What a wild weekend of college football!  No less than ten ranked teams lost, and while admittedly several of them were to other ranked opponents, there were a few upsets.  Perhaps none was more surprising than Indiana’s 24-21 win over Michigan State.  While the Spartans were coming off of a loss to Wisconsin, not many people expected them to lose to Indiana in the battle for the “Brass Spitoon”.  The Spartans had won the last seven meetings against the Hoosiers, with only one of those wins by less than double digits.  Another big upset was South Alabama’s 42-24 win over San Diego State, who came into the game ranked #19 in the country. While the Aztecs’ star running back Donnel Pumphrey still gained over 150 yards, it wasn’t nearly enough against the Jaguars, who added another impressive win to their upset of Mississippi State earlier this year.  It was the first win over a ranked team in the history of the South Alabama football program.

Well, look who’s back!  Some teams that have proud football histories but have had recent downswings find themselves in high spirits again.  Colorado is ranked for the first time since 2005.  At 4-1, with the only loss a respectable road defeat against #4 Michigan, the Buffaloes find themselves leading the Pac-12 South.  Meanwhile, Mark Richt has breathed new life into Miami. The Hurricanes have made it all the way to the top ten in both the AP and coaches’ polls.  The last time they finished the season in the top ten was 2003; can they stay there this year?  They can take a big step this weekend, when they face old nemesis Florida State.  North Carolina, who beat those same Seminoles this past Saturday 37-35 on a 54-yard field goal at the buzzer, are 4-1 and ranked 16^th in one poll and 17^th in the other.  The Tar Heels have won 679 games, in the top-30 all time, but haven’t finished in the top ten in the final polls since 1997.  UNC plays at home against Virginia Tech this weekend.

After four games, the eye-popping figures put up by Texas Tech’s offense are worth taking a closer look.  The Red Raiders have scored at least 55 points in each game.  They’re scoring 59.5 points per game, first in the country. They are averaging 547.8 yards passing per game, which is not only first in the country, but first in the country by over one hundred yards over the number two team.  They’re averaging over a first down (10.19 yards) every time they throw the ball.  They’ve thrown 23 touchdown passes against only four interceptions – again, in four games.  Texas Tech figures to get a better defensive test this weekend against Kansas State, who is 12^th in the country in passing defense and 19^th in passing efficiency defense.

Then there are the teams who score with their defenses – namely, the #1 and #2 teams in the country, Alabama and Ohio State.  Alabama has scored five defensive touchdowns this year.  They have had at least one defensive touchdown each game except against Kent State.  Alabama’s defense has outscored two opponents’ offenses this year, and tied a third (Kent State, who they shut out).  Meanwhile, Ohio State has scored four defensive touchdowns in four games, and are so stingy that they’ve only given up 37 points thus far themselves – only nine points more than they’ve scored!

In small-school news, this weekend will mark the 100^th anniversary of the biggest win in college football history – Georgia Tech’s 222-0 destruction of Cumberland College on October 7, 1916.  There’s lots of information about that game online; it’s an interesting read, to be sure.  Obviously, the Yellow Jackets play in the ACC – what about Cumberland? After that 222-0 game, their football program had many stops and starts until finally restarting the program for good in 1990, and has a record of 125-141 overall since then.  The Phoenix, as they are known, play in the NAIA’s Mid-South conference.  This year, they are 2-3, and play at Kentucky Christian this weekend.  One wonders how much any of the current Cumberland players even know about that memorable game 100 years ago.

Congratulations to JagAL, who wins week 5 with 197 points!  In second place was maestro, who scored 195, and Crimson Gator was in third, with 191.

Standings after five weeks:

1st	maestro	1040
2nd	In Accord	1038
3rd	AllySun	1035
4th	Crimson Gator	1031
T-5th	bamaken	1024
T-5th	JagRag	1024
7th	JagAL	1018
T-8th	TheColombian	1017
T-8th	Shame! Shame!	1017
10th	AUBrian	1016

Thanks to several teams with bye weeks and a few matchups between ranked opponents, this weekend offers a relatively light slate of sixteen games.  Nevertheless, every point counts, so pick wisely and well!  The first game this week is Clemson at Boston College, Friday, September 7 @ 7:30 ET, so make sure to get your picks in by then!

A football game consists of two 30-minute halves. “Thankfully,” Tennessee fans are saying today. “And not a second more,” Auburn fans are adding.  After looking somewhat lost in the first half against Florida, the Volunteers promptly reeled off 38 straight points in the second half to win against the Gators for the first time since 2004.  Tennessee finds itself at 4-0 for the first time since 2003 as a result of the win.  Meanwhile, Auburn lost, then won against LSU when officials reviewed what appeared to literally be a last-second touchdown by the Bayou Bengals and nullified it, saying that the play had not started before the clock ticked down to zero.  It was the first time Auburn won a game without scoring a touchdown since 2008 (the infamous 3-2 win over Mississippi State).

