November 6 Notebook
November 06, 2006 01:10 PM | General
November 6, 2006
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – West Virginia coach Rich Rodriguez said after Thursday night’s disappointing loss at Louisville that there was still a lot of football left for his team to play. He’s right.
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| West Virginia coach Rich Rodriguez watches the seconds tick off on his team's national championship hopes last Thursday night at Louisville.
AP photo |
With Louisville now in the driver’s seat for the Big East’s BCS bowl slot and a possible meeting against Ohio State or Michigan in the national title game on Jan. 8 the Mountaineers also remain in contention for a spot in one of the other BCS bowl games.
If West Virginia should win out against Cincinnati, Pitt, South Florida and Rutgers (three of the remaining four are at Milan Puskar Stadium with a Nov. 16 road date at Pitt), the Mountaineers would be 11-1 and right there in the mix with the rest of the one-loss teams.
According to CBS Sportsline, two possible fits for West Virginia as at-large teams are the Fiesta Bowl played on Jan. 1, and the Orange Bowl played on Jan. 2.
Of course a lot of this depends on what happens in the Pac 10 with USC and Cal, what happens in the SEC with Florida, Arkansas, Auburn and even LSU, what happens with Notre Dame, and whether or not Boise State finishes undefeated and gets into the Top 12 in the BCS standings. Boise State remained at 14th this week after beating Fresno State last Wednesday night.
West Virginia could also still go as the Big East co-champion should it tie Louisville and have a higher BCS rating than the Cardinals.
The Big Ten most likely gets two BCS bids with the loser of the Ohio State-Michigan game going to the Rose Bowl, and the Pac 10 could wind up with two if Cal beats USC and the Fiesta or Orange takes a two-loss USC team. The ACC, SEC and Big 12 champions claim their three spots; the wild cards are of course Notre Dame and Boise State.
On Sunday, WVU stayed in the Top 10 in both polls (No. 10) and is currently ninth in the Sagarin Ratings, ahead of Auburn (11th), Boise State (12th) and Notre Dame (17th).
West Virginia’s computer ranking will continue to improve as it works it way through the remainder of its schedule. Couple that with the offensive star power West Virginia has in running back Steve Slaton and quarterback Patrick White -- along with the Mountaineers’ great tradition of fan support -- and WVU remains very much in the hunt for an at-large BCS bowl berth.
Big East Bowl Scenarios
The Big East’s strong performance on the gridiron this year may lead to some re-negotiated bowl agreements for the future. As for now, it could get very interesting for the conference, especially if Notre Dame falls out of BCS bowl contention.
The way I understand it, if the Gator Bowl claims Notre Dame and the Big East doesn’t get two teams in BCS bowls, the No. 2 Big East team could slip all the way down to the Texas Bowl to be played on Dec. 28 against a Big 12 team.
The Gator could also choose to pick a Big 12 team this year sending Big East No. 2 to the Sun Bowl to play Pac 10 No. 3.
With Navy becoming bowl eligible and securing the Meineke Car Care Bowl for this year only, the No. 3 Big East team could wind up playing in the International Bowl against a Mid-American Conference team. Big East No. 4, which right now could be 6-3 South Florida, 6-3 Pitt or 5-4 Cincinnati, will play in the Birmingham Bowl against a team from Conference USA.
Connecticut, 3-5 with games left against Pitt, Syracuse, Cincinnati and Louisville, and 3-6 Syracuse are not out of bowl contention either. There is a good possibility of six Big East teams getting bowl-eligible with an outside chance of seven making it, meaning Big East officials may have to go bowl shopping to keep everyone happy.
Chaos
What happens if there are no undefeated teams remaining at the end of the season? Better yet, what happens if the only remaining undefeated team is Boise State, rated 14th in the latest BCS standings?
Can an undefeated WAC champion get enough BCS points to earn the right to play for it all?
Obviously, of the five remaining undefeated teams Boise State has the easiest road to perfection with games left against San Jose State, Utah State and Nevada.
What if No. 1 Ohio State, which didn’t set the world on fire against Big Ten bottom dweller Illinois on Saturday, stubs its toe at Northwestern? Don’t forget, the last time the Buckeyes traveled to Evanston in 2004 they lost in overtime 33-27.
Undefeated Michigan, which nearly laid an egg against 3-7 Ball State last Saturday, still has games remaining on the road at Indiana and at Ohio State.
One of those two undefeated Big Ten teams is going to go down on Nov. 18 in Columbus.
And one of the two remaining undefeated Big East teams will be out of the picture next Thursday night in Piscataway, N.J., when Louisville travels to Rutgers. Even if Rutgers pulls off the upset, the Scarlet Knights still have games remaining on the road at Cincinnati and at No. 10 West Virginia.
If Rutgers can get through a pair of Top 10 teams to close out the season, will that be enough to hoist the Scarlet Knights into the national championship game? Rutgers is presently 13th in the BCS standings.
As for Louisville (No. 3 in the BCS behind Ohio State and Michigan), following the Rutgers game the Cardinals still have Big East contests remaining against South Florida (which beat them 45-14 last year and has a defense better equipped to stop the passing game), on the road at Pitt, and at home against Connecticut.
It’s not likely Louisville loses, but the possibility still remains.
And if all of these things happen look out – it’s chaos.
Best One-Loss Team
For my money, the best one-loss team in the country right now isn’t in the SEC and it’s not Texas. It may be California. Remember Lee Corso’s pick to win it all? The Golden Bears lost its season opener at Tennessee but have since won eight in a row, including convincing victories over Arizona State (No. 22 at the time) and No. 21 Oregon.
Cal (BCS No. 8) still has a ways to go to jump up into Florida, Texas and Auburn range in the BCS standings but it is possible for them to make up ground with the big showdown coming up in two weeks against USC.
The Pac 10, not the SEC, has the best power rating this year and is the strongest overall league mainly because Pac 10 teams have played better non-conference schedules (too many I-AA buy-in games for the SEC).
One-loss Auburn (BCS No. 6) playing games down the stretch against Arkansas State, Georgia and Alabama won’t help its cause, particularly now that Georgia lost to Kentucky and Alabama lost to Mississippi State.
One-loss Florida (BCS No. 4) has games left against 5-4 South Carolina, I-AA Western Carolina and 5-4 Florida State. Even if the Gators should win the SEC championship game will be that be enough to get them into the Top 2?
One-loss Arkansas (BCS No. 11) can make a run at getting to the big game if it wins out against Tennessee, Mississippi State and LSU during the regular season and then wins the SEC championship game, but a 36-point loss to USC at home to open the season is still an awful lot to digest.
The Longhorns (BCS No. 5) survived scares at Nebraska and Texas Tech and have regular-season games left against Kansas State and Texas A&M. But will another blowout Big 12 championship victory over a Nebraska or a Missouri be enough to put the Longhorns back into the title game?
USC (BCS No. 7) got back on the right side of the ledger with a win against Stanford, setting up a late-season run of games against No. 21 Oregon, No. 8 Cal and No. 9 Notre Dame before wrapping up the regular season against UCLA. With the right things happening, there is enough left on the Trojans’ schedule to get them back into the national title picture.
The Cal-USC game on Nov. 18 will take a back seat to Ohio State-Michigan as far as national hype, but it could be almost as important in determining who plays for the national championship.
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