The surprise in the first week was BYU beating OU...
shoving BYU from 20 to 9 and OU from 3 to 13...next week
USC gets Ohio State...as the big one... (but, we are sneaking a
peek at what Tulane and BYU do in NOLA).

AP College Football Poll -- Sept. 8

(1st Plc Votes) Record Pts Pvs (SEC /b; Big 12 /i)
1. Florida (56) 1-0 1,493 1
2. Texas (2) 1-0 1,424 2
3. Southern Cal 1-0 1,355 4
4. Alabama (2) 1-0 1,331 5
5. Oklahoma St. 1-0 1,201 9
6. Mississippi 1-0 1,095 8
7. Penn St. 1-0 1,082 9
8. Ohio St. 1-0 985 6
9. BYU 1-0 984 20
10. California 1-0 971 12
11. LSU 1-0 890 11
12. Boise St. 1-0 882 14
13. Oklahoma 0-1 782 3
14. Virginia Tech 0-1 652 7
15. Georgia Tech 1-0 630 15
16. TCU 0-0 523 17
17. Utah 1-0 404 19
18. Notre Dame 1-0 383 23
19. North Carolina 1-0 338 21
20. Miami 1-0 315 —
21. Georgia 0-1 294 13
22. Nebraska 1-0 266 24
23. Cincinnati 1-0 248 —
24. Kansas 1-0 196 25
25. Missouri 1-0 126 —

Of the teams I saw this weekend, Alabama, Oklahoma State and Cincinnati impressed. Most of the teams played non-competitive games against outmatched opponents.

I'm shedding no tears for OU. Bet they won't be scheduling any more games in Arlington anytime soon.

USC, Houston, BYU, Penn State all looked good this weekend...Tenn. let me down, but it was UCLA...
Looks like the usual suspects....Pac 10, SEC, Big 12 and Michigan coming awake in the Big 10.

Ohio State played a good game...which probably won't be remembered in this "win or go home" world.
...but, they may have the argument, come the end of the season, that they led the champion for
3.75 quarters yesterday in Columbus. Good game Buckeyes.

I've just watched the best game so far this year.

LSU beats Miss. State 30-26, after stopping MSU
at the four-inch line three times with under two minutes left.

Coach Myles never doubted, I never doubted,
LSU's Defense never doubted. MSU is to us what
Tex. A&M is to Texas. MSU had the best coaching
and the most heart I've witnessed...only the calm
talent of LSU got us through. Our young QB Jefferson is A-1,
and Chad Jones (who pitched in relief at the CWS to close
out Texas - no hits in 3 innings) ran back a 97-yd punt
return TD, swatted away a pass on third and goal and
finished off the QB sneak to deny MSU at the one-inch-line.
WOW! What a game for Chad Jones and the Fighting Tigers.

God I love college football!

The Usual Suspects...

AP Top 25 Poll:

Rank....Team...1st plc votes...record...all votes...last week's ranking

1 Florida (55) 4-0 1,490 1
2 Texas (1) 4-0 1,420 2
3 Alabama (3) 4-0 1,400 3
4 LSU 4-0 1,225 7
5 Boise State 4-0 1,203 8
6 Virginia Tech 3-1 1,190 11
7 USC 3-1 998 12
8 Oklahoma 2-1 979 10
9 Ohio State 3-1 957 13
10 Cincinnati 4-0 946 14

others with an argument:
11 TCU 3-0 896 15
12 Houston 3-0 844 17
13 Iowa 4-0 788 NR
18 Kansas 4-0 418 20
22 Michigan 4-0 271 23

Well, the top four are still the top four...

This week it's Florida in Death Valley!

What a match up!


...and the teams are pretty good too.


Seriously though...it's the journey...and boy do we have one...Florida, Auburn, (Tulane) and Alabama.
The road to the 2009 SEC Championship is a hard, hard road. ...and Lord do I love it...

Who can figure college football sometimes.
Take the Univ. of Houston. After huge wins over Okie State and Texas Tech, they got routed by previously winless UTEP. Guess they got caught napping on that one.

Go figure...Florida gets two more than questionable calls en route to a touchdown to tie Arkansas...
Arkansas misses a 37-yd field goal and FLA gets a 20-yd FG to win. I've come to believe it will
be Alabama or no SEC team in the championship game this year...FLA has run it's referee luck out, IMO.

In fact, today I think Iowa is Cinderella. I can't remember Iowa in a championship game...
but this year...it looks like the Hawkeyes are the most inspirational...we'll see how the rest
of the Big Ten plays out. Arkansas, LSU and FLA look equal...it's up to Alabama to break out...
if they do, my bets are on them. I'll take Ala. and USC (to make the media happy) if both win out.
The only other is Texas...if they win out...Ala./ Iowa/Texas vs. whomever...but it's who wins out.

