My College Football Thoughts

[dencyguy]

I posted this on the other board as well, but here are my thoughts on the upcoming season:

SEC: There's no reason to believe that Alabama will slip up in the west, but the east should be interesting--will Florida be able to not miss a step? Will Georgia's defense improve enough under Todd Grantham to make a run? My hunch is that the answer to both questions is yes, but ultimately I think Florida will win out.

SEC East
1. Florida
2. Georgia

SEC West
1. Alabama
2. Auburn

SEC Championship: Alabama over Florida
Other Big Storyline: Coaching hot seats--I think Georgia improves enough for Mark Richt to stick around, but anything more than two or three losses might doom Les Miles at LSU. My hunch: Bye, Les--we'll miss your insane gameplan of going for it on every single fourth down.
Whither Tennessee?: Not much, this year anyway. From everything I've heard, Derek Dooley sounds like a patient guy who does things methodically. If it works out, once the Vols turn the corner they should stay good for a while. The downside is that it will take at least 2-3 years of (at best) incremental improvement. My guess: 6-6 this year, maybe with a trip to the Music City Bowl.

Big Ten
It's Ohio State's conference to lose. Penn St. and Iowa will be good, but not great.

1. Ohio State
2. Penn State
3. Iowa
4. Michigan

Other Big Storyline: It's gotta be Rich Rodriguez's job security. I expect them to make a move this year--not big enough to beath Ohio State or make a run at the conference championship, but I like them to win 8 or 9 games this year (including their bowl).
Second Other Storyline: Come on, did anyone see Paterno at the Big Ten media games? My grandmother is more coherent, and she's senile and has been dead for ten years. Now that Bowden can't catch you, time to hobble away with some dignity, JoePa.

Big 12
I don't see a great team in the conference this year. Texas always has the potential, and Nebraska has been rising. OKlahoma should be good. Other than that, I see this conference as good, but not great.

Big 12 North
1. Nebraska
2. I dunno...Missouri? (who's the genius who put all of the good teams in the South?)

Big 12 South
1. Oklahoma
2. Texas

Big 12 Championship: Nebraska over Oklahoma

Other Storylines: How will the teams handle the impending divorce? And--not that this is a storyline or anything, just a question--how in God's name does Dan Hawkins still have a job?

Pac 10
Not the most relevant conference out there, but an interesting one nonetheless. Several pretty good teams, but no championship contenders.

1. Stanford
2. Oregon St.
3. USC
4. Oregon

Other Storylines: What else but the return of Hurricane Lane? I don't think he's going to be successful in the long run, but I don't think they'll suck enough to make it truly satisfying for Tennessee fans. That said, Chip Kelly is already thanking his lucky stars that there's a coach in the conference who runs a looser ship than he does.

ACC
Like the Pac 10, there isn't a championship-level team in the bunch. Also, I gotta say that this is just a boring conference. Meh.

ACC Atlantic
(note: these are total guesses; I don't even know if these schools are even playing football this year)
1. I dunno...Florida State?
2. Boston College, maybe

ACC Coastal
1. Miami
2. Virginia Tech

ACC CHampionship: I have no idea...Miami over Florida State. Or Duke over Maryland. Who gives a crap?

Other Storylines: What other storylines? It's the ACC, and it's football.

Big East:I'm an SEC guy, and I recognize that the Big Ten is the second-best conference out there this year. That said, I love watching Big East football. I'm a big fan of West Virginia. I admire what Dave Wannstedt has done at Pitt. Cincinnati is usually watchable. Syracuse...well, Syracuse used to have nice uniforms. I just like watching the conference's games.

1. Pitt
2. West Virginia
3. UConn
4. Rutgers

Other Storylines: None, really

Other Questions
Will this be the year a non-BCS team gets a shot at the national championship? Don't be silly. That would make people think that there should be a playoff or something.
Will Notre Dame re-awaken the echoes this year? No. Brian Kelly is a better coach than Charlie Weis, but Notre Dame is irrelevant now. Also, that cliche sucks.

My Prediction for Every Bowl
Meineke Car Care Bowl: What is this, a sick joke? Screw that, and let's skip to the BCS.

Rose Bowl: Penn State over Stanford: Paterno finally has a chance to go out getting carried out on the shoulders of his players. Or he keels over with shock after someone tells him that they won.

Fiesta Bowl: Required non-BCS token TCU over Nebraska.

Orange Bowl: Pitt over...I dunno...Miami, I guess.

Sugar Bowl: Florida over...hmmm...let's make it interesting and go with Oklahoma.

National Championship Game: Alabama over Ohio State (although I could see it going either way).

Dennis
Note: I posted this before Pitt's opening day loss to Utah, so maybe it's already starting to unravel. Then again, maybe not.

[Pedros Gaff]

The Ohio State University all day baby number 2# is takin us to the top and in april 97# will hopefully be a brown

[Jax Dawg]

Originally Posted by dencyguy

anything more than two or three losses might doom Les Miles at LSU. My hunch: Bye, Les--we'll miss your insane gameplan of going for it on every single fourth down.

Dennis,

First off, great break down of all the conference top contenders! I'd like to add Wisconsin to the top teams from the Big Ten. They have almost all their starters back and their RB John Clay is a beast!

If Les Miles gets fired from LSU, he won't have to wait long unitl Michigan offers him the HC job and fires Rich Rod. I think he is a Michigan alumni and would welcome the homecoming.

Even though I live in Gator country I'm not a fan of them or the SEC but recognize their recent dominance of the National Championship games. I'm a die hard homer when it comes to my sports teams so since I was born and raised in Ohio I live and die with Ohio State in college ball.

