Post-season blues

The longest 8 months of the year have officially begun. Random thoughts...

- The BCS Championship Game was pretty crazy/boring/surprising, no? It’s rare that you see such an exciting beginning followed by a pretty thorough butt-kicking. It reminded me a lot of the 2003 Orange Bowl between Iowa and USC. Both games started with a kickoff return for a TD, and in both games, the better team pretty much dominated from that point forward.

- Is it just me, or are more and more players leaving early for the NFL Draft each year? I’m no Draft expert, but I follow college football quite closely, and every day on the ESPNews ticker, I’ve seen at least one “who?” scroll across. I don’t necessarily think this is a bad trend. If you don’t have anything left to prove, and you play for, say, Marshall, I can’t blame you for taking the NFL money. It’s just a bit amazing to me that a dozen or so running backs alone had the same idea. But, ya, 4th-round NFL money is still good money - better money than most of us will ever see.

- Ted Ginn conspiracy theory! I’m not buying it, but I will admit that during the game, I questioned his need for crutches. I’ve just always viewed him as a “doesn’t like contact” guy. But after seeing this pic, I think it was all legit.

- Oregon lost their Offensive Coordinator to LSU this week. After being “exposed” against OSU and USC, I was a bit worried about what a quality OC could do against our 2007 secondary, especially in what might be our first “real” game of the season. I still consider this a trap game, though.

- This is old, but I think plenty of folks missed it:

"Michigan's athletic director Bill Martin said Monday he is looking for an opponent for Sept. 1 -- he moved the Eastern Michigan game back into October. Martin wouldn't say whom he's considering but added it would be a Division I school."

- Speaking of 2007, there are some decent non-conference games, although not nearly as exciting as this past season:

9/1 – Tennessee at Cal
9/1 – Oklahoma State at Georgia
9/1 – Georgia Tech at Notre Dame

9/8 – Virginia Tech at LSU
9/8 – Miami at Oklahoma
9/8 – TCU at Texas
9/8 – Nebraska at Wake Forest
9/8 – BYU at UCLA
9/8 – Notre Dame at Penn State
9/8 – Navy at Rutgers

9/15 – USC at Nebraska
9/15 – South Florida at Auburn
9/15 – Notre Dame at Michigan
9/15 – Louisville at Kentucky
9/15 – Texas A&M at Miami
9/15 – Ohio State at Washington

9/29 – Alabama vs. Florida State (at Jacksonville, FL)

- Other stuff you might have missed: Better Red Zone stats, offensively and defensively ; Post-Carr coaching options