BG Bowl Pick Em

[Bregor]

The "scoresheet" view of our group is pretty interesting. Only three people picked OU over Florida... wow. The Rose Bowl is pretty evenly split, which is also surprising. The two funniest things I noticed were that we all got hosed by Central Michigan, and only Miz picked Ohio State over Texas.

[Akiyama]

Man. Cal scared the shit out of me there.

[Kirin]

That was the second worst clock management by a FBS team's head coach i've seen all year. Randy Shannon and his staff should be ashamed about those closing 2 minutes.

The only team to do worse was WVU in one of their losses, when Stewart just kinda sat there and called 2 TO's as their own playclock wound down twice.

Nice to see Florida State with some fire under their asses.

And yeah, UNC was the superior ballclub to WVU today. But i gotta give it to White, he was not going to let his team go softly...hes done it in every bowl game hes won...definately bumped his draft stock a touch.

[Tyche]

I figured Shannon was just letting his Freshman QB run the offense, even if he was making mistakes. More or less giving him the opportunity to learn from his mistakes. At least that was the impression I got from looking at how calm Shannon was and refusal to take a timeout when his offense was clearly discombobulated.

[Akiyama]

That or he was still pissed by that fumble there at the end, and when Cal jumped on top. You have to let that sort of stuff go and come back strong. They did not. :/ Good game until the last couple minutes though. Cal/Miami and WVU/UNC were better games than I thought, but the FSU/Wisconsin game was just wow. I'm not sure it's fair to call it a game.

[Azkarin2]

I was shocked at him not calling a time out. I caught the game late so I figured they didn't have one. When he finally used his last one on the next play I was dumbfounded. He let 20 seconds tick off. I don't think that's the time your QB should learn from his mistakes.

[Plow]

Big East/Big Ten/ACC/Pac-10? o.o; I dunno if this is a trick question.

4 of 6 teams playing today were from within about 6 hour drives at the max lol.

And all 3 games had ACC teams.

It took a career game out of Pat White to will them past UNC. UNC is the better club and should have won that damn game. Oh well, it was only my 11 pointer. I haven't lost anything higher than 25, although I did lose my 21, 23, 24, and 25.

lol Nicks had as much receiving yardage today as his last 4 games combined to give UNC a chance.

Pat White won his 4th straight bowl game.

One of those 2 was easier to predict than the other ;p

[Tyche]

I actually had WVU over UNC at first because of Tate, but changed it because UNC is clearly the better team. Just didn't anticipate White going fucking nuts. It happens, oh well. Didn't lose much on it.

On the scoresheet, I noticed Miz had LSU over G.Tech as his 34 pointer. Wow, I hope you're right.

[Plow]

I actually had WVU over UNC at first because of Tate, but changed it because UNC is clearly the better team. Just didn't anticipate White going fucking nuts. It happens, oh well. Didn't lose much on it.

Very similar schedules, UNC goes 8-5 WVU goes 9-4, WVU beats them in like every stat except raw passing yardage and slightly behind in points per game, and WVU beats them head to head on neutral field (cept it was really a home game for NC) when both teams have major players produce career days to make a great game.

Yeap, clearly UNC was the better team.

[Bregor]

On the scoresheet, I noticed Miz had LSU over G.Tech as his 34 pointer. Wow, I hope you're right.

A lot more people picked Georgia Tech than I wanted, figured I could pick up some points there but no dice. Originally I thought GT would roll but now I'm betting on a good game. Based on how Notre Dame came out and performed well with time to prepare, I kinda think LSU will be ready for the option and surpass expectations. Still, I'd go 30-28 GT.

Meanwhile, Tyche has Florida as his 34-pointer. I dunno if it's a moral obligation to weigh the NC game the most, or he has that much faith in Saint Tebow. Either way, I think it's funny the top four in the group right now all have the NC game at 1 or 2 points.

[Akiyama]

I picked GT, but I think LSU will surprise people and play better defense than they have all year.

As far as UNC/WVU goes, in my opinion, neither team was clearly above the other. I think it was more of a toss-up between both teams, and we saw that with the one point win by WVU.

[Tyche]

I should reiterate...when I say that UNC was the better team, I mean they had a better collection of people going into the game. The teams (players) are close enough to not make any strong stance, but I just really thought that UNC's coaching was leaps and bounds better than WVU's and it would show in the bowl game. I always weigh coaching pretty heavily in bowl games.

And I just felt obliged to put the NC game as my 34 pointer because it was the NC game. I don't feel strongly at all about it.