Oh ya, Ohio State defeats Alabama in a close one in Glendale, AZ for the BCS Championship!

[grimmreaper3]

It's a midterm election year. OSU's going to be in the championship game.

[Alo]

USC's defense looked pretty bad. How long before Kiffin fires his dad?

[dencyguy]

Originally Posted by Alo

USC's defense looked pretty bad. How long before Kiffin fires his dad?

A quote from Deadspin, quoting from a story from somewhere (the LA Times? who knows?):

>>It turns out the Trojans did not know the Warriors would be running the "Pistol" offense — a spread attack in which the running back lines up behind the quarterback — until defensive boss Monte Kiffin saw it on the news Wednesday night.

"So we spent all morning changing things and preparing for it," said Lane Kiffin. "I guess that shows we should never watch the news, because the preparation didn't do any good."<<

Just to provide historical context, David Reaves was Tennessee's QB coach last year. He is also Lane Kiffin's brother-in-law. When Kiffin bailed for USC, Reaves was on the road recruiting for UT. He found out about the move on television, because Lane didn't tell him. Because he wasn't planning on taking him along.

Dennis
Everything the man does just re-inforces that Al Davis was right about something post-2000. Which is absolutely terrifying.

[Alo]

That's awesome.

About a week ago, the analysts on ESPNU were debating whether Kiffin's actually a good coach. One of the guys who must have been on a bathroom break or something shouted from offsceen, "Two words: Jon Crompton".

I guess Reaves doesn't get any credit for making City of Crompton look like a competent QB, which - according to everyone and the San Diego Chargers - he is not.

>>The Chargers released QB Jonathan Crompton from their practice squad.
According to San Diego-Union Tribune, Crompton "is not ready to play in the NFL." The one-year wonder at Tennessee picked up a lot of "sleeper" steam heading into the NFL draft, but he's no longer worth a roster spot even in deep Dynasty leagues.<<

Alo
Imagine what Kiffin could do with Jevan Snead.

[dencyguy]

I'll give Kiffin credit for helping turn Crompton around to the point that he was draftable; it's hard to describe just how bad he was at the beginning of the year--bad enough that the yahoos in Tennessee were sending him death threats. Kiffin stuck with him, scaled back the offense so that he basically couldn't mess it up, and built up his confidence. I never thought that Crompton was the next Peyton Manning (I quote myself from the Texas vs. the Nation" thread):

>>Would I take him in round five? Boy, I'm not sure. Round six, maybe, depending on who else the team takes before that. But he's a project who needs a lot of work, and my concern is that he's got about a 30% chance of becoming a serviceable NFL QB (probably a serviceable backup) and 70% of turning into a shorter version of DA with less arm strength. <<

...but I can't hate on Kiffin for Crompton; even if he wasn't able to turn him into an NFL QB, at least he was able to turn him into a somewhat reasonable fascimile.

Dennis

[Shep]

Great stuff, Dennis.

My answer: Yes, Kiffin can coach... but no so much on defense. He's definitely altered the culture, introduced discipline and accountability. He's known to be good "in the room."

I'm eager to see Florida State against Oklahoma. They could make things interesting.

[dencyguy]

I'm intrigued by the idea of his introducing discipline and accountability back to USC--could you give some examples? I'm not asking to be a jerk, I'm asking because it wasn't his strong suit at Tennessee.

The Vols had been slipping on both counts for several years--Phil Fulmer could still kind of recruit at the end, but he seemed to attend the Fred Thompson "How to Win Friends and Influence People Through Napping" school of discipline--and Kiffin didn't exactly run a tight ship. He racked up something like six secondary recruiting violations during his first month on the job--he tried to spin them as knowing attempts to get Tennessee's name out there, which means that he was either lying or intentionally running afoul of the NCAA and SEC to increase the visibility of a school that, even at its lowest (i.e., this year), can still pull in top-15 quality recruiting classes. Of the guys he managed to pull in in his first recruiting class, a good number of them have either left the program or been kicked off the team after run-ins with the law. When he left, he basically had Ed Orgeron call UT's early recruits (using his UT-issued cell phone) to suggest that they not go to class the next day so that they could leave the program without sitting out a year (to their credit, none of them did).

If anything, Kiffin's tenure at UT anyway was anything but disciplined and accountable--his offense was good, but even with quality assistant coaches like Monte and Orgeron, the defense was barely even an afterthought. But for the uniforms, the Hawaii game looked like a replay of Tennessee's games against Ohio and Ole Miss. The special teams were a mess.

And, as some have pointed out, Kiffin can be kind of a dick to people. Like everyone not in his fami...oh. Like pretty much everyone. Can he grow up? Sure--he's only three years older than me, so I would hope that he can change. With that said, he's never been held accountable for anything (Oakland's struggles could ((with some justification)) be blamed on Al Davis, Tennessee's AD and fans were willing to put up with a lot of crap so long as he aggravated Urban Meyer and wasn't Phil Fulmer, and USC's fans seem to forget that he was their offensive coordinator when their best offensive player got a hous...sorry, got a bit carried away there), so where's the motivation for him?

So, to sum up (because I know I've been pretty vague about him so far), I'm inclined to agree with Mark May--the next three years will show if Kiffin can (re)build a program and coach without a lot of advantages, and I don't see it working out.

Dennis
I'll be diplomatic and avoid making a "Paul Hackett with hair" line.

[Alo]

At the OR/UT game. Duck fans wearing shirts that say, "WE HATE KIFFIN TOO."

via here.