So, how about Wisconsin, huh? After their scare against Georgia State, it was hard to imagine the Badgers walking into Spartan Stadium and coming out with a win.  Not only did they do so, they did it in impressive fashion, with a 30-6 victory over Michigan State.  The Badgers passed this test, but it was the first in quite a gauntlet for them.  The next four weeks’ opponents: At #4 Michigan, #2 Ohio State, at Iowa, #15 Nebraska.  Those four teams have combined for a single loss so far this year.  How are the Badgers doing it? Primarily the way badgers normally operate – scratching and clawing.  In other words, stingy defense. They are currently 7^th in the country in points allowed, at 11.8 per game, and haven’t given up more than 17 to any opponent.  They’ll need that defense to be at their best, especially in the next two weeks: Michigan is fourth in the nation in points per game, and Ohio State is third.

The Badgers aren’t the only “W” team with a bunch of Ws.  Washington has started the season 4-0, and after a squeaker against Arizona on the road, the Huskies get to find out how good they really are.  Stanford comes to Seattle this weekend in a top-ten matchup.  If the Huskies win that, they’ll have perhaps their best chance to beat Oregon in quite a while.  The Ducks have won the last twelve games in that series, and during that stretch only last year’s game was closer than seventeen points.  Meanwhile, West Virginia is one of only two Big XII teams to remain undefeated at 3-0, after a tough win over BYU.  The Mountaineers now enter the conference season against Kansas State.  West Virginia has never won more than eight games in a year since becoming a Big XII member, but this year might be the opportunity for them to rise up – of the three currently ranked conference teams they play, only Texas is on the road.  The Mountaineers also get Oklahoma at home.

In small-school news, Austin Ekeler has been tearing up the ground for Western State (Colorado) this year.  Through four games for the Mountaineers thus far, Ekeler has rolled up 832 rushing yards, averaging out to a tidy 208 per game.  However, it’s his last two games that have been particularly impressive.  After a 37 carry, 283 yard performance against Chadron State, Ekeler topped it this past weekend with a 32 carry, 316 yard day against Colorado Mines.  The 599 yards total in those two games, if he were in FBS, would tie him for the national lead in rushing yards.  As it stands, he’s first overall in Division II by almost 160 yards over his nearest competitor.  Western State takes on Dixie State (Utah) this week, who’s only 135^th in rushing defense this year in Division II.  Looks like Ekeler has a chance for another really big day…

Congratulations go out to GuidestoneRocks, who wins week 4 with 170 points! JagRag took second with 168, and there was a tie between maestro and Shame! Shame! with 166 points each.

Standings after four weeks:

1st	AllySun	849
2nd	In Accord	848
3rd	maestro	845
4th	bamaken	842
5th	Crimson Gator	840
6th	Shame! Shame!	838
T-7th	Ralphie	836
T-7th	JagRag	836
9th	TheColombian	834
10th	AUBrian	830

This week features a slate of very intriguing games.  Four games are top-25 matchups; two of them are top-10 matchups.  Even some of the games that aren’t between top-25 teams are good matchups – North Carolina-Florida State, Oklahoma-TCU.  The first game this week is UConn at Houston, Thursday, September 29 @ 8 ET, so make sure to get your picks in by then!

First off, I feel compelled to tell everyone (even myself)…I tried to warn you about North Dakota State. The Bison did it yet again, beating #13 Iowa (and taking home half a million dollars from the Hawkeyes in the process), 23-21 on a last-second field goal.  That makes it six in a row for the boys from Fargo over FBS competition, with over $2,000,000 in so-called “paycheck” games from their vanquished foes.  The next FBS opponent currently on the Bison’s schedule is Oregon, in 2020, so fans of NDSU have four years to revel in this extremely impressive streak.

Drop the ball (North American phrase of drop, informal): make a mistake; mishandle things. “I really dropped the ball on this one.”

What is it with players trying to look cool by dropping the football as close as they can to the front line of the end zone, only to mistime it and drop it at the 1 yard line? It’s happened multiple times in recent memory, and twice more this past Saturday.  Oklahoma’s Joe Mixon returned an Ohio State kickoff 97 yards for a touchdown…or rather, 96 yards before “fumbling”.  The officials and review team didn’t spot it, and Oklahoma kept the touchdown, although Ohio State ended up winning 45-24.  Perhaps even more difficult to swallow was what happened in the California-Texas game.  With 1:30 to go, and Cal hanging on to a seven point lead, running back Vic Enwere broke through Texas’ defense for 53 yards and a score…or rather, 52 yards and a fumble.  This time, the reviewers noticed it, but claimed Texas didn’t immediately recover, and so Cal kept the ball at the 1 yard line and was able to run out the clock and preserve the win. Coaches – tell your guys to hang on to the ball!  Whatever style points they might hope to gain by doing this celebration aren’t worth possibly losing the six actual points.

