Week two gave us some good nail biters- GA Tech/Clemson was down to the wire, as was Notre Dame/Michigan, UGA/South Carolina and USC/Ohio State. There are also a few games who's final score is not indicative of the struggle: Jacksonville State was beating FSU, in Tallahassee, with 34 seconds remaining on the clock. That would have probably been the biggest upset of all time (Michigan fans would have rejoiced). Also, Alabama and Texas both struggled mightily early on against extremely inferior opponents (Florida International and Wyoming, respectively), but ended up with a respectable final score.
To me, this year is very similar to 2007 with its extreme parity. Remember when South Florida was #2 in the county? A two loss LSU team snuck into the BCS Championship Game due to the lack of any powerhouse teams who were clearly better than all the rest. I think Florida stands out as the team who can be the exception this year, but the #2 team is a wide open race. If Florida goes undefeated, or suffers just one loss, they are going to march into the title game. The question remains, who will the voters put over the top to challenge the Gators? Most likely USC or Ohio State since the pointless preseason rankings have them in position to handle early losses. I'll be surprised if we see an undefeated team in the BCS Title Game (sorry Boise State and BYU, it just ain't gonna happen).
As for my predictions, I went 9-5 (5-1 on SEC games) in week two, not my best. A few of those I really don't feel bad about (CMU over Mich State, Colorado losing to Toledo) but such is the volatility of college football. Here are the results:
W- Clemson @ Georgia Tech
L-Colorado @ Toldeo
L-Central Michigan @ Michigan State
W- Fresno State @ Wisconsin
W-BYU @ Tulane
L-Notre Dame @ Michigan
W-USC @ Ohio State
L-Stanford @ Wake Forest
L-UCLA @ Tennessee
W- Vanderbilt @ LSU
W-South Carolina @ Georgia
W-Troy @ Florida
W-Florida International @ Alabama
W-Miss State @ Auburn
At least I was right about tOSU going down to USC. Happy to see Tyrelle Pryor lose in the big spotlight, even though his moron of the month award was swiftly stolen by Kanye West (see what I did there?). Michigan could be a dangerous team in a few years: 89 of their players are either freshmen or sophomores. True freshman QB Tate Forcier looked very good against a quick, blitz-crazy Notre Dame defense. I still think this is still far off, but we may be seeing a resume on monster.com that looks something like this:
Name: CONFIDENTIAL
Purpose: Find a head coaching position which allows mediocrity
Experience:
2000-2004 Offensive Coordinator, New England Patriots
Duties: let Tom Brady and Bill Belichek make me look like a genius
2004-2009 Head Coach, Notre Dame
Duties: turned a top tier program into the door mat of college football
Don't feel bad for the guy though, he is the most overpaid coach in college football. You're off the hook, Kirk Ferentz:
1. Pete Carroll, USC | Pac-10 | $4,400,000 |
2. Charlie Weis, Notre Dame | Ind. | $4,200,000 |
3. Urban Meyer, Florida | SEC | $4,000,000 |
4. Nick Saban, Alabama | SEC | $3,900,000 |
5. Bob Stoops, Oklahoma | Big 12 | $3,800,000 |
6. Les Miles, LSU | SEC | $3,800,000 |
7. Jim Tressel, Ohio State | Big Ten | $3,500,000 |
8. Kirk Ferentz, Iowa | Big Ten | $3,030,000 |
9. Mack Brown, Texas | Big 12 | $2,910,000 |
10. Bobby Petrino, Arkansas | SEC | $2,900,000 |
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