CFB Roundtable: Under the Radar Teams

Every year there are surprise teams in college football. Last year, teams like Notre Dame and Texas A&M greatly exceeded their pre-season hype. Teams like Utah State, Oregon State, San Jose State and Vanderbilt finished in the final AP Top 25. A couple of days ago, we looked at darkhorse Heisman candidates in our roundtable. Today we look at under the radar teams that fans should keep their eye on this year.

Once again Kevin McGuire of  No2MinuteWarning.com, Crystal Ball Run and Nittany Lions Den and Andrew Coppens of Madtown Badgers and the B1G Time join me to discuss the upcoming season.

Here are our “under the radar” teams to watch:

Kevin McGuire: Would it be crazy to suggest we keep another eye on Notre Dame this season? I know the images from the BCS Championship game are difficult to erase, but let’s keep in mind that the Irish are returning their starting quarterback and Brian Kelly has been doing a decent job with recruiting to plug in some new names in to key positions this season. If you look at the schedule you will notice that Notre Dame’s toughest games mostly come at home (Oklahoma, USC, BYU). The Irish take on Michigan in Ann Arbor in week two but I think Michigan has some work to do to impress in 2013, and I think Notre Dame has a good chance to be better at the end of the year when they take on Stanford in Palo Alto. Winning at Stanford certainly won’t be easy, but if they can navigate through the 2013 season in similar fashion to the 2012 season, the Irish could be in prime position for another BCS bowl appearance of some sort.

Andrew Coppens: This may sound a bit homerish, but I think Wisconsin is a team that’s flying under the radar on the national scale. They return seven starters on defense and eight on offense. If they get the QB situation settled early in camp this team could be very dangerous. I don’t think a lot of people realize that at almost every position group the Badgers are now in the “next man up” category. Add in a team that was a Top 25 defense in all statistical categories that’s getting more aggressive and a much more favorable schedule (no Nebraska, MSU, or Michigan in regular season) and you’ve got a good recipe for success. Watching them in spring it seems like this is a team re-energized by the coaching change and things have gone about as smoothly as possible in the transition. 

Kevin: Under Mike Gundy, Oklahoma State is one of those teams that just wins games year in and year out without much fanfare. From 2008 to 2011, the Cowboys won an average of 10 games per year. Last year they dropped down to eight wins but they also had to replace Brandon Weeden and Justin Blackmon and had to deal with multiple injury issues at QB. The conference schedule sets up nicely for them this season. They catch WVU fairly early and get Kansas State, TCU, Baylor and Oklahoma at home.  

Another team that could be interesting is the Hurricanes of Miami. They return ten offensive starters and nine on defense. Couple that with RB Duke Johnson and QB Stephen Morris’s swan song and you have what could be a tough team to beat. They weren’t especially good last year but still managed to tie for the best record in the ACC Coastal Division. They have a date with Florida early and play at FSU early in November but every other game on their schedule looks very winnable.