Another trend for this past week was teams running out to large leads, then losing them or hanging on for dear life.  Michigan State enjoyed a 36-7 lead over Notre Dame at one point, then had to withstand a furious comeback by the Irish before prevailing 36-28.  Alabama and Ole Miss swapped roles in the same game, with the Crimson Tide overcoming a 24-3 deficit to take a 48-30 lead with five minutes to go, then watching the Rebels score 13 points in eight seconds and being forced to grind out the clock to preserve a 48-43 win.  LSU had a 23-6 lead over Mississippi State with four minutes to go in the game before the Bulldogs scored two quick touchdowns and forced a three-and-out, getting the ball back with one last chance to win or tie. LSU recovered a fumble and ran out the clock to survive, 23-20.

The two-point conversion has always been an interesting quirk when it comes to football.  It usually only becomes a factor late in a game, in specific situations where the reward of an additional point outweighs the risk of not gaining the almost-automatic extra point kick.  But Oregon didn’t do things normally in Saturday’s game against Nebraska.  The Ducks scored five touchdowns – and went for two after each.  However, they only converted one of the five. Nebraska’s five touchdowns were each followed by a standard extra point, which proved to be the difference in the game, as the Cornhuskers won 35-32.

Quick notes: Western Michigan University, located in Kalamazoo, Michigan, has had an excellent showing so far against teams from Illinois.  After knocking off Northwestern 22-21 in week one, the Broncos went to Champaign and beat Illinois 34-10 this past week. If WMU can knock off Northern Illinois on October 8, they’d have a good argument for being crowned champions of Illinois…no one has beaten a service academy team yet – Army, Navy, and Air Force are a combined 8-0…Donnel Pumphrey of San Diego State has 599 yards rushing after three games.  That’s more than 83 FBS teams…Louisville, after three games, has 1,000 yards rushing (one of only 3 FBS teams) and 1,038 yards passing (one of only 13 FBS teams)…Utah, whose punter won the Ray Guy award for best punter the last two years, then graduated, has a new punter, Mitch Wishnowsky. All he’s doing is leading the nation in punting average, at 52.6 yards per punt…eighty-one FBS teams average 389 yards or more per game. Florida’s defense has given up 389 yards – total – in three games.

Congratulations to Tex Duck, who wins week three with 205 points!  In Accord was second with 204, and Crimson Gator took third with 203.

Standings after three weeks:

1st	In Accord	702
2nd	AllySun	685
3rd	Crimson Gator	684
4th	bamaken	681
5th	maestro	679
6th	Pachyderm	678
7th	Jeff4Bama	677
8th	Ralphie	675
9th	TheColombian	673
10th	Shame! Shame!	672

We are finally in the thick of the conference season! Of the games involving ranked teams, only five are not conference games.  That usually has the side effect of making the games trickier to pick, so be on your game!  The first game this week is Clemson at Georgia Tech, Thursday, September 22 @ 7:30 ET, so make sure to get your picks in by then!

Going into week 2 of the college football season, there didn’t appear to be many games of interest. Sure, there was the novelty of the Battle at Bristol, which ended up with a record attendance for a college football game.  Just shy of 157,000 people watched Tennessee beat Virginia Tech.  But most of the big teams had easier opponents, so what would the storyline be coming out of the week?  It appears that the answer to that question is “rulebook controversy”. In the Central Michigan-Oklahoma State game, the Cowboys took a snap on fourth down with four seconds left in the game and threw a pass out of bounds, seemingly running out the clock and winning 27-24.  However, they were called for intentional grounding, and an untimed down was given to the Chippewas, who promptly completed a fifty-plus yard Hail Mary-plus-a-lateral that gave them an improbable 30-27 win.  As it turns out, Central Michigan shouldn’t have gotten another snap, even though Oklahoma State took a penalty at the end. I won’t go into specifics, because this is supposed to be easy reading on a Monday morning, and much more knowledgeable people than I have discussed it online. However, it seems like there’s some work that needs to be done on the rulebook to make sure that situations like this don’t happen again.

Thankfully, there were some other interesting occurrences this week that didn’t involve controversial finishes.  The most eye-popping occurred in Tempe, Arizona, after many of our bedtimes. Arizona State running back Kalen Ballage scored eight touchdowns for the Sun Devils in a 68-55 win over Texas Tech. In doing so, he tied an NCAA record for touchdowns in a game, but what perhaps is most interesting is how comparatively normal the rest of his stats were.  Ballage only ran the ball thirteen times for 137 yards, but scored seven touchdowns on the ground (from 1, 1, 4, 2, 7, 1, and 75 yards). He caught two passes for 48 yards and one receiving touchdown (39 yards).  Ballage’s effort ties the record of Illinois’ Howard Griffith, who scored eight touchdowns in a game against Southern Illinois in 1990.

Ballage isn’t the only touchdown machine early this year.  Louisville quarterback Lamar Jackson has accounted for thirteen scores this year in two games against Charlotte and Syracuse. He’s run for six touchdowns and thrown for seven more. Perhaps most impressive in all of this is that Jackson didn’t play in the second half against Charlotte, so this has all happened in six quarters of football. Louisville is currently averaging 66 points per game, but things figure to get tougher this week – the Cardinals take on #2-ranked Florida State this Saturday.  Patrick Mahomes of Texas Tech has thrown for nine touchdowns and run for three more in two games against Stephen F. Austin and Arizona State.

In small-school news, North Dakota State is finding the going tough to start the year.  The five-time defending FCS champions and #1-ranked team in FCS were taken to overtime for a second straight game to open the season.  After beating then-FCS #6 Charleston Southern 24-17 in overtime, the Bison squeaked by then-FCS #8 Eastern Washington 50-44 in extra time this past Saturday.  North Dakota State ups the ante yet again this week – they travel to Iowa City to take on Iowa, currently ranked #13 in the FBS.  If you think that the Hawkeyes couldn’t take the Bison any more seriously than they already are, consider this: in the five years that NDSU has won their titles, they have gone 4-0 against FBS teams, and only one of those wins was by single digits (37-24 against Minnesota in 2011, 22-7 against Colorado State in 2012, 24-21 against Kansas State in 2013, 34-14 against Iowa State in 2014).  In addition to that, they have a win over Kansas in 2010, so NDSU is currently on a five-game winning streak against FBS teams. Overlook the Bison at your own peril.

Congratulations to In Accord, who wins week two with 273 points!  Coming in second this week was Pachyderm, who had 271 points.  Third was a tie between bamaken and maestro, who each scored 270 points.

Standings after two weeks:

1st	In Accord	498
2nd	Shame! Shame!	489
3rd	TheColombian	487
T-4th	Pachyderm	486
T-4th	Jeff4Bama	486
T-4th	AllySun	486
7th	notlastagain	485
8th	bamaken	483
9th	AUBrian	482
T-10th	Crimson Gator	481
T-10th	maestro	481

Week three promises to be very interesting, with several intriguing intra-conference matchups and a couple of big early division games between ranked opponents that will go a long way to determine the winner of the division.  Pick wisely and well!  The first game this week is Houston at Cincinnati (a future Big XII conference game, perhaps?), Thursday, September 15 @ 7:30 ET, so make sure to get your picks in by then!

We’ve only had one week of a full slate of games, and it seems like there’s already plenty to talk about.  To wit:

With #15 Houston’s 33-23 win over #3 Oklahoma, and Wisconsin’s 16-14 upset of #5 LSU, it marks the first time since 1972 that two AP preseason top-5 teams were beaten in their first game of the season (#1 Nebraska lost to UCLA 20-17; #4 Arkansas lost to USC, 31-10).  We almost had two other top-5 teams go down before Clemson held on to beat Auburn and Florida State rallied to beat Ole Miss.  In addition, #10 Notre Dame was beaten in overtime by an unranked Texas, meaning two top-10 teams lost to unranked opponents.  It doesn’t give one a lot of faith in those preseason polls , does it?

With a 24-7 win over Massachusetts, Florida won their first game for the 27^th straight year, the longest current streak in the country.  The last time the Gators lost an opening game was a 24-19 loss to Ole Miss in 1989. However, two other such long winning streaks were snapped.  USC, which hadn’t lost a season opener on the field since 1997 (14-7 to Florida State; the Trojans vacated a 63-17 win over Hawaii in 2005), lost to Alabama 52-6. Missouri lost 26-11 to West Virginia, breaking a 14-game streak (the Tigers lost in former coach Gary Pinkel’s first game in 2001 to Bowling Green, 20-13).

