It’s the most wonderful time of the year again; college football season is upon us. The season began with what was arguably the best slate of games we’ve seen on opening weekend in a long time beginning with Appalachian State’s “almost” upset over No. 9 Tennessee and ending with a thriller, No. 4 Florida State beating No. 11 Ole Miss.
I think viewers got their money’s worth. College football is commonly full of upsets and instant classic but this week seemed better than that in more ways than one.
This column will contain many topics of which I found interesting from the week, ending with what the most important, the Southeastern Conference not showing up to play, despite the one obvious exception Alabama.
First of all, why doesn’t Appalachian State get more respect? The team is obviously still red hot after its win over Michigan in 2007. What does the team need to do in order to get national attention? Also, why is Tennessee ranked ninth in the country?
Appalachian State took Tennessee down to the wire, eventually losing 20-13 in overtime. I assume Tennessee gets the high ranking because of the team’s blowout victory over Northwestern in the Outback Bowl, 45-6, but does that single victory deserve to give the team such a high ranking?
I’m sorry to all the fans out there, but Tennessee is one of the worst teams in the SEC.
The best game had to have been Texas vs. No. 10 Notre Dame – the double overtime thriller ending with Texas outlasting the Irish, 50-47.
The game, not filled with too much defense, was certainly supplemented by the dozens of huge offensive plays that were made.
With Notre Dame leading 35-31 late into the fourth quarter, Texas took the lead 37-35 after a touchdown run. Following the score, their extra point was blocked and returned by the Irish for a two point conversion, resulting in a 37-37 tie.
Texas also took the Irish by surprise with the team’s two quarterback set, one for passing and one for rushing. The Longhorns worked hard for this victory and hopefully will crack a spot in the AP top 10 polls after this big victory.
Another disappointing upset was No. 5 Louisiana State facing off against Big Ten rival, Wisconsin. I can’t find very many positives from this game.
I believe that it was unfair playing the game at a “neutral” location, Lambeau field (located in Green bay, Wisconsin). The Badger’s fans easily filled up three-quarters of the seats.
The poor play out of LSU was also disappointing. When you’re a top tier SEC team, handed a preseason rank of No. 5, and have the best running back in college football, you need to put up more than 14 points against an average team.
Since LSU has been on a downfall the past few years, the Tigers have dropped as one of my favorite teams.
The most interesting game was nothing but a shocker to viewers. Losing 28-6 with 3:04 left in the second quarter probably put viewers to sleep knowing that Florida State was done for. The game only led to the following morning’s headlines of “Florida State outscores Ole Miss 39-6 in final 32 minutes leading to a 45-34 FSU victory.”
FSU got lucky. I do not believe that Florida State deserves to be in the top four and the team would not have won that game if Ole Miss defensive back, Kendarius Webster, didn’t get hurt.
College football threw out various headlines too, such as Nebraska lining up to punt the ball with 10 men in honor of their punter who lost his life last summer in a car accident and Georgia running back, Nick Chub, rushing for 222 yards coming off an injury last season, but nothing in my mind was as big as the SEC playing like garbage.
A college football “powerhouse” like the Southeastern Conference shouldn’t be playing that way. The one exception to the mediocre play was No. 1 Alabama stomping on rival USC, 52-6.
The two worst teams in the conference battled it out with South Carolina topping Vanderbilt, 13-10, Missouri lost to West Virginia by 15, Mississippi State and Kentucky both lost at home to South Alabama and Southern Mississippi, Florida needed a late touchdown pass to beat Louisiana Tech by a single point, Texas A&M needed overtime to beat UCLA, LSU was upset, the Auburn Tigers didn’t show up offensively, Tennessee almost lost to Appalachian state, Ole Miss blew their huge lead and Georgia wouldn’t have won without Nick Chubb shredding the North Carolina defense.
This week of college football was certainly a wild one. I look to watch more next week and have another exciting report. The match-ups this week seem to have been more exciting than those next week but in college football, anything can happen.
