My Yearly Bowl Picks

I always like to post my college bowl game picks, so if I’m right about a surprise win (I picked Texas over USC last year), I have historical documentation (OK, an internet blog, but it’s dated) to back me up. I can even waffle some. Sure, I picked Georgia, but I can point out I thought the team speed of the the West Virginia Brokeback Mountaineers could cause the Bulldogs problems. And I can also ignore the historical documentation of all of the picks I blew. Anyway, here are this year’s picks (if I’m not clear in my explanation, winners are in italics).

Poinsetta Bowl – TCU vs. No. Illinois – I like NIU’s Garrett Wolfe a lot, but TCU’s defense will be too much for him. Besides, how can you pick against a team called the Frogs named after a Toad that isn't really a toad.
Las Vegas Bowl – BYU vs. Oregon – Mormons vs. Ducks. What else can you say? I'll take the school named after the dude with 50 wives.
New Orleans Bowl – Rice vs. Troy – One team is named after edible grass (or someone named Rice). The other after a city full of people fooled by a wooden horse and subsequently lent their name to a popular brand of condoms. Bet on the Rubbers.
Papajohns.com Bowl – S. Florida vs. East Carolina – Ummm, Pizza. South Florida is in Tampa which is halfway to Georgia. East Carolina is in Greenville which is near the coast. Give ECU the edge for honesty, but they'll still lose.
New Mexico Bowl – New Mexico vs. San Jose St. – New Mexico went 6-6 to finish 5th in the Mountain West. Their reward - a bowl named after their state being played in their home stadium. I'm still taking San Jose St.
Armed Forces Bowl – Tulsa vs. Utah – Utah named their team after the tribe the state is named for. Tulsa's team name in the Golden Hurricane which is a weather phenomenon that isn't gold colored nor found in Oklahoma. Since the BCS has proven that logic has no place in college football, take Tulsa.
Hawaii Bowl – Arizona St vs. Hawaii – AZ State players will have fond memories of the trip. If they go to the beach, because they aren’t winning this game.
Motor City Bowl – Middle Tenn. St. vs. Central Michigan – CMU lost their coach. MTSU didn't. Take the mid-major team that was good enough to get their coach promoted.
Emerald Bowl – Florida St. vs. UCLA – Contrary to what you might think, this bowl was named after nuts, not jewels. Low scoring game as neither team passes the ball or runs the ball well. UCLA’s coming off a big win over Southern Cal while FSU pretty quit down the stretch. Tough call, but take UCLA.
Independence Bowl – Oklahoma St. vs. Alabama – This bowl was much more interesting as the Poulon/Weedeater Independence Bowl. And when it didn’t have two sorry ass 6-6 teams. Take the sorry ass OSU Cowboys.
Holiday Bowl – Texas A&M vs. Cal – Could be a statement game for Cal which means they’ll lose like they do in every statement game they play.
Texas Bowl – Rutgers vs. Kansas St. – Formerly the Houston Bowl, but changed its name to feel bigger. Then showing how big time it is, it signed a TV deal with a pro football owned channel that’s premium in most markets including one of the teams. With the help of possibly losing an antitrust exemption, the NFL is allowing Rutgers fans to watch their team beat KSU (whose fans may not get to watch).
Music City Bowl – Clemson vs. Kentucky – Since this is not a higher tier bowl, UK’s presence is not the first sign of the Apocalypse. Poor Marty Moore. ESPN has this game, so does anyone think they won’t constantly show Moore fumbling after catching what should have been a game ending interception in the ’93 Peach Bowl? This rematch of that game won’t be 14-13 because both teams will score. I think Clemson’s defense will do a better job of slowing Kentucky’s offense than UK’s defense will do to Clemson’s.
Sun Bowl – Oregon State vs. Missouri – Oregon State is rolling. Missouri is fading. Doesn’t mean Oregon St will win, but they will.
