Odds and Ends

First - The bears are likely going to the Emerald Bowl in San Francisco, to the dismay of the team members and to the excitement of many local fans who can not travel this year due to untold financial hardship. I think it will be good to have a home game - it would be better if the visiting team was someone better than an ACC also-ran. However, Cal already lost to an ACC also-ran this year, so it will be good for redemption in a sense. That is why I am rooting for Boston College, Florida State or Virginia Tech, as opposed to Wake Forest. Maryland lost to all those first teams, and the game would be much higher profile. Beating Wake Forest would be nice but not that much of a boost.

It would also have been nice to go to the Holiday Bowl and play someone like Okie State or Missouri, and see how we measure up.

As far as the team goes, I think it is better that the game is later in the year - more practice time and less need interrupt finals for the practice sessions. At the end of the day, I think the Bears are going to have a good time and kick some butt. All the stuff about staying home is BS - you do not hear USC folks complaining about the Rose Bowl being in their back yard, do you? OK - maybe a bad example.

On the other hand, it would be nice to have some better bowls for the top three or four Pac 10 teams to get sent to. The Emerald is for the 7th place ACC team. We are 4th in the Pac 10. Kinda sucks. The good news is that this year, the entire ACC is tied so it is difficult for them to decide who goes where.

As far as it goes, i was really disappointed that Oregon State lost to Oregon over the weekend. It would have been nice to see one of the 9 dwarfs kick the Toejams out of the Rose. It also would have been nice to split an additional $4.5 million for the conference. The Pac 10 refs should have known this. Oh well. I think this makes the Pac 10 much more likely to win most of the bowl games than if the Beavers went to the Rose. Here is my bowl line up right now for the Pac 10:

Rose - SC vs Penn State (USC wins)
Holiday - Missouri vs Oregon (Missouri)
Sun - West Virginia vs Oregon State (Oregon State)
Vegas - BYU vs Arizona St (BYU)
Emerald - Wake Forest vs Cal (Cal)
Hawaii - Hawaii vs Arizona (Arizona)

I am predicting that AZ state beats Arizona and gets into Bowl contention. If that is the case, both would be 6-6, and eligible for bowls based on the Pac 10 schedule. The Vegas would take whichever one they thought would do better. The Bears would still be sent to the Emerald. Overall, I think the Pac 10 loses two and wins the rest. Although whichever Mountain West team they send to the Vegas Bowl (BYU or TCU) will probably beat whichever Arizona team they send to match up with them. I think the Bears would beat either TCU or BYU, but that will not be the matchup, and the Mountain West will move to 7-1 on the year against the Pac 10. Totally embarrassing - even though they feasted on our weaklings for the most part. Thankfully the Bears kicked the crap out of Colorado State to eliminate the shutout.

As far as it goes, the whole National Championship thing is a debacle. Texas got screwed, which is fine. But the way they did it was stupid. The BCS is an end of the year ranking system, not designed to be used as a tiebreaker in a conference matchup. If a conference wanted to use a computer based system to pick the matchup, they should have developed one, and not been lazy and relied on the BCS. There are lots of tiebreaker formulas floating around out there. The NFL uses a ton of them to get to their playoff picture. So a conference out do the same. but relying on voters who are focused on Ohio State vs Ohio University to vote for who is playing in the Big 12 south championship slot is stupid.

Bottom line - Texas beat both of the teams playing in the championship game (Missouri and Oklahoma). But they were hosed. Tough luck Mack Brown, which is not a bad thing. But this was a terrible process.

As far as it goes, it is also incredible that no one is calling out the SEC this year. They are terrible. Alabama is not a good team. Yet, there they are, playing for the National Championship. i think they beat Florida, who is not that good either. Not that they suck, but they would certainly not be with only one loss playing in the Big 12 south.

I think USC is getting screwed this year, but they could have done something about it. Same with Florida. If Alabama wins, I would think they deserve a shot at the title. But if they lose, I would have Oklahoma and Texas go at it again. That would be a fun game to watch.

Too bad it is not going to happen.

Here are the bowl matchups that I want to see:

Poinsettia - Boise State and TCU - great matchup in a crappy venue. Huge game overshadowing the Oregon / Missouri game a week later in San Diego.

Rose - Good traditional matchup - I think SC gets a decent test but not a real threat. Another slow Big 10 team loses in the Rose.

Sugar - Alabama at Utah - Alabama loses and goes to the Sugar. Florida to the NCG and Utah kicks Alabama's ass. Plus, all the Mormons getting sloshed in New Orleans is fun.

Cotton Bowl - Texas Tech at Mississippi - probably the second best SEC team this year playing a great Texas Tech team. Huston Nutt and Mike Leach can both coach. Great matchup.

Capital One - Michigan State against Georgia. It would be nice to see State beat Georgia since we beat them handily. Georgia is not that good.

Chick-fil-A - Georgia Tech against LSU - nice to see LSU lose another one.

Anyway, some nice matchups coming up in the next month. Should be fun.

GO BEARS!!