Week 2 musings, contd

I'd like for someone to explain to me what on God's Green Earth just happened in Louisville tonight. MTSU gains a grand total of 217 yards on a glorified junior high squad, and then 4 days later waltzes into Papa John's stadium and drops 42 points and 554 yards? We all figured correctly that Louisville would be able to name the score, but who knew they didn't give a rat's ass that they'd give up 42 points against an opponent that would be overwlemed by the 1994 Marian Catholic Spartans. Oh well...there always risk in laying 40. Cincy came through though, so we went 1-1. Man, that's terrible. Hopefully Rutgers will get us going.

Did anyone notice that Lloyd Carr and the Miss Shit Can Wolverines lost to Appy St? Yeah, that happened, in case you didn't hear about it. Charlie Weis took a dumper as well, as predicted by the musings. If only that ethical and morally bankrupt jagoff Tommy Tuberville had lost to K St last week, I would have had the trifecta. It almost happened, but K State's QB was crippled, and their LT might as well have been crippled trying to keep Quentin Groves out of the backfield in the 4th quarter. Unfortunately, K State's coach sat there with his thumb up his ass hoping his statue of a QB might somehow make something happen before Groves could sprint 7 yards to bury his helmet into Freeman's kidneys. Ever heard of keeping a back in to block? I was holding a juicy +500 ML ticket on that one. Oh well, there's always this week.

1. @Ohio St -28 1/2(better hurry) v Akron: Actually, who cares...it's over 28, and has been stationary pretty much all week. Ok, so here we have Akron, coming off several years of mediocrity, and off a home win against Army in what was a total taffy pull. They both slogged around for 3 hours, traded punts and an occasional score brought about by the other team's incompetence. It resulted in about a dead heat, but Akron pulled out a 22-14 win. Army came into that game not sure if it would get a first down, and probably wouldn't have if they played anyone worth a crap. Army ran it on the road against Akron, so you can bet the Buckeyes will have no problem. We all know about OSU's D, and Akron is breaking in 4 new OL and just came off a game in which they struggled to score on Army at home. This looks like a mismatch. Of course, laying the big number is always risky, just ask Pete last night. We all should have known that MTSU would morph from Sun Belt speed bag to a West Virginia/Texas Tech hybrid offensive juggernaut in 4 days, right?

2. @Oklahoma -10 1/2 v Miami: I'm seeing lots of people gobbling up the DD points and taking Miami in this one on principle. I have one question to ask these people: Have they ever seen Kirby Freeman play quarterback? For the uninitiated, it looks like bad. He reminds me of former NC State goofball Marcus Stone, who's primary skill was looking fly in his uniform. I spent my New Year's Eve last year throwing up on myself after putting my money in his hands against Nevada in the Blue Turf bowl needing to cover 3. Now he has to go to Oklahoma and face one of the top defenses in the nation, and certainly one of the top secondaries. Miami's MO will be to run it, but they haven't had an effective run game in years, having failed to crack 100 yards in 6 games last year, including games with Duke (26 carries 30 yards!!!!) and Fla Int'l (29 carries 90 yards)!!!!!!!! They have people back on the line, but I don't want people that get pushed around by Duke. Now Oklahoma on the road? I don't like their chances to score much here when the alterative if Freeman chucking it. Oklahoma is very underrated on offense, and although Miami has a solid D, Shannon will be matching wits with Stoops on the road. They will get the ball to their playmakers and score plenty. Bad, bad matchup for Miami here.

3. @Arkansas St +4 v Memphis: These two teams played last year in Memphis, and Arky St won on a Hail Mary as time expired. You might think it was a lucky victory, but the Indians(kudos for telling the NCAA to suck it on that issue) outgained Memphis by almost 100 in that game. They actually outgained their opponents on the year last year, which is rare for a Sun Belt team. Coming into the year, a kid on their team made news by predicting they would go undefeated, eliciting a smattering of guffaws from anyone who happened to notice. That tells me they have a confident bunch, and lo and behold they absolutely took it to Texas last week, outgaining them 397-340, stopping the run, haraasing Mc Coy...it was legit.(21-13 final). Now they get a rare home game against a team from a bigger conference than theirs, so they'll be jacked up. Memphis showed they are entirely capable of pissing away a game based on what they did against Ole Miss. So they are totally capable of losing this one.

4. West Virginia -24 @Marshall: Hate to lay the wood like this on the road in what some people call a rivalry game, but this looks like a mismatch. Marshall lost their best defensive player just before last week's game, and they trudged through the Miami game showing no ability to do anything. WVU looks like they have figured their defense out, especially against weaker squads, so I doubt Marshall will be putting up a lot of points, which is the exact opposite of what WV will do. It simply does not matter who they are playing, they will not be stopped. I tend to think they just torched a better defensive squad in WMU, putting up 62. In order to cover this Marshall will probably have to score at least 24. That's unlikely, but even if they do, WVU might drop 60 again and make it a moot point.

