College Football's thrilling season came to a close yesterday. And what a disappointment ending it was. LSU, playing a relative home game, flexed their muscles in a 38-24 victory over Ohio State.
What's most disappointing is that the changing of the guard in college football never fully matriculated. Not to mention of the five BCS Bowl games, none were memorable. Really only one-and-half games were even competitive, the half being yesterday's title bout. However, there were at least five instant classics during the regular season, starting with Appalachian State's shocker in the Big House including Stanford-USC, Pitt-West Virginia, Notre Dame-Navy, Arkansas-LSU to name a few others.
To give this season proper perspective just think that the No. 1 and No. 2-ranked teams hadn’t been defeated in the same weekend since 1996. It happened three times in the last two months of the season.
Thirteen top-five teams were beaten by unranked opponents. Unheralded programs in Cal, South Florida, Boston College, Oregon and Arizona State all made appearances in the top five.
It's just too bad that excitement didn't carry over to the bowl games. I'd discuss them but in all honesty, it's not worth your time. The year ended with familiar face in the top five: LSU, USC, Ohio State and Georgia, with only one new face in Missouri. Oh, well.
Now, for a brief look back at my pre-season predictions.
What I got right...at the end of the season there were 55 quarterbacks with a better passer rating than Matt Stafford (a la the next Brett Favre). They included all of my highlighted guys, even Sam Keller who had a terrible season. Caleb Hanie of Colorado State was even better than Georgia’s Stafford. Ouch!
Bad karma befell both Alabama and Arizona State. Nick Saban's new squad barely finished above the .500 mark as predicted (7-6). Arizona State appeared in the top five, before Dennis Erickson's team sputtered going 2-3 down the stretch losing all their games to top 25 teams. Former ASU coach Dirk Koetter would have fared as well, if not better.
Maryland, Pittsburgh, Oregon and Kentucky all played spoiler roles during the season. ‘Fear the Turtle’ rang true as the Terps knocked off two top 10 teams. The Panthers looked pathetic most of the year, but they marched in to Morgantown and took West Virginia's national title hopes with them. The Ducks quack-attack upset the Pac-10 power balance, before sizzling out due to injuries. The Wildcats popped Louisville's inflated balloon and survived No. 1 LSU in three overtimes.
What I got terribly wrong...Notre Dame. Enough said the Fighting Irish were pathetic. Eight wins was more than wishful thinking, it was pure fantasy. Coach Charlie Weis is not an offensive genius unless he has the players to run it. The Irish's streak of 43 consecutive wins over Navy came to an end. And the 3-9 Fighting Irish had trouble collecting first downs against the scout team.
And Louisville. Coach Bobby Petrino’s magic touch reared its ugly head both in Louisville and Atlanta. It’s too bad QB Brian Brohm couldn’t play defense. Pours ‘D’ did the Cardinals in. After starting 2-0 beating up on featherweights, Louisville stumbled against rival Kentucky and the wheels came off. Brohm’s leadership was questioned during a disappointing 6-6 campaign. To think I had them in the National Championship game, wow.
Blogger’s Note: FPS Final Rankings 1. LSU 2. Ohio State 3. Georgia 4. Missouri 5. USC 6. Kansas 7. West Virginia 8. Oklahoma 9. Virginia Tech 10. Texas Honorable Mention: BYU, Boston College, Hawaii, Oregon
No comments:
Post a Comment