Maybe Iowa vs Ala. or Texas vs Ala. ...too early to tell.

An ugly win for Texas today, but any win over OU is a good win. This year, the Horns' strength may be their defense.

Haven't been here since FLA and ALA whupped LSU...but hey, it's the SEC!

Team...(1st Place votes)...total votes...rank last week
1 Florida (36) 10-0 1,463 1
2 Alabama (14) 10-0 1,429 3
3 Texas (10) 10-0 1,424 2
4 TCU 10-0 1,307 4
5 Cincinnati 10-0 1,247 5
6 Boise State 10-0 1,213 6
7 Georgia Tech 10-1 1,139 7
8 Pittsburgh 9-1 1,030 8
9 Ohio State 9-2 990 10
10 LSU 8-2 968 9

Read more: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/football/.../#ixzz0XEACebbO

Looks like the year of the unsung programs. TCU, Cinn., Boise St. all climbing into consideration.
If FLA (or ALA) gets Texas in the BCS Championship I wonder who remaining matches up with whom.
Oh well, I better slow down...LSU still has Ole Miss and Arkansas to go...and like I said...it's the SEC.

Congrats to FLA, ALA,Texas and the rest (BTW Ohio St. has shown up too - congrats mac2).


And, just for the fun of it, I add this unrelated tid bit that a football fan might find interesting:

http://slatest.slate.com/id/2235910/?wpisrc=newsletter


Beverage Company Approves Whiskey Rescue Mission In Antarctica

Beverage company Whyte & Mackay has approved a plan to drill beneath Antarctica's surface
in search of two 100-year-old crates of whiskey that were lost during a 1909 shipwreck.
If recovered, the company will use samples of the whiskey to decide whether to relaunch the brand.
The rescue mission will be led by New Zealand's Antarctic Heritage Trust and is slated to begin in January.
The crates were located in 2006 beneath the floor of an expedition hut near Cape Royds, but the ice
was too thick to drill through at the time. When asked about the mission, a Whyte & Mackay's spokesman
said that it's time for the whiskey to return home. "It's been laying there lonely and neglected.
It should come back to Scotland where it was born."

I'll drink to that!

TCU is getting a lot of love this year, but I'm not so sure. OTOH, I haven't seen them play much, as their games are on an obscure network that I don't get. I've only seen one all year.

Texas has impressed me as the season has gone along. I think the Horns have a D that can play with the SEC big boys.

But the most impressive team of late has been Stanford. I wouldn't want to play that big, physical offense of the Cardinal.

LSU got to the 20-yd-line of Ole Miss tonight and the coach couldn't get the field goal team on the
field for the last play with 1 sec. left to win the game. I emailed a three-word letter to the editor
of the Baton Rouge newspaper immediately after the game: "Fire Les Miles."

There are some mistakes that are unforgiven...this is one.

It's one thing to go for it on a 4th down...or call a trick play when not needed....but good lord--what the hell was he thinking. Did you see the on-field interview after? He was not ready...there was not plan.

Disgusting, he and his staff failed those kids.

Fire him. Sorry, but that was just gross negligence.

I didn't see the game. How did LSU manage to get caught without enough time left?

Nine seconds...4 and 26 on their own 40...heave it up...and their receiver catches it. Clock stops at 1 second. Chains reset...LSU stumbles around...confusion everywhere...QB knows he has a timeout--but fails to realize to down it, it'll kill the clock. Meanwhile coach is over there messaging his johnson, fails to get kicking team prepared to hit the field and kick for the win....OR...fails to call a play for the win.

Horrible comedy of errors.

Yikes! With the brief first-down clock stoppage, they should have been able to call the timeout or get set for a quick spike of the ball. That does sound pretty inept.

I'm not a NCAA rules expert, but I think they had to wait till the ref's started play. Unlike the Pro's. I'm sure there is someone here who can break it down better. But the bottom line was, LSU needed to run down the field and either run one last play...or have the field goal team run off the sidelines...line up and kick the dang thing through the uprights.

Personally, I'm glad LSU lost...I'm a BSU fan...so I'm always happy when a top 20 team loses.

Felt bad for the kids though...they earned a shot for the win after the on-side kick recovery.

From reading about this game, LSU didn't have time to spike the ball but did, and the game ended. The coaches/QB should have known that a second would expire on the spike. Still, though, LSU would have had to score on the final play, so a win probably would have been a long shot. There was also some question that LSU should have called its last timeout earlier on the previous play to allow more than 9 seconds.