The SEC is often recognized as the best of the Power 5 conferences. However, its reputation was somewhat tarnished in the first week.  The conference had seven teams lose their first game; that’s the most SEC teams ever to lose their first game.  The previous record was six, last set in 1995. SEC teams had non-conference losses to ACC, Big Ten, Big XII, Conference USA, and Sun Belt teams (at least they went 2-0 against the Pac-12). In addition, there were close wins against Conference USA and Sun Belt teams. The “SEC” chants aren’t quite as loud right now as they’ve been in years past.  However, they do have one bright spot: they were the only conference to post three wins against ranked opponents this week.  In addition to Alabama’s win over then-#20 USC, Texas A&M beat then-#16 UCLA, and Georgia beat then-#22 North Carolina.

I’ve mentioned plenty of times in this space before about how service academy football has a special place in my heart, so I feel obligated to point out this little tidbit: each of the major service academy teams won their opening game this year (Army 28-13 over Temple; Navy 52-16 over Fordham; Air Force 37-21 over Abilene Christian). That makes each team 1-0 for only the second time since the turn of the millennium (2013 was the only other time).

Other interesting notes: Washington State lost to an FCS team in its opener for the second straight year, 45-42 to Eastern Washington. The Cougars still managed to finish 9-4 with a bowl win last year, so perhaps all is not lost…other FCS winners over FBS teams included Northern Iowa (25-20 over Iowa State) and Richmond (37-20 over Virginia).

Congratulations to TheColombian, who takes week one in a tie-breaker victory over In Accord!  Each finished with 225 points. Shame! Shame! and notlastagain tied for third with 220 points.

After the sheer number of great matchups and exciting games that were on the docket in the opener, it might be a little tougher to come by interesting games this week.  But, hey, it’s still college football!  There are 23 games on our schedule this week, so a lot of points are at stake.  The first game this week is Louisville at Syracuse (“in a classic ACC matchup”, he said, coughing), Friday, September 9 @ 8 PM ET, so make sure to get your picks in by then!

The season is complete, and now it’s time for the awards!  First off, congratulations to the overall winner of the 2015 e-Systems College Football Pool:

AUBrian

 AUBrian finished the season with 2,318 points in the “drop two lowest weeks” format.  In second place was Jeff4Bama, who scored 2,312 points, and AllySun was third, with 2,307 points.  Congratulations to each of the top three for their awesome performances!  Each will receive a special prize for their accomplishment.

AUBrian pulled off the win with consistent high scoring, especially in the second half of the season, where he only finished out of the top five once (week 14’s abbreviated schedule).  By doing this, he also won the second half championship with 1,080 points.  The first half champion was AllySun, with 1,409 points.  Congratulations!

AUBrian, AllySun, and Jeff4Bama finished as the top 3 in the “all weeks” category, with 2,460, 2,452, and 2,445 points respectively.  Congratulations!

The player who picked the most games correctly (217 out of 265 –81.2% correct) was Mrshamie2.  AUBrian was second with 214 games, and Crimson Gator, Eric G, and Jeff4Bama tied for third with 213 games. Great job to each of these accurate pickers!

There were two multiple-week winners this year: rocky tide (weeks 6 and 7), and pachyderm (weeks 11 and 14).  Good job!  Other weekly winners were JagAL (1), Jeff4Bama (2), Corn (3), Maestro (4), AllySun (5),  Jhutto (8), bamaken (9), verntroyer (10),  BrittaniaTex (12), and Mrshamie2 (13).  Congratulations to all of the weekly winners!

The tie-breaker award, which goes to the player who did the best overall in picking tie-breaker amounts over the season, goes to BrittaniaTex, who was only off by 149 points total over all 14 weeks!  In second was bamaken (174) and bevo (189) was third.  Good job!

The “against the grain” award goes to the picker who picked winners in games most pickers missed.  This year, the award goes to  verntroyer for picking five such games correctly! BrittaniaTex, Crimson White, and JustGuess each had three such picks.  Nicely done!

No one had a perfect week this year, but there were 21 “almost perfect” (1-miss) weeks, including 10 the last week. AllySun, AUBrian, AUsomeTiger, bamaken, JagAL, and Jeff4Bama had multiple 1-miss weeks!

How did we all do?

Picks: 5,110 / 6,463 (79.065%)
Points: 57,849 / 67,858 (85.250%)
Best week as a group, by picks: week 2 (538/616 – 87.338%)
Best week as a group, by points: week 1 (8,068 / 8,700 – 92.736%)
Six weeks with 80+% of picks correct
Four weeks with 90+% of possible points gained

Everyone will receive a prize for participating this year! If you aren’t sure that we have your current mailing address for shipping, please respond to my e-mail that was sent today and we will update our records.

On behalf of all of us at e-Systems, thank you again for participating in our 12^th annual College Football Pool. We love college football season, as I’m sure that you all do, and we hope that this pool adds even more enjoyment to your season!  I hope that all of you will join us in 2016, when we’ll do it all again! In the meantime, we hope you will think of e-Systems for all your custom application and system needs.  We’re just as much fun to work with!