[thestalkmore]

Cal was sloppy as shit. Best has been the only reason we've limped through this season reasonably successfully.

[Plow]

I should reiterate...when I say that UNC was the better team, I mean they had a better collection of people going into the game. The teams (players) are close enough to not make any strong stance, but I just really thought that UNC's coaching was leaps and bounds better than WVU's and it would show in the bowl game. I always weigh coaching pretty heavily in bowl games.

Nothing against Butch Davis and what he's done at NC this year, but he had talent at Miami that could fill out an NFL team right now with players still in the league performing at a level where it would easily be among the best teams in the league. And I'm not exaggerating here, here's just a quick lineup that could be made:

DE's: would be kind of weak mostly due to injury, Jerome McDougle and Kenny Holmes
DT: Vince Wilfork
LB: Jonathan Vilma, Ray Lewis, DJ Williams, Dan Morgan
Safeties: Ed Reed and Sean Taylor... other than the whole being dead thing
CB's: Antrelle Rolle and Philip Buchannon

Oline would have Bryant McKinney and Vernon Carey, not sure on guards and center.
How about a 3 TE set with Jeremy Shockey, Kellen Winslow, and Bubba Franks lol...
Cept then how would you use Andre Johnson, Reggie Wayne, and Santana Moss >.>
And of course you'd want Willis to get plenty of carries.
I'm pretty sure even Ken Dorsey would look like a badass with those tools around him lol.


Anyway, point being, he's done well with ridiculous talent at a traditional powerhouse, (although even with all that he only had one year that was much better than this year at UNC), Bill Stewart just happens to have stepped into his first game as a head coach and *stomped* an OU team that was playing real damn well at the time in the biggest game in school history. And then followed it up in a year with some major personnel losses by getting 9 wins in probably the toughest overall schedule West Virginia's ever had, at least since Pitt's glory days.

It's hard to argue that there's some big difference in the quality of coaching there, outside of Davis being a proven extremely strong recruiter. Don't forget he was coaching last year when they went 4-8 in a weaker ACC, too.

[Tyche]

No, it's not hard to argue at all. Butch Davis is leaps and bounds above Bill Stewart. There's a reason he's 87 years old and had just one (failed) head coaching job. I find it absurd you'd judge Stewart on one season where he already has arguably the best QB in Big East history and another man's players, and going only 2-3 against bowl teams. With one of those wins coming when Rutgers was playing horribly. So they had one good win against UCONN. Sweet. But hey, he beat Oklahoma, that's been an amazing accomplishment to beat OU in bowl games the past few years.

[Plow]

No, it's not hard to argue at all. Butch Davis is leaps and bounds above Bill Stewart. There's a reason he's 87 years old and had just one (failed) head coaching job. I find it absurd you'd judge Stewart on one season where he already has arguably the best QB in Big East history and another man's players, and going only 2-3 against bowl teams. With one of those wins coming when Rutgers was playing horribly. So they had one good win against UCONN. Sweet. But hey, he beat Oklahoma, that's been an amazing accomplishment to beat OU in bowl games the past few years.

Butch Davis had one of the best teams in the history of college football and couldn't get them into the national championship.

Larry Coker took the same team undefeated to the NC and really won the game, just got screwed by the refs, the very next year.

[Akiyama]

So what? People have come in and taken teams to big bowl games where the previous coach recruited all the players all the time. It's not it makes them better. Look at Willingham to Weis at ND. Butch Davis IS the better coach, if only for the fact that he's coached for a longer period of time and has more experience. Just because you have one of the best teams in the history of College Football, it doesn't mean if you don't get them into the National Championship, you're a failure of a coach.

[Tyche]

Tubby Smith took Pitino's payers to a national championship in his first year. Clearly Tubby is a national championship caliber coach and much better than Pitino =/

[octopus]

Butch Davis had one of the best teams in the history of college football and couldn't get them into the national championship.

Larry Coker took the same team undefeated to the NC and really won the game, just got screwed by the refs, the very next year.

I have to argue a bit about details here. I believe Butch Davis' last year was the year they got screwed out of the national championship game despite being #2 in both human polls. Florida State got picked despite Miami beating them head-to-head (and has a better human ranking).

[Plow]

Just because you have one of the best teams in the history of College Football, it doesn't mean if you don't get them into the National Championship, you're a failure of a coach.

Tyche was supposed to be the one that said that, so I could point out the whole Roy Williams thing, dammit.


And yeah, Davis should've been in the championship. He sure has hell should not have lost a game with that team though. Like 3/4 the people I listed were all there that one year.