Liberty Bowl – Houston vs. S. Carolina – Ah, memories of Memphis in December. I imagine South Carolina fans will be quite surprised by how cold it can be there(except UL isn’t playing in it, so it will probably be nice & sunny). Imagine their surprise when Houston upsets the Cocks.
Insight Bowl – Texas Tech vs. Minnesota – Minnesota can’t stop the pass to save their life. Texas Tech throws on just about every play. I like Texas Tech’s odds.
Champ Sports Bowl – Purdue vs. Maryland – Purdue didn’t beat anybody who was worth anything. Maryland barely won most of their wins. So, Maryland barely beats Purdue.
Meineke Car Care Bowl – Navy vs. Boston College – BC’s coach just left for a conference rival who coaches in the same state as the bowl game. Leaning towards the Swabbies on this one.
Alamo Bowl – Texas vs. Iowa – My how the mighty have fallen. From national champs to playing a 6-6 Iowa team. Actually, I’m still not sure how a 9-3 Texas ended up here, but they are clearly better.
Chick-fil-A Bowl – Georgia vs. Virginia Tech – A de facto home game for Georgia. What happened the last time they had one of those? There will be less scoring, but history will repeat itself.
MPC Computer Bowl – Miami vs. Nevada – I’m sure Nevada is pleased to be here, and Miami isn’t. Truthfully, this is one of the hardest picks to make, because Miami is better, but they could come out flatter than the transsexual hooker that Jon Con…. er, never mind. Or be motivated to send the coach-they-got-fired out as a winner. Coin flip says motivated.
Outback Bowl – Tennessee vs. Penn State – Joe Paterno has an incredible 21-10-1 bowl record at Penn State. Of course, a lot of those wins were when dinosaurs roamed the Earth. As of January, his bowl record will be 21-11-1.
Cotton Bowl – Auburn vs. Nebraska – On paper, Auburn seems like the likely winner, but under Tuberville, they don’t play so well against good out of conference teams. I’m going with the Cornholers or huskers or whatever.
Gator Bowl – West Virginia vs. Georgia Tech – Toothless Redneck Central Tech isn’t good against the pass, and GA Tech has a great receiver in Calvin Johnson. Too bad they have a crappy quarterback in Reggie Ball. The Brokeback Mountaineers run all over GA Tech to win.
Capital One Bowl – Arkansas vs. Wisconsin – When governors do their silly bets on these games, I’m assuming Wisconsin will bet cheese or bratwurst, but what product is synonymous with Arkansas? Stained dresses? Wannabe New York politicians? At least Arkansas football is good this year.
Rose Bowl – Michigan vs. USC – Always seems to be a team that seemingly got jobbed by the bowl system then turned in a clunker. Michigan is this year’s clunker. Just like a Ford.
Fiesta Bowl – Boise State vs. Oklahoma – I would dearly love to pick Boise State to win this, but Oklahoma will be too tough. Plus, they have a guy named CJ Ah You on the team. How do you counteract that? Ia Falo? Just not as good.
Orange Bowl – Louisville vs. Wake Forest – Dammit, Louisville better win.
Sugar Bowl – Notre Dame vs. LSU – Neither team deserved to be in a BCS bowl game. ND only played two good teams and had their asses handed to them both times. LSU didn’t even win their division of the SEC. Still, LSU will handle ND easily.
International Bowl – Cincinnati vs. Western Michigan – Since this game is in Toronto, they probably should have scheduled it before January since people going to the game will need a passport. Of course, with the crowds they draw in the regular season, may not be many. UC’s new coach is from Central Michigan, so he knows Western Mich which will be enough for the win.
GMAC Bowl – Ohio vs. Southern Miss – This is not the same Ohio team that beat UK two years ago. That team sucked. Still, this one won’t beat Southern Miss
BCS Championship Game – Florida lobbied to get into this game. I hope it was worth it when they lose by two touchdowns to Ohio State.

