Sign-up for your FREE Play Sheet and get fantasy rankings, weekly picks and survivor pool solutions on one printable page. It’s sent straight to your inbox every week during football season.
As you prepare your fantasy line-up, finalize your weekly picks or decide which team to select in your survivor pool, BumpAndRun.com will serve as your “second opinion.”
So if you ask the BCS leaders, these are your college football playoffs. Seven teams remain undefeated and a one loss Alabama team still has a legitimate shot at the national title game. Just when you think a team is safe, it gets snake-bitten. Boise St. has already won their game this week in a rare Tuesday night contest. Though sloppy at times, there really was never a doubt that the Broncos were going to win. As for the other key games this weekend with BCS implications:
Michigan St. at Iowa (Saturday, 3:30, ESPN/ABC)
Michigan St. is a good team but let’s be honest: they got extremely lucky that a Northwestern corner back got caught turning his head on a fake punt. If Northwestern stops that play the ball game is over and we aren’t talking about the Spartans any more. But Sparty pulled it off and here they are with their last legitimate test this season. Their second road game in a row will be a much different test. Michigan St. has to come out from the start and be dominant at the line of scrimmage. They need to establish their running game or Kirk Cousins will be crushed by the Iowa pass rush.
The Hawkeyes suffered a disappointing home loss to Wisconsin last week but they know their season is not over. They still remain very much in the picture for the Big 10 title, but they have to win this game to have a chance. Iowa needs quarterback Ricky Stanzi to play mistake free football and he should be able to that against a weak Michigan St. secondary. Running back Adam Robinsonhas been on a roll the last two weeks and the Spartans’ speedy linebacking corps will have to be up to the task to stop him. Last year, Iowa was in Michigan State’s position, the undefeated Big 10 team that no one expected.
Pick: Michigan St. 27 Iowa 24
So here we are, Week 8 now in the books. Oklahoma is who we thought they were, and that’s not the best team in the nation. LSU is who we thought they were, the luckiest team in the nation up until last Saturday. Oklahoma St. is who we thought they were, the typical high octane offense that can’t stop a quality opponent. The human polls changed a little bit, and the computers changed a lot. All for the benefit of those teams within a BCS Conference, please tell me how Missouri is the #2 team in the nation according to the computers? Last week was their only half way decent win!
I know you aren’t supposed to do this but let’s just compare results for a second. Oklahoma beats Air Force 27-24 in Norman. TCU beats Air Force 38-7. Missouri beats Oklahoma but it’s a close game. Scratching my head here but TCU’s given up a combined ten points over the last four weeks and doesn’t get any love from the computers or the human pollsters as Auburn jumps them. Rest assured if Michigan St. beats Iowa this week, the Spartans will jump TCU in the human polls as well.
And does anyone else have as much disdain for Craig James as I do? The two things he’s good at: threatening law suits at Texas Tech to get his son playing time and getting on his knees for the high and mighty BCS conferences. He then acts like he’s showing Boise St. and TCU respect by voting them # 4 and #5 in his AP Poll. Get over yourself buddy.
And now onto the rankings: … Continue Reading
Through the first six weeks of the NFL season there have been more than a few times when watching a game that I ask myself how team A beat team X. Parity officially rules. While it is good for fans of certain teams to believe they have a chance, it really sucks for people like me in trying to predict what will happen on a week-to-week basis. It’s also tough for odds-makers in Vegas who have created lines for road underdogs that have covered pretty regularly. This week, despite an effort to make sure the lines aren’t as big, expect the trend to continue.
Washington @ Chicago
This NFC matchup might not look like much for a late October game, but come December the result of this game could have playoff implications. The Redskins sit at 3-3 and I am not sure what to make of them. Five of their six games have been decided by 6 points or less, so they keep themselves in every game. The defense has been very opportunistic so far and LaRon Landry is making an early season push for defensive player of the year. The offense has had its ups and downs. One drive Donovan McNabb looks great and the next he is throwing balls into the ground. They must get Ryan Torain going early to slow down the Chicago pass rush.
The Bears are very similar to the Redskins. They have an offense that can look great or look awful. They have a defense that is carried by their front 7. Julius Peppers and Brian Urlacher are going to cause havoc for the Redskins offensive line. But the problem for the Bears is their offensive line is on par with how bad the Redskins offensive line was last season. Jay Cutler has been hit hard and often so far this season and has thrown some INT’s in an effort to get the ball away to save his life.
Pick: Washington 19 Chicago 14….Carlos Rogers will have the game clinching INT.
Sign-up for your FREE Play Sheet and get fantasy rankings, weekly picks and survivor pool solutions on one printable page. It’s sent straight to your inbox every week during football season.
As you prepare your fantasy line-up, finalize your weekly picks or decide which team to select in your survivor pool, BumpAndRun.com will serve as your “second opinion.”
Week 8 of the college football season has the potential to be the most important of the season. At least two teams will fall from the ranks of the unbeaten and two other unbeatens face very tough obstacles. The # 1 team in the Coaches and Harris Poll’s kicks off the week on Thursday night against a banged up opponent, as Oregon faces UCLA. And then come Saturday everything promises to get very interesting, so make sure you have your spot in front of the television, sit back and enjoy.
