Around the Pac-10...
Cal goes to Oregon in a likely elimination game for both teams' BCS hopes. Cal is VERY fast. So is Oregon. Oregon's rush defense is suspect. When a Duck kickoff unit is on the field (kicking or receiving), yards are to be had. Expect lots of scoring. Last year's Cal game was the turning point for Oregon - they flailed down the stretch. The Ducks want to prove they are tough. Between home field advantage and Dennis Dixon, the Pac-10's best individual player so far, I have a feeling it might be Oregon's year.
Oregon State hosts UCLA, in a game that should send the loser into the bottom half of the conference. UCLA laid a huge egg at Utah but recovered to beat Washington in a wild shootout. Oregon State played their regular head-case role at Cincinnati and couldn't hold a 19-point lead at Arizona State. I can't figure these teams out and I'm not going to try.
Washington State plays at Arizona. WSU is a surprising 2-2 - surprising not for their record, but for how the Cougars played Wisconsin tough at Camp Randall and how they've plugged holes in the roster. After getting blasted by Cal, Arizona needs a victory bad - with a schedule that still includes USC, at UW and Oregon, a loss Saturday could seal the end of Mike Stoops' tenure.
Stanford hosts Arizona State at the end of a four-game homestand that ends the Sun Devils' four-game homestand. ASU is still an enigma and Stanford showed some life last week against Oregon, so the game might have been a truth-telling session had Stanford been healthy. With several defenders and a power tailback (injuries) plus receiver Mark Bradford (whose father died this week) questionable or out, I doubt the Cardinal have the personnel to hold up.
I will be attending USC at Washington, courtesy The Bootleg magazine which has commissioned me to write a live analysis of two of Stanford's future opponents. UW quarterback Jake Locker has made waves so far, but a big game would cement him as the one of the best young players in the country and at the same time expose faults in the vaunted Trojan defense. USC can cement a claim to #1 with an impressive win in one of the West's toughest environments. Four years ago, Reggie Bush made one of his first highlights when he took a flat pass all the way; two years ago, he added a new move to his repertoire with a brilliant punt return. Will another Trojan hero rise at Montlake?
...and around the nation:
West Viriginia goes to South Florida in a Friday night game. (My opinion on Friday night games: they belong to the high schools. End 'em for colleges.) South Florida has won one headline-grabbing game in each of the last two years, including West Virginia last season, and after beating Auburn and North Carolina this season, beating the best team in the Big East could get the Bulls over the hump. (Are there any actual bulls in South Florida?)
Michigan at Northwestern features the backstories of Michigan's defensive facing its first spread offense since it went on a two-game win streak and Mike Hart going for Michigan's career rushing record. The man adopted by the faithful as the archetypal Michigan Man needs 139 yards to pass Anthony Thomas, although there has been speculation that Lloyd Carr should limit his production so he can break the record at home.
Notre Dame's pass defense will be tested for the first time at Purdue, whose quarterback Curtis Painter is throwing for 322 yards per game.
Air Force goes to the Yard to play Navy in an inter-service game that has become a classic the past few years. Navy has taken the last four Commander-In-Chief's Trophies after Air Force owned or shared it for 21 straight seasons. For me it's not as much fun now that Air Force has ditched the option, but Middies versus Falcons has displaced Army-Navy as the premiere matchup between the service academies.
Iowa State-Nebraska: Only one way to put it - the loser of this game is the suck.
Michigan State and Wisconsin have almost identical team stats, yet the Badgers are ranked #9 and the Spartans are unranked by the AP. Hmm.
Texas goes for revenge hosting Kansas State, who ended the Longhorns' at-large dreams last year. K-State quarterback Josh Fields was impressive at Aurburn and played masterfully against UT. I still think Texas might be a phony; this could be a classic look-ahead game with Oklahoma looming.
Alabama at Florida State could be another Seminole offensive meltdown against a well-coached Nick Saban defense. Comic relief alone is a reason to watch.
THURSDAY NIGHT FOOTBALL
I love getting home from work and flipping on an early-evening (on the West Coast) Thursday night ballgame. ESPN went to Boise for Southern Miss-Boise State, as the Broncos continued past the Washington loss with a 38-16 win.
Bronco tailback Ian Johnson, the nation's leading scorer in 2006, is a damn good football player. People can argue that he's been running up the score against overmatched WAC opposition, that he's a product of the system or his excellent line, or whatever, but he can flat-out play.
Johnson doesn't look like a burner on TV, but he compensates with power - I don't think anyone except Michigan's Mike Hart can move a pile like Johnson - and has a great instinct for holes. He had a typically workmanlike touchdown run in the second quarter where he followed a block into the alley, cut downfield and ran out of an arm tackle to the end zone.
We're not tuning in because of your good looks and charm: One of my great loathings is when broadcasters are more interested in screwing around in the booth than actually discussing the game that's going on. On Thursday, Chris Fowler and Doug Flutie spent a minute laughing over a photo of third man Craig James riding a horse. (I must have missed the humor; perhaps James is known as an hippophobe?)
Meanwhile, Boise State was flagged for an illegal snap penalty, a rare infraction I would expect the crew to describe to the audience. Not important; the horsey talk went on until the next snap and the penalty was never discussed.
ESPN also showed a fulsome number of shots of Ian Johnson's wife, famously proposed to at the end of the Fiesta Bowl.
THE ROCK CAN THROW THE ROCK
The Rock is starring in a fish-out-of-water film titled "The Game Plan," where he plays a pro quarterback. What I didn't know was that the pseudonymized Dwayne Johnson walked on as a defensive tackle at Miami and was part of the 1991 national title team alongside legends Ray Lewis and Warren Sapp. I'm sure Hurricane football of the time was enough of a zoo that the pro wrestling was an easy transition.
In a feature talking about Johnson's education on the position, ESPN interviewed a man identified as "football stunt coordinator." The double entendre flashed through my brain.
OTHER STUFF
The Floppycock of the Week for next week has already been awarded, to U.S. Women's National Soccer Team coach Greg Ryan for benching his starting goalkeeper Hope Solo (4-0 and scoreless in almost 300 minutes in goal) for Briana Scurry, who didn't prevent Brazil from scoring three times.
A firestorm of analysis and criticism has already ignited, and in accordance with blog policies, I will not repeat it. What I do want to do is cite a hidden principle of sports - you can never underestimate the impact of a great performer in places they don't actually play. Ryan's camp floated some claptrap about how Scurry was strong against Brazil (12-0 with an Olympic victory against the Amazonians, no lie there) and Solo hadn't played against them. But every phase of the game can be affected by a player swap, even parts that supposedly have nothing to do with who's in goal.
Result: Total failure. Brazil owned the 4-0 game, even before a bogus call forced the U.S. to play the second half with 10 on the field (an aspect of the game I find bizarre at best, but let's defer that discussion).
In a risk-analysis world, it might have been the right call, but this was a tournament - a continuum of performace spanning multiple games, with momentum and teamwork at their most important. It would be one thing if the U.S. was road-tripping around the Americas taking on exhibition matches against various national opponents. This was the damn World Cup, with the goalkeeper at the height of performance.
And this is without mentioning the psyche of the team, which was undoubtedly compromised by the coach's admission that he didn't have confidence in the keeper that had brought his team to the semifinal. Clearly the team's mental game suffered, so much so that Solo felt comfortable ripping the coach to the media:
It was the wrong decision, and I think anybody that knows anything about the game knows that...There's no doubt in my mind I would have made those saves. And the fact of the matter is it's not 2004 anymore. ... It's 2007, and I think you have to live in the present. And you can't live by big names. You can't live in the past. It doesn't matter what somebody did in an Olympic gold medal game in the Olympics three years ago. Now is what matters, and that's what I think.That sound, Coach Ryan, is the sound of the air going out of your team's balloon. Welcome to the Mack Brown Club of Stupid Personnel Decisions. I don't normally give a rip about soccer - just too many other sports I enjoy more - but this is a national team, two-time World Cup champions, putting the nation on display, against a world power and in the United States' biggest economic rival to boot.
Who knows if they had the Jessies to win the whole thing? This was a team that tied North Korea - no freedom-loving American could be happy with such a result against one of the world's most shameful dictatorships. But the Americans deserved their shot, dancing with the goalie who helped get them there. Their coach took that away by outsmarting himself, and his call put the team in a situation to lose.
So congratulations to Dr. Floppy, Greg Ryan. In light of precedent, if someone else commits an offense that merits the award (not likely given the magnitude of Ryan's call), a second medal will be printed.