$2 Million Doesn't Buy Much Anymore

My only prediction this year for the UL/UK basketball game was that it would be ugly. I think I understated that. Ugly would have been an improvement. This was a game that 11-6 at the 10 minute mark of the first half. The rest of the half got a little better, but one stat puts it in perspective. UL finished the half on a 0-9 shooting streak to end up shooting 26.7% from the field, and they were still only down three. Of course, they improved to 27% for the game. I would like to give credit to UK since it would make me feel better about UL's chances later in the year. However, when a team misses 21 of 24 mostly wide-open three point shots, I'm not sure you can give a lot of credit to defense. Plus, how did they only score 61 points when UL's defense was playing "unintentional double team"? (That's inexplicably double teaming someone with out the ball which is really just not knowing who you should be guarding) Well, they got out rebounded 19-8 on the offensive boards. So, I wouldn't book those tickets to the Final Four for them. Still, they are in much better shape than UL. Fortunately, I have the football team giving me a reason to go to Miami, because basketball ain't crap.

Those who know me know that I've never liked Rick Pitino. His "coaches win, players lose" attitude got old when he was at UK. However, at least when he was doing his schtick at UK, he was still winning. I didn't like Pitino coming to UL (or how they booted Denny Crum out the door), but I assumed he would win. I was a little less than pleased when his first three years included one NCAA tournament win. Then he made the Final Four in 2005, so I thought he turned the corner, but last year's NIT team was disappointing, but this year's may not even make the NIT. That's how mediocre Pitino has been at UL. The Final Four looks like the fluke. At UK, in his six seasons UK was not on probation, he went to three Final Fours with his worst result being a second round loss. At UL, unless things get dramatically better, he will miss the NCAAs in three out of six years with a second round loss being the second best season.

I think the worst thing about Pitino has been his history as a pathological liar (in Boston, the press called him Pitinocchio). At UK, it was always that he hadn't talked to anyone about an NBA job while he's negotiating contracts or that UK would be a better team without Jamal Mashburn. At UL, he lies even more. Every recruiting class is his best ever, but he runs off half of them for not being good enough or even better, he says they aren't ready for college basketball like he did with prized recruit Derrick Caracter. On the radio show before the game, he said UL wasn't struggling (all Big East teams have at least two losses to Atlantic 10 squads), and Randolph Morris is the second best center in college behind Greg Oden (which makes UL's performance even worse since Morris was on the bench most of the game). After the game, he said they played a good game if they had actually hit their shots.

That last line is probably true. However, Pitino's in game performance has left a lot to be desired. Yeah, UL couldn't hit crap from the three point line. So, why were they still shooting so many three point shots? Here's a thought. If something isn't working, make an adjustment. I'm convinced the only reason UL made the Final Four in 2005 was because they got down 20 points to West Virginia in the Elite Eight. When you get to that point, you don't run plays, you just play. Once it was out of the coach's hands and into the players', UL makes a huge comeback and wins. Since that game, they haven't beaten anyone worth a crap. And I don't see that changing anytime soon. The simple fact is Pitino's success has had a good bit of luck added to good recruiting. His Providence success depended on him being one of the few coaches to immediately embrace the three point shot. At UK, college basketball hadn't seen the glut of top high school players jumping directly to the NBA. So, he's able to stockpile talent to the point that he had better players on the bench (say Ron Mercer) than most teams had as their focal point. There also weren't the recruiting restrictions that limited how many new scholarship players a team could sign each year. So, he could run off a bunch of players and replace them easily.

Unfortunately (for me), Pitino seems to be mailing it in. I think that Final Four has caused him to believe that he's "proven" he can still coach after the Boston problems. Another point that he made in the pregame interview was that he's happy now as opposed to when he coached the Celtics. Well, that's great that he has his priorities in order and no longer considers winning the most important thing. Except UL is paying him $2 million a year because they thought they were getting the win-at-all-cost attitude. Not an underachieving team that might not even make the NIT this year. Let's put it this way, Denny Crum was considered out of touch and past his prime. If UL doesn't' turn it around enough to make the NCAAs (unlikely with the Big East schedule ahead), that will be two straight years that UL has not made the tournament. Crum never went two years without making the tournament.