Bloguin College Football Roundtable 1.0

Welcome to the first edition of the Bloguin College Football Roundtable. Bloguin has been recruiting NCAA blogs aggressively, and had harvested a nice core group of college sites. We are still expanding, and if you are reading this and are a writer of a college sports blog, please visit Bloguin and follow the links to find out more on how to join a great and up and coming network.

The guys over at Left Over Hot Dog decided to get this thing started and presented a simple, yet comprehensive list of items to cover.

• Conference Winners
• Heisman Winner
• National Champion

This is a lot of material, so let’s get started…

Conference Champs

ACC—–> North Carolina

• The ACC may be on the east coast, but it is as wide open as the wild west. 7 schools have a legitimate shot to land in the ACC title game, and then anything can happen.
• Florida State will finally flex their muscles a bit with a refreshing regime change, and land in the title game.
• North Carolina has the best defense in the country and has serviceable players on offense that will surprise a lot of people.

Big East—–> PITT

• The Big East is still a bad conference from top to bottom. ( I don’t care what Randy Edsall thinks). Parody in the league hides their mediocrity.
• We could see a repeat of 2009 with PITT and Cincy basically playing for a conference title when they meet on December 4th.
• PITT has the overall talent advantage over the rest of the conference, and will be determined to take revenge out on the Bearcats.

Big 10—–> Ohio State

• As obvious a choice as OSU is, the conference is much better top to bottom in 2010.
• The Buckeyes don’t play Michigan State or Northwestern due to the weird scheduling practices of the Big Integer- so it kind of evens itself out.
• OSU has 3 games in November to win the conference: Penn State, @Iowa, and Michigan.

Big 12—–> Texas

• The conference feels like it is in shambles, and has fell down the totem pole from 2 years ago.
• Once again… The Red River Rivalry will determine the Big 12 South champ.
• Nebraska is the sexy pick to win it all, but not from me. I think they beat Texas in the regular season, but fall (again) to Texas in the title game.

Pac-10—–> Oregon

• The Pac-10 is even more wide open than the ACC in my opinion.
• Even without Masoli, Oregon has enough to win the conference.
• It’s a gut feeling, but The Civil War between Oregon and Oregon State may end up deciding the Pac-10 champ. Oregon State is much better than they are getting credit for from everyone else.

SEC—–> Alabama

• This is the one conference where the Conference Title game actually has meant something year in and year out.
• Auburn and Alabama will both be undefeated heading into the Iron Bowl, with the winner going to the SEC title game- Bama.
• Alabama will face a surprise team from the East, South Carolina. Alabama easily beats the Gamecocks for the 2nd time in a season.

Mountain West—–> TCU

• The MWC could be a 4 team race. TCU and Utah are obvious, but BYU should never be overlooked. Air Force could be a big surprise here and help  shape the title race.
• No one will run the conference table.
• Utah loses their top 4 tacklers and 5 out of their top 6. That is cause for concern, while TCU is too well rounded on both sides of the ball.

MAC—–> Northern Illinois

• The best team over the last 5 years was Central Michigan. This year they take a few steps back while a few others take a step forward.
• Temple may end up being the best team in the conference with the best player, Bernard Pierce.
• After beating NIU in the regular season, Temple loses to the Huskies in the MAC title game. NIU will only get better as the season keeps going.

USA—–> Houston

• This is another “change of the guard” as East Carolina will be rebuilding in 2010.
• Houston and Central Florida will play in the title game. Houston will get there with their offense, and UCF gets there with their defense.
• Keenum and Houston are too good. Not only will Keenum kill you with the pass, but Houston has a very nice running game as well.

WAC—–> Boise State

• Boise is too damn good for this conference. Period.
• Nevada has the offense to compete, but their defense is severly lacking.
• November 26th could be billed as the WAC Title game with Boise traveling to Nevada, but the Broncos will probably win that game 55-31.

Sunbelt—–> Middle Tennessee St.

• Middle Tennessee St. has the best QB and player in the conference in Dwight Dasher (what a name!).
• Troy will make a push, because that’s what Troy does.
• MTSU has their 3 toughest games at home in Troy, North Texas, and Florida Atlantic. Between that fact and Dasher, is the reason they win the conference.

Independents—–> Notre Dame

• Because all 3 Independents play each other… that’s why I am listing this thing. (And one other footnote: All 3 games will be on a Neutral Field).
• ND has an immense talent advantage and has the revenge factor on its side against Navy.
• Kelly will want to make a statement that the Fighting Irish will not bow down to the service academies. If he is able to run the score up on them- he will.

Heisman Trophy

I am beginning to hate this award more and more each year. It has become a total bullshit event. Basically it goes to the best player on the best team. That’s fine- if the award was meant for that kind of accolade. It is supposed to go to the best player in college football, and it probably hasn’t been right since Charles Woodson won the award. ( Do you know how hard that is for me to say?) Further more, any “MVP” award that wasn’t handed to Rocket Ismail is again- total bullshit.

Because of my angst towards the award, I have to provide you with two choices. 1) The player I am promoting, and 2) Who I think will/should win it in 2010.

Rickey Dobbs- Navy

• This is the player that I am pushing hard. He is dynamic and invaluable to his team. The only way that he even gets invited to New York, is if Navy goes undefeated (and that is a conflict of interest for me) and he improves on his numbers from last year with over 1000 passing and 1000 rushing yards while rushing for 28 TD’s and passing for 6 more.

Ryan Mallett- Arkansas

• Mallet won’t get the press like Pryor. Mallett won’t have the numbers like Keenum. Mallett won’t have the crazy-as-bat-shit coach pushing and selling him like Luck. Mallett won’t have Todd McShay all over his nuts like Locker. Mallett won’t have the David VS. Goliath theme like Moore. What Mallett has, is a great offense, and an arm that was blessed by the god Thor to throw a ball threw Fort Knox. I think Ryan is the best QB in college football, and even if he is almost as much of a longshot to win the award as Dobbs- he CAN do it.

This is a particularly weak year for the Heisman, even with a returning winner in Mark Ingram. Ingram will get some love, but he will see a reduction in carries in 2010 and that will hurt him.

2010 BCS National Champion

Alabama- SEC

It sickens me that I have to pick a SEC team to win this thing. Even with the losses on defense, Alabama will have an improved offense that is more diverse, explosive, and experienced than the one they had in 2009 that won them a title and a Heisman Trophy.

• Ohio State will play Alabama in the title game with both teams going undefeated.
• Boise State will have a 12-0 record and be shutout of the title game because their schedule is a FUCKING JOKE. Who cares if they play Virginia Tech on a neutral field and Oregon State on the smurf turf? Ohio State plays 3 of 4 teams that are cupcakes to start the season, but the entire WAC is basically a gigantic cupcake. Get over yourselves Bronco Nation.
• I think Ohio State will have the better defense in the title game, but not by much. I’m not sold on the Buckeyes running game, and Pryor will have to show me more than beating up on a PAC-10 defense to have me convinced that they can beat Bama.
• It will be a low-scoring game, and Bama wins 16-10.

So it has been written, so it shall be.

——–

Please check out these other Bloguin NCAA blogs for their responses (Main Page Links):

• Leftover Hot Dog, A USC Gamecocks Blog
• Bama Sports Report, An Alabama Blog
• SOX & Dawgs
• The North End Zone, A VT Blog
• All Things Maroon, A MSU Blog
• Saturday Night Slant, A LSU Blog
• Blatant Homerism, An OU Sooners Blog
• Randall Simon’s Sausages