I’ve been called a lot of things over 22 years in the business but I have NEVER been called a BCS expert. In all honesty, only who’d WANT to be known as you? That having been said, we’re stuck with the BCS determining college football’s national title game match up and most individuals really are a little worried nowadays, as almost everybody is expecting a Texas/USC or USC/Texas (whichever way you prefer) show-down in this season’s Rose Bowl.
The initial BCS standings were released on October 17 and there were no rumors while USC wouldbe No. 1, agen judi bola No. 2 in the polls Texas, could find itself behind Va Tech in the standings. Those fears were unfounded, as USC and Texas were a good onetwo from the initial BCS standings. I am here for some time to remind everybody that because the BCS’ beginning in 1998, the two teams ranked first and second in the first standings of this calendar year, have NEVER met from the BCS’ season-ending title match!
Moving on, the second BCS standings were published this past Monday. In somewhat of a surprise, USC dropped to No. 2 with Texas moving up to the amount one spot. The perimeter of .0007, has been the closest-ever between the first two spots in the standings history. USC possesses the world’s longest winning streak in 29 matches (Texas gets got the secondbest series just 14!)
For USC fans, it isn’t quite as awful as sounds. USC is ahead of No. 3 Va Tech and bear in mind, No. 2 is simply as great as No. 1 at this’match’, as they both advance to the Rose Bowl. Actually, Texas, that has no further ranked teams onto its own staying schedule, is at greater danger of falling out of one the top two spots compared to USC. The Trojans still have Cal (No. 23 from the BCS), Fresno State (unranked in the BCS but 22nd at the AP and 2-4 from the coaches’ survey ) and UCLA (No. 9 at the BCS) on their agenda.
Currently, Va Tech is in the”dreaded” No. 3 spot (visit USC at 2003 and Auburn at 2004). Nevertheless, the Hokies drama Boston College (BCS No. 1-2 ) Thursday night also still possess Miami-Fl (No. 8 at the BCS) and also a likely ACC title-game showdown on tap with Florida State on December 3 (No. 11 at the BCS), to boost their personal rankings. These days, you can find SIX unbeatens remaining in college football and it’s possible that the entire year can end with as many as four.
Either USC or UCLA needs to reduce when those teams match on December 3 and assuming Georgia and Alabama were to stay unbeaten through the ending of the regular season, the Bulldogs and Crimson Tide would meet in the SEC title game, decreasing the other from the ranks of the unbeaten.
Speaking of unbeatens, Alabama, Georgia, Texas, UCLA, USC and also Va Tech are all 7-0. But, just Texas is an ideal 7-0 ATS. The teams united ATS mark is 26-16, or 61.9 percent. At the opposite end of the spectrum, four-division I-A schools enter this weekend’s action winless. The list comprises Buffalo (0-7), New Mexico State (0-7), Rice (0-6) and Temple (0-8). Of those four, just Rice, in 0-6 ATS, is also winless against those things! The combined ATS markers of those four richest universities is 11 17 or 39.3 per cent.
Here’s a fascinating fact. You have often heard me among others refer to the pointspread because the”great equalizer.” This is why? The six unbeatens naturally have a winning percent of 1.000 and the four winless teams naturally are at.000. But, you’ll realize that when you compare the two groups’ SU winning percentage versus their ATS percentages, here is what you get. Even the unbeatens’ ATS percentage is .619, a huge difference of .381. As for the winless teams. Pretty darn close!
Before leaving this talk of unbeatens and winless teams, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention both Duke and Purdue (even though I’m convinced those schools prefer I did not!) . While Texas is still the nation’s ONLY perfect ATS school, Rice isn’t the nation’s only winless ATS school. Assessing the Owls are Duke and Purdue. The Blue Devils are 17 SU but 0-7 ATS, beating only VMI at a non-lined game. As for the Boilermakersthey have been 25 SU but 0-7 ATS, since they won but did not cover against Akron and Arizona to open the calendar year, before losing their last five games both SU and ATS!
Exactly how are those new head coaches doing?
In just one of the many preseason articles, I mentioned that 23 of this state’s 119 Division I-A schools (almost 20 per cent !) Would start the 2005 season having another head coach than they’d ended together in 2004. Are a lot of these schools better for the change? I won’t waste time record each faculty’s respective record but alphabetically from BYU to Western Michigan, ” the 23 schools which changed head coaches for the 2005 year went a collective 114-149 (.433) at 2004 using an ATS listing of 117-138-2 (.459).
When a tree falls in the forest and there’s nobody around to hear it, does it make a noise? As the overall numbers are pretty similar from last year to the year, listed below are seven schools that have surely noticed a shift, either bad or good.
Skip Holtz has East Carolina in 3-3 SU and 5-1 ATS, after the Pirates went 29 SU and 5-6 ATS at 2004 (ECU was a joint 3-20 in’04 and’03). Hal Mumme attracted his supposed”Air Raid” offense to Las Cruces but the Aggies of New Mexico State are averaging just 14.3 PPG and so are 0-7 SU and 25 ATS after moving 5-6 (6-5) at 2004. Mike Gundy took over at Oklahoma State and also the Cowboys are 3-4 SU (wins have come over I Aa Montana State, Fla Atlantic and Ark S T ) and 1 5 ATS, following a 7-5 (7-5) 2004.
Greg Robinson got his first head coaching job, after 30 years in the business, at Syracuse this past year. But, his mid-season report card isn’t good, because the Orange are 16 SU and 2-5 ATS after going 6-6 (8-4) in Paul Pasqualoni’s final year (had 11 winning seasons at 14 years at Syracuse!) .Utah set the school football world on its ear in 2004, becoming the very first non-BCS conference school to receive a BCS bowl bid plus ended 12-0 (10-2 ATS). But, Urban Meyer left for Florida (where he’s a unsatisfactory 52 SU and 34 ATS) with former DC Kyle Whittingham taking-over to the Utes and moving only 4-4 and a pitiful 1 7 ATS thus far in 2005. Things are looking up in Kalamazoo these days (take to writing this with a straight face!) , as Bill Cubit in his first year as a Section I-A head coach, gets the Broncos 4-3 SU and 2 4 ATS after the faculty ended 2004 in 110 (3-7).
I haven’t forgotten about Charlie Weis and Notre Dame, I just left them until past. Weis, with not one of his own recruits, acquired over a crime that had finished 108th in the nation in total offense in 2002, 90th at 2003 and 81st in 2004. After seven games of the 2005 season, Notre Dame is 8th in total offense (492.7 YPG), 12th in scoring (37.9 PPG) and 52 SU (6-1 ATS). After going 66 SU and ATS in 2004 plus 5 7 SU (4 8 ) at 2003, Weis has the Irish ranked 9th at the most recent AP poll, 10th at the latest coaches’ poll and 15 th (?) From the most recent BCS standings. He has got a QB (Brady Quinn) that’s breaking Notre Dame passing records to a weekly basis and are the Heisman frontrunner or even for 2 guys from USC and also a QB out of Texas called Young. Most of all, he has the Irish in line for a BCS bowl bid, if they can win-out.
Out of respect to this Willingham family, I won’t cite just how Notre Dame’s former head trainer is doing in Washington. On second thought, I don’t know any one in his loved ones, so what the hell. Willingham has got the Huskies 1-6 SU and 2-4 ATS throughout seven matches, with his lone win coming over an Idaho team that’s 16. In fairness to Ty, he inherited a team that was 110 (3-7) at 2004.