It’s the second year of the College Football Playoff, and the entrants are set.  This year didn’t provide nearly as much drama regarding the participants as last year, although one could certainly quibble about the seeding if one wanted.  Not counting the national championship game, there are forty – count ‘em, forty – bowls this year!  Everyone’s interested in the semi-finals in Dallas and Miami, of course, but what other games should you watch?  It might depend on your mood.  Let me help you out!

If you want a team that’s excited to go bowling, watch: the Cure Bowl on December 19.  Georgia State will be making its first ever appearance in a bowl game, as the Panthers take on San Jose State in Orlando.

If you want to see a rivalry renewed, watch: the Las Vegas Bowl on December 19.  BYU and Utah have played the “Holy War” 89 times, but haven’t played in the regular season in the last two years, and have never played each other outside the state of Utah.

If you want to watch a team play a de facto home game, watch: the New Mexico Bowl on December 19 (Arizona vs. New Mexico in the Lobos’ own University Stadium in Albuquerque), or the Military Bowl on December 28 (Pitt vs. Navy in Annapolis at Navy-Marine Corps Memorial Stadium).  Arizona State won’t be playing on its home field in the Cactus Bowl against West Virginia on January 2, but it’ll be all of eleven miles away at Chase Field in Phoenix.

If you want a good early game Group of Five matchup, watch: the Boca Raton Bowl on December 22.  Toledo and Temple were both ranked for much of the season, and the Owls are 24^th in the last CFP standings.  Temple will be going for its 11^th win, something it has never done in a season; Toledo will be attempting to win 10 games in a year for the first time since 2001.

If you want a wide variety in offensive styles, watch: the GoDaddy Bowl on December 23, or the Armed Forces Bowl on December 29.  In the GoDaddy Bowl, the leading rushing offense in the nation (Georgia Southern) takes on the third-leading passing offense (Bowling Green).  As for the Armed Forces Bowl, California is fifth in the nation in passing offense, at 368.8 yards per game; Air Force is third in rushing offense, at 321.8 yards per game.

If you want beautiful weather, watch: either game on December 24.  The Bahamas Bowl (Middle Tennessee vs. Western Michigan) or the Hawai’I Bowl (San Diego State vs. Cincinnati)…how can you go wrong?

If you want something that doesn’t make sense on the surface, watch: the Pinstripe Bowl on December 26.  Indiana and Duke, two basketball schools, play football in a baseball stadium.  No word yet on whether a soccer match will follow.

If you want to watch the last game of an all-time coaching great, watch: the Independence Bowl on December 26.  Frank Beamer and Virginia Tech faces Tulsa in his final game as head coach of the Hokies. With 278 career wins, he’s 15^th all-time in overall wins across NCAA divisions, and if he wins this game, he’ll tie Mack Brown for 9^th overall in FBS wins with 238.

If you want to watch teams from the same conference play each other, watch: the Arizona Bowl on December 29.  Nevada and Colorado State are both members of the Mountain West.  The teams did not play each other during the regular season.

If your favorite TV channel is the Big Ten Network, watch: most any game on January 1. Four of the five games feature teams from the Big Ten (Outback – Northwestern, Citrus – Michigan, Fiesta – Ohio State, and Rose – Iowa).

If you want to see the best blue-blood matchup, watch: the Fiesta Bowl on January 1. Notre Dame is second all-time in victories, with 892; Ohio State is fifth, with 874.

Congratulations to pachyderm, who wins week 14 with 17 points in a tiebreaker over JagAL!  One point behind were bamaken, Jeff4Bama, and BrittaniaTex, with 16 points.

Stay tuned for the season wrap-up and the announcement of the awards!

As a whole, I generally try to make this space a positive one.  I try to talk about teams that win games instead of teams that lose, because for the most part I don’t know what loyalties we have within our ranks.  I wouldn’t think it’s much fun to read negative items about your team here, so I generally try to keep it to a minimum.  However, I have to make an exception this week because of the incredible nature of this statistic (and because I feel like it’s a fairly low chance of knocking someone’s team).  You might remember that earlier this year I said that Boston College’s defense would be able to keep them in games this year.  It certainly did that; in fact, unless a team in a championship game this weekend has a tremendous defensive performance, the Eagles will end this year with the #1 total defense (in terms of yards allowed per game) in the country.  However, BC finished the year 3-9 and 0-8 in the ACC after a 20-17 loss to Syracuse.  It will be only the second time since 1993 that a team with the #1 total defense will not go to a bowl game (NC State finished 5-6 in 2004).  In fact, only once since 2005 has a team with the #1 total defense lost more than three games (2012 BYU – 8-5).  In that span, the teams with the #1 total defense have won a national championship (2011 Alabama), played for another (2007 Ohio State), and won two other BCS games (2008 USC and 2010 TCU).

How would you like to average better than two touchdowns per game for an entire season?  That’s what it’s like to be Kenneth Dixon or Jeremy McNichols.  Dixon, who plays for Louisiana Tech, has 17 touchdowns in ten games this year, highlighted by a six-touchdown performance against North Texas on November 7^th.  He’s averaging 13.2 points per game.  McNichols, a Boise State running back, has 18 touchdowns in eleven games, and has scored in every game he’s played in this year.  As a result, he’s averaging 12.5 points per game.  Some Alabama fans might ask about Derrick Henry – he’s third in the country at 11 points per game.  Other interesting facts from a season’s worth of data:

• Tennessee has the national leader in kickoff returns and punt returns, but they’re different players!  Evan Berry, at 38.3 yards per return, leads in kickoff returns, and Cameron Sutton, at 18.7 yards per return, leads in punt returns.
• Stanford’s Christian McCaffrey had the two games with the most all-purpose yards this year – 389 against California, and 369 against UCLA. He also averaged over 50 all-purpose yards per game more than the #2 player in the country (San Jose State’s Tyler Ervin).
• Two different Cincinnati quarterbacks have two of the top three passing yard totals in a single game; Hayden Moore had 557 against Memphis, and Gunner Kiel had 523 against Houston.
• Kent State “allowed” -33 yards to Delaware State (-38 rushing, 5 passing) in week 2.  Delaware State still managed to score 13 points due to two fumble recoveries for touchdowns, but the -33 yards is the only game this year in which a defense allowed negative yards.

In small school news, the lower division playoffs are off and running, and North Dakota State and William & Mary have revenge on their minds!  It’s a funny thing to say about a team that has won the last four national titles in its division, but the North Dakota State Bison are looking to avenge a loss from earlier in the year.  They face Montana, who beat them 38-35 on a touchdown on the last play of the game in the first game for both teams this year.  That game was in Missoula, Montana; this one will be in Fargo, North Dakota.  That might prove to be the difference.  Meanwhile, the William & Mary Tribe looks to gain redemption against Richmond.  The Spiders defeated W&M 20-9 in both teams’ last regular season game on November 21.  Because Richmond earned a first-round bye, they will play William & Mary twice in a row.

Congratulations to Mrshamie2, who wins week 13 with 168 points!  Crimson Gator took second place with 164 points, and AUBrian was third with 162 points.

Standings after thirteen weeks (dropping two lowest weekly totals):

1st	AUBrian	2172
2nd	Jeff4Bama	2164
3rd	AllySun	2163
4th	JagRag	2144
5th	Ralphie	2138
6th	pachyderm	2135
7th	Maestro	2124
T-8th	bamaken	2118
T-8th	JagAL	2118
10th	Mrshamie2	2113

We are down to the final week of regular season football, folks.  Six games are on the docket, including five conference championship games.  The first games are Saturday, December 5 @ Noon ET, so make sure to get your picks in by then!

With the events of the past weekend, the number of undefeated teams has dropped to two: Clemson and Iowa.  The Tigers are 11-0 for only the second time in school history; the Hawkeyes have never been 11-0 before.  Clemson has a top-20 scoring offense and defense; Iowa rides offensive balance (208 yards rushing, 210 passing per game) and a top-20 defense of their own.  Both teams own wins over two currently ranked teams.  Both have already punched their tickets for their conference’s championship game, where they will most likely face a one-loss top-10 team for the right to make the national semifinals.  Suffice to say, it’s been a special season in Clemson, South Carolina and Iowa City, Iowa.

There is no week in sports like this week.  Rivalries exist in most every sport; indeed, they are as old as sport itself.  But I know of no other sport that has so many rivalry matchups scheduled at one time.  Games like Bedlam, The Civil War, and Clean, Old-Fashioned Hate have histories over a century old.  Trophies like Paul Bunyan’s Axe, the Old Oaken Bucket, and the Apple Cup can salvage a bad season when they’re won.  It’s one of my absolute favorite sports days of the year.

Those who have read this blurb know that I have a soft spot for service academy football.  This year is truly a special one for two of the schools.  Navy has lost only to Notre Dame and can lock up a spot in the American Athletic Conference championship with a win over Houston this week.  If that happens, the Midshipmen would find themselves in the unique situation of playing a regular season game after the championship game, since their traditional season-ender against Army is December 12.  Air Force is the champion of the Mountain Division of the Mountain West, and will play San Diego State for the conference title.  That game will be played on the Air Force Academy campus.

In small-school news, the FCS playoff brackets are out, and a local team finds themselves as the number one seed!  Jacksonville State, whose only loss this year was to Auburn in overtime, is the overall top seed in the tournament for the first time.  Jax State has FCS top-5 rankings in total offense and total defense, and no team has come within twenty points of them since October began.  The Gamecocks will be going for their second overall national championship – they won the Division II title in 1992.  They made the Division II national title game three other times, but have never advanced beyond the quarterfinals in the FCS.  Could this be the year they add another championship?

Congratulations to BritanniaTex, who wins week 12 with 163 points!  Tied for second were AllySun and AUBrian, each with 162 points.

Standings after 12 weeks (dropping two lowest weekly scores):

1st	AllySun	2019
2nd	Jeff4Bama	2011
3rd	AUBrian	2010
4th	JagRag	2004
5th	Ralphie	1996
T-6th	pachyderm	1979
T-6th	Crimson White	1979
8th	Jhutto	1974
9th	JagAL	1972
10th	Maestro	1971

As I mentioned before, this is rivalry week!  Keep in mind that several games will be played on Friday this week, so make sure to remember to pick.  The first games are Friday, November 27 @ Noon ET, so make sure to get your picks in by then!

Herbert Hoover had made a promise that he couldn’t keep.

Before he became the 31^st president of the United States, and the politician who famously promised “a chicken in every pot” just before the Great Depression hit in full force, Hoover was in a somewhat lesser position – that of student manager of the Stanford football team.  And so, in 1892, he was in charge of many things, including publicity for the games, taking tickets, and ensuring equipment was ready to go.  Someone had come up with the idea to have Stanford’s team play a team from the University of California, and Hoover got down to work.  By the day of March 19, 1892, the day of the game (yes, spring football wasn’t just about practice back then) everything looked ready to go.  Hoover had found a place to play the game, in San Francisco’s Haight Street Grounds.  He had publicized the game such that afterwards $30,000 worth of tickets had been purchased – an astronomical amount for a game in those days.  Hoover’s hard work was paying off – this was truly going to be a big game.  There was just one little detail that Herbert Hoover had overlooked.

He had forgotten to bring a football.

Frantically, he and the California student manager – who for some reason didn’t have a football either, but who is spared similar ignominy because he didn’t become President later – scoured the city for a ball to use.  However, recall that this was the 19^th century; goods weren’t as easy to come by as today, especially something as frivolous as sporting equipment.  (It’s a bit ironic given that this area is now the home of tech giants that let you purchase anything you want with the tap of a finger, isn’t it?)  Finally, they found a general store that had a ball.  However, this wasn’t a football as you or I might recognize one.  It was more of an inflated bladder.  But it was close enough to a football for their needs, and so Hoover raced back to the field, having delayed the start of the game by an hour or so.  Stanford won, 14-10, and the “Big Game” was born.  The teams play for the 118^th time this weekend at Stanford.

Rivalry games are one of my absolute favorite parts of football, and indeed all of sports.  And rivalries give us some of the most interesting tidbits and factoids.  For example:

• Toledo (nickname: the Rockets) has an actual U.S. Army missile rocket installed outside of its stadium, the Glass Bowl.  It is aimed such that if it took off, it would hit the 50-yard line of their archrival Bowling Green’s Doyt Perry Stadium.  (The teams played last night – Toledo won 44-28).
• The winner of The Rivalry (the game between Lafayette and Lehigh) doesn’t get a trophy; instead, they keep the game ball.  Each school has a display of said footballs, and one can see the development of the design of the ball through the years. The teams play for the 151^st time Saturday.
• Harvard-Yale has the tradition of The Little Red Flag, a Harvard pennant that has been waved since 1884 by a person deemed “Harvard’s most loyal fan” after each Harvard score during “The Game” with Yale – and only during that game. Harvard and Yale play for the 132^nd time Saturday.

These are just a few of the little things that make college football cherished by so many.

Congratulations to pachyderm, who takes week 11 with 208 points! Jeff4Bama was second with 207 points, and AUBrian and bamaken tied for third with 203 points each.

Standings after 11 weeks (dropping two lowest weekly totals):

1st	AllySun	1857
2nd	Jeff4Bama	1851
T-3rd	AUBrian	1848
T-3rd	JagRag	1848
5th	Ralphie	1846
T-6th	JagAL	1826
T-6th	Crimson White	1826
8th	pachyderm	1822
9th	bevo	1820
10th	Maestro	1818

This weekend features no less than six games between top-25 teams!  It will be a tough week for sure, and with so tight a race at the top, every point matters, so pick wisely and well!  The first games are Saturday, November 21 @ Noon ET, so make sure to get your picks in by then!