Picks for the week
Again, in order of confidence:
Miami -7.5 over UNC
Navy +15.5 over Wake Forest
Marshall +15 over West Virginia
Mississippi +22.5 over Florida
Indiana +8.5 over Michigan State
Duke -7 over Virginia
Houston +10.5 over East Carolina
Auburn -6.5 over Tennessee
UAB +26.5 over South Carolina
Army +27 over Texas A&M
South Florida -9.5 over NC State
NFL:
Buffalo -8 over St Louis
San Diego -7.5 over Oakland
Washington +11 over Dallas
Arizona +1 over NJ Jets
ECU/BYU’s BCS Chances and Return of the Picks
We are 3 games into the college football season and already people are talking about how when ECU and BYU both go undefeated, 1 is going to get left out because the ‘evil’ BCS only allows for one at-large non-BCS school. And all this on top of the many articles I saw last week proposing that ECU could miss out of a BCS game entirely even if they went undefeated. I think all of this is complete non-sense. There’s a reason why the BCS rankings don’t come out in week 1, because there’s no way to tell how the season will play out. It’s obvious that the average fan can’t figure the BCS out, I think we shouldn’t show the BCS standings until the last 2 weeks of the season. Here’s my opinion: It’s worthless to talk about right now because ECU and BYU are not going undefeated. I don’t think either one are. Sure, I can’t look over their schedule and tell you when they will lose and they should be favored in all their remaining games. But just because they are favored doesn’t mean they will win them. Let’s not forget that a non-BCS team going undefeated is the exception and not the norm. And as far as ECU goes, they’ve had non-conference success in the past, only to blow it in conference play and they could face an underrated Tulsa team that was picked to win Conference USA in the championship game. If they get there, that is. It’s still a long way between now and then. I think they lose at least 2. I think BYU loses 1 and Utah loses 2.
And now, the return of my weekly picks, posted late Fridays or early Saturday morning:
In order of confidence:
Utah (-5) over Air Force
Purdue (-10.5) over Central Michigan
Penn St (-27.5) over Temple
Toledo (+7) over Fresno State (should be closer than 7)
Florida (-8) over Tennessee
Notre Dame (+8) over Michigan State
Mississippi (-7) over Vanderbilt
Virginia Tech (+3.5) over North Carolina
Indiana (-3) over Ball State
Navy (+5.5) over Rutgers
NFL:
Tennessee (-4.5) over Houston
San Francisco (-4) over Detroit
Atlanta (-5.5) over Kansas City
Cleveland (+2) over Baltimore
Cincinnati (+13.5) over NY Giants