5. South Florida +7 @Auburn: Last week USF started slow, much like they did last year. Auburn, as we should know by now, is not very good. I don't happen to think that K st is worth a shit, when it comes right down to it, and they should have beaten them last week, outgaining them and holding them under 300 total yards. That marks about the 900th consecutive time that's happened to Auburn. USF has a good Qb with experience, and this squad has won in environments like this before. I tend to think they are better than K State, and almost certainly better coached than K st is at this point. I'll be rooting for a win outright, but the TD helper is nice.

6. @SMU -17 1/2 v North Texas: North Texas is so bad it's not even funny. Oklahoma was practically trying not to score, but still ended up racking up 79 on them. SMU is coming off a painful shellacking on their home field on national TV at the hands of Texas Tech, so they will be eager play schoolyard bully on the glorified high school team that N Texas is. Throw in the fact that NT somehow beat SMU last year(I think SMU QB Justin Willis was suspended for that game) and SMU even has revenge on it's mind. This one won't be pretty.

7. @UCLA -7 V BYU: BYU looked good facing Arizona at home last week, but the tables will be turned in this one. I think they will really struggle to score on the road with UCLA, and they won't have an inept offense breaking in a new system when they travel to Pasadena. Ben Olson was spectacular last week on the road at Stanford, which is not saying much, but I don't think BYU will have much success either, despite the fact that they are a solid D. 7 isn't enough here, I think UCLA wins comfortably.

8. Missouri -5 1/2 @ Ole Miss: Nobody was all that impressed with Mizzou's D last week against Illinois, since the Illini put up 34 on them with their backup QB. however, one thing Missouri did do was shut down Illinois's running game, which was tops in the Big Ten last year(believe it or not). In order for Ole Miss to have any success on offense, they will need to run it, and I have to believe that Illinois has a better running game than Ole Miss. Ole Miss got a win last week, but Memphis all but handed it to them, and outgained them badly. Martin Hankins completed 40 passes against them. What do you think Chase Daniel will do? In order to hang in this one, they will have to shut down one of the top offenses in the country or put up 24 or so points. I don't think either is likely. There is risk in backing Gary Pinkel(moron) as a road favorite, but they should roll here.

9. @Georgia -3 1/2 v South Carolina: This spread keeps moving down. As you know, I like South Carolina, but Georgia looks to be much improved on offense. Asking So carolina to go in there and basically play Georgia to a standstill in Blake Mitchell's first game of the year is asking a lot. They really struggled stopping the run last week as well. I can see Mitchell laying an egg here. I can see hem turning it aroundd later and still having a great year, but this doesn't appear to be a good matchup for them at this juncture.

10 @Baylor -6 1/2 V Rice: Too bad for Rice that they are breaking in yet another new coach, and the David Bailiff era started with a loss to Nicholls St. To make matters worse, in the post game press conference, Bailiff basically just made a bunch of excuses. That's never a good sign, as the coach is already covering for his inability to prepare his team. Guy Morriss knows what he's doing at Baylor despite the talent thing. If they concentrate on stopping Chase Clement and Jarrett Dillard, they should have no problem. Rice might be in serious trouble this year.

Others: A lot this week....I like La La believe it or not getting 2 at home against Ohio. LA La ran it down South carolina's throat last week, and have a tricky offensive sceme. Ohio has a weak offense..I think they'll have their hands full... I'ts a lot of points, but I'm not sure how ND is going to score off of Penn St's D. We all know that ND's D is porous so 17 1/2 might not be too much in this one. It could be a 41-17 type game, a reverse of last year...There are two teams with classic look-ahead situations that shape up well. Nebraska is coming off a game where they walked on water and has USC on deck, and they are playing Wake on the road, who is coming off a poor performance in what shapes up to be perhaps their marquee home game of the year. Riley Skinner probably won't play, but that offense doesn't rely a ton on the QB and their backup looked ok against BC last week. The spread is up to 8, and we all know what Wake can do as a dog. The second one is Kentucky -12 1/2 v Kent. Kentucky has Louisville coming to Lexington next week, and they just got done watching Louisville get torched, so they are probably licking their chops. However, before they get a crack at Louisville they have Kent to contend with, who is coming off a win on the road against a BCS opponent. (weak one in Iowa St, but nontheless...)Big trap situation for both....So Miss goes to Knoxville getting only 10 1/2. In the past, So Miss has been a solid squad, but they struggled as sizable dogs last year with this bunch. Tennessee showed me something at cal by hanging in there in a firestorm. They should be able to handle this amount if they have a good defensive game.....That's it for now. Good luck to whoever drops a dime.