan State did what was expected with routine wins. But Illinois had lots of trouble with Louisiana Lafayette 20-17...are you kidding? Also, Michigan got beat by Notre Dame. One good spot for the Big 10 was that Purdue just kept coming back at No. 16 Oregon and took them to two overtimes. But that wasn't enough for the Big 10 to even get a B. I GIVE THE BIG 10 a C-.

Big 12 - Their top teams dominated; Oklahoma, Missouri, Texas Tech. OK State and Nebraska did too. Baylor had a big win over Washington State. Kansas lost a heartbreaker to USF, but that game was so good that that doesn't count too much off. Iowa State lost. I GIVE THE BIG 12 a A.

Big East - South Florida scored big for them with their win over Kansas. Rutgers lost in a disappointment to North Carolina. Syracuse got killed but Connecticut did surprisingly good. West Virginia was off. BIG EAST GETS a B.

Tell me what you think about those grades.

Game Analysis...

The Big One (USC vs. Ohio State): I know that I predicted a big win by USC, but I didn't know it would be that big. Can we go ahead and crown the Trojans national champs? No. But can we go ahead and give them a spot in the nat'l title game? Yes. Who the heck is going to beat them on their schedule?? Their path from here is nothing tough. Now; will Mark Sanchez win the Heisman? That's hard for me. I haven't really been thinking of his as a Heisman candidate, but he has to be up there now. It's kind of hard to tell with the Heisman this early, but he's on my list. Ohio State, meanwhile, should probably drop five or six spots. That was downright embarassing. Just another embarassment for them. First Florida, then LSU, now USC. I don't know how we can consider them contenders for anything now, except for the Big 10 title, which really doesn't count for anything much anymore.

Auburn 3 Mississippi State 2: Wow. It's really hard to know what to think after that. I mean, who has seen a score like that in the last ten, even twenty years? I haven't heard of it. Those two defenses are amazing. Auburn's defense is the best in the country. There. I said it. But I believe it. Just watch next week against LSU. I don't think we'll win, but I'll bet on that they won't score over 20 points 17 max. The offense, though, is another story. THE FUMBLES MUST BE FIXED!!! Five in the last two games have almost done us in. Three points will not cut it in any game in the next 100 that the Tigers play, I guarantee it. Why the heck was Kodi Burns not put in for at least one single snap? I mean, at the goal line when we have four downs to go five yards why isn't Kodi in there? Can the spread really work with a QB that won't run? Not looking like it. And then, on that goal line situation, we missed a chip shot field goal. My man Wes Byrum never misses field goals, but he missed two out of three!! Everything looked pitiful except the defense. State never even got inside the red zone. War Eagle. A win's a win. We're undefeated and 1-0 in SEC play. That's all I can say.

Rankings after Week Three

1. USC - no explanation needed.
2. Florida - I've had them there, and I think it's stupid to move a team down because they didn't play.
3. Oklahoma - looking better and better
4. Missouri - moves in front of Georgia with 69-point effort.
5. Georgia - had several chances to lose against South carolina.
6. LSU - dominated North Texas, big game next week against Auburn
7. Auburn - might as well put 'em here
8. Texas - game was postponed
9. Alabama - looking good over Western Kentucky
10. Penn State - I know, they haven't had a quality team yet, but they're scoring like crazy!

Well thanks for reading, I'm worn out. NFL's in full swing, and AP's dominating. Will have to wait until next time for NFL coverage.

New Blogger! What was the best thing before sliced bread?

Give me an answer. Now.

I'm kidding. Thought that was pretty funny. Our church pastor told us some of these "imponderables" last Sunday. The title was one...another one...

If con is the opposite of pro then isn't Congress the opposite of progress? Anyway, onto some sports.

College Football
(this was written a day ago so you can disregard some of this) Kansas is up on South Florida 20-13 right now. Looks like my pick is starting out good on that one. A lot of people were picking USF in that one. I think they're now regretting it. Todd Reesing and KU's offense is too good to be stopped by USF. Others can, but South Florida's defense is not quite good enough to compete on a high level, with top 10-15 teams.

Tommorow, I'll be watching a couple games. Auburn vs. Mississippi State is probably not recommended viewing for those of you that aren't Tigers or Bulldogs fans. Auburn should probably hide some of it's best offense and just run it through them. State shouldn't score too much on AU's stout defense, either.

Georgia vs. South Carolina, though, is quite recommended. Last year USC (of the East Coast) roughed up the 'Dawgs 16-12 in an exciting game. Usually exciting games have higher scoring but that one was good. Of course, Georgia was just about to hit its stride and finish big on its way to a top 5 ranking now. And the Gamecocks quickly went downhill after that. But still. Georgia should win, but hopefully not too easily. It's definitely their first test. I feel like most SEC games are tests for any team.

The Big One, so I've dubbed it, is also recommended. You can go to ESPN.com (note the TWENTY-ONE! articles on the right side of that page), SN.com, numerous blogs on this site and others, any sports TV network, and so on and so forth to find out why. Of course, if you don't know why USC-OSU is a big game then you've been living in a cave for the past 5 years.

Kansas vs. South Florida also would've been on here, but by the time I post it will be close to finishing anyway. No. 13 vs. No. 19 is usually going to be a good game. I especially like it because these two teams put their teams on the college football map last year and are following up just as good so far this year.

One More: Wisconsin vs. Fresno State is yet another meeting between ranked teams. Again, like USF, I see many picking the upset. And again, I'm not buying it. And again, I like Wisky's offense. I'm serious. Maybe I've fallen into a trap about these kinda games, but so far the first one is working out. Tell me what you think about this one; I'll be interested to hear from ya'll.

NFL

• Matt Cassel will be making his first career NFL start on Sunday. Eeeck. If I could pick one player that would hurt his team the most by being injured, it would probably be Tom Brady. Patriots...I don't feel for you. Can't get over spygate, can't find any sympathy here.

• In a bizarre twist, apparently Vince Youngwas close to commiting suicide on Monday night. Read the linked article for all the info - his therapist was concerned and so were people close to him including Titans coach Jeff Fisher. Young drove away from his house with a gun after mentioning suicide several times...don't know if that was recently or not. Odd, huh?

• I follow the Bucs some because former Auburn RB Carnell "Cadillac" Williams was drafted there. But Caddy is injury-prone and is still rehabbing from a leg injury last year. Earnest Graham has taken his place and looked solid in his first game. It seems a lot of the "experts" like him. I wish him well. Jon Gruden meanwhile is having trouble at QB. Nothing new there...

• Is it too early to judge Brett? Yes. Nothing more needed. He did good, but its one game, so how about everyone just attempt to shut up about him for a week. --cough ESPN cough-- -

• Jags play the Bills this week after a tough loss against a suicidal QB...I'm expecting a win. Running game should carry Jax. They need to call more running plays...but Jones-Drew and Taylor I guess should make the most out of what they got anyway to prove it.

One More Thing... On the cover of this week's SportingNews Magazine it said, "Blue skies, blue chips. How USC's combination of atmosphere and attitude has created the most talented team ever." YOU'VE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME SN!!!! Most Talented team ever!!?!??! And listen, that's not just limited to football. That's every sport in the history of mankind. And guess what. It's been ONE FREAKIN GAME!!! That's horrible journalism, I don't care what you say. USC cannot be considered the most talented team ever. I don't even think that can be a title to any team anyway.

Thanks for reading, still trying to figure out this new site! I'm over on Sporting News.com also.

--2012