Michigan St. @ Northwestern
Michigan St. has played great football this year and controls their destiny moving forward. This is the first time Kirk Cousins and company have left the state of Michigan and it has all the makings of a trap game. If they get caught looking ahead to the Iowa game next weekend, they could be in a lot of trouble in Evanston. The Spartans need to rely heavily on their ground game as the weather conditions look a little bit iffy for this weekend. Edwin Baker and Le’Veon Bell have had great success so far this year. The Spartans defense has been great the last two weeks; however in Northwestern they face a different beast.
The Northwestern Wildcats come into the game against Michigan St. with a record of 5-1. Four of their six games have been decided by five points or less. The Wildcats run a spread offense that relies more on the pass than the run. It is very similar to the Notre Dame, which gave Michigan St. its toughest contest of the season so far. Senior QB Dan Persa is completing 78% of his passes and has thrown for 10 TD’s and two INT’s so far this season. Persa will also take off and run as he is the Wildcats’ leading rusher on the year as well.
It will be a very interesting test for the Spartans. How do they handle their first game out of the state? How do they handle the now lofty expectations? Do they look ahead to Iowa?
Pick: Northwestern 30 Michigan St. 28
All hell continued to break loose over the weekend with Ohio St. and Nebraska falling from the undefeated ranks. I knew Ohio St. wasn’t any good and Texas would be well prepared for Nebraska after having a bye week to prepare. What you are seeing is not that all these conferences are super tough; rather these teams just really aren’t very good.
Two more undefeated teams are going to fall this coming weekend as Oklahoma takes on Missouri and Auburn battles LSU. There are also many other big games to look forward to this weekend and it gets going on Thursday night as the #1 Oregon takes on UCLA.
The initial BCS rankings came out this week as well. And all I have to say is the computers are absolutely worthless. If you hate the BCS as much as I do, I recommend purchasing ‘Death to the BCS’ by Dan Wetzel, Josh Peter and Jeff Passan. If you want to know how absurd some of the computer rankings are just click here. If you are going to keep the BCS, at least change how it is organized. We know the coaches don’t watch all the games because they are all a little busy on Saturdays. We also know a lot of the press doesn’t watch all the games because well they are covering games. So how exactly are people fairly ranking teams? The NCAA needs to fix the process by which it determines who plays for the national title, and they need to do so as soon as this BCS television contract runs out.
Sign-up for your FREE Play Sheet and get fantasy rankings, weekly picks and survivor pool solutions on one printable page. It’s sent straight to your inbox every week during football season.
As you prepare your fantasy line-up, finalize your weekly picks or decide which team to select in your survivor pool, BumpAndRun.com will serve as your “second opinion.” Check back this weekend as the injury status of your fantasy players may change.
Yes, the first six weeks of the season matter a great deal, just ask Alabama. But now we had into Week 7 with a lot more on the line as the BCS rankings will come out for the first time on Sunday night. So the top teams in the country need to be very careful as a loss now could take them out of the national title picture. Yes, I absolutely hate the BCS. One loss should not ruin a season — it doesn’t in the FCS where there is a playoff. But the BCS is what we have so we have to deal with it.
Texas @ Nebraska (Saturday, 3:30, ABC)
The rematch of last season’s Big XII title game, only the teams look just a little bit different. Now Texas appears to be in the position Nebraska was last season: a team with a solid defense that is still trying to find its identity on offense. Following two losses, the Longhorns have had a bye week to game plan for Taylor Martinez and the rest of the Nebraska offense. Mack Brown and Will Muschamp know the Cornhuskers are going to primarily run the ball. Expect eight guys in the box and single coverage on the outside by the Longhorns in an effort to stop Nebraska.
Martinez and the Cornhuskers have been explosive on offense. Much like Michigan had been up until last week, the Cornhuskers toughest test has come at the hands of an FCS opponent. What that proved to me is if a team is well coached and the players want it, Nebraska can be stopped. If you line up and play athletes against athletes with no real game plan, Nebraska will run right by you. So as the Cornhuskers get ready for their toughest test this season, are they going to be too hyped up do their jobs, or is Bo Pelini going to keep them level headed?
Pick: Nebraska 27 Texas 21
Finally we have chaos and my guess is this is just the beginning. The #1 team in the nation Alabama suffered a crushing defeat over the weekend. The worst part about it for the Tide is that it wasn’t by a field goal — South Carolina dominated the game from beginning to end. The loss looks like it could knock Alabama out of any talk of the national title game.
So who are the big winners of the weekend? The Boise St. Broncos and TCU Horned Frogs. Thanks to Oregon St. going on the road and beating previously unbeaten Arizona, Boise St. and TCU’s strength of schedule is soaring. Add to that for Boise, Va. Tech keeps on winning as well. For TCU, Air Force and Utah keep winning games as well giving the Horned Frogs the potential for two more top 20 victories.
On an individual basis this weekend, Denard Robinson appears to have lost his stranglehold on the Heisman Trophy. The first tough defense he faced held him in check and caused him to throw three INT’s. So now the Heisman race is WIDE open.
And now onto the new BumpAndRun.com Top 15:
