College Football Bowls Thread!

[RSC]

Welp, its that time of year again, where college football's imperfect (and that is a bit of an understatement) form of post-season play "shines." Despite the pure insanity of the BCS, there is going to be some fantastic football (and fantastic anti-football, as Crasher likes to say ). Here's what I think are some of the best games:

12/12/09

ARMY vs. NAVY

Now, I know this isn't a bowl game, but this is always awesome. Ok, Navy has destroyed Army for the past several years, but I think Army's going to pull of the win this year. If they can, they'll be in the Eaglebank Bowl in sunny Washington D.C. against Temple. That, coupled with the intensity of this rivalry, will lead Army to victory. Its always a blast to attend, and I'll be there in Philly on Saturday

12/22/09

Las Vegas Bowl

Oregon State vs. BYU

Oregon State lost their annual Civil War against Oregon for a bid to the Rose Bowl against Ohio State, so they'll be looking for some redemption. Meanwhile, BYU will be finishing their season after starting as what many regarded as the most likely Non-BCS team to make a BCS bowl, especially after beating Oklahoma. Unfortunately, losses to Florida State and TCU ended that dream for the Cougars.

12/26/09

Meineke Car Care Bowl

North Carolina vs. Pittsburgh

After blowing a 21 point lead to Cincinnati last weekend, the Panthers lost a shot at a BCS bowl and ending the Bearcats' perfect season. North Carolina, meanwhile, has had a good year for the most part, only losing one game they should have won, last week against North Carolina State 28-27.

12/27/09

Music City Bowl

Clemson vs.Kentucky

There is only one reason to watch this game: CJ Spiller. The guy is an amazing running back, and he shreds defenses. IMO, he'll go top 15 at worst in the NFL draft come April; if you don't watch college football and want to see a guy who I think is going to be huge (not that my opinion means anything ) watch CJ Spiller.

12/29/09

Eaglebank Bowl

Temple vs. Army or UCLA (Army gets bid if they beat Navy Saturday)

OH. MY. GOD. This bowl game is so f'ing unnecessary. This is what its come to. We have so many bowls now, they have put one in DC in an outdoor stadium, matching Temple vs. a 6-6 team. Are you sh!tting me? There were already too many bowls, so what do we do? Put on in fvcking Washington DC! Ah well. This is going to be anti-football no matter who Temple plays.

12/30/09

Holiday Bowl

Nebraska vs. Arizona

Arizona flew under the radar this year, and because of USC's off year, they had a legitimate chance at capturing the Pac-10 title until losing a heartbreaking (though awesome) Double OT game against Oregon. Meanwhile, Nebraska comes in after watching their upset bid against Texas in the Big 12 Championship game fall short by literally 1 second. Ndamukong Suh showed by he is a Heisman candidate, dominating Texas' O-line. Will he be able to do it against Arizona? Probably, and at will.

1/1/10

Capital One Bowl

Penn State vs. LSU

I always think of the Capital One Bowl as the best non-BCS bowl, and its always a good game. Penn State LSU will be no different. After losing against Ole Miss because of boneheaded clock management, LSU didn't let history repeat itself the next week against Arkansas and won by 3 in overtime. Penn State had a usual Penn State season, high expectations but coming short.

Gator Bowl

Florida State vs. West Virginia

Bobby Bowden's last bow (see what I did there?!!?) against his former team, WVU. Noel Devine for West Virginia is going to be the player to watch in this game.

Rose Bowl

Oregon vs. Ohio State

Two good teams here, this will be a great game. The traditional Big 10 vs. Pac-10 BCS game is always fun, unless of course USC is playing in it (I don't like USC, in case you haven't noticed). That loss to Boise State is so far away from the Ducks' minds now; simply put, they are a different football team. Meanwhile, after that loss to USC early in the year, people began to (or in some cases continued to) wonder if Jim Tressel can win the big games. This is a chance for him to prove his critics wrong.

PREDICTION: Oregon over Ohio State

Sugar Bowl

Cincinnati vs. Florida

Cincinnati comes in still undefeated after getting by Pitt by the skin of their teeth. They'll be looking for their first undefeated season (question: can they still get a part of the National Championship, or has that been done away with by the creation of the extra BCS game?). The Bearcats won't have it easy, however, as Florida comes in seething after getting blown out by Alabama in the SEC Championship Game. This will be Tebow's last collegiate game ever, and possibly his last as a quarterback, if some NFL Draft analysts have their way, and the question on everybody's mind: will tears be shed?

PREDICTION: Florida over Cincinnati, and Tebow cries

1/4/10

Fiesta Bowl

Boise State vs. TCU

You will never, ever again in your life see a game with two non-BCS teams get so much hype. Ever. Both teams come in undefeated, and many people are wondering if this game is a grand conspiracy to keep these two teams from beating BCS teams and remaining undefeated (personally, I think it was just brilliant selection by the Fiesta Bowl committee). This is going to be a fun game to watch, and at the very least, we will have a Non-BCS national championship game.

PREDICTION: TCU over Boise State (No blue field, no win)

1/5/10

Orange Bowl

Georgia Tech vs. Iowa

Georgia Tech and their triple option offense roll on in to Florida to take on a Hawkeyes team that was undefeated until the lost to... Northwestern. Yes, Iowa was looking like they would be in Cincinnati's position until two weeks of under performing cost them, followed by a loss to Ohio State. Georgia Tech, meanwhile, defeated Clemson in the ACC Championship game. Watch Jonathon Dwyer in this game, Georgia Tech's running back.

PREDICTION: Georgia Tech over Iowa

1/7/10

BCS Title Game

Alabama vs. Texas

Welp, here it is. The national title game. Alambama comes in after blowing out Florida, while Texas limps in after beating Nebraska by 1 point. Many people are questioning Texas after only being able to score 13 point against Nebraska, but Nebraska has a great defense. These two teams are coming from the exact opposite sides of the spectrum, and it'll be interesting to see how both come out after a month plus to prepare for the other.

PREDICTION: Alabama over Texas

So that's it, I think later I'm going to post a 16 team playoff bracket like I did last year, just to show what it'd look like.

[Devils Pride 26]

this thread blows...

haha im most excited for the sugar bowl, two teams that know how to run the spread

[RSC]

this thread blows...

haha im most excited for the sugar bowl, two teams that know how to run the spread

Gee, thanks

Anway, I did a little work and here's what a theoretical 16 team playoff would look like this year, as well as the rules I used for determining seeds.

Using Conference champions, and the Final BCS Standings before the bowl games but after the conference championship games, I determined what a 16 team bracket would look like, assuming that all 11 conferences had one automatic bid and the BCS standings determined the final 5 seeds. The BCS standings would also determine the seeding of the teams. For teams that are not in the top 25 of the BCS standings, I used a tie-breaker system of Win %, Conference win %, Points For, Points Against, and then coin flip, which most likely would never, ever happen . a team's BCS ranking is in parentheses, as is the not ranked teams tie breakers.

Playoff teams:

ACC- Georgia Tech (9)

Big East- Cincinnati (3)

Big 10- Ohio State (8)

Big 12- Texas (2)

C-USA- East Carolina(NR) (.692)

MAC- Central Michigan (NR) (.846)

MWC- TCU (4)

Pac-10- Oregon (7)

SEC- Alabama (1)

Sun Belt-Troy (NR) (.750)

WAC- Boise State (6)

At Large 1- Florida (5)

At Large 2- Iowa (10)

At Large 3- Virginia Tech (11)

At Large 4- LSU (12)

At Large 5- Penn State (13)

Seedings:

1.Alabama 2. Texas 3. Cincinnati 4.TCU 5. Florida 6.Boise State 7.Oregon 8.Ohio State 9.Georgia Tech 10.Iowa 11.Virginia Tech 12.LSU 13. Penn State 14.Central Michigan 15.Troy 16.East Carolina

First round matchups:

1. Alabama vs. 16. East Carolina

2. Texas vs. 15. Troy

3. Cincinnati vs 14. Central Michigan

4. TCU vs. 13. Penn State

5. Florida vs. 12. LSU

6. Boise State vs. 11. Virginia Tech

7. Oregon vs. 10. Iowa

8. Ohio State vs. 9 Georgia Tech

[Devils Pride 26]

dude you thought i was serious? i wasn't thats good work on the playoff system

[RSC]

dude you thought i was serious? i wasn't thats good work on the playoff system

No, not at all. I was kidding too,

This is why sarcasm on the internets doesn't work.

Edited December 11, 2009 by RSC

[Prucenterrules]

The boise state game is going to be insane.

[Devils Pride 26]

yeah they put the two bcs busters together which is bs. if they played in two different bcs games and both won the world would explode. either way whoever wins people are going to say, "oh, well they only beat ___" which defeats the purpose of getting them respect.

[RSC]

It is officially bowl season!

Today's games:

New Mexico Bowl

Wyoming 35, Fresno State 28, 2OT

St. Petersburg Bowl

Rutgers vs. Central Florida

[DH26]

that QB for Wyoming was insane. He was just unbelievable and a true freshman?

[Mike441]

is anyone else watching this game?

[ThreeCups]

is anyone else watching this game?

Pretty insane. I thought once McCoy got knocked out of the game that Bama was gonna smash them. They slowely crept back into it behind the strong Texas D...3rd down for Bama right now...huge play upcoming!

[RSC]

Anti-climatic ending for what had become a pretty good game. That botched shovel pass is going to be haunting Mack Brown all spring and summer, I think. I honestly don't know what he was thinking, he should've just let the clock run to halftime instead of calling a timeout and running that play. It really wouldn't have done anything positive for them, even if they didn't fvck it up.

[Mike441]

class-less move by saban scoring that TD late after the game was over, what a douche. if i was on the texas defense i would go for the late hit after that garbage TD

[95Crash]

Congrats to the Alabama Crison Tide. I was a big 'Bama fan growing up, so of course I am happy to see them win, even though I don't follow them much anymore.

However, the whole complexion of tonight's game changed once McCoy went down near the start of the first quarter. This game never got to be all that it could've been. I really would've liked to have seen what would've happened had Texas not lost their starting QB.

[DH26]

Bama's displaying their trophy at wal-mart BCS gets classy

[DaneykoIsGod]

I'm not a big college football guy, but I thoroughly enjoyed reading this piece in SI where BCS boss Bill Hancock defends the current system.

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/article/magazine/MAG1164551/index.htm

Next, Bill talks about how there is no playoff system that quite works. How many teams do you want in a playoff? Eight teams? Not enough.... There are 11 Football Bowl Subdivision conferences plus Notre Dame. If people want a playoff to make it fairer for teams like Boise State and TCU, you can't have an eight-team playoff.

O.K., make it 16 teams. Minimum. But that's four extra games. Do people really want to add four games to the college schedule? Do you really want national champions to play 17 games? Is that good for 18-to-22-year-old players who are trying (you would hope) to go to school and trying to stay healthy? And where would these games be played anyway? At neutral sites? No, fans are not going to travel week after week. At home sites? O.K. ... but is that fair?

And, for that matter, is 16 teams really enough to bring happiness to the playoff hounds? There are more than 100 football programs in Division I. "Everybody talks about the NFL," Bill says. "You know, 37.5% of NFL teams make the playoffs. To reach that level, we'd need a six-week, 45-team playoff. Is that what people really want?"