College Football Debriefing

Each week, after all of the games have been played, I'll re-visit some of them and give my take(synonym for biased, slightly informed opinion). It's called the debriefing because whatever happened during your chosen team's game you probably felt like you were part of a crime scene, or maybe a terrorist attack. Whether you thought you were robbed by the referees, or got to witness some WMD's exploding in your stadium, this is where we'll re-open fresh wounds and examine the positives and negatives. But since we're all college football fanatics, probably mostly the negatives.

USC Did Their Best To State Their Claim As #1
At the beginning of the season everyone was saying that Nebraska was going to be USC's first big test, and that the Cornhuskers were looking for revenge after last year's game. Well, on Saturday it looked like USC had a cheetsheat, and paid off the professor after they put Nebraska down 42-10 early and held off a comeback attempt to win 49-31. USC's offensive line dominated all night en route to racking up 313 yards rushing with an 8.2ypc average. LSU's defense is probably better, but USC can put up points with anyone in the country. Orson(and Stranko) at EDSBS have some pretty good illustrations of just how dominant USC's offensive linemen were.

LSU Is Still The #1 Team In The Country
The Tigers beat an MTSU team that put up 42 on Louisville(pay no attention to Kentucky!) by a score of 44-0. With their backup quarterback. So far, over three games, LSU has allowed 7 points, and an average of 128 yards per game. And when the offense is averaging 45pts and 480 yards per game that equals lots and lots of wins.

Michigan Got A Win At Home!(Notre Dame Still Winless)
In the game "someone has to win" of the week, Michigan took out their frustrations from the App. State and Oregon debacles on Notre Dame as they cruised to a 38-0 victory. Mike Hart made good on his guaranteed victory by rushing for 187 yards and 2 TD's. The only positive is that it wasn't a home game for ND because I don't think even Touchdown Jesus would have stayed for the fourth quarter. ND hasn't scored an offensive touchdown yet this season, and their schedule doesn't get much easier.

Defense Wins Championships
At least that's what they've always told us. It's probably why over the last few years Louisville has been a great early season pick as possible Big East champ and national title contender, but always stumble at some point. Sure they can score points in bunches, but their defense always seems to allow them in that fashion as well and this year is no different. The only difference is that it caught up to them very early this season, as Kentucky downed the Cardinals 40-34. Andre Woodson played sharp all night, and looks to be a great leader for the UK team.

Nick Saban Has Time For Winning
Saban has his team sitting at 3-0 after the Crimson Tide pulled out a win against Arkansas, and I'm sure the fans couldn't be happier. I however, am not thrilled because I'm also a Miami Dolphins fan. So from here on out, Nick Saban will be known as Dick Satan.

My (insert respective team here) Did This Well
Won! Beating Tennessee 59-20 is good enough for me. They did everything well! If I had to pick one thing, though it would be the rushing attack. Coach Meyer knows how to get the ball into the hands of the playmakers, and that often means lining up a receiver in the backfield(Harvin, Fason, etc.). It's worked so far, and the rushing attack looks the strongest it has in years.

My (insert respective team here) Didn't Do This Well
Penalties are still a concern(9 for 66yds), but at least there wasn't one on the Brandon James return TD!

Heismens!
Colt Brennan? Maybe you've heard of him? Hawaii rebounded from a scary close game the week before to hang 49 on UNLV. Brennan's stats: 26-32, 298yds, 2TD's, 0INT and 3 rushing TD's. The week he scores less than 4 total TD's will cause widespread panic among UH fans.

Sam Bradford. If he keeps leading OU to wins while completing almost 80% of his passes, then he deserves some type of recognition.

Steve Slaton & Ray Rice. Running backs that have the fortunate situations of their coaches giving them the ball all the time. Tied for the nation lead in rushing TD's at 8 both are strong runners. Though, it does seem that Slaton hasn't gotten off to a great start, and I expect him to pull away from the competition as the season progresses.

Don't Forget Thursday(and Friday) Night!
We've got some more Thursday night games lined up this week as Western Kentucky and MTSU face off, and Texas A&M heads to the Orange Bowl to face Miami. It will be interesting to see how TAMU does against UM, and should give us a decent idea how they stack up against an OU team that put up 51 points on the 'Canes. Whatever happens it still beats anything else that's on TV that night.

We also get Oklahoma traveling to Tulsa on Friday night in what could be considered a "trap" game for the Sooners. Tulsa has enough firepower to make it interesting, but OU should get passed them.


You